Recap: Power Rangers Ninja Steel, Episode 16 – “Make my monkey grow”

Recap: Power Rangers Ninja Steel, Episode 16 – Monkey Business

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Hayley is a little upset that Calvin overslept and didn’t pick her up for school. She says he should be more reliable, but he apologizes.

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Once at school, Principal Hastings immediately suggests Hayley run for school president. She asks Calvin if he’s interested, but Hayley scoffs at the idea and says a president should be reliable. Calvin can’t even pick her up on time.

Calvin takes that as a challenge and he decides to run too.

Monty says incumbent president Victor should run again as he would be sure to win. Victor says maybe, but to ensure a victory, he’ll find a way to disqualify the couple instead.

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The Rangers go out to get supplies for the campaign. After flipping a coin, Brody and Sarah will help Calvin while Preston and Levi help Hayley.

Meanwhile, Phonepanzee has just collected all the Rangers’ voices to use. But the Rangers spot him as he tries to quietly leave. They chase after him and morph.

The Rangers first take on Basher Bots. But this is the perfect time for Phonepanzee to use their voices against them. He uses the Rangers’ voices to distract them and unleash a Sonic Boom at them.

Phonepanzee is able to get away and the Rangers take care of the Basher Bots before hurrying back to school to start campaigning.

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Calvin and Haley try to one-up each other with the gimmicks. Calvin gives a heartfelt speech and Hayley apologizes for being too harsh with her words earlier. He’s not too laid back since he’s done a pretty amazing job so far with the campaign. He says it’s okay since he is pretty lax sometimes.

Hayley thinks Calvin proving he’s reliable means he’ll quit the race. But Calvin actually wants to keep going.

Calvin has cupcakes from Hayley’s mom to give away to the other students while Hayley has big slices of her mom’s cake. But as the students enjoy the treats, Victor and Monty begin their plan. Monty squirts hot sauce on Calvin’s cupcakes and Victor starts a food fight using Hayley’s cake.

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The Rangers blame each other for the chaos. Phonepanzee decides this is the best time to turn the Rangers against each other even more.

Principal Hastings puts a stop to the madness and warns Calvin and Hayley that any more shenanigans and they are both disqualified.

Later, Phonepanzee gets started. He first calls Calvin pretending to be Levi and says Hayley started the food fight. He adds that Hayley is planning something else and to go to the plaza to catch her in the act.

Calvin heads over to the plaza and right into Phonepanzee’s trap. Basher Bots grab hold of Calvin as Phonepanzee grabs Calvin’s Power Star.

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Phonepanzee calls Sarah and Brody and gets them to the plaza as well. He immediately knocks them to the ground and their Power Stars go flying. Now he’s got three. Rangers and Power Stars.

Phonepanzee calls Hayley as Brody saying Calvin started the food fight. She and Preston start to leave to confront Brody at the plaza, but Mick stops them and says it’s not like Calvin to start a foot fight or Brody to rat on Calvin. Either way, Hayley and Preston are going to the plaza.

Outside, they run into Levi and tell him what’s going on. But just then, Levi gets a call from Phonepanzee… as Hayley! They realize it must be the monster and they hurry to the plaza to make sure the others are safe.

Levi and Hayley arrive at the plaza already morphed. They take on Phonepanzee. Meanwhile, Preston ninjas his way through Basher Bots to save the others.

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Hayley is able to use a Ninja Earth Attack to sneak up on Phonepazee and grab the sack of Stars.

Hayley and Levi hurry to the others and they all morph. They use their Battle Morphers to finish off Phonepanzee’s first life. But not before Levi takes a selfie with Phonepanzee.

The Galaxy Warriors approve a Gigantify and Phonepanzee embiggens. The Rangers hop into their zords, but Phonepanzee unleashes a Super Sonic Boom at them. Hayley counters with a Sonic Howl. That allows the Rangers to combine into the Ninja Steel Megazord and Bull Rider Megazord.

They deliver finishers at Phonepanzee to finish him off for good.

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Back at school, the election results are about to be announced. The Rangers apologize for doubting each other and Hayley and Calvin make sure they’re cool.

Victor and Monty are planning to drop water balloons on Principal Hastings as the final shenanigan to disqualify Hayley and Calvin. But Hayley and Calvin both withdraw from the election. Principal Hastings declares Victor will remain president then.

Victor leaves Monty with the rope holding the water balloons and it’s Victor who gets wet as he steps to the mic to accept another term.

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Episode Thoughts

A fairly innocuous episode. It was fun overall. The school election, for some reason, felt like such an old and dated plotline. lol Very old fashioned story it felt like. The episode also felt like the most Ninninger-heavy as well with all the morphed footage.

But it was alright. Again, I really enjoy Haley and Calvin actually being a normal couple. None of this season-long “Will they? Or won’t they?” tension Power Rangers usually does with possible couples.

It was great to have all the Rangers involved in the story as well. Mick, however, has really not been woven into the stories as well as he had been in the beginning of the season. These random moments of him popping up to dole out some sort of nugget of morality or the lesson of the day are very awkward and out of place.

A special sideeye to them keeping in the selfie part which also felt awkward and out of place. Like, that quirk works for Kinji. But certainly not for Levi.

I loved seeing Preston pop up in his ninja training uniform. MORE NINJA-ING PLEASE!

But my favorite part of the episode though was hearing Calvin’s Sony Ericsson ringtone.


What a throwback! lol My first two cellphones were the Sony Ericsson T610 and W810, so I know that ringtone well. It used to be my alarm tone lol Meh at Brody’s ringtone. lol

I was amused by Monty’s “shenahnighan”:

Anyway, the episode was fine. Typical Sentai-heavy filler. But overall enjoyable.

2 thoughts on “Recap: Power Rangers Ninja Steel, Episode 16 – “Make my monkey grow”

  1. Even if this was a filler episode, Phonepanzee has been the most dangerous monster to the Rangers so far. I mean, his plan to take the Ninja Power Stars was ALMOST a success, and because of a tiny mistake he failed.

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