Season 3 Ninja Suits Theory.
Season 3 is definitely my favourite series of PR for a few reasons, such as: plot, pacing, Ninjor, Zords and nostalgia. But while there's so many things I love about that season, one thing always stood out: the damned ninja powers. They were supposed to be this halfway hybrid between civilian and morphed, but on analysis there's pretty much no in-universe reason for them to exist. As for real life, I don't think we ever got a confirmation from anyone who worked on the show, fans have pretty much assumed two leading motives:
1. They Existed To Sell Toys: Okay, this is the most believable reason why Saban would invent another suit for the rangers to wear, as it's another toy to sell. Especially as this is the season that gave us Shark Cycles, Alien Rangers and THAT metallic armour, it's almost impossible not to imagine it was done with toys in mind. Even if the toys did have badass weapons they never got in the show, but I digress... 2: They Existed To Tone Down Violence: Another very likely reason. Season 3 opened with a very much toned down version of Lord Zedd along with a new comic relief villain to cement it, but easily copied hand-to-hand combat was always the most controversial aspect of the show back in the day. Season 3 removing a lot of the punches and kicks in favour of dispatching enemies with "wacky hijinks" could very easily be seen as a move to please the soccer moms. There's another possible motive I've been thinking of, but I've not seen discussed: 3: They Existed to Save Money: So go with me on this. By the time Season 3 rolled around, Saban had burned through most of the Sentai footage, forcing more and more of the show to be American-made. Saban is not known for their (his) generous spending. The previous year, half the cast walked out over disputes about how little they were earning against the insane hours they were working. By changing the pre-morph fights to be stunt guys in ninja suits, Saban cut the workload of the main cast, meaning they'd essentially get paid the same for the less hours they worked. I've no evidence to suggest it was intentional, but the way it was done made the American footage cheaper to produce, as well as minimising any further contract disputes. It's a win win. The only loser is the audience who loved the kickass fight scenes. I'm sure in reality the reason was a combination of the above motives rather than just one, but it's an idea that's only just occurred to me. |
Re: Season 3 Ninja Suits Theory.
Yeah. The storyline and writing of of MMPR season 3 improved over season 2 at the expense of the martial arts action.
A lot of the combat of season 3 is closer to 3 Ninjas than Season 1 Zyuranger footage. In the actual suit footage filmed the Rangers seem almost incompetent at times. Season 1 Kim would have murdered most of the Season 3 MotW with a shot of her Power Bow. An option never considered in fights, the Rangers even forgetting about their blade blasters. |
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They existed because they had them leftover from the movie. Same with the Tengas.
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2, not really toning down as much as making it more cartoony through special effects. Effects heavy violence was somehow okay because it was less realistic to the 90s mom organizations. 3, this is half right, as it saved money on paying the actors to do their stunts and action scenes which had become a bit of an expense at that point. But it was still all original footage, which was expensive to make though it turns out that it's super easy to cheap out on paying people who's faces aren't on screen, especially if they work mainly stunts. Don't forget 4 though. 4 was "it was in the movie" and easy to bring to the show without having to pay Fox for suits/rights. |
Re: Season 3 Ninja Suits Theory.
I thought the in-universe reason was simple, that they couldn't fight Tengas unmorphed.
Granted, they could just morph, but why not play with your cool toys if you can? It was no different than the civilian powers of the Disney years which also would have been useless if the Rangers had just morphed first. |
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I think it was something that was created for the movie and they continued this into the series..
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Also at least in the beginning it was also the fact that it allowed the kids to see the american actors fighting the bad guys too, not just morphed suits. But when the direction started shifting by S3 we got the ninja suits as a kind of compromise. Not quite completely getting rid of the idea of them being able to beat the grunts without morphing, but allowed them to be masked for stunt filming purposes and with ninja powers it lessoned the 'violence' of the fighting. Now a days it feels like they followed the Sentai trend where the rangers morph to even just fight the grunts except for certain times. |
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I'd heard it was something to do with cutting down imitations of violence by children- the ninja suits are a halfway-house morph that allows for grunt fights but reduces ease of imitation, because they're no longer just teenagers but magical superninjas. Hence why we also got no unmorphed fights in Zeo save very rare and brief occasions. Could be nonsense though.
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Maybe it was for the stunt teams' benefit. Those suits looked a lot more mobile than the standard costumes...
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I don't think it had anything to do with violence because they went back to unmorphed fights in Turbo. It was probably just to sell more toys.
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You know, it may have just been more of an intimidation game to the remaining actors too. Saban tossing a "we can cut your screen time down even more" heck, that season was filled with gutting their screen time. Just a shady "keep them in line" move especially after the movie should have given them room to demand more money. |
Re: Season 3 Ninja Suits Theory.
I go with the 'Made to Sell Toys' theory. Hell, Saban has been known to skip seasons of Super Sentai just because the toys didn't sell overseas (Go-Busters & To-Qger, anyone)?
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did they ever explain why the alien rangers coincidentally had the same powers of the main cast?
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you mean aside from the battleborgs looking like pretty much the exact same thing as the shogun zords but thinner? Also, didn't they control shogun and Ninja zord at some point?
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The Alien Rangers weren't seen controlling the Ninja Zords at all. Falconzord doesn't count here since it was already shown to be compatible with the Shogun Megazord which the Aquitians did control. Yeah, the Battle Borgs were thinner Shogunzords that couldn't combine.
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The Battleborgs were a gift to the Alien Rangers from Ninjor, and the Shogunzords were activated by Finster using technology taken from the Falconzord, which was obviously a gift to the Power Rangers from Ninjor. So that explained their similar appearance. |
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as for 4 I don't think that's quite right since the suits were the creation of 20th Century Fox meaning they had owned anything to do with that specific movie including the suits but not the characters that were made for the Power Rangers TV show. Quote:
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I wonder what would happen if the show had multiple minion types like both the American Tengas, and Kakuranger's Dorodoroos.
And one minion type could be fought in civilian mode while the other had to be fought in Ninja Mode. |
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Ninja Storm = a ninja-themed season, so the civilian powers were actually a part of the plot and integrated into the show. DinoThunder = Dino Gems. Genetic-based civilian powers. S.P.D. = The Rangers inherited them from their parents who worked for S.P.D. and Sam was established to be the last one to have them by getting them from his parents. Mystic Force = Magic. An excuse for the Rangers to have civilian powers. Operation Overdrive = Gene Randomizer. As in another version of Mystic Force's and DinoThunder's civilian powers. Jungle Fury = The civilian powers were written into the season's plot like those in Ninja Storm, plus is was a martial-arts based season. So no need for an excuse for them here. R.P.M. = Dillon was a hybrid, so his civilian powers were written into his own storyline. I don't recall other R.P.M. Rangers having any civilian powers, because we've actually had hand-to-hand un-morphed fights in that season. Anyway, I liked the MMPR S3 Ninja Powers. I wish they could have the Rangers use them more so they could slowly ditching the Zyuranger suits. |
Re: Season 3 Ninja Suits Theory.
I think Eddie did away with the civlian powers for RPM. Dillion was a hybrid because it suited the story and probably would have been done that way if there were never any civlian powers.
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Well they already had the MMPR suits for most of season 3. And had the Alien Rangers finish off the season. So I don't think thry were really ready to change suits until Zeo.
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They could have made Tommy Red Ranger. Red takes the lead in a lot of the Kukuranger footage.
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Anybody know why the main Ranger Actors were written out during the storyline? It was odd David Yost came back earlier too.
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I think the op nailed it. Those are three main reasons. They could sell toys. keep the parental advocacy groups happy, and save money on the cast.
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I actually read somewhere that the cast has been filming season 2 and and MMPR:TM back-to-back and also season 3. They needed a break. They were constantly divided between Australia and America in order to get everything done and once S2 and the movie were done, they were busy filming MMPR S3.
For example, in the S2 episode "The Wedding, Part III", the Rangers are all present in the Command Center scene when Billy restores Alpha back to normal and Tommy says a line, but we never actually see JDF delivering the line on screen. I think we only seen Amy Jo doing a reaction to what is being said. |
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I could see where the actors needed a break after that crazy schedule.
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