Power Rangers Dino Charge Season Poll
 

End of the season! Time for a poll on how you felt the season was overall. I'll include some information that may help determine your vote!

Story
Sledge, an evil bounty hunter, is searching for the Energems, little crystals that hold untold powers. He's tracked a being named Keeper to Earth and shoots down his ship. Keeper bonds the Energems to dinosaurs, then blows up Sledge's ship, which (thanks to his asteroid collection), causes the extinction of the dinosaurs and most of the Earth.

Fast forward 65 million years later...

The show begins following the stories of two of our future Rangers - Tyler and Shelby. Our Red Ranger, Tyler, is following the footsteps of his missing father in the journal that he found and it has taken him to Amber Beach. After visiting the museum he heads to a local cave and finds the Red Energem while avoiding a monster looking for it.

Shelby, a waitress at the Dino Bite Cafe, is obsessed with dinosaurs and wants badly to go on a fossil dig. She sneaks aboard the truck and ends up coming face to face with the Ice Age monster. Tyler appears to help, and the two end up bonding to the Red and Pink Energems, becoming Power Rangers. With the help of the T-Rex Zord, they defeat Ice Age and decide to continue their adventure looking for Tyler's dad.

We then meet Riley, a rancher who loves to practice sword fighting. He discovers the Green Energem while protecting his dog from Fury. He's drawn to dinosaurs from the vision he has while grabbing the Energem, and sets off to Amber Beach. His moped breaks down and by chance is picked up by Tyler and Shelby, who decide to travel to the Amber Beach Dinosaur Museum.

By chance they end up in the secret base of Ms. Kendall Morgan and Keeper, who have been collecting the Energems. We meet Koda - a caveman who was frozen in ice after saving his younger brother from a sabertooth tigre but survived thanks to the Blue Energem, and Chase, a New Zealand native who was given the Black Energem after he saved a fortune teller's cat.

The team discovers that not only is Fury still alive, but so is Sledge, and he is back with a vengeance to get the Energems.

They begin searching for the other Energems. They discover the Anklyo Zord, which Kendall informs them could only happen if the Aqua Energem had bonded to someone (as a zord only awakes when it's Energem has bonded). Before they can continue their search, the Gold Energem is revealed as part of the treasure of Zandar.

Fury ends up having someone inside of him and the key to getting him or her out is the Gold Energem. Tyler is convinced it's his father but fate reveals it to be the legendary knight of Zandar, Ivan, who then becomes the Gold Dino Charge Ranger. Soon after, Prince Phillip, the current ruler of Zandar, wishes to also become a Power Ranger. His team manages to unearth the Graphite Energem, but it won't bond to him no matter what good deeds he does. After informing the Rangers of the Energem and returning it to Kendall and Keeper, he saves Chase's sister from certain death and the Energom bonds to him, turning him in to the Graphite Ranger. He joins the team (but heads back to Zandar with a promise to help whenever needed) and they continue their search for the Energems and are immediately alerted to New Zealand, where Sledge's ships have been seen.

They discover Albert, a local man who tells tall tales in hunting for Big foots and other legendary monsters. As fate would have it, he saved a young child and the Purple Energem bonded to him. However, he chooses not to remain a Power Ranger, and gives up the Energem. The Plesio Zord though is awakened and now that the Energem isn't bonded to anyone, is sick. The Rangers need to bond it to someone or at least get the Plesio Zord closer to the Purple Energem to keep it alive.

Sledge and a new villain, Snide, manage to steal the Purple Energem from the Rangers but not before they can save the Plesio Zord. In a plan to then get on Sledge's ship to get back the Purple Energem, the Red Energem is stolen by Sledge to power a new weapon to destroy the Earth. Keeper is also kidnapped. Kendall sneaks aboard Sledge's ship to get back the Energems and manages to get the Purple Energem. After saving Keeper, the Purple Energem bonds to her, making her the Purple Ranger.

Tyler and Shelby get on board and Tyler stays behind to get back the Red Energem and succeeds in doing so. He then trashes the ship which crashes, leading our heroes to believe Sledge and his crew are destroyed. The group disbands (except Koda and Ivan) to go live their lives while Kendall, Ivan, and Koda look for the Aqua and Silver Energems.

The crashed ship of Sledge is shown with a mysterious monster looking out of the same cage that Snide was locked in to.

-------------------------------

Differences from Kyoryuger...
- The team comes together and becomes a team rather easily in Power Rangers, while in Kyoryuger the team is separate but together, however they keep their identities from each other. It is up to Daigo, the Red Kyoryuger, to bring the team together as a real team over the course of the first 8 episodes.

- In Power Ragners, Ivan is a knight who served the Kingdom of Zandar. In Kyoryuger, Uchi is a samurai who served his lord that looks identical to Daigo, and is absorbed by Dogold after killing his master.

- In Kyoryuger, the monsters are all based on forms of emotions (happiness, sadness, anger, etc.) with their leader being Chaos, who hopes to revive the legendary Deboss, the ultimate villain. In Power Rangers, Sledge is simply searching for the Energems and the generals are simply his main henchmen. The monsters of the day are captured monsters from Sledge who fight for their freedom by destroying the Power Rangers.

- In Power Rangers, only Tyler seems to have a bond to the T-Rex Zord, while the other Rangers rarely, or not at all, speak of their zords with care or concern. In Kyoryuger the team is much more caring of their zords and treat them as if they're living dinosaurs and not just weapons of war.

- Kyoryuger was all about music and the "song of the Earth". Dino Charge has no musical themes tied in to the show.

Fun Facts
- Power Rangers Dino Charge features more "original footage" than any Neo Saban series thus far. Only Power Rangers RPM in the last 10 years or so features more original footage.

- Sledge and Keeper are original creations, used in place of Chaos and Torin (the Kyoryuger counterparts). They receive mixed reviews from fans (Keeper especially).

- Chip Lynn, executive producer, is more proud of Dino Charge/Dino Supercharge than any other series he's worked on. Says there are some episodes coming up that will simply leave us floored. His belief is that this series will become a fan favorite by the time it finishes airing.

- Koda, played by Yoshi Sudarso, is a Power Rangers/Super Sentai enthusiast. He was also a suit actor for Power Rangers Megaforce (Robo Knight) in many of the local (California) live appearances of Megaforce.

I felt Super Megaforce was a failure and this definitely made up for it. This was a great season and I hope Dino Super Charge is better.

The whole thing with the emerges was just so inconsistent with me. Started to bother me, like I know power rangers isn't all for mind blowing stuff, but consistency.

The show's fun had started to die out by the end. Hopefully DSC will change this but I doubt it.

Overall this series was pretty good, but still it's kinda average.

I gave Dino Charge a 4 only because there wasn't a 3.5 and I didn't, personally, think it was a 3. I thought it was a pretty good season; definitely better than any Samurai or Megaforce season we got, but it still had some problems in it. I wouldn't put Dino Charge in my top 5 (right now, I still need to see Super Charge), but if this is what we've got for the first half, I'm sure the second would be good if not better as well.

I do have some problems with this season like Keeper barely doing anything, Prince Phillip being credited as a major support and barely doing anything, how the Rangers never checked to see if Sledge's ship was actually empty, and a few more, but overall, it was a season I enjoyed.

Now I feel like Power Rangers is back to it's old ways/feel.

I gave it a 3. Please allow me to explain why.

The show started out brilliantly. The powers had an origin (somewhat), the mentor and series villain were given a brief backstory (more than we got in the previous years), and the Rangers were all given backstories and did not feel 2D at any point (except for Riley).

But after the first maybe 4 or 5 episodes, the series became incredibly flat.

Riley is a genius! Who knew? Not the audience - at least not until an episode released that showcased he was a genius. But where was that in his introduction episode? They give us him practicing sword play (so we can relate to the Sentai footage of Kyoryu Green being an excellent swordsman), but they forgot to tell us he's also a genius with logic. Miss.

Shelby and Kendall. What started as a "we don't like each other" bit in episode 2 just ... kind of disappeared.

T-Rex Zord is shown to be an actual living, thinking being (episode 1, 2, and 3). We never get follow up from that point on.

The show is barely a step ahead of Megaforce with "power ups" and the such. The "Dino Drive" bit felt incredibly forced. "Here's a random power up that actually won't do anything other than change your suit because we can't match up Megazord footage that would indicate any level of power increase thus making the entire thing a moot point except for new suit = new toys". And then to see Gold, Graphite, and Purple (PURPLE WHO JUST JOINED THE TEAM) have it really bothered me.

Why do Fury and Wrench work with Sledge? What are they indebted for? What keeps them so loyal when everyone else on the ship is wanting to escape?

What is Keeper's actual backstory? Where did he come from? What exactly are the Energems and how did they get their power? What about Sledge - he said he's working for someone. Who? Will we ever know?

Perhaps Dino Supercharge will answer those questions but the "oh thank God this isn't Super Megaforce" high wore off and Dino Charge has some glaring flaws. It's a GOOD season - it's just still not at the level of quality story-telling (or ADR work) that we've come to want (because let's face it we don't expect much).

The show needs to:

- Realize action is action and does not need a dozen one-liners. What made kids go crazy with MMPR was that they SHUT UP when they fought and you got cool "HIYAS" and "KIYAS" that everyone then wanted to emulate. Please change whomever is doing the ADR to stop adding all these one liners. PLEASE.

- No more "surprise!" moments for characters to explain Sentai footage. I don't want to find out later that Tyler is also an accomplished dancer who has been taking dance classes in secret so it can match the damn Carnival mode footage. Or that Prince Phillip has a random secret attack that he can use his head with ... again to match the footage. No more of that.

- Please use the Dino Charge theme song during the show. It's good, it's catchy, but the last 5 episodes elected not to use it during Megazord battles. That's like a Power Rangers staple, and now that you don't have an annoying cookie-cutter theme song (like in Samurai/Megaforce), fans want to hear it! it sounds great! Let's hear it!

Picky? Maybe. But I feel I have to be to be heard over what feels like a vocal majority screaming that this is the greatest season of all time.

This especially for Brennan/Tyler. I get that Tyler sees things as an adventure, but sometimes I think his excitement and his "Awesome" and "Cool" is over the top or there's just too much of it. Plus, his dad storyline was basically the only thing that defined him this whole season so we really haven't learned a new thing about him.

That's almost as annoying to me as the Chase and New Zealand thing, but they have to put that in there.

Why they can't do more to develop the characters in general is beyond me. Maybe they have too much to really get through during the season. Overall, I felt like the finale was more of a midseason and this whole season was just an elongated introduction into season 2 where things will really get going. (But 20(/22) episodes might've been too long of a wait for some action.)

pretty good season, IMO. despite faults and the naming sense

Still want Torin in though.

There are still a couple of episodes that I need to see, but I've really enjoyed Dino Charge. It's definitely up there with MMPR season 2, Lightspeed Rescue, and RPM as some of my favorite seasons of Power Rangers. Yeah, there are some things that could use some explaining/backstory, but I think as a whole the season was very enjoyable and definitely something I want to own on-disc so I can rewatch it any time I want to.

Kickback brought up some good points. Worth considering, definitely. But there is always another take, and here is mine:

- The Shelby/Kendall thing has unquestionably cooled. Perhaps they wanted to show them working together so they can realize that their differences don't matter. It's also possible that the whole "class bias" thing can't be stressed upon too heavily. Either way, bring it back so we can get a good "Clash of the Titans" feel from this animosity and then have to fight together to work through it better.

- Tyler feels a little too whiny. Sure, missing father is upsetting, but much of what he does feels like a stretch or a push. Honestly, ones like Shelby give and receive the "Endearing" card more effectively.

- So what you will about Sledge, but I respect the decision as Chaos was just controversy Dino Charge didn't need. Honestly, his relationship feels like Zedd and Rita for a variety of different points: A) Both consist of a singular, primary coloration with an armored exterior, B) Sledge's "mouth" lights-up like Zedd's visor, C) Sledge's ship has an almost gothic feel in much the same way as Zedd's Chamber of Command, D) Both are P.R.-exclusives and are "lovey-dovey" with a thematically-dissimilar Sentai Villain.

- Fury is occasionally at odds with Sledge and perhaps their working relationship is just a matter of convenience, or Sledge has a hold on him for some reason. Wrench is an oddity as he is occasionally described in almost "robotic" terms. Either way, it feels as though he could be bullied into obeying Sledge easily.

- Sledge having an "employer"? Interesting! What's he been doing all these years? Then again, what's Sledge been doing all these years?

- Heckyl is the current "make-or-break" of Dino Supercharge! A Darkonda/Deviot for the 21st Century!

- Someone: Zords are unexplained! Lynn: Keep watching! Best possibility at present!

- Why are these monsters outlaws to begin with? I have ideas on what should be the reason, but what is the actual reason? Also, are they ever going to do any episode where they befriend an outlaw out of sympathy for being incarcerated only to have him turn on the Rangers because he isn't that sympathetic in reality?

- Did Zordon ever know of Sledge or the Energems? Will Zordon get mentioned at all? Will Gosei? Did Fury come across Rangers throughout his years on Earth?

- Fans: Keeper is terrible! My Response: Why?

Final Remarks: Does feel rather "by the numbers", but it is still leagues above what has most recently preceded it. The promise for "Super Megaforce" was only that and it failed. Hope Lynn can keep his!

I'd give it a four. It's an extremely promising start and while there are still areas for improvement, for me this can still only be considered as a half-season despite having a "finale" of sorts. It isn't like Megaforce where they crammed one whole Sentsi season into 20 eps.