John Tellegen, a longtime writer for Power Rangers, agreed to do an e-mail interview with us, since timing and whatnot wouldn't allow him to actually have a phone chat on the show. Tellegen started out on the show as a writer's assistant with Ninja Storm, started writing episodes with the widely-enjoyed "Shane's Karma" two-parter and the rest from there was history. Tellegen stayed with the show for seven seasons. Enjoy!

How did you first end up writing for Power Rangers?

I wrote a feature film that Doug Sloan read. From there he hired me as the writer's assistant for Ninja Storm. I pitched the story for "Shane's Karma" and the rest is history. Doug is still a good friend of mine, and a great guy. He launched my career.

As someone with one of the longest tenures on the writing staff, what appealed to you about writing it?

As any writer will tell you, your first paid writing gig is the hardest to land. I was very excited for the opportunity. I think the best thing about Rangers is the fact that almost anything can happen - it's fantasy. A format like Rangers opens all the doors of possibility.

Inversely, what do you think about the show and its writing appeals to others?

I can only guess, but it seems to me that Rangers in some way helped spark the "superhero" craze that we are living in now. For many kids, Power Rangers is their entry point. Beyond that, who knows what makes anything a hit.

Jackie and Greg had mentioned the production staff weren't allowed furniture during the Kalish years, to encourage activity rather than sitting around. Did the writer's room finally get chairs after Bruce left?

Not sure - I never heard that. But I can say that I always had a chair of some sort. Did Bruce ever confirm this? Funny.

What was your favorite episode to write?

Jeez, I wrote close to 50 and helped (as we all did) on countless others. Over the years, the tone changed because of different showrunners and notes from Disney (make it funnier, now it's too funny, make it scarier, now make it more exciting, wait, why isn't it funny anymore?)... Even though it wasn't well received by many on RB, the first draft of Ocean Alert was hilarious and a blast to write. I even stuck a review on my refrigerator that referred to me as "Craptacular" -- It's become part of my lexicon.

What was your favorite episode you didn't write?

I wrote an episode of RPM that never made it to camera. It was a heartfelt Flynn story. There were a few reasons why it was hijacked - I don't want to get into specifics - but it's unfortunate. You guys would have liked it.

Saban PR would often continue a cast or seasonal premise and adapt the next Sentai as a continuation. If you could have continued a cast or seasonal premise beyond its source footage, which one would you have picked?

Interesting question. When you do a new season every year with new characters etc., you run over some of the same ground - the first episodes are spent meeting the characters, getting them powers, setting up the premise, etc. It's hard though to bridge seasons because the source footage could go from dinosaurs to space - not impossible, but tricky. I think my favorite cast was the Ninja Storm crew - though I liked SPD a lot as well. I thought it would be cool to do a whole season using our favorite actors/characters from the previous seasons. Almost like a dream team season. Never happened.

Were there even discussions about adapting Shinkenger, or was the
writing always on the wall for the entire year?

The writing was on the wall every year! Then we would get the word that we were doing another season. We never knew until the last hour. Always remember that the fate of our favorite shows on any network rests on a spreadsheet on the desk of a businessman or woman in an office we will never see. You just keep working until the axe falls.

Yes, we know this is nearly three months after the fact. Stop mocking me.

In Part II of On Location, we have clips of the panels, costumes and odd moments culled from our more than six hours of footage.

Real life kept Tyler from editing this as fast as he would like. So Shamus "Rider Jetfire" Kelley swooped in kind of like Batman and finished it in time for Tigercon. The Tigercon panel didn't quite go as planned, but it went and you'll hear about that next time. Enjoy!

The crew from 137 keeps going and talks about "And... Action" and the far better "Ancient History." We start getting sleepy towards the end, so we start getting weird.

-Mack is a dismantled sexbot
-"And... Action" as our Rosetta Stone?
-Other things Col. Truman should have had on his mind
-Fun with holograms
-other stuff?
-Disney plans to burn off the rest of RPM before the end of the year, in what is both good news and bad news.

See you at Tigercon. We have some stuff to premiere there. Not too hard to guess what it is, since we've been slacking on it for some time...

So one of our own, Gemma Lascio, was on an episode of MTV's "True Life" yesterday. I'm sure you can find the whole episode with just a bit of YouTube browsing.

In this episode of Rangercast, Chris, Eric, Tom and Tyler chat with Gemma about the experience of doing the episode and what got edited out. (Hint: A lot.)

Also, in a shocking turn of events, Tyler is funny. Be ready, ladies and gentlemen.

Next time: The crew kept recording long into the night and talked about "And... Action," "Ancient History," the newest KRDK and the latest news.

Alternate titles for this episode: OHMYGODHOWMUCHISTHAT, Just A Friend

(And if Chris sounds different, it's because he's with us by phone.)

Blah blah blah, excuses excuses, yeah I know. But between connection issues at home and big things happening in work, school and real life in general. I certainly apologize for the delay and will try not to let it happen like this again.

Tonight, Tyler, Ryland, Tom and Hayden talk about "Not So Simple," "The Dome Dolls" and what's up with Dragon Knight. And yes, we know "And....Action" happened. It just happened after we recorded this. See above. That, and does it really count as an episode anyway? There's a question for the panel!

Also, Kamen Rider Decade ended, in the loosest possible sense of the word, as Double began. Look for Tyler and Gemma somewhere in MTV's "True Life: I'm a Fanboy," airing 9/19 at 4 PM (not 1 PM as we thought before recording). Also, Hayden tells us a little about his involvement with the NO H8 Campaign and working with ranger actors and crew members to make a difference.

Finally, a reminder: Tyler and Tom will be at Tigercon on Saturday, 9/26. There will be a Rangercast live panel. You have been warned.

So the Parsec Awards were tonight. About ten minutes before I went to write this, they read the Speculative Fiction News winner, which was not us (though congrats to (Cool) Shite on the Tube). But you know what, I was downright flattered that we made it as finalists.

So for you, now, I'm giving you guys what apparently put us there. Enjoy. As for the next actual episode of Rangercast, we ran into some issues on our end. Hang in there. The pain will be over before you know it.