When the subject of Star Wars and Power Rangers comes up, I’ve never really ever thought about comparing them. They both have been around for some time with Star Wars originating in 1977 and Power Rangers in 1993. Each have their fans but as far as comparisons go, that’s as far as it went, for me at least. However, in Power Ranger’s producer Adi Shankar’s mind, there is clearly a better franchise and it’s name is NOT Star Wars.
Shankar delivered his own take on the Power Rangers franchise at “Power Morphicon”when he compared the franchise to Star Wars, and how he believes it doesn’t compare to Power Rangers.
“I literally think Star Wars is not as cool as Power Rangers,” Shankar said. “Power Rangers is not about good versus evil. It’s not and never has been. It’s the lens through which the stories are told to us, through the lens, the narrative lens, but really it’s about shades of gray, and it’s always been about shades of gray, and it’s about people working together to overcome those shades of gray, through a single point of view. That’s why the Power Rangers are super powerful. Star Wars is about good versus evil. I don’t know what the empire did wrong. I still have no idea. I still don’t know, they got up and they dress the same and then they (the rebels) kill them because they dress the same, like, I don’t understand it. Yeah they blew up a planet, but that’s a cheap reason to want to hate someone. The point is Power Rangers is way doper than Star Wars.”
Shankar wasn’t done there. As told to ComicBook.com, it all came down to his confusion of not knowing why the Empire is so bad.
“Dude, I think Star Wars is f****** horrible,” Shankar said. “I think Star Wars is a terrible franchise. It has terrible values. What are you teaching people with Star Wars, right? ‘Oh yeah, we’re the rebels and we’re just gonna blow up people who dress the same?’ Like it’s good versus evil? It’s terrible because there’s really very little evil out there. The evil is taught to us through a narrative, but the evil has a point of view, the evil has a perspective., and if you don’t get to know the perspective of the evil then how do you know you’re not evil?”
While it is pretty easy to see that Power Rangers villains are not known for showing great depth, Shankar points out that is not really the point of the franchise. He believes that the Power Rangers main theme is to show how the Rangers work together than to focus on just defeating “evil” bad guys.
So how about it Star Wars and Power Ranger fans? Do you find the points Adi Shankar valid? Does he have a point or is he missing something? Share your points with us a GVNation.
Senior Writer at GeekVibesNation – I am a 50 something child of the 70’s who admits to being a Star Trek/Star Wars/Comic Book junkie who once dove head first over a cliff (Ok, it was a small hill) to try to rescue his Fantastic Four comic from a watery grave. I am married to a lovely woman who is as crazy as I am and the proud parent of a 18 year old boy with autism. My wife and son are my real heroes.
