Power Rangers Prime #3 is written by Melissa Flores and published by BOOM! Studios. Illustration is by Michael Yg, colours by Fabi Marques and letters by Ed Dukeshire. Main cover art (left) is by Dan Mora.
Power Rangers Prime #3 is available now, in print and on digital platforms where all good comic books are sold. Grab your digital copy from Amazon Comixology right here.
Synopsis
A new Ranger emerges! Our heroes enter a museum filled with Rangers artifacts, when they suddenly encounter Rita herself. An epic face-off ensues that literally brings relics from the past to life!
But when the governor of Angel Grove calls in her elite team of Troopers… a fateful choice from Rita will change the Prime universe forever!
Review
This is it Ranger Nation. The slow bubble of Melissa Flores’ Power Rangers Prime is becoming a sizzle. BOOM! Studios took a serious gamble on ending its long-running and hugely successful series for this original take on the legacy. That gamble has clearly been paying off. But this month Flores’ long-game storytelling starts to reveal its cards and what has so far been a gripping series becomes a compelling one.
Picking up almost immediately after the events of issue #2, Power Rangers Prime #3 is essentially the crucial moment in a pilot episode where the team becomes backed in to a corner. With no other options it’s finally time for a group of Rangers to be formed. That tells me two very important things about Flores and the series. One, Flores’ is acutely aware of the audience anticipation for seeing the Rangers suit up. Two, that moment is now right around the corner and that’s hugely exciting.
Issue #3 frames events in the present day with flashbacks which give context to Mark’s connection with the Angel Grove Natural History Museum. Anecdotally, I love that this version of Angel Grove feels far more like an expansive city. One complaint looking back at the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers show as an adult is how the budget really restricted the scale of its concept. Obviously the comic book medium means those constrains can easily be sidestepped. But Flores, Yg and Marques make it look effortless. This brief glimpse in to Mark’s past also cleverly adds to the class issues which exist on this version of Earth. The world-building is truly exquisite.
In the present day we’re still far more clued in on what’s really going on than Mark, Lauren, Jun and Orion. With Valentina having ratted them out to the authorities there’s a ticking clock on things going sideways. But in true Power Rangers fashion it’s also now abundantly clear that this is our team. Of course this franchise has always been about finding family. But Power Rangers Prime makes it clear it fundamentally understands that doesn’t always mean seeing eye-to-eye with your team mates. It’s far to say these guys are still at the storming stage of their journey through Tuckman’s model of team building.
Meanwhile Flores’ beguiling new take on Rita Repulsa continues to be taking a greatest hits trip through the Power Rangers universe. This issue takes her to a legendary location where she meets up with an equally unexpected character from Power Rangers: Jungle Fury. This kind of reverence for the legacy of the franchise is Lower Decks style rewarding. It adds a level of unpredictability to each issue which makes it even more exciting.
Finally we’re starting to see the two storylines head towards a convergence. Again, it’s clear that Flores is aware that the slow burn approach can only work for so long. The right amount of time has been taken to lay the foundations and now we’re seeing the next phase of storytelling begin. The anticipation easily builds as Rita and the teens end up in close proximity and it leads to the back half of issue #3 becoming a scintillating page-turner. It’s not that Power Rangers Prime has been without conflict. There’s been plenty to hook the reader in to this new concept. But this is the turning point where it surfaces at the top of the reading pile and becomes the go-to book each month.
It all leads up to a jaw dropper of a final page which I’m sure Flores has been eagerly awaiting fans to witness. It’s the moment Michael Yg gets to say “here are my Rangers” and boy is it worth the wait. It’s been a long time since a single page has left me so pumped for the next issue of a book…
Verdict
Power Rangers Prime #3 is the moment this series hits the stratosphere. Flores already brave storytelling reaches a turning point that will have Ranger fans on the edge of their seats waiting for the next issue. This series just became a gamer changer…
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
