Recap & First Impression Review: Power Rangers Dino Charge, Episode 1 – "Helping is always the right thing to do."

Recap: Power Rangers Dino Charge, Episode 1 – Powers from the Past

TYPE OF REVIEW : FULL RECAP and FIRST IMPRESSION REVIEW
Full recap, so naturally, plenty of spoilers.

A big ship with some huge cargo is in hot pursuit of a smaller aircraft through space.

The bridge is busy with activity as foot soldiers are scurrying about. Fury tells Wrench to hurry and fix the lasers before Sledge comes in. And that’s the moment Sledge comes in. He takes the lasers’ split tube with 10 million gigabolts running through it and simply attaches them to fix it.

Sledge’s fiance Poisandra also comes onto the bridge as they are hot on the heels of Keeper. Realizing this Keeper is the very one that is keeping her and Sledge from marrying, she takes the initiative to sing and send Do Re Mi blasts right at the small ship.

Keeper’s ship is hit and falls right to Earth. Sledge orders Fury to follow and retrieve the Energems.

Crash landing on Earth, Keeper is unharmed, but hurries to try and find the Energems. Instead, he immediately comes face to face with a T-Rex. It growls at Keeper, but Keeper calmly says he means it no harm. He asks the T-Rex to gather the bravest of his friends for their help.

The T-Rex leaves and Keeper digs through the wreckage to find the case holding the Energems. But Fury has arrived on Earth and finds the wreckage.

Fury approaches and sees what he believes to be a dead Keeper. To make sure, Fury decides to deliver a guaranteed stab through the heart, but before he can, he sees the Energems case. He picks it up and heads back to Sledge’s ship, while Keeper opens his eyes, perfectly fine.

Sledge and Poisandra are strolling through the several levels of cellblocks filled with wanted space criminals caught by him as a bounty hunter. But Poisandra is annoyed by Sledge’s focus on capturing criminals in exchange for asteroids. Sledge says those asteroids will make him the richest bounty hunter in the universe. Then, maybe they can be married.

“What do you mean ‘maybe’? WE ARE GETTING MARRIED!” Poisandra asserts.

They arrive at the bridge to welcome Fury back. But when they open the Energems case, they only see it contains a bomb.

The bomb immediately goes off. In the Chaos (;)), Fury gets stuffed back onto his little pod and gets launched back to Earth. Explosions rock the ship and the sharp jolts cause the huge haul of asteroids they had been tugging along to come loose.

On Earth, Keeper meets T-Rex’s dinosaur friends and asks them for help. He then shows them the Energems before inserting one into each of them for safe keeping.

Suddenly, Keeper hears Fury, shocked that he didn’t die on the exploding ship. Keeper tries to be on guard, but Fury attacks. They battle.

Just before Fury can finish off Keeper for good, they hear a rumbling. It’s Sledge’s asteroids. They are all falling to Earth. Fury decides to run for his life, as do all the dinosaurs, but it appears to be no use.

Keeper looks up into the sky, then closes his eyes as he is engulfed in black smoke from the impacts.

Fast forward 65 million years later. A woman is leading a tour group through an exhibit at the Amber Beach Dinosaur Museum.

Also exploring the exhibit is a red-shirted young man. He stops a Kiwi-accented man who works here at the museum and asks about Sampson Caves where his father did some exploring 10 years ago. The Kiwi says it’s nearby.

The red-shirted fellow takes a selfie with the T-Rex skeleton before leaving.

The Kiwi, meanwhile, tries flirting with some girls passing by before stopping at the museum cafe for a drink.

Seeing him, a young waitress hurries to bring an order to a table. In her hurry, she drops a dinner roll in the soup of a glasses-wearing lady. Shelby is the young waitress’ name and she apologizes before setting the food down to a nearby table of waiting customers.

Only, this table hasn’t even ordered yet. Shelby says it’s okay because she can read their minds. She tells them to enjoy and hurries after the Kiwi whose name is Chase.

Chase calls her “Sherri” before she corrects him and segues into asking if he’s going fossil hunting today. She sees a tablet with the picture of a triceratops on it and is now even more excited to come along since that’s her favorite.

“Let’s just cut to the… Chase and check out a movie.”
“Did that line work on New Zealand girls?”
“No, it doesn’t work on them either.”

They walk out to the truck and Shelby says instead of a movie, why doesn’t she just come along on the dig. No can do, Chase says, “museum policy.”

Shelby turns to a long-haired museum employee, Koda, and says she’s got his favorite Bronto-Burger for him. As long as they let her go with them on the dig.

Koda takes a big bite of the burger.

“So I can go?!”
“Go where?”

A frustrated Shelby takes a seat on one of the crates. Koda effortlessly picks it, and her, up to place on the back of the truck.

The glasses-wearing lady from earlier, Miss Morgan, comes out and places her things on the truck. She already knows what Shelby wants to ask and the answer, like it always has been, is No. “Museum policy.”

Shelby says she knows as much about dinosaurs as any else on Miss Morgan’s crew. Miss Morgan says Chase and Koda are highly trained museum personnel.

Shelby turns to look at Chase and Koda. Chase is fooling around with his skateboard while Koda licks his fingers of Bronto-Burger sauce and burps.

Miss Morgan and her crew leave, but Shelby manages to stow away on the back of the truck.

Meanwhile, the red shirted guy from earlier has arrived at the cave. He goes in and makes his way down rock walls over molten rock and through the dark caves.

He seems to have found a dinosaur tooth, but he suddenly hears a growl. A second later, he sees from who that growl is coming from. He runs.

The guy manages to hide from the hooded figure who runs past. He turns to find he’s stumbled upon a dinosaur fossil. And in the rock wall, he finds some sort of glowing crystal. He takes it.

The dig team has arrived at the site. Shelby practices how to explain herself to Miss Morgan. But the hooded figure arrives and searches through the boxes on the truck.

Shelby sees the hooded thing steal a glowing box. She tries to let Chase and Koda know, but they cannot hear. She decides to follow the hooded figure herself.

Shelby manages to sneak behind the hooded figure and grabs the crate, but the hooded figure shoots at her.

Shelby drops the crate when she is tripped up by the explosions. The hooded figure approaches her, but the red shirted guy swoops in to grab the crate. He hurries over to help Shelby up and introduces himself as Tyler.

The hooded figure, Iceage, removes his hood. They have no idea what it is. But Tyler is ready to defend the box. He pulls stuff out of his backpack to help. First a banana then Eiji’s boxers.

He finally takes out a small shovel which helps block the blasts from Iceage and even sends them back.

But the shovel eventually melts away. Tyler asks if Shelby has any ideas.

She steps forward and tells Iceage that if he continues this, then the “thing” in the crate will also be destroyed. Iceage is sure the precious cargo will survive, but not them. He continues shooting at them and they fall to the ground, including the crate which opens.

The crate’s contents fall out, as does the crystal thing Tyler got from the cave.

Iceage is excited. There are TWO Energems.

Tyler and Shelby reach for the glowing Energems, but Iceage shoots a blast of ice to freeze them.

Both of them, however, each have a finger on the Energems and some kind of power surges through their bodies in the ice to free them.

Iceage can’t believe it. Tyler and Shelby pick up the Energems and a fossilized gun looking thing materializes in their hands. Tyler tries inserting the Energem into a hole in the gun and that breaks the gun thing out of its stone. Shelby does the same.

Tyler starts spinning a wheel on the thing and it shoots a blast that skims right by Shelby and hits Iceage.

“Nice shootin’ Tex!”

Tyler apologizes since he doesn’t know how to use the thing. Both of them start spinning the wheel then shoot, but instead of sending a blast toward Iceage, it sends out colorful bursts of energy.

And Tyler and Shelby morph.

Iceage cannot believe they have become Rangers.

Tyler and Shelby cannot believe it either, but they are confident they can defeat Iceage if they stick together. They charge and fight.

Suddenly, a huge red T-Rex comes stomping by them. Both Tyler and Shelby are forced to demorph as the T-Rex takes Iceage in its mouth and spits him clear across the mountains.

The T-Rex leaves and Tyler and Shelby can’t believe what just happened.

Shelby sees the dig team has already left and asks Tyler for a ride.

They hop into Tyler’s jeep and drive back to town. He shows her his dad’s journal. He disappeared 10 years ago on an expedition and Tyler is determined to find out what happened, no matter how long it takes.

In the journal, Tyler’s father said he was being chased by a lion looking thing. Fury.

Scary. Shelby thanks Tyler for saving her back there, even though he didn’t have to. Tyler says his father told him, “Helping is always the right thing to do.”

Shelby hopes to meet his dad one day.

They drive off. But emerging from the forest is a very alive Fury and he smells Energems.

Episode Thoughts and First Impression Review

Wowowee! This was an amazing episode. An amazing premiere!

And it’s not just because the last four years have been so horrible. This premiere episode looked and felt like it could’ve easily premiered during the Disney Era. And that’s a very good thing!

It was enjoyable, fun, refreshing, original and maybe best of all, it featured a great, talented and charming cast.

I really loved it. It even had some nice, probably unintentional callbacks to previous seasons and other shows! The dinosaurs and the young Rangers immediately remind one of DinoThunder. The fun (and good!) quips and one-liners are very Ninja Storm. Jumping right into the excitement in the opening scenes was reminiscent of RPM‘s amazing premiere. Tyler’s spelunking was very Operation Overdrive. The spaceships may remind someone of In Space or Lost Galaxy, but for me, it actually reminded me more of a big Battlestar Galactica raptor vs. cylon battle. And Tyler’s boxers was a great unintentional (or was it?) homage to Kamen Rider OOO‘s Eiji and his underwear for tomorrow.

This episode by itself was already much more enjoyable and interesting than most, if not all of Samurai or Megaforce’s episodes.

The opening scenes in space were just amazing. Most especially excellent was showing the several levels of cell blocks containing all the wanted criminals Sledge has already captured. Panning up through the levels and then following Sledge and Poisandra through the halls was just great.

Then we got to meet the awesome Keeper. Some fans were unsure or even horrified by Keeper’s design, but I think he looks great. Much better than just simply having Torin flying a spaceship. I definitely hope we get to see more of Keeper throughout the season. We’re not sure who’s going to be the mentor figure, but it would be great for Keeper to at least pop up once in a while. I want to see him kick more ass.

What about that build up to the realization that essentially, Keeper caused the extinction of the dinosaurs?! How that sequence unfolded was so good.

Our introductions to Tyler, Shelby, Chase, Koda and Miss Morgan were equally engaging. Each of them left great first impressions. Shelby was especially charming. And it is great to see Tyler is likely nothing like Daigo.

It was a full episode and they managed to squeeze in a lot of stuff even though we only got to see just a minute of spandex fighting. That in itself is also refreshing and a very promising sign that much more effort will be put in the story.

I am excited. I haven’t been this excited for Power Rangers since the finale of RPM. It’s a great feeling.

Welcome back Judd “Chip” Lynn! Looks like your magic touch has helped a great deal.

How different was Dino Charge from Zyuden Sentai Kyoryuger?

VERY different. This Dino Charge episode was all original footage. They not only filmed brand new villain footage, they created a brand new big bad as well as an entire spaceship set (which I’m not sure if we’re even ever going to see again). The spaceship also helped set up an entire world for Sledge as we saw with the prison cells. It’ll be interesting too to see how Sledge will be used alongside the Kyoryuger villain suits.

Chase might be a flirt like Ian. And Koda is certainly not Nossan. But Tyler and Shelby are very different from Daigo and Amy and that’s awesome.

And it’s great to have an original Keeper instead of reusing Torin, though we don’t know if American Torin could pop up in the future as well.

But the differences are evident and that is very promising.


Celebrate Power Rangers‘ 20th Anniversary on DVD!
The first 18 seasons, from Mighty Morphin to RPM on four complete DVD sets!
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Also, check out the brand new Power Rangers Dino Charge store, also at Amazon!

9 thoughts on “Recap & First Impression Review: Power Rangers Dino Charge, Episode 1 – "Helping is always the right thing to do."

  1. I was waiting for this, and I totally agree with you. One think I really liked is when they morph, unlike Megaforce, they didn’t do the “Now for some unknown reason I know what to say and what to do to morph” stuff. That make the characters more natural and I have the feeling that will also have some development.

  2. Finally! Out of every fans review, Yours is the one I really want to read, and the one I always wait for. And you still dont disappoint.

      1. You’re Welcome. I loved this episode, but you’ve already said enough for me about it being better than the last 4 years of terrible seasons.

  3. I’ve been reading your Power Rangers posts for a while now, and now I’ve finally decided to comment on one. I completely agree with you on this episode. I. LOVED. IT!!!!! I enjoyed this one episode more than the 80+ episodes of Samurai and Megaforce combined. And for the first time in a long time, I’m excited for the show and can’t wait to see where it goes from here. Thank you Judd (or Chip, as he’s going by now) Lynn!! I think that as long as higher-ups at Saban don’t restrain Judd’s creative ability, or Judd doesn’t suddenly have a big brain-fart, Dino Charge will be great!

    By the way, I’m still interested to hear your full thoughts on Operation Overdrive and how you feel it’s better than Samurai and Megaforce. I know you touched on it in your top 5 Power Rangers seasons, but you mentioned a while back in your Disney Era Power Rangers post that you may have a full post dedicated to the subject. I hope you get to do it soon, if at all. For me, I can see the problems people may have with Overdrive, but I’ll take it over Samurai and Megaforce any day of the week.

    1. I agree. I think even Samurai and Megaforce could’ve better than they were if it wasn’t for some apparent meddling from the non-creative people at Saban. I’m very hopeful for the season.

      And that big OO essay will probably be a while off. I’ll have to gather my arguments very well. lol

  4. What’s this? A POSITIVE review for Power Rangers episode?
    Is the world is coming to an end!!
    Chinese is buying Russia.
    Cats and Dogs are having war with Republican!
    Asteroid the size of Jupiter is heading towards Earth!!!
    Mass histeria!!!! LOL XD

    Regardless, this was VERY good season premiere.
    I have seen premiere this good since Time Force (I might be minority, but it took me a while to get used to RPM; especially, I wasn’t into the show at the time).
    It’s been a while since we’ve seen episode premiere that had ZERO sentai footage.
    It’s nice to see Chip is back.

    I thought the premiere was FAR better than Kyoryuger premiere; in fact, it was better than every episodes of the series; especially since I HATED that show

    Only minor nitpick I have to say about this episodes is that villains are from outer space in their spaceship. It’s bit tiring and redundant, considering the fact we just sat through 2 seasons of it (Warstar and Armada).
    I was also bit bothered that Chase/Green was no where to be seen, but since this is a 2-part premiere, I can’t complain too much.

    As much as I enjoyed Samurai~Super Megaforce, I REALLY loved your review, where I thought it was hilarious. LOL
    This was very well written review.

    I’m really looking forward how rest of the season turns out.
    Take care.

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