Rangercast Episode 163: What’s A Forever Red?

We’ve been off the air, so to speak, for reasons beyond our control. No episode discussion this time, but plenty of news.

The panel: Tyler; ex-fandom member, ex-PMC staff, ex-Crayfish Chris Funaro; Shamus; newbies Nicholas Cochran and Sean Brewington

-The invites have gone out to former rangers for Super Megaforce. They’re kind of ugly. A handful of cameos have been confirmed (including Jason David Frank, Selwyn Ward, Danny Slavin, Sean Cw Johnson and Jason Faunt). Others, like Rhett Fisher, were invited then uninvited. Others were invited, then didn’t get calls returned from Saban. Others turned Saben down for reasons ranging from money, to union concerns to time to longstanding issues with producers.

Still others (apparently nearly the entire Disney-era cast) didn’t get invited at all, except for, apparently, Jason Smith, now reportedly a writer for the show. Why the low turnout at this point, what happened and what does this mean for Super Megaforce?

-Some fans have tried to post a Kickstarter page trying to raise money to give to Saban Brands to afford said cameos. Why this won’t work, and some of the backstory behind a similarly ill-advised fanfilm project.

-Amit Bhaumik and producer Jonathan Tzachor, from whence this episode’s title came.

-Bluefin wants more of our money, is importing the Tamashii Nations Kibaranger (White Ranger) Figuarts.

Rangercast Episode 162: Danger! High Voltage

Today’s panel: Tyler, Darrin, Shamus and later on, Gemma

-”Who’s Crying Now,” a distinctly unremarkable episode focusing on a distinctly unremarkable Megaforce red ranger

-The first four braves of Kyoryuger, a distinctly more remarkable Sentai

-This video raised a furor in the fandom for all of five minutes. Paul Schrier and Jason Narvy claimed they were banned from Power Morphicon because of The Pie Incident. They’re not, but helping to pay the repair expenses for it might help, PMC staffers say (they’re 15 percent of the way there, as of this writing).

Additional music used in this episode: “みんな集まれ!キョウリュウジャー” (Minna Atsumare! Kyoryuger) by Hideaki Takatori

Sorry this is late to post. It’s been edited for a while, just didn’t get to posting it.

Rangercast Episode 161: Out of Key

Late? Yep. But in this episode, which we swear was recorded on time, Tyler, Tom and Darrin talk about “Harmony and Dizchord,” the latest… uhm, when we recorded this… episode of Megaforce. Where does it fit in PR’s musical pantheon from Shayla’s song to Kira Ford? Find out.

We’ll get to “Who’s Crying Now?” and how Kyoryuger’s going plus some other happenings in the PR world in another episode this week, which will actually be out this week. Honestly.

Rangercast Episode 160: Unfriendly Fire

Tyler and Darrin pump out a quick episode to talk about “United We Stand,” the new episode of Power Rangers Megaforce.

Also:

-The Legacy Megazord is in the wild. Good luck finding it.

-Out in the wild this summer? Bluefin’s releases of the Tamashii Nations red and green MMPR Figuarts. Links go to photos. They look pretty slick.

Rangercast Episode 159: Masqueranger

We talk the latest episode of Power Rangers Megaforce as of this recording, “Stranger Ranger.” (Since this recording, Nickelodeon did fans a solid and put the next episode, “United We Stand,” up online. It airs Saturday at 1.)

Darrin and Tom hold Tyler to his pre-premiere proclamations about invoking the five-episode rule.

The latest with Bandai’s anniversary toys and where they’re popping up, along with the legacy Megazord, separate from the recently-released chogokin figure. And yes, Tyler is that schmuck who may have raided his local Toys ‘R’ Us for Power Morphers before you got there. He left one, though!

Music used in this episode: ”Unofficial Sentai Akibaranger”-Haruko Momoi feat. Yukio Yamagata

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Rangercast Episode 158: More Testing For Science

Taken at Katsucon 2013

Wish you were here.

In under the wire, before “Stranger Ranger” premieres Saturday. This week…

The panel: Tyler, Darrin and Gemma

-A two-for-one special as we talk “Going Viral” and “He Blasted Me With Science.”

-Jyuden Sentai Kyoryuger premiered last weekend. Koichi Sakamoto is directing, and it shows.

-Katsucon was a pretty great con for tokusatsu this year (Exhibit A: the cover photo here, taken during the huge photoshoot Saturday afternoon.)

-Superhuman Samurai Syber Squad is on DVD, for those of you interested.

Other events mentioned in this episode: Otakon in Baltimore (registration just opened), Lexington Comic-Con in Kentucky, Animazement in Durham, NC.

Also from Katsucon 2013.

Rangercast Episode 157: Day of the Derivative

Your panel tonight: Tyler, Tom C, Chris, Ryland, Darrin

We spend most of this episode talking about the Power Rangers Megaforce premiere, Day of the Dumpst—excuse me, I meant Mega Mission. In Tyler’s opinion, it’s the first re-watchable episode of Power Rangers since 2009.

We talk about the new team of rangers and the plentiful callbacks, from the legend war to whole lines copied and pasted from 1993. What did you think of the premiere? Let us know in the comments, or on our Facebook page.

Also, some of the early 20th anniversary toys, particularly the Power Morpher, are showing up at brick-and-mortar Toys ‘R’ Us stores this week (not online). Have you seen it in the wild?

Rangercast Episode 156: Megaforced?

We’re back!

This week’s panel: Tyler, Tom C, Gemma

The topics du jour:

-Megaforce premiere on 2/2 on Nick (Mea culpa: I said during this part that Saban would likely be stashing the Ranger War footage until we get into the Gokaiger episodes proper. This clip came out the day after we recorded. Consider me mistaken.)

-How about that Samurai finale?

-In Sentai news, Go-busters ends, Kyoryuger set to begin

-Power Morphicon happened during our long siesta. So, too, did the Power Rangers DVDs. Seasons 1-Lost Galaxy are still for sale through Time Life. And, correcting something said during the show, it appears that the MMPR Red figure is still part of the $220 deal. If you can’t afford that, all the episodes through the end of Super Duper Mega Hyper Whosiwhatsit John Jacob Jingleheimer Schmidt Samurai (Isn’t that its name by the finale?) are on Netflix.

-The long-promised import toys from Bandai are slowly coming to American shores. Via such shady names as, uhm, Toys ‘R’ Us? Shinken-Oh and a Chogokin MMPR Megazord lead the charge, with a Power Morpher sighted on Canada’s TRU site.

-Ron Wasserman’s recut PR music. You’ll hear some of “We Need a Hero.” Buy it, and the rest of the tracks, right this way.

We’ll be back at you after Megaforce gets going. How do you think the show will fare or, if you’re hearing this after the show has premiered, how was it? Tell us in the comments. We may read your thoughts next time on the show. If your thoughts are spammy pleas to buy your Coach bags, sorry, we will laugh at you and your comment will neither be posted nor read. But you’re probably a bot, so I don’t have to worry about hurting your feelings.

(Note: Tried to do something about the echoing in this episode I found in editing. We’ll try to address it in recording next time, assuming I find my trusty old mic.)

Rangercast: The back catalog

We’ve gotten more than a few requests for this stuff. You know who you are.

Here’s almost everything we’ve ever recorded, presented as-is. Show notes may or may not be included in a few of these… maybe? Let’s just say every episode is a surprise. It took me forever just to pull titles from the ones that had them.

Some of the early episodes are missing. Some of the early episodes, particularly the first few, sound awful. All the hallmarks of learning as we go, I suppose. Anyway, without further ado, here’s the list after the jump.

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Rangercast Episode 155: Your Backseat Driver

This episode’s panel: Tyler, Ryland, Shamus, Darrin, Tom C and, later on, Gemma

-The DVDs are hitting mailboxes, and it turns out they’re pretty good. Quit yer bellyaching.
-Lost Galaxy to be first PR series out of the gate on Saban’s new Vortexx block on The CW.
-What’s happening in the world of tokusatsu? The panel educates Tyler.
-Power Morphicon is a thing. And it’s happening in mere days.

(This was recorded last week, by the way. A few updates to things we talk about during the show… the DVDs are shipping. Some folks may be getting theirs as early as Monday. And the PMC panel schedule is out in the ether. See you there!)

Also, do you have a real cool podcast? Do you have a promo for it? Email it (please keep ‘em short, like 45 seconds, a minute tops) to rangercast@gmail.com and I may cut it into a future episode.

Programming notes: As I write these notes, I’m uploading 150 some old episodes of Rangercast. You ask, I deliver. So if you need something to keep you company on the long flight/drive to Pasadena… I’m sorry, this batch will have to do.