With all the pre-publicity talking of a 'grounded' approach and trailers that clearly promised modern more-bang-for-your-buck CGI, this 2017 movie take on the cheap and dopey 90s kids' TV franchise is - perhaps inevitably - a very mixed bag. It starts off like Green Lantern meets The Breakfast Club, then becomes a very extended origin story that plays like Chronicle meets Tim Story's Fantastic Four, and ends up with an enormous CGI-filled showdown of carnage that is like a collision of Transformers and The Avengers. The writing and tone is frustratingly uneven, as if the production was uncertain whether to embrace its kitsch origins or run with a cool contemporary update: for every sequence that really works well (such as the discovery of their powers and the spaceship) there is a real misfire (e.g. the training montage). The action is often very chaotic on screen, but the movie's real strength is the interplay and performances when all five PC-stereotype Rangers are together. In a seemingly impossible task, Elizabeth Banks does create an effectively-performed villain from TV's ridiculous Rita Repulsa character, although she is given remarkably little screen time. Yes, the quintuple-superhero landing is a joyous moment, and the suits (when they finally manage 'Morphin' time'!) are a massively good-looking upgrade from the spandex onesies, and how they got away with the crude opening joke is a beguiling mystery. When Power Rangers the movie works it is rather enjoyable - a less origin-focused sequel that really pits the team against the enemy throughout the film would be interesting to see.
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