Monday, August 24, 2009

Power Rangers: Promotional Differences

I thought I'd point out differences between merchandise and the show, through the 17 years of Power Rangers, there has been some inaccuracies. We all know these type of inaccuracies happens because pre-production, the merchandise people receive one idea of how the character looks and it might be changed later.
The first such inaccuracy and most blatant one is the power coin emblems on the Ranger's chest. This was in the early Mighty Morphin Power Ranger toys, coloring books, comic books, bed sheets, costumes, and all other illustrations (even in the Power Ranger Magazine comics but not the regular Comic Book). This was rectified sort of with the movie, where the Rangers wore the emblems on their chests. The Tyrannosaurus emblem was not even like the actual coin from Zyuranger because the coin had a tail. The Ninja Coin emblems also look different in the movie than in the merchandise and the show. It is understandable why the Ninja Coins changed in look because of deadlines and pre-approval, etc. (just to say it shorter), but why the emblems on the Ranger's chest if everyone could had access to Zyuranger footage. Either Saban or Bandai America had decided to put those things on their chests early on.

I do not know if younger fans know this but the Green Ranger toy had a different emblem (when you took off the shield) that the regular Dragonzord coin symbol we know and love. I have personally thought (for the past 16 years) this image looks more like Titanus. On the box, the Green Ranger had the show's Dragonzord coin. The Green Auto-Morphin Ranger came with a sticker using this image above. In the Power Rangers Fan Club package, the show's Dragonzord coin image was used for a tattoo that said Tommy on it. The above symbol was rarely used in any merchandise but I vaguely remember it being used once in another product. Maybe this Titanus-looking symbol was exclusively used for Bandai America. Other differences included the Green Ranger having diamonds on his cuffs and the Pink Ranger's color shade varying from the promotional image above and the actual product and the shade in the show. Additionally, the lack of skirt, which many fans have added skirts to the Pink Rangers that had them missing.
This Titanus-like Green Ranger image continued on to current Adult T-Shirts.

Yet some other shirts are show-accurate, yet the Dragon coin symbol here looks a bit like a Marijuana leaf.

Back when from 1993 to 1995, the costumes had the emblems on the chest. But now that official Red Ranger and Pink Ranger costumes (adult and child sizes) came out two months ago, the emblem is gone. In all other current illustrations of the MMPR Rangers, mainly the Red Ranger has no coin on the chest. The Super Legends toys also have gotten rid of the emblem, semi-accurate, many fans complain that the Green Ranger doesn't have his shield straps, but we get what we can.

Rita Repulsa's action figure infamously was never released because of problems with her chest, but in illustrations, she was colored purple and pink. I remember having a cut-outs package, where you had to cut out the Rangers and Rita Replusa and make 'sets' with them. The purple-version Rita was with it. Part of the reason I believe in the season 2 premiere "The Mutiny," Baboo said that Rita would be 'purple' with envy. Maybe a coincidence or maybe a reference. Recently I found out there was a plushie Rita, Goldar and Putty Patroller. I knew about the Rita squeeze night light (she was purple there too), but it's interesting her dress was not brown like on the show.


When Lightspeed Rescue hit McDonalds in 2000, the Yellow Ranger magically gained a skirt. She didn't have one in the show and for the illustration above and the McDonalds toy, she had a skirt. The MMPR Yellow Ranger never gained a skirt in any of the illustrations or merchandise. Curious.

By the time MMPR ended, many thought these inaccuracies had ended. Well, it didn't. In 2001 for Time Force, there was some illustrations of the Quantum Ranger with a strange two-streamed arrow and he was a darker shade of red. This held true for the costume as well. In fact he had a little yellow thing on his head, this made me believe to have a connection to the Titanium Ranger, which had the Max Solarzord symbol on his helmet. This strange version of the Quantum Ranger was also used for the walkie-talkies.


Around 2006, merchandise with the three male Mighty Morphin Power Rangers came and they had capes. Many suspected this was from the rumored animated series but now it is just believe it is only for merchandise. It has been seen in t-shirts, umbrellas, sunglasses, etc. This picture above is from a Latin American trading card. The newest brand of merchandise to sport the three caped Rangers is an Adult T-Shirt and children shirt below.

1 comment:

ColdFusion said...

Wow. I was aware of most of this, but the capes were a genuine surprise!!! There's so many weird coincidences, too, like how Kibaranger actually HAD a circular chest emblem, and was the only one of the Dairangers that did (along with a few other costume aspects), so adding him into the footage as 'white ranger' made a stupidly large amount of sense. None of us kids suspected frankenfootage