Recap: Power Rangers Dino Charge, Episode 2 – "Welcome to the Power Rangers."

Recap: Power Rangers Dino Charge, Episode 2 – Past, Present and Fusion

Dino Charge 2

A narrator explains the current situation before we head to a large New Zealand farm. Here, we meet Riley as he practices his fencing inside the barn. His older brother interrupts his playing “Three Musketeers” to get him to feed the pigs.

Dino Charge 2

Riley calls his dog, Rubik, to come with, but he’s gone. Into the forest. Riley finds Rubik barking at something. And it’s Fury.

Fury wants to shut Rubik up by killing him, but Riley grabs a metal rod and blocks Fury’s sword. Fury is enraged and Riley uses his sword skills to fight off Fury’s attacks.

Dino Charge 2

Fury stars sending blasts Riley’s way. The metal rod goes flying into a large rock nearby revealing a fossil. And a Green Energem.

Riley tries to pull the rod out, but the Green Energem glows and a surge of power flows through the rod and him. The rod turns into a sword and with it, Riley manages to go toe to toe with Fury.

Dino Charge 2

Riley blocks a blast and it ricochets to a tree branch which falls on Fury.

Riley grabs the Energem and heads home with Rubik.

A while later, Riley says goodbye to his mom and big brother as he sets off for the dinosaur museum for the summer. His brother gives him an old owner’s manual for the scooter, just in case.

Dino Charge 2

Meanwhile, Shelby wonders why these glowing things were inside fossils. Tyler thinks maybe the dinosaurs ate them.

They see Riley by the side of the road and stop to help. He says it’s okay, since he has the manual. But a truck drives by and the pages of the old manual fly off.

Tyler and Shelby welcome him and his scooter onto the jeep as they continue back into town. Shelby and Tyler think it’d be cool to live on a ranch.

Suddenly, they come across an overturned car. A woman asks them to help her husband trapped under the car.

Dino Charge 2

Riley sees fluid leaking from the car and smells it is gas. They struggle to move the car even an inch until their Energems kick in and they flip the car like a chabudai.

The husband gets up, perfectly fine. No injuries.

The three teens each take the Energems out as they glow.

“Let me guess, you’re going to the dino museum, right?”

They arrive at the museum and Shelby tells Tyler to drive to the loading dock. Shelby sees Koda and Chase and they follow, but they suddenly disappear.

Dino Charge 2

Tyler sees a huge dinosaur skull. He hops in and asks them to take a picture, but he moves a tooth and gets swallowed.

It’s a secret passage! Riley slides in and Shelby follows.

Dino Charge 2

They find some kind of underground lab. They see the other Energems on the wall and when they take theirs out, they immediately attach themselves as wall, like it is some kind of power source.

A mysterious cloud appears and it is Keeper. He explains the Energems and says they’ve bonded with them. But why?

Dino Charge 2

Koda, Chase and Miss Kendall Morgan walk out. Kendall approaches Tyler and says the red Energem chose him after he risked his life for a stranger.

Dino Charge 2

Kendal says Riley’s discipline and intelligence are why he was chosen.

Dino Charge 2

And finally Shelby. “Why the pink Energem chose you… is anyone’s guess.”

None of them can believe it, but Koda and Chase show them their Energems.

Dino Charge 2

Kendall says she helped Keeper track down Chase after he bonded with his Energem. Then they found Koda.

Dino Charge 2

“Welcome to our team.”
“You’re officially Power Rangers.”

There are still five Energems missing and they must find them before they fall into evil hands.

Shelby is not so sure about all of this. She wanted to dig for dinosaurs, not bond with them.

Dino Charge 2

The alarm sounds and Kendall sees seismic activity. Chase says they must check it out. Tyler and Riley say they’re in.

Shelby is hesitant. Keeper says she fought bravely to save the Pink Energem. Now the world needs her help. Kendall says Shelby has a right to be hesitant.

“Clearly this mission is just too dangerous… for a waitress. Go without her.”

The guys start to leave, but Shelby tells them to wait. Of course she’s scared, “but I know more about dinosaurs than any of you. Fact is, you need me. And I want to help.”

Dino Charge 2

They grab their Energems and Dino Chargers, but Tyler can’t grab his. Kendall sees something is interfering with the Red Energem, so he must stay behind.

Dino Charge 2

The other four hurry over and find a volcano has appeared and is about to blow. But it’s just the T-Rex zord.

Dino Charge 2

Kendall explains to Tyler that when someone bonds with an Energem, their zord is awakened. She explains that she created the Dino Chargers to harness the power of the Energems. They energize their weapons and morph them into battle mode.

Tyler is able to grab his Energem now and he heads downtown.

Iceage is freezing the city and orders the Vivix foot soldiers to combine into Vivizords.

But the T-Rex zord arrives and goes crazy until Iceage freezes him too.

Dino Charge 2

Tyler arrives and tosses the Red Energem to the T-Rex, helping him to break free.

And “It’s morphin’ time.”

“Dino Charger, ready.”
“T-Rex Charger, engage.”
“Energize. Unleash the power!”

Tyler officially morphs into the Red Ranger. He tosses a Dino Charger into Rexy’s mouth and the T-Rex zord attacks the Vivizords.

Tyler fights off the regular sized Vivixes as the others arrive.

Dino Charge 2

Chase and Koda prepare to morph. Shelby steps forward, but she doesn’t know how to use the Dino Charger. Koda tells her to click.


All four of them click, engage and morph.

Dino Charge 2

Shelby, Riley, Koda and Chase take care of the Vivixes while Tyler unleashes a Final Strike with Rexy’s help to finish off Iceage.

Dino Charge 2

The Rangers head back to the lab. Shelby assures Koda she’ll still make him his favorite Bronto Burger. Tyler is excited to tell his brother about this, but Kendall says nope. No one else must know of their work.

Chase goes to Keeper. The monster they fought wasn’t Fury. But didn’t Keeper say there were no other monsters on Earth?

Dino Charge 2

Keeper explains that Iceage is one of the monsters caught by the bounty hunter Sledge. Sledge is the reason Keeper had to hide the Energems to begin with.

“Somehow, Sledge has returned. He’ll destroy anything to get the Energems. Including you.”

A very alive Sledge walks through his cell blocks and asks which of them can destroy him a Power Ranger.

Dino Charge 2

Episode Thoughts

While not as awesome as the premiere, this was definitely still a great episode. A couple of nitpicks, but overall an enjoyable and fun half-hour

Riley’s introduction was very good. It’s nice to actually see a Ranger actually has a home and family. It helps fill out the character.

The chabudai scene was hilarious though. I don’t even think the scene was necessary, especially with the chubdai car and the man being absolutely injury-free after having a car on top of him. But it’s okay. The Rangers, and maybe more the actors themselves, made the scene still fun to watch.

Thank goodness Keeper has popped up too. And yay for no GOGO!!!.

But the lab scenes got a little iffy though. All the clumsy exposition could’ve been tightened up a little bit.

And they actually needed a little more explanation too. Like how exactly Kendall, Chase and Koda knew of the others that they weren’t surprised to see them there. Or what are zords supposed to be? Or “What’s a Power Ranger?” How did Tyler know what a Vivizord was without checking Wikipedia for the name (like I did)?

I guess they had to make up for the zero explanation in episode 1. But I do think it could’ve gone a little smoother.

Kendall was definitely a little harsh to Shelby. Especially after she showered compliments to the two guys she’s never even met before. And even when Keeper obviously has seen Shelby’s bravery. It’s an interesting dynamic, though maybe they could’ve toned it down a little? We did see that Shelby has been very persistent in joining the digs, so Miss Morgan could definitely have grown annoyed with her. But the “She’s just a waitress.” attitude was really harsh. I hope she has a reason to be that way towards Shelby other than just being annoyed. Maybe jealous?

And kinda sad that the morphing sequence is exactly like Kyoryuger. But it’s okay.

I definitely noticed the edits to the Zyudenchi though. No Gabutyra here.

Anyway, those nitpicks are excusable since the overall story has been set-up very nicely, the characters have been introduced well and the cast is great, charming and likeable.


Celebrate Power Rangers‘ 20th Anniversary on DVD!
The first 18 seasons, from Mighty Morphin to RPM on four complete DVD sets!
.


Also, check out the brand new Power Rangers Dino Charge store, also at Amazon!

4 thoughts on “Recap: Power Rangers Dino Charge, Episode 2 – "Welcome to the Power Rangers."

  1. I wasn’t expecting your recap so soon. Yeah, I feel this episode was a bit rushed, at least I was hoping Keeper teaching the new Rangers how to morph, but I guess Shelby and Koda’s “click” was something about that.

    Riley vs Fury was for me the best part, I think because it reminds me of the quality of this season’s original footage we saw in the premiere, if Saban would had a bigger budget…

  2. Another great episode to a 2-part season premiere.
    It wasn’t quite as good as previous, but it was still very solid.

    Nice to start the show with narration at the beginning.
    I wasn’t really bothered with it, and it was handled much better than previous seasons.

    I like how they introduced Riley, the Green Ranger.
    Right off the bat, we started with beautiful scenery and atmosphere, to show how interesting his character is.
    While his trait is similar to Souji (swordsman), he’s much more interesting and well written.
    It’s nice that he has dog and have passion for it.
    That would never happen to Souji. lol
    He would be like “Dog? …no thanks. I’m too busy with practicing sword. I don’t care. ” or something like that.

    It’s nice to see a glimpse of Graphite from Matt (Riley’s brother), thanks to his hat. At least he has hair… unlike his sentai counter (although, he did “magically” grew hair later without explanation… maybe Gosei did it. lol)
    He’s already better than Tessai.

    It’s nice to see rangers (Tyler, Shelby, and Riley) saving people.
    It’s nice to see rangers helping someone.
    This would NEVER happened in Kyoryuger.
    They would be like “Nah, we’re too cool for this crap, no thanks. ” or something. lol

    I like the entrance to underground base, where the entrance is T-rex mouth AND has secret slide. AWESOME!
    Far better than that lame-o generic pedestal that appear out of nowhere.
    I really like the design of the underground lab; it reminds me of Dino Thunder, which I enjoyed.
    The design is FAR better than Spirit Base, which was generic and had pale bland white ceiling.

    The team uniting was done pretty well, although bit rushed (which I will explain later). It’s also nice to see Keeper without his hood, which makes him more AWESOME!

    The morphing sequence was pretty nice, where it was nearly similar to sentai; except done better, because of no dancing! Thank you Chip! They done pretty good job IMO.
    Although, I kind of missed “Go, Go” a little. OK, maybe a BIT!
    I like how Charger is labeled in English name (Gabutyra -> Tyrannosaurus Rex), instead of just using Japanese name (ex. Gosei Red).
    Huge improvement in technical/production standpoint.

    Here’s my few gripes/cons with this episode.

    First, the pacing. It felt bit rushed and could have been use another episode, making 3-part episode. Koda and Chase joining the ranger/team wasn’t established very well; obviously for set up to following 2 episodes.

    The part where Tyler getting “stuck” also bothered me a bit, which reminds me of MMPR-ish plot device.

    Another gripe I had with this episode is fight scene, which I blame tokusatsu footage. One thing I couldn’t stand about Kyoryuger is that it had REALLY horribly down-right embarrassing fight/action choreography I have ever seen in any sentai series (and any tokusatsu series in general). The action between this and previous (which was all original) was pretty jarring, where Tyler was being “King” in this episode. The tokusatsu footage just doesn’t matches well IMO; but that’s more of the problem with sentai series.

    My last gripe is Sledge appearance, who appeared at tail end.
    I NEED MORE SLEDGE, DARN IT!!!

    Aside from few gripes/nitpicks, the episode itself was great.
    The story and character was written well; far better than Sanjo has done.
    Still better than every episodes of Kyoryuger combined.
    Overall, it was one of the best 2-part season premiere since Time Force.
    I’m really looking forward to next 2 episodes, which will focus Chase and Koda.

    Take care.

Share your thoughts!

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Back to top