Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: 30th Anniversary Tribute

While the Power Rangers franchise is still going strong after 30 years, I thought I’d look back at the early seasons of “Mighty Morphin Power Rangers,” which premiered on American TV on Saturday, August 28, 1993, 30 years ago today. In New York, it settled into a daily weekday afternoon schedule on local station WNEW-TV/Channel 5 as part of the Fox Kids programming block. I’d heard about it and seen promos for it and wondered if it had roots in a Japanese show. I don’t think I’d seen it yet when I visited a local monthly comics show at a hotel in Manhattan that September and asked my friendly dealer of Japanese tapes, mostly anime, if this new superhero show had a Japanese origin. He replied “Yes, and here it is,” as he handed me a VHS tape of “Zyuranger,” Volume 1, containing the first four episodes. It was in Japanese and untranslated and I eagerly bought it.

“Aim for the Ace!” – Classic Anime Tennis Series

“Aim for the Ace!” (Ace wo Nerae) is a 26-episode Japanese animated TV series made in 1973 about high school women’s tennis. The focus is on Hiromi Oka, an awkward, somewhat graceless first-year student at Nishi High School who joins the tennis club in awe of the club’s star players, especially Ryuka Ryuuzaki, a stunning rich girl with long, flowing, curly blond locks who is nicknamed by the other girls, “Ochofujin,” translated in the subtitles as “Madam Butterfly.” Oka is initially mocked by the other girls in the club and treated with disdain by the star players, but the stern male coach, Munakata, sees something in Oka’s spirit and determination and gives her special attention that outrages the other teammates and incites petty gossip about Munakata’s and Oka’s relationship. In the face of great odds, including the physical brutality of rigorous practice, and numerous obstacles placed in front of her by other people and, most importantly, herself, Oka struggles to prove her worth—to the coach, to the team and to herself–until she’s ready to rank with the club’s top players.

I was first exposed to this series when in 2010 I picked up two VHS tapes from Book Off which contained episodes 19-23 of the series, in Japanese with no translation. I knew it was a famous show so I was eager to see it. I was struck by how the story was told in strong visual terms and found each episode thoroughly compelling. I even did an IMDB review of the series based on those episodes. Earlier this summer, I decided to watch the tapes again and was inspired enough to want to do a blog entry on it.

Paintings in Movies: PILLOW TALK (1959) and PROJECT A (1983)

I’m always intrigued when I notice background details involving artwork in various films and TV shows, especially paintings on the walls of the various interiors used in the film. These settings can include a character’s home or office, gathering places like clubs, lodges, saloons and taverns, or simply an artist’s studio. Sometimes, the paintings are actually commissioned for the film since they portray a character in it, as found in such films as LAURA (1944), THE PICTURE OF DORIAN GRAY (1945) and PORTRAIT OF JENNIE (1948). Sometimes, the artwork is found in films about artists where we see a famous artist working on a well-known painting, like Vincent Van Gogh in LUST FOR LIFE (1956) or films and TV shows about fictional artists where the artwork has been clearly commissioned to depict the style of painting of an artist character, as frequently happened in “Perry Mason” (1957-66).

Portrait of Laura Hunt, played by Gene Tierney, in LAURA (1944)