REVIEW: Dino Super Charge 7 "Home Run Koda"
The last few episodes have included great elements in a context that was largely sub-par. Interestingly, and in contrast, the enjoyability of this episode is high with a lot of flaws. Not sure what that says, but it’s just my observation. While plot is certainly a big deal, tone and presentation can make or break an episode just as easily. As a result, most of this review will be complaints about an episode that I largely enjoyed. The places where this episode faltered was plot; the places where it succeeded was presentation. How exactly did this break down? Let’s find out.
The episode opens on a weird scene where the Rangers are just suddenly playing sports. It’s not that it’s weird that they’re having fun, but incidentally the only person who’s expressed interest in competitive sports is Riley. All the other Rangers just train for fights. Most of the scene is a bunch of funny shorts where each of the Rangers try to teach Koda how to play a sport and fail, generally because he’s too strong. Things like this have been Dino Charge’s strong suit and continue to be. Ivan’s comments about how modern sports are nothing like his own (jousting or greased pig wrestling) are nice; he gets another funny aside when he blows a ram’s horn trumpet at a sporting event. I’m not sure if the choices of sport say anything about the Rangers themselves, but we have tennis for Tyler, rugby for Chase, golf for Shelby and baseball for Riley, which ends up being the easiest sport for Koda to excel in.
A monster appearance interrupts their fun. I kind of like Game-Face’s design and name, possibly because I came up with a similar monster as a kid, so maybe I’m biased. (His name was Sports Nut, though.) One of the best things about this part is the panicked reaction from the random civilians, which is one of the things that shows the difference in attitude between Power Rangers and randoms. The other athletes immediately run for cover, despite the fact that as athletes they could probably tangle with at least the Vivix. I think that over the years, it’s become maybe a little less clear why certain people become Rangers, and scenes like this help to establish the higher level of preparedness and willingness present in people chosen for the power. Also, Koda’s grabbing of a baseball bat to protect himself feels similar to the shovel usage of Dino Charge’s first half, but it seems more personal to him as a club is the weapon he would identify with most strongly. His efforts to repel the monster are noticed by Ted, the baseball coach for the Amber Beach Earthquakes, which kicks off the main plot thread of Koda becoming a professional athlete this episode.
I did like how early Riley’s overenthusiasm and vicarious experience were highlighted in the episode. From the beginning Koda seems on the fence about this opportunity and it’s Riley influencing him to take it. I’ve seen people argue that this character trait doesn’t fit Riley, and I am of two minds on this. It’s actually quite apparent that Riley is one of the more mercenary Rangers on this team. Essentially all of his focus episodes after “The Tooth Hurts” involve him cheating or using tactics outside of the rules in order to win. I’ve posited on this perhaps being a facet of his logical mind; why impose arbitrary boundaries on behavior that prevent you from reaching your goals, if your objective is to reach that goal? At the same time, it’s a little odd that someone with such a sociopathic relationship with morality would be chosen to be a Power Ranger, and in episodes where he isn’t the focus (which this isn’t, despite the name) this trait isn’t really present. I can, however, easily believe that Riley was a baseball lover who wanted to be better at sports but didn’t have the physical prowess of someone like Koda or even Burt. Also, he’s a farmboy, so he’s probably more active/outdoorsy than the average person, and his fencing background gives him more manual dexterity.
The main issue with this plot comes in the form of fridge logic. In the real world, Koda would never be able to be a baseball star in such a short time or at all. Ignoring the lack of identification--as far as the United States is concerned, Koda doesn’t exist in-universe--there are so many plot holes with respect to Koda’s being placed on the Earthquakes team that it’s not really beneficial to go over them all. But it does give us an interesting contrast between the Rangers and villains that is usually switched when it comes to this sort of thing. Game-Face trains the Vivix to be stronger and better at combat, while Riley and Koda train for frivolous reasons. The result (spoiler alert) is that the Rangers need a new Dino Charger courtesy of Kendall to defeat the Vivix.
So the heroes use bigger and stronger weapons in order to defeat the villains’ teamwork, focus and dedication. That...is an interesting role-reversal to say the least, and I’m not sure that’s the Aesop they wanted to put forth, but there it is. Generally, the hero tries to defeat the villain, fails, then goes away and trains harder to be able to defeat him, usually despite the villain’s far superior powers and owing in large part to the villains' lack of teamwork. But here, the Rangers are the villains; they handily defeat Game-Face and his mooks without even morphing, and then he has to train the Vivix to come back stronger and harder against the Rangers, who go on to win because of their shiny new toys after spending the majority of the episode divided.
As for the baseball plot, Koda continues to train with Riley while causing a rift between the two of them and the remainder of the team. While Koda tries to persuade Riley to get back to helping the team, Riley assures Koda that they don’t have to do their jobs as Rangers, and at this point the Green Energem should have just imploded to be honest. It even gets to the point where Riley leaves the communicators in Koda’s duffel bag after assuring the team that they’d be reachable by them. The people I was watching with were pretty disgusted by Riley by the end of the episode and with good reason, especially since he never really has to make up for his single-mindedness and gets what he wanted in the end. That was probably the biggest problem for me. Riley is never really shown that he was wrong and doesn’t have to learn a lesson regarding priorities.
Sure, in order to save the civilians, Koda has to throw away the magic exploding bat that Game-Face accidentally left him, but he later wins the baseball game with his caveman instincts anyway. While Riley and Koda do need to leave the game temporarily, I feel like it would have been better for them to lose without the bat, or even admit to inadvertently cheating, since it would have done several things. One, they’d have paid for shirking their duties. Two, they’d have been banned from baseball, since we’re probably not going to see this plot again. And three, perhaps most importantly, it would have given a logical reason why Koda isn’t locked into a ten-year contract with the Earthquakes. There are some serious issues with the resolution of this plot, but the tone, to the writers’ and Chip’s benefit, is so good that it helps smooth those over. I'm a sucker for grunts wearing funny outfits, and this episode delivered in that regard. Also, Koda is such a fun character that he makes you smile whenever he's on screen for more than a minute and a half. Furthermore, morphed Kendall action is always a bonus.
Despite the feel-good tone and great presentation, “Home Run Koda” is perhaps the most morally troubling of Dino Charge. I’ve seen it compared to a Tzachor-era or Kalish-era plot, and I have to regretfully agree with the latter. The Disney Rangers were frequently lacking in moral fiber and it showed in many of the issues they faced. Taking the easy way out, being insubordinate and impulsive, even displaying prejudice--these are characteristics that are perhaps realistic, but Power Rangers should be more like the people in the beginning of the episode. The people who ran toward danger to protect others who had to run away from it are my Power Rangers. They are not the weak-willed shadow of a caveman Koda was when he allowed Riley to talk him into ignoring his duty, or the one-track sports-nut nihilist that Riley became once he was given the promise of stardom and vicarious glory. Let’s hope they steer away from that, because despite the enjoyability of the episode, this is still a kids’ show and a potentially influential one at that. Not to be the Moral Guardian hand-wringer soccer mom, but there’s value in presenting the Rangers as ideal. Hopefully the midseason finale will give us more of that.
