Power Rangers Reviews: Power Rangers Zeo (1996)

 Hey everyone! Happy Halloween! How are you all doing today? I'm doing very well. I'm back for my review of Power Rangers Zeo (1996), a.k.a. season 4. So let's get right into it shall we?

Power Rangers Zeo is the last season of Power Rangers that I watched the entirety of as it aired until Power Rangers Ninja Storm came out in 2003. I was nine years old when this season started airing and was getting into my 10s/teen years and being that I went to schools that were intolerant as it was, I distanced myself from Power Rangers for fear of being bullied for still loving it as much as I did. Particularly because I didn't have any friends who were into it the way I was. Until 2001 when I started high school. But I'll get to that in my reviews of the early to mid-2000s seasons. 

I firmly believe that Zeo is an underrated season and is often dismissed as just a continuation of Mighty Morphin Power Rangers (1993-1995). It had alot to accomplish and even though it did the best it could, the show was starting to drop in popularity, which was a downward spire that began after Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: The Movie came out in the summer of 1995. Hence why Saban chose to finally change costumes after three seasons of the Rangers using the same suits and arsenal despite getting new powers and Zords every season. In fact, Zeo also changed villains entirely too, though Rita and Zedd do return in the back end of the season, around the time that Jason returned to be the Gold Ranger. Which, by the way, being that I haven't watched the entire season like this since it was airing back in 1996, I was actually surprised at just how late in the season it is when the Gold Ranger actually shows up.

In most seasons of Power Rangers the sixth Ranger or extra warrior, depending on the season, usually shows up around episode 17 or 18, especially in the longer seasons such as the first two seasons of Mighty Morphin. The post 2009 seasons, which were only 22 episodes long, bring the sixth Ranger in around the seventh or eighth episode. But here, the Gold Ranger doesn't show up until episode 27 and then Jason doesn't get the Gold Ranger powers from Trey of Triforia until episode 34, which is more than halfway through the season. Sure the season is only 50 episodes long, but for the sixth Ranger to not show up until more than halfway through such a long season is unusual.

I also felt surprise at just how late in the season it is when Billy leaves the show permanently. Well, not so permanently now since he's returning for the MMPR 30th Anniversary Special next year, but back in 1996, it felt pretty permanent. At the time we didn't know why. It wouldn't be until years later that we'd find out why David Yost left the show. And sadly, it's for disturbing reasons, which I won't go into here, but if you're a Power Rangers fan, you know why he left. Anyways, Billy left the show with only two episodes left after his departure episode. He left in the second part of a two part episode called "Rangers of Two Worlds", which is the very first fully blown team-up episode where the previous season's Ranger team and villains return to team up with the current season's Ranger team and villains. But because five out of the six Zeo Rangers were originally the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers and Amy Jo Johnson (Kimberly), Walter Jones (Zack), Thuy Trang (Trini), and Karan Ashley (Aisha) either weren't available or just weren't invited (typical Saban move) the Aquitian Rangers from Mighty Morphin Alien Rangers came back instead. Actually, it's because Chouriki Sentai Ohranger, the Sentai series that Zeo took it's ground fight, Zord Battle, and villains footage from had a crossover movie with Ninja Sentai Kakuranger, the Sentai that Mighty Morphin Power Rangers season 3 and Mighty Morphin Alien Rangers got it's Zord Battle footage from and Ranger suit footage from, it made sense to bring in the Aquitian Rangers.

One thing I enjoyed about this season is that the Rangers's school lives was the focus of the early part of the season, with various school assignments, that led to King Mondo getting inspiration from for his schemes, being the main plot of these episodes. And every Ranger got an episode of their own too. I mean Tanya got two episodes in very close proximity to each other. 

One complaint I've heard from people is that Tommy had nothing to do once he became the Red Ranger. Um, yeah, because the writers finally realized that this is Power Rangers not the Tommy Oliver Show Featuring the Power Rangers. So much of the first two seasons of Mighty Morphin focused so heavily on Tommy simply because entitled kids refused to eat until they brought Tommy back. And you know what, those kids are probably the same entitled jerks who made fun of me for being a geek in high school, and are probably being jerks to people now that they're adults too, so the fact that they basically bullied the writers into bringing back a character, who had a cool costume and a cool Zord, but otherwise wasn't any better than the other five Rangers, or even that interesting a character for that matter, is a bit maddening. 

Don't get me wrong, Tommy did have a few solid episodes this season. It's just the writers didn't feel the need to cater to the "Tommy Oliver is the BEST Ranger!" crowd and focused on other Rangers. Though I do sort of feel like Kat got shafted hard this season, after being a huge focus in the last few episodes of Mighty Morphin, though she did have one or two decent episodes. Rocky and Adam were actually better this season. Adam did anyway, Rocky had some moments that were dumb at best, problematic at worst, but again, not here to talk about that kind of thing.

Bulk, Skull, and Lieutenant/Detective Stone were almost completely separated from the Rangers this season. Their subplots were completely apart from the Rangers this season and that made it a better season because, as I stated in my season 1 review, there were alot of episodes in the early days that felt longer when they took five minutes for Bulk & Skull's slapstick humour in what was meant to be a serious and intense scene. And I think that in this season more than any other, Bulk & Skull saw the most growth as people. 

My one negative with this season is that way too much was happening in the second half of the season and we barely got any "human moments" out of the Rangers. By that I mean they spent a good chunk of time morphed, at the Power Chamber, or morphed AND at the Power Chamber. As I have said in many comic book and comic book based TV show and movie reviews, I'm not watching these shows and movies for the big, prolonged, superhero vs supervillain battles. I watch them for the characters and their stories because at the end of the day these shows and movies should be about people rather than superpowers and fight scenes, but that's a rant for another day. 

 As mentioned before, Zeo was adapted from the 19th Super Sentai series, Chouriki Sentai Ohranger, which from everything I've heard about it was the most serious, most intense, Sentai series ever made. I've never seen it so I don't know if that's actually true or not, but trust me, there are some ridiculous scenes in Zeo that are from Ohranger, not shot for specifically for Power Rangers. This is also the first season of Power Rangers that uses footage from a single season of Sentai since Mighty Morphin Power Rangers season 1 since the second and third seasons used a combination of Zyuranger, Zyu2, Dairanger, and Kakuranger. It's also the first season to use mainly Sentai footage of the villains inside their base of operations since the villains this season aren't just Rita and Zedd again like they were for all of Mighty Morphin Power Rangers and Mighty Morphin Alien Rangers. The only time original footage was shot of the villains was in the back end of the season because Prince Gasket, the eldest son of King Mondo and Queen Machina, is the older version of Prince Sprocket (Mondo and Machina's younger son) in Ohranger and since Sprocket didn't transform into Gasket and appeared in scenes together, they had to shoot all new footage of the two of them together.

As Zeo reached its halfway mark, Saban began production on another TV show for Fox Kids called Big Bad Beetleborgs, which premiered on September 7th, 1996, two days before Power Rangers Zeo episode 21, "Brother, Can You Spare an Arrowhead?" aired. Adapted from the Metal Hero Tokusatsu series, Juukou B-Fighter (1995-1996), Big Bad Beetleborgs is about three kids, Drew, Jo, and Roland, who become superheroes known as the Beetleborgs, after they enter a haunted mansion, meet a phasm named Flabber, who is basically the Genie from Aladdin, and he grants them their wish of becoming their favourite comic book superheroes, the Big Bad Beetleborgs to fight the Magnavores, villains from the comics. I loved Big Bad Beetleborgs when I was a kid, because it focused more on the comedy and the everyday stuff rather than the monster of the week aspect that the early seasons of Power Rangers focused on. This will be a post all of it's own, don't worry.

Of course, Zeo had it's own toyline. It was a much larger toyline since Bandai America could release all of the weapons, Zords, morphers, villains, and Ranger figures, which they hadn't really done since the first season of Mighty Morphin since Rangers and villains carried over from season to season. I only had two figures from this line, and I didn't get them until I was an adult. I got rid of them after my parents and I moved in 2016 though because I decided to focus on building my Mighty Morphin Power Rangers toy collection. 

While Mighty Morphin Power Rangers had books, comic books, toys, puzzles, playing cards, pogs, clothing, VHS tapes, and audiocassettes/CDs that were released from 1993 until 1995, Saban severely scaled back on the merchandise for Power Rangers Zeo. In fact the season had a single comic book issue and that's it. Published by Image Comics on September 1st, 1996 and was actually Rita and Zedd's first appearance in the continuity of Zeo since episode 2, "A Zeo Beginning Part II" as they wouldn't reappear on the show, outside of Adam's dream in episode 23, "It Came From Angel Grove", until Jason becomes the Gold Ranger. This issue has the Zeo Rangers teaming up with Rita and Zedd to prevent the Machine Empire from using the residual Mighty Morphin energies leftover from Rita and Zedd destroying the Ninja Power Coins in the third episode of Mighty Morphin Alien Rangers. This issue was supposed to be the first in an ongoing series, with a changing title as Power Rangers Zeo was only the show's title for one season, but for some unknown reason Image Comics lost the Power Rangers license before the issue even came out and this ended up being the only one despite it ending on a cliffhanger. But with notorious comic book artist, Rob Liefeld, being credited as the editor on this book, I can see why Image lost the license. 

Only two VHS tapes were released for this season. Power Rangers Zeo: Zeo Quest is the first and it's mostly bits and pieces of the Rangers's Zeo Quests from Mighty Morphin Alien Rangers and then the two part premiere of Zeo, "A Zeo Beginning" and then Zeo's Halloween episode, "It Came From Angel Grove" had a VHS release, and that's it for the season. This fuels my theory that Power Rangers became less popular after Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: The Movie came out until it became the niche superhero franchise that it is today. Because at the height of it's popularity in 1994 and 1995, during the end of the first season and during the second season, MMPR had so much merchandise coming out from clothing to comic books, AND a theatrical feature film, so to have things scaled back, particularly on the home video front is interesting.

Power Rangers Zeo was released on DVD in two volumes. The first volume, containing the first 25 episodes of the season, was released on November 12th 2013 and the second volume, which contained episodes 26 to 50, was released on February 11th, 2014. I got both volumes from my friend Kelly a few years ago when I was still staying at her place for the weekend twice a year. 

Zeo was also released as part of the Power Rangers: Seasons 4-7 DVD boxset, along with Turbo, In Space, and Lost Galaxy in the summer of 2013, along with tons of bonus features. From what I can see online, all six discs were in one case rather than split up into volumes. One of the bonus features was Power Rangers: The Lost Episode, which was the 1999 airing of the original pilot version of "Day of the Dumpster" hosted by Austin St. John and Walter Emmanuel Jones. 

Overall I enjoyed watching Zeo all the way through for the first time since 1996. It was interesting, fun, funny in places, and I never got bored of it like I started to be by the end of Mighty Morphin Power Rangers season 3. As I said at the beginning of this review, Zeo is a very underrated season of Power Rangers and it often seems to get dismissed as just a continuation of MMPR even though it's more than just that. Because, it is a continuation, no matter how you look at it. But it's a continuation that opened up the Power Rangers Universe in a way that MMPR was barely able to do by the end of it's run. And the franchise would continue to do so until 2011, but I'll get there when I get there.

Alright my friends, that's it for me for today. I'll be back tomorrow for my review of Turbo: A Power Rangers Movie (1997) as it's next in the sequence. My plan is to finish the first six seasons, with Turbo and In Space, by the end of November and then I'll take a break and get into some movie and comic book reviews before returning to Power Rangers in the New Year. So until tomorrow, have a great evening, Happy Halloween, and I will talk to you all later. Take care.

DC Comics's Star Trek Overview Part 10: Star Trek: The Next Generation Specials (1993-1995)

 Hey everyone! How's it going? I'm doing pretty well. I started watching Power Rangers Zeo last night so look out for that review on Monday. I know, it's Halloween but I'm not a big Halloween person, so I don't have any other plans that day. So here I'll be, talking about a 26 year old season of television from my childhood instead. But that's on Monday. Today I'm here for the penultimate part in my DC Comics's Star Trek overview where I'll be talking about the three Special issues for Star Trek: The Next Generation. This is actually the last segment to focus on a particular comic book series. For the finale I'll be talking about various miscellaneous mini-series for both TOS and TNG that came out during the twelve years that DC Comics had the Star Trek comic book license. But for now, let's dive into TNG on it's own one final time. Let's do it.

Star Trek: The Next Generation Special #1 is the only one I've ever owned. Same with Star Trek Special #1, which I talked about in an earlier post. And because I still have it in my collection, I can talk about it at a much greater length than I can the other two issues. There are three stories in the issue. The first has an away team from the Enterprise-D dealing with problems on a Federation colony where these little ape-like creatures use their telepathic powers to ignite the worst fears and desires in the colonists as well as the away team which consists of Commander Riker, Doctor Crusher, Lieutenant Worf, and Guinan. As well as two officers, one in medical and the other in security, who are one off characters for this story. The second story has Worf and his son, Alexander, on shore leave so that Alexander can go through a Klingon rite of passage, which are always interesting to see. There are also two pin-up pieces of art. One is of the Enterprise-D and her crew, and the other is of Tasha Yar facing off with Armus, the alien being made of an oil slick that killed Tasha in the season 1 episode, "Skin of Evil". The final story is about Spot, Data's cat, and his journey around the corridors of the ship after escaping from Data's quarters during Data's conversation with Worf. 

The second issue also has three stories. The first story has to do with Ensign Ro saving Riker's life in a situation similar to what she went through prior to her debut in the season 5 episode, "Ensign Ro". The second story is basically a follow-up to the one-shot graphic novel, Star Trek: Debt of Honor, as it features two of the main characters of that book, Jamie Finney, the daughter of Kirk's friend Benjamin Finney, and Commander Kor from the TOS episode, "Errand of Mercy". According to the synopsis on Memory Alpha, the two of them have to redeem their honor in the 24th Century. The third story is about Captain Morgan Bateson, played by Kelsey Grammer in the TNG season 5 episode, "Cause and Effect", having difficulty adjusting to life in the 24th Century. He ends up getting some help from Montgomery Scott, who has also recently found himself living in the 24th Century after being rescued by the crew of the Enterprise-D in the season 6 episode, "Relics". Since I never owned this issue, that's all I have to say about it.

The final issue only has two stories. The first one is a typical story you'd see in a TNG novel or comic published in the '90s. There's a murderer running around, killing all of the officers who had been the chief engineer of the Enterprise-D and Geordi is the next target. Meanwhile Picard is trying to negotiate a trade agreement. According to Memory Alpha this story is based off of an unused story considered for the TV series sometime in the early '90s, as this issue came out in 1995, after the TV series had ended and Star Trek Generations (1994) had been released in theatres. It was also written by Michael DeMeritt, who was a second unit director on Star Trek: Voyager (1995-2001), so that's cool. The final story, according to Memory Alpha, has Lieutenant Robin Lefler, Wesley Crusher's girlfriend, showing Scotty around the Enterprise-A, which is in the Starfleet Museum at Starbase 122, but they have to deal with Captain Koloth, who wants revenge on Scotty for the Tribbles thing in the TOS episode, "The Trouble with Tribbles". Memory Alpha says this story takes place between "Relics" and the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine episode, "Blood Oath", which, spoilers, saw the deaths of both Koloth and Kang.

That's it for this part of the overview. There's one more part to go but that'll have to wait until next week. Until then look forward to my review of Power Rangers Zeo on Monday, and I'll probably have one or two other posts this week and next week too. So until then have a great evening and I will talk to you all later. Take care.

The Sword in the Stone (1963) Movie Review

 Hey everyone! Happy Friday! How're you all doing today? I'm doing pretty well. Well, I ended up not getting my booster shot today, so I'm here to do that movie review that I promised you all that I'd do today if I didn't get my booster. That movie is Walt Disney's 1963 classic, The Sword in the Stone, directed by Disney Animation veteran, Wolfgang Reitherman, and with a story by Disney Story veteran, Bill Peet. I watched the 1991 Walt Disney Classics VHS release before bed last night. Let's get into it.

The Sword in the Stone is one of those movies that I have come to appreciate more as an adult than I did when I was a kid. Mainly because the Wizard's Duel scene between Merlin and Mad Madam Mim scared the crap out of me when I was a kid. In fact the entire Mad Madam Mim sequence scared me when I was four or five years old, which is basically when I saw it for the first time because it was either in late 1991 or in early 1992 when I first saw the movie since we were still living in the city, and the movie had been re-released on home video as part of the Walt Disney Classics in July of 1991. Watching it as an adult though, I really enjoyed it.

One of the most fascinating things about this movie is the fact that Merlin has knowledge of the future and tries to force that knowledge onto Wart, despite Wart being from medieval times and not understanding these futuristic things because they aren't available in what is the present day of the movie. It'd be like trying to teach me about warp engines or transporters or other technology that doesn't exist for us here in the year 2022. I'm not going to understand any of it. And that's how it ended up being for Wart in this movie. Which is interesting to see. 

Merlin isn't as good of a character as the three fairies from Sleeping Beauty, but he's pretty good. I like his interactions with Mad Madam Mim both before and during the Wizard's Duel. In fact that whole sequence is incredible. Though I think Merlin accepted Mim's challenge because if he hadn't there would've been no point to Mim being in the movie and there wouldn't've been an action sequence in the movie at all. 

Many of the voice cast is pretty familiar as those that are have been in other Disney animated movies both before and after this. Like Jimmy Macdonald, who does the voice of the Wolf (no dialogue) was the second voice of Mickey Mouse once Walt Disney stopped voicing the character. And of course I can't forget Sebastian Cabot and Junius Matthews. Sebastian Cabot narrated the first three Winnie the Pooh shorts, Winnie the Pooh and the Honey Tree (1966), Winnie the Pooh and the Blustery Day (1968), and Winnie the Pooh and Tigger Too (1974), as well as the 1977 movie which was a compilation of those three shorts, The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh. He also voiced Bagheera in The Jungle Book. Junius Matthews voiced Rabbit in the Winnie the Pooh shorts and the compilation movie before his death necessitated him being replaced by Will Ryan for the fourth, and final, Winnie the Pooh short, Winnie the Pooh and a Day for Eeyore (1983).

Oh, and Sir Pellinore, Ector's friend who tells Ector and Kay about the jousting tournament was voiced by Alan Napier, the actor who played Alfred on Batman (1966-1968) and in Batman: The Movie (1966), and the great grandfather of James Napier, the actor who played Connor, the Red Ranger on Power Rangers Dino Thunder (2004). I had completely forgotten that Napier voiced Sir Pellinore in this movie so when I heard him speak his voice was familiar but I couldn't quite place it since it's slightly deeper than it is on Batman. Not too much deeper, but just enough that you wouldn't recognize it without looking it up on Wikipedia or IMDB. 

Speaking of that fourth short, it was released theatrically alongside the 1983 theatrical re-release of The Sword in the Stone. Which is pretty cool.

Honestly I think this movie did with Merlin what Aladdin (1992) would do with the Genie 29 years later. They're both magical, they both act as a mentor to the lead character, and they both have to save the lead from the villainous character of the movie. 

Originally released on VHS on March 25th, 1986 as part of the Walt Disney Classics lineup, The Sword in the Stone was re-released on July 12th, 1991 in that same lineup. As I mentioned earlier, I saw the movie on VHS sometime in either late 1991 or early 1992. We never owned it but we rented it instead. I found a copy of the 1991 VHS release at a local thrift store when I was out with Brad on Tuesday. I had also previously found the 1994 Walt Disney Masterpiece Collection VHS release not that long ago either, as well as the 2008 DVD release too. I watched the 1991 VHS release for the purpose of this review last night. There aren't any previews before the movie, just the Walt Disney Classics logo. Which is what I suspected when I did my Walt Disney Classics overview on The Review Basement two years ago. So it's neat to experience it for myself after 30 years. 

Overall I really enjoyed watching The Sword in the Stone again. It's not the best Disney animated movie, but it's still really good and pretty fun to watch. Even though we only rented it once when I was a kid, I actually had the storybook adaptation of the movie that Disney put out in the '90s, so I read it quite often. Of course it's on Disney+ so if you've never seen it, I recommend giving it a watch.

Alright my friends that's it for me for this week. I will be back next week with more posts, including a few more comic book reviews as well as the second to last part in my DC Comics's Star Trek overview, and a potential post on the mid-season premiere of Star Trek: Prodigy, which is finally returning after six months of not being on. So until then have a great night and I will talk to you all later. Take care. 

Batman '89 (2022) Comic Book Review

 Hey everyone! How's it going? I'm doing pretty good. I'm back with a comic book review. Today I'm taking a look at the 2022 hardcover collection, and the story it collects, Batman '89 by Sam Hamm with art by Joe Quinones. I got the hardcover on Tuesday during an unexpected outing with my best friend, Brad. Because the book is still fairly new, I'm not going to give too many spoilers, if any. So let's get into it.

For those of you who don't know, for the last nine years DC Comics has been publishing comic book series based on their TV and movies based on their characters. They've kind of been doing this for years as they've been doing it with their animated shows since The Batman Adventures, based on Batman: The Animated Series, began publication in 1992, but aside from comic book adaptations of some of their movies, DC didn't publish anything based on their shows and movies until they began publishing the comic book series based on Arrow (2012-2020) in 2013. That same year DC began publishing Batman '66, a comic book series based on the original 1966 TV series starring Adam West and Burt Ward, and that's kind of where things began to kick off for comic book series based on DC's TV show and movie properties as they went on to publish Superman '78 and Wonder Woman '77 along with series based on The CW's The Flash and Supergirl. 

Batman '89 is a six issue limited series written by Sam Hamm, who wrote the script for Batman (1989) and the first draft or two for Batman Returns (1992). It's based on ideas that Hamm had come up with with Tim Burton for the movie that became Batman Forever (1995) when Burton was going to direct it and Michael Keaton was going to be Batman in it. Which is a pretty cool idea. Especially because Michael Keaton's return as Batman in the movies has been reduced to being in The Flash (2023) since Batgirl got canceled. But that's neither here nor there.

This series takes place a few years after the events of Batman Returns and Gotham has gotten worse. It's not specified how many years after Batman Returns but it's been enough time that Bruce Wayne has a bit of gray in his hair that wasn't there in the 1992 film. Though Catwoman still looks like Michelle Pfeiffer would've in 1994 or 1995, whenever her Catwoman movie spin-off would've come out had that gone forward. It's also been long enough that Harvey Dent, who was played by Billy Dee Williams in the 1989 film, has started to grow corrupt and begins to hate Batman and Commissioner Gordon. Though it hasn't been so long that Harvey looks the way Billy Dee looked in the mid to late '90s rather than how he looks now. 

Speaking of Commissioner Gordon, he was played by Pat Hingle in the four Batman movies that came out between 1989 and 1997, but the Commissioner Gordon in this series doesn't look like Pat Hingle at all. In fact he looks more like the version of the character from Batman: The Animated Series (1992-1995). Oh and apparently Harvey is dating, and later becomes engaged to, Barbara Gordon, the Commissioner's daughter, who is normally Batgirl and then Oracle in the DC Universe. 

If you've read the scripts for both movies, and the comic book that he wrote and DC published in 1989, Batman: Blind Justice, then you can tell that this was written by Sam Hamm. It's well written but things escalate pretty quickly for basically no reason and the pacing is super fast, almost as if he was writing a movie script or a one shot comic book rather than a six issue limited series. The artwork is also spot on, except for, like I said, Commissioner Gordon for some reason. 

I think it's cool that Bruce was able to fix the Batmobile since it had been pretty badly damaged in Batman Returns. I also like that Bruce still has the original Batsuit from the 1989 movie as well as the suit he had in the 1992 movie. It's in line with Batman in the comics, because he has kept every Batsuit he's ever worn and even goes back to older ones sometimes. To be clear, he's still wearing the Batman Returns Batsuit in this series, but you do see the previous suit hanging up in the Batcave as well as the Batarangs from both movies, which is neat to see. 

I don't think I have much more to say without giving away spoilers, but I enjoyed this book. It was interesting to see plans for a third Batman movie that ultimately never got made come to fruition in comic book form. Even though Keaton is returning as Batman in The Flash, it would be more difficult to do a third movie directed by Tim Burton today as the casts from the first two movies are either not with us anymore (Pat Hingle and Michael Gough) or are much older than they were thirty years ago. Oh and neither Alexander Knox, nor Vicky Vale are in this series either. I definitely recommend checking this book out if you have the chance. It's a pretty good six issue story.

That's it for me for today my friends. I might or might not be back tomorrow for a movie review. It's going to depend on whether I end up going to get my booster shot in the morning or not. If I do, my arm is gonna be stiff and sore, so I'm not going to feel like doing the review. So if I'm not back for a movie review tomorrow then have a great weekend and I will talk to you all later. Take care.

DC Comics's Star Trek Overview Part 9: Star Trek: The Next Generation Annuals (1990-1995)

 Hey everyone! How's it going? I'm doing pretty well for a Wednesday. Today we'll be talking about the Annuals for DC Comics's Star Trek: The Next Generation comic book series. I've only read half of these issues so I won't be able to provide much detail for three out of the six issues. In other words this could possibly be a short post. Let's get into it.

All of these annuals came out in conjunction with the annuals for the TOS comic book series that was running concurrently with this series, so publication details are exactly the same as the TOS annuals. Based on the cover I can tell that TNG Annual #1 is a Q story, written by Q himself, John De Lancie, which makes sense since George Takei (Sulu) wrote the TOS Annual #1 that came out at the same time as this issue. I actually don't mind it when an actor from the Star Trek shows and movies writes a Star Trek novel or comic since they know the characters pretty well. Especially when they were playing the characters.

Annual #2 is a Riker story and has something to do with him meeting an old childhood friend according to Memory Alpha. This is another one that I've never owned or have found anywhere. If I do find it and end up picking it up then I'll do a full review on it.

Up next is Annual #3 and this is the first TNG Annual I ever got. In it Geordi goes to a planet that he'd been to as a young ensign as a friend of Geordi's from that world, reports that his mother is acting strange for some reason and so are many people on his world's ruling council. It turns out they've been infested by the Yeerks....excuse me, I mean the alien parasites from the TNG season 1 episode, "Conspiracy". These parasites were never seen on any of the shows after that one episode and I don't think they've appeared in any novels or any other comic book series. I don't have this issue anymore so I haven't read it in years. I remember liking it.

Annual #4 is my favourite of the six annuals. It has Trills, Romulans, Andorians, a saucer separation, Picard being forced to be host to a Trill criminal's symbiont, and Riker once again trying to outmaneuver Picard as he did in "The Best of Both Worlds Part II" when Picard was assimilated and operating as Locutus. It also sees the return of Ambassador Odan, the Trill we met in the season 4 episode, "The Host". Now this issue came out in 1993, before too much of Trill society had been developed and fleshed out on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. So there are some discrepancies in this issue that would be ignored once the Trill took a more active role on DS9. I still have this issue in my collection.

Annual #5 is the last issue I got when I was a kid. I don't have it in my collection anymore but I did enjoy it. After the Enterprise-D investigates an abandoned space station near an unstable natural phenomenon, Data is killed when the phenomenon strikes the unshielded station and the Enterprise. The rest of the issue is Geordi trying to repair Data and the ship since most of the Enterprise's systems were knocked offline during the blast that disrupted Data.

Annual #6 is the final issue of the annuals. It's also one I didn't have when I was a kid. The story is a direct continuation of the Convergence storyline started in Star Trek Annual #6. Of all the Star Trek annuals I haven't read this one and TOS Annual #6 are probably the ones I want to read the most. Just because it's a TOS/TNG crossover that doesn't happen all that often in Star Trek in general. 

That's all for the TNG annuals. Next week I'll be talking about the three TNG Specials and the following week I'll be wrapping up this overview with miscellaneous Star Trek comic book series that DC published between 1984 and 1996 and don't fit into either of the main series, TOS or TNG. I'll also be back with a comic book review. So until then have a great rest of the day and I will talk to you later. Take care.

Power Rangers Reviews: Mighty Morphin Power Rangers Season 3 (1995-1996)

 Hey everyone! How's it going? I'm doing pretty good. I'm back with my review of season 3 of Mighty Morphin Power Rangers and it's ten episode finale arc, Mighty Morphin Alien Rangers. Originally I was going to do separate reviews for each section of the show, but most people consider Alien Rangers to be part of season 3 and even back in 1996, it wasn't marketed as it's own thing, as even the packaging for the toys continued to use the original MMPR toyline logo, relegating the MMAR logo to the bottom left corner of the packaging. So I decided to just do this single review for the both of them. Without further ado, let's get into it. It's Morphin Time!

Season 3 is a pretty interesting season as it's the only season of Power Rangers as a whole to have multiple multi-part episodes. Other seasons tended to save multi-part episodes for season openings and season endings, or mid-season cliffhanger endings. But the writers and producers had experimented with this format in the tail end of season 2, mainly because the main cast was in Australia shooting the movie and they needed story to accomodate their absence during the three part episode, "The Wedding". Plus "Return of the Green Ranger" also didn't include the usual locations beyond the interior of Angel Grove High, specifically the classroom set. Even then season 2 had more multi-part episodes than season 1 had, and season 3 continued that trend. I'll get into why I think that when I talk about Alien Rangers.

This season took footage from the 18th season of Super Sentai, Ninja Sentai Kakuranger, which had a much lighter tone than Zyuranger and Dairanger had had. It wasn't as big of a deal as it would become two years later with the Sentai footage Saban used for Power Rangers Turbo, but it was still different from what Saban had used previously. The reason it isn't as big of a deal is because, well, season 3 didn't use a whole lot of Sentai footage to begin with. Like with season 2, the footage was primarily restricted to the Zords and the Megazord fights since the villains were made up of Zyuranger villains mixed with Lord Zedd, who had been created specifically for season 2 of Mighty Morphin. The only villains used from Kakuranger were Rita's brother, Rito Revolto, and their father, Master Vile. And Vile only appeared for a total of seven episodes before disappearing forever at the end of the two part opening for Alien Rangers, "Alien Rangers of Aquitar".

Alot more original fight footage was shot for this season as Saban decided that brand recognition was more important than story progression and kept the Rangers in the original Zyuranger and Dairanger suits from seasons 1 and 2. Not to mention the fact that they used the Tenga Warriors, originally called Tengu Warriors, from Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: The Movie (1995) starting in episode 5, "Ninja Quest Part II" with the Putties never being mentioned or seen again until Power Rangers In Space (1998) (Z Putty Patrollers) and Power Rangers Beast Morphers season 2 (2020) (Rita's Putty Patrollers), and in archival footage in Power Rangers Dino Thunder (2004) (Rita's Putty Patrollers) and Power Rangers Dino Fury (2021) (Z Putty Patrollers). 

Mighty Morphin Alien Rangers is where the most footage from Kakuranger was used because Saban finally used the Kakuranger suits for the Aquitian Rangers, which meant they could use fight footage from non-Zord battles unless they were in a place that was particular to Power Rangers, like the water park, or if Billy and the kid Rangers were involved. But I'll talk about that more a little later on.

Season 3 starts weirdly. The first three episodes of the season were used as a backdoor pilot for Saban's next Tokusatsu series, Masked Rider, which took footage from Kamen Rider Black RX (1988-1989), which was the most recent Kamen Rider series to be available for Saban to pull footage from as it was also the last Kamen Rider series to air until Kamen Rider Kuuga debuted in 2000, leaving the '90s completely devoid of Kamen Rider. Saban needed another series to capitalize on the success of Power Rangers as their previous attempt, VR Troopers, was already starting to run out of footage and would ultimately end in early 1996, around the time that Alien Rangers was wrapping up and Power Rangers Zeo was starting. 

While it had it's own toyline, Masked Rider was never as popular as Power Rangers was, and because Saban only had Kamen Rider Black RX to take footage from since Kuuga was still five years away, and Black RX only had 47 episodes to pull footage from, Masked Rider ended in 1996 though would remain in syndication until mid 1997. I'll talk about this more when I talk about Beetleborgs in my Power Rangers Turbo review, but one of the problems of adapting Tokusatsu series in the '90s is that many of them were one-offs or had gone out of production by the time Saban, and others, as we saw the previous year with Superhuman Samurai Syber-Squad, were wanting to create their own superhero franchises based on pre-established Japanese superhero shows. So the material just wasn't there for any of these shows to last more than a year or two the way Power Rangers had thanks to Super Sentai remaining in production throughout the '90s and into the 2000s, the 2010s, and the 2020s.

So even though "A Friend in Need" opened season 3 of Mighty Morphin Power Rangers, it could still be considered part of season 2 as it continued to use the last season 2 opening introduced in "Goldar's Vice Versa", and the Ninjazords, Ninjor, Rito, the season 3 morphing sequence, and the season 3 opening credits sequence weren't introduced until episodes 4 to 7, "Ninja Quest". 

Season 3 is much more story heavy than seasons 1 and 2 were, as there's alot going on with the arrival of Rito, the destruction of the Thunderzords and the Tigerzord, the introduction of Ninjor, and the departure of yet another Ranger. There's still some great character episodes in the first half of the season, though it's primarily focused on Rocky, Adam, and Kimberly. In fact, Kimberly has the most episodes devoted to her throughout this entire season, though Aisha does have one solid episode in the two-parter, "Stop the Hate Master". But with the Green Ranger storyline concluded in season 2, Tommy doesn't have much going on this season and neither does Billy. Though he gets more to do in Mighty Morphin Alien Rangers as he becomes a mentor to the Aquitian Rangers during their time on Earth, and takes a leadership role while the Earth Power Rangers are children, being that he's the only one who was able to be restore to his original age before Rita and Zedd destroyed the Power Coins and transformed Billy's restoration device into a monster. Because of course Lord Zedd turns things into monsters.

I don't know for sure, but I suspect that Mighty Morphin Alien Rangers was done the way it was done because it gave the cast a chance to film the first few episodes of Power Rangers Zeo. The final episode of Mighty Morphin Power Rangers season 3, "Rangers in Reverse" aired on November 27th, 1995. However Mighty Morphin Alien Rangers didn't start airing until February 5th, 1996, and finished up on February 17th. Zeo didn't start airing until almost two months later, on April 20th. So with the main Ranger cast, aside from David Yost (Billy), not being needed for Alien Rangers until the final episode, "Hogday Afternoon Part II", they could shoot some episodes for Zeo or finish up any season 3 episodes they had left over, depending on when Alien Rangers started filming. 

Season 3 had it's own toyline of course. An Ivan Ooze figure was released in the season 3 line rather than in the movie line that was out around the same time for some reason, and the Deluxe Ninja Megazord and Deluxe Falconzord were re-released as part of the season 3 line. The line also had Auto-Morphin figures for Tommy as the White Ranger, and Rocky, Adam and Aisha as the Red, Black, and Yellow Rangers, but no figure for Kat as the Pink Ranger. They also had talking toys for the six Rangers and Lord Zedd. I don't know about the Rangers but Lord Zedd says, "Earth will be mine!" when you press the red button on the back of his neck. The Talking Lord Zedd is the only figure from this line I ever had and I still have it in my collection today. Also, the five Aquitian Rangers and their Battle Borgs were made, but they were released as part of the season 3 line, rather than their own dedicated toyline. 

By the time season 3 debuted on Fox Kids in 1995, the comic book license for the franchise had transferred over to Marvel Comics, who had a ton of big franchise licenses at the time, including Star Trek and Gargoyles. They produced two series based on season 3. The first had the Rangers in their regular Ranger suits, though occasionally the suits would look more like their movie counterparts rather than the versions from the TV show for some reason. This series only lasted for seven issues from 1995 to 1996.

The second series, which was published concurrently with the first series and ran for only five issues, was called Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: Ninja Rangers as the Rangers are in their Ninja Ranger suits in the entire series for whatever reason. This series is notable for having Lord Zedd rebuild the original Power Coins and the destroyed Thunderzords to use for his group of Dark Rangers in issue #3. All through season 2 Lord Zedd planned several time to have his own dark heroes who would destroy the world, rather than save it, but, aside from the lame looking Dark Rangers, who showed up very briefly in "Green No More Part II" and never actually did anything, none of his plans actually came to fruition. Unfortunately the story comes to a cliffhanger conclusion and the story was never continued in future issues as the series was canceled only two issues later. The two series combined had Marvel publishing this series well into Zeo's airing in 1996. Ninja Rangers was a flipbook series, that was combined with a comic book series based on VR Troopers.

The Ninja Megazord, Shogun Megazord, Falconzord, and Ivan Ooze were all featured in the SNES game Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: The Fighting Edition.

Unlike the previous two seasons, which had alot of VHS releases, season 3 only had two. The first was "Ninja Quest" which was part of the All-Time Favorites Collection. The other was "I'm Dreaming of a White Ranger" which was actually a direct-to-video special first before airing on TV as part of the season. The video version has an extra scene where Kat calls the Rangers from Australia on the Viewing Globe at the Command Center to wish them a Merry Christmas. So timeline wise this episode takes place between scenes in "A Different Shade of Pink Part III" as Kat is good, she knows the Rangers's secret identities, but Kimberly is still there as the Pink Ranger. However, in the aired version Kat's scene is removed and it aired between "The Potion Notion" and "A Ranger Castrastrophe Part I", which was Kat's introduction in the series. So not as many VHS releases as previous seasons had.

a compilation of scenes from the last five episodes of Alien Rangers was released on VHS with the first two episodes of Zeo, "A Zeo Beginning", on Power Rangers Zeo: Zeo Quest, which was one of only two VHS releases that Zeo had.

Like with the previous two seasons, season 3 and Alien Rangers were released in Germany sometime in the late 2000s. 

Then in 2012 Shout! Factory released individual DVD sets for both season 3 and Alien Rangers. While I saw all of Alien Rangers in reruns on Fox Kids leading up to the premiere of Power Rangers Zeo in April 1996, I didn't see the majority of season 3 until I got the complete series DVD set in 2014. I saw the final episode, "Rangers in Reverse" just before Alien Rangers reran in 1996, and I saw "A Different Shade of Pink Part II" on CHRO sometime in 1997 or 1998, around the time I stopped watching Power Rangers entirely, but I didn't get to see the full season until I did my first watch through of the series after I got the complete series set.

Speaking of the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: The Complete Series DVD box set, the Alien Rangers disc was included in the season 3 DVD case rather than it's own separate set within the bigger box, even though Alien Rangers had had it's own separate release when the individual season sets were released. This set is how I saw all of season 3 for the first time.

Overall season 3 is a pretty good season of the show. It's shorter than previous seasons, but there's also alot going on in this season too. And unlike previous seasons, the Zeo Crystal, which was introduced in the final multi-part episode, "Master Vile and the Metallic Armor", would become the crucial element for the Rangers to become the Zeo Rangers in the next season, even though things like that would've been one and done macguffin items in seasons 1 and 2. Next time we'll be going Zeo when I review season 4, Power Rangers Zeo. 

That's it for me for today. I will be back tomorrow with the next installment of my DC Comics's Star Trek overview series, and I've got a special review coming on Thursday or Friday. So until then have a great evening and I will talk to you all later. Take care.

She-Hulk: Attorney at Law Season 1 Review

 Hey everyone! How's it going? I'm doing pretty well. So today I'm here to talk about the first season of She-Hulk: Attorney at Law which dropped it's season finale today. I say first season and season finale, but as of when I'm writing this review a second season hasn't been announced yet though the people involved with the show say that it's possible that the show will get a second season. Similar to what happened with Loki last year. There will be some spoilers for this season so if you're watching the show and aren't caught up yet, particularly with the finale, this is your spoiler warning. Let's get into it.

Going into this show I was skeptical. I'm not the biggest Marvel fan and after my friend told me what the She-Hulk comics were like generally and reading more about the comics on the internet, I wasn't sure how I felt about this show being a comedy, especially one with fourth wall breaks and that kind of stuff that I don't care for in superhero and comic book movies and TV shows, preferring the more campy shows like Batman (1966-1968) which are ridiculous but play it like it's a serious show rather than playing it up for the comedy. But I enjoyed it as I watched it. I just didn't feel engaged with it in the way I've felt with Star Trek: Strange New Worlds and Superman & Lois. 

I enjoyed the show. It was fun, though some things didn't really make all that much sense to me, but that's more from this show being my introduction to Jennifer Walters/She-Hulk and not being used to the fourth wall breaking style of comedy. Not to mention I've never watched The Incredible Hulk (2008) all the way through, so the Blonsky stuff was new to me too.

Tatiana Maslany was fantastic as Jen/She-Hulk. This is the first thing I've seen her in since alot of the movies and shows she's been in in the past are ones I either didn't know about, or had no interest in. But she was good. The funny thing is is that Ginger Gonzaga, who plays Jen's best friend Nikki here, was in Alone Together (2018) as Benji's older sister, and I'd just finished watching that when She-Hulk started, so that was cool. It was also neat seeing Josh Segarra in another comic book TV show after he'd been such a major part of season 5 of Arrow as Adrian Chase/Prometheus. I really liked him there, so to see him again here was great.

I loved Jen. More than any other MCU character, including Peter Parker, Jen represented the regular people like myself, who struggles to get through an average day and it was great to see. I was a little thrown off at first, when she said she wasn't going to become a superhero like Bruce did when he became the Hulk. But, not all of the early MCU films were superhero movies. Thor (2011) was a fantasy film, Captain America: The First Avenger (2011) was a war movie etc. So I was fine with this being a legal comedy rather than a superhero show. 

I think my favourite part of this show was watching Jen become more comfortable as Jen rather than using her She-Hulk persona as a crutch/shield. That speaks to all of us because life is about learning to feel more comfortable with ourselves, even when someone appears to be confident to the outside world. It didn't need to be flashy or a CGI fest, and I'm glad it wasn't.

I have to talk about the season finale, because it was so much nonsense but so much fun at the same time. I was expecting a sudden major battle to take place between Blonsky transforming into Abomination, Todd transforming into a Hulk, and the Hulk showing up. But then the craziest thing happened, Jen was like, "What? No, this is stupid! Who do I talk to about this crap?" (I'm paraphrasing here) and she comes out of the show onto the Disney lot and goes to see Kevin Feige, who is actually a robot named K.E.V.I.N. who is said to be in charge of the MCU and Jen proceeds to have a nice lawyer speech about why her show doesn't need giant monster fights just to conform to the Marvel formula, and she wins the argument. I loved it! It was also fun seeing the villain of the season just be a dude, who hates She-Hulk because she's a woman, which seems on point with alot of internet trolls. 

Daredevil's introduction was a bit weird since I assume that Daredevil: Born Again will have a more serious tone than She-Hulk does. Honestly though I loved the connection between Jen and Matt and I loved that somebody was able to write a more lighthearted version of Daredevil even though that's not the normal tone you might associate with the character.

Overall I had a fun time watching this show. It may not be for everyone, but I recommend giving it a try. It's funny, easy to watch, and the only thing you really need to know going into it is who Hulk, Blonsky, Wong, and Daredevil are. That's it. It doesn't even take place in New York. I hope the show does get a second season because that would be really cool.

Alright my friends, that's it for me for today. I might be back tomorrow, but that depends on what I decide to write about. If not I'll be back on Sunday for my combo review of Mighty Morphin Power Rangers season 3 and Mighty Morphin Alien Rangers. Until then have a great afternoon and I will talk to you later. Take care. 

DC Comics's Star Trek Overview Part 8: Star Trek: The Next Generation (1989-1996)

 Hey everyone! It's Wednesday once again, which means I'm back to talk about DC Comics's Star Trek comic book line that ran from 1984 until 1996. Today we'll be heading back to 1989 to take a look at the second Star Trek: The Next Generation that DC published in tandem with their second series based on TOS. So without further ado let's get into it.

Star Trek: The Next Generation #1 came out at the same time as Star Trek #1 did. However, unlike the TOS series, this TNG series did not have an overarching story running through 24 issues of it. Instead it focused on individual story arcs and standalone issues that could be read on their own without having read previous issues. This series also took place during the TV series, starting in the time period of the show's second season which ran from 1988 to 1989. Which is odd because the date on the front cover says October 1989, which means it was published in July or August, depending on how far apart DC had the cover date from the actual publication date. Which means that it was published between the second and third seasons of the show, but it may very well have been written while the second season was still airing. As we know from the original TNG mini-series that DC published in 1988, the lead time for these writers was months away from when the issue had to be printed and published. 

The first issue starts with Picard returning to a planet that he had visited while he was the captain of the USS Stargazer. I picked this issue up a while ago since it came out when I was only two years old. I also reviewed it a few months ago, so if you wanna know what I thought of it, you can check out the review. Pablo Marcos returned as the artist from the previous series and did the art for the first six issues of this series, and then returned for several other issues throughout the series' run. Michael Jan Friedman, who had already written a few Star Trek novels in the '80s, was the primary writer for this series, with other writers only doing three of the issues.

While the TOS series mostly stayed within the time period between Star Trek V and Star Trek VI, except for the issues that took place during the TV show, the TNG jumps from season 2 to season 3 with issue 5. Which makes sense because having the comic be a direct tie-in to the TV show, while the show is airing, rather than be a tie-in to a series of movies means moving into a new season when the TV show does. 

The first story arc that had more than two or three parts to it, and the only one to have been collected in it's own trade paperback edition, was The Star Lost, which I've also reviewed on this blog. It ran from issue #20 to #24. 

As I stated in the introduction to this series, and in many other blog posts over the years, Star Trek: The Next Generation #31 is the first issue of the series I ever got when I was a kid. It, along with Star Trek #31, was my introduction to the comic book medium. The crew of the Enterprise-D, along with Captain Okona of the independent ship, Erstwhile, are looking for Commander Riker, who is stranded on a space station caught between two dimensions.

The first multi-issue storyline I read was issues #33 to #35. In it the Enterprise-D is taking a delegation from a warrior race who hate Klingons to a conference, leaving Worf without much to do on the mission. However, Picard makes the mistake of telling Worf that he wishes he had a hundred more like him onboard and Q happens to hear it, transforming everyone except for Worf who is already a Klingon, and Data, who is an Android, into Klingons. Which makes things with the delegation pretty tense and even causes Riker to take Picard out and assume command in a very un-Rikerlike manner. Which then in turn forces Worf to take actions he normally wouldn't take. I still have this arc in my collection and it's pretty great.

The first major arc I read though was an unnamed one that was told from issue #39 to #44 where the ship is investigating an artificial moon and are attacked by an aggressive alien race which forces Picard to leave the away team on the moon and order a saucer separation, which causes the saucer section, commanded by Riker on the other side of the galaxy and confronted by one of the alien ships. While characters from the show, besides the senior staff, had appeared in the comic before, this was the first time so many of them appeared at once. Keiko and Molly, Chief O'Brien, Worf's son Alexander, Mot the Barber, Lieutenant Solis from the season 1 episode "The Arsenal of Freedom", Lieutenant Burke from "The Best of Both Worlds", Lieutenant D'Sora from the season 4 episode, "In Theory", Ms. Kyle (the school teacher introduced in season 5), and Robin Lefler all showed up. As did Ensign Ro. It's one of my favourite arcs from this series and it's great. I kept it in my collection all these years.

The next major arc that was published, and the next one that I read was "The Worst of Both Worlds" follow-up to the two part TNG episode, "The Best of Both Worlds". In this story, the Enterprise-D and her crew find themselves transported to another universe where the crew failed to rescue Captain Picard from the Borg and as Locutus, he oversaw the assimilation of Earth, as well as the Federation as a whole. Riker is the captain of a battered stardrive section, Commander Shelby is his first officer, Data and many of the others such as Guinan, Keiko, Molly and others were killed when the saucer section was badly damaged in battle and had to be abandoned. And Picard has to face what he would've been responsible for had he not been rescued by the crew in "The Best of Both Worlds Part II". It's a fantastic arc.

 The final arc that I read was called "War and Madness" and deals with the Borg, the Tholians, and Riker's dad, Kyle. This arc, and the rest of the series, takes place between the series finale, "All Good Things..." and Star Trek Generations (1994).

I didn't get to read the full arc because the last issue of the series that my dad got for me was #74. So I've never read the full story, which is too bad because I was interested in seeing the return of Hugh the Borg and his fellow disconnected Borg from the season 6 finale/season 7 premiere "Descent". And as you can see from the cover of this issue, Gowron makes his first appearance in the comic for the first time. At least I think it's his first appearance as he didn't appear in any issue I had growing up, and except for issue #46, I had every issue from #31 to #74. So that was interesting.

A couple of years later a friend of mine at school gave issue #80, which was not only the final issue of the series, but also the final issue of a two part story arc where Q turns the entire crew into Androids, because Picard remarked that he wished he had more of them like Data at the funeral of a fallen crew member. You think Picard would've learned from when Q turned the crew into Klingons all the way back in issue #33. But, no, he didn't. Only this time they end up dealing with space pirates.

A few years later, sometime in the 2000s, I got issue #79 as a birthday or Christmas present from my sister. I was finally able to read the first part of the final two part crew turned into Androids by Q story. It was cool, but I do wish I could've gotten it brand new. Obviously this wasn't the final issue that I got, though it was the last one I got until I got issue #1 a while back. 

The first trade paperback collection this series had was The Star Lost which collected the story arc of the same name from issues #20 to #24. I got this trade last year and, like I said, I reviewed it on the blog earlier this year. It's a great story, but sadly this was the only arc from the series to get it's own trade paperback collection.

The final trade paperback collection for the series was The Best of Star Trek: The Next Generation published by DC in 1994. It collects issues 5, 6, and 19 and the first two annuals, so not as many issues as the earlier The Best of Star Trek collection that I talked about in my TOS segment of this overview series. I remember seeing it advertised in an issue of the TOS series, though I don't remember which one.

That's it for my look at the main TNG series. Next will be the annuals, the specials, and some miscellaneous Star Trek comics that DC published in addition to the two main series at the time. So there are still three parts of this overview to go. Until then join me tomorrow for my review of She-Hulk: Attorney at Law which has it's season/series finale dropping tomorrow on Disney+. I'm not sure when that review is coming out because I gotta go get some bloodwork done in the morning so we'll see how long that takes. Until then have a wonderful evening and I will talk to you all later. Take care.