Season 1, Episode 22: The Trouble With Shellshock

"The Trouble With Shellshock"
Episode 22
Air Date: October 11, 1993

So we've come off a run of episodes dealing with the rangers' toughest scenario yet. We've introduce a new ranger, new villain as well as a whole new zord.  The show finally changed and evolved. Not by much but it was nice to see the main plot moving with Rita's fight against the rangers. So it's utterly disappointing to go back to basics with this episode. Teens are hanging out, wacky hijinks from Bulk and Skull, random Puttie fight that looks lame because of weak direction, goofy looking monster of the week, some terrible exposition from Zordon on how to defeat said monster of the week, tedious zord battle, epilogue with the teens laughing into freeze frame! Wash, rinse, repeat!  The only difference now is Tommy and how he will come to be the "save the day" ranger for like the rest of the series until the 3rd season.

Anyway, Squatt and Baboo are put center stage this episode and these two really are the monster equivalent of Bulk and Skull. They're incompetent, annoying and are overconfident idiots who think they can prove themselves to Rita, when she's asleep, by making their own monster to defeat the rangers. Where was Finster during all this when they were using his monster matic???!  Anyway, they make Shellshock...again, possibly the goofiest looking monster yet with a traffic light attached to it's shell, because he's a turtle. Shellshock...get it!!! URGH!!! After that lame Puttie fight, Tommy says he's late for his karate class, Bulk and Skull annoy but this time actually punished for their idiocy, thank God!  I love how Zack is beating everyone at basketball....just keep piling on the stereotypes, writers. Will Trini be good at math next??? Anyway...

Squatt, Baboo and Shellshock arrive to mess with the rangers as they morph into action when Shellshock blasts the basketball.  Immediately, Shellshock uses his Green Light blast that makes Trini unable to stop moving. The fight moves to a different location where Shellshock's other abilities are just ridiculous.  Making a bat come out of his shell, etc. He then stops three of the rangers in their tracks with his Red Light blast; leaving Jason to retreat back at the Command Center.  Back at the Moon Palace, Goldar is furious that Squatt and Baboo made a monster and tried to fight the rangers without Rita just as she wakes up and is...surprisingly happy about it! Wow! O_o So Rita sends Shellshock back down and makes him grow. Back in the Command Center, Alpha is working on freeing three frozen rangers while Zordon exposition begins. He sent Trini on a mission to the Mountain of Hope to retrieve some magic flowers which their pollen will cure the rangers and break the spell his traffic light blasts have on them.

Jason, meanwhile, must handle Shellshock alone until Trini can get it.  Tommy is....just doing random karate moves with a staff..... Jason is getting his ass handed to him as Trini is making her way up the mountain. Zordon says Trini can do it even though she thinks she can't and is growing tired but Zordon sent her zord to help....which I don't get because we only see a transparent version of it instead of the actual zord. Anyway, Trini finds the flowers and calls on the power of the Sabertooth Tiger....for reasons! Meanwhile, as Jason continues to have trouble with Teenage Mutant Traffic Turtle, he finally contacts Tommy and he morphs into action. Tommy calls for Dragonzord with his flute and the two zords fight Shellshock.  But he blasts them with a Red Light and freezes their zords.  Luckily Trini arrives and uses the power of the flowers to break the spell on the zords and the rangers. The combined strength of Tommy's Dragonzord and Jason's Tyrannosaurs destroys the monster and the restored rangers back at the Command Center celebrate with Alpha. See Rita, now you have a headache again!!! P

The episode ends with Zack getting embarrassed by Billy in basketball. Well thanks for at least not letting Zack be THAT good at basketball and making Billy look more competent! Overall, meh, it's an okay episode, I just wish after the Green With Evil arc we had more plot movement. This episode is such filler and goes back to the comfortably basic structure of the pre-Tommy episodes. But there have been worse and will be more worse episodes!

Final Morph: C-