[StardustWhip]

Finding out about this news a month late... sad, but not very surprising in hindsight. IIRC even Kamen Rider (the much more popular half of Super Hero Time) has been selling less toys than they'd like, given the declining birth rate and how even a lot of the kids they have are leaning more towards technology than traditional toys. I know at least that they were purposely trying to make a Kamen Rider with international appeal when developing Zeztz; Hideaki Yanaka said as much in the LA Comic Con panel.

And going international to make up for low profits domestically isn't really an option for Sentai. Not when they would have to go through Hasbro, or whoever is the current owner of the Power Rangers IP, in several of the biggest territories they could want to sell Sentai in. So with that in mind... it makes sense that Sentai would be going away, at least for now.

Not that that makes it suck any less, losing the series that got me into Japanese tokusatsu with Gokaiger, after I grew up on Power Rangers. And losing the Super Hero Time duo I've always known since Gokaiger.

Quote:

Originally Posted by acdcguy

Hasbro certainly has not helped things. They continuously pivot to MMPR even though Power Rangers has had many popular post-MMPR seasons. The problem with Hasbro is they make crappy toys then consider the brand a failure for not selling.

This seems to be a recurring thing with Hasbro's current leadership. It's a similar story with MLP; the previous CEO had big plans for an interconnected universe linking the original G1 series, the hugely popular G4, and the brand new G5. Then he passed away and all we ended up getting after the movie were mediocre series on Netflix and YouTube, and really crappy toys. Ultimately G5 ended prematurely, and they've gone back to occasional projects with the more popular G4 series.

Essentially the same thing they've done Power Rangers since Brian Goldner's unfortunate passing; ignoring the larger franchise (including the most recent iterations) and just occasionally doing merch or media for the most "iconic" installment.