Season 10, Episode 7: The Bear Necessities

"The Bear Necessities"
Episode 7
Air Date: March 16th, 2002

Thank God for Taylor! Not just because Alyson Kierman is give the finest performance out of the new cast of rangers but Taylor is just the most interesting in terms of backstory, personality and motives.  She's an Air Force pilot who discovered the Animarium thanks to her Eagle Zord calling out to her and inadvertently leading her there during a mission.  She grabs her crystal and ejects out of her jet, landing on the Animarium.  She runs into Princess Shayla, who comes out of the sacred well and introduces herself to her as well as why she has been chosen to be a ranger.  At first, I was surprised by Taylor's initial reaction to all of this otherworldly stuff but we learn later in the episode, she saw the Animarium as a child on a flight with her mother; making it very clear why she became a fighter pilot in the first place! Very nice! :) It's clear Taylor misses her former life at the Air Force Base as we see at the beginning of the episode but her calling as a ranger being more important, especially since she dreamed about discovering the Animarium since she was a child.  It calls back to "Click, Click, Zoom" and why she seemed so touched by that mom reading the story of the Animarium to her.  :)

What I also enjoyed about this episode is that the rangers for once have to work together and figure out a solution to an Org who forces them to be powerless for a while.  Unlike the last few episodes where the rangers are given the easy way out by being given a new zord, new weapon, etc.  The Cellphone Org creating a force field over the city puts the rangers into a situation where they have to rely on their wits and not their powers for once; as Alyssa comes up with a plan for the team to break the force field together.  It's not much, but it's progression in the right direction; showing that this new team is quite capable of handling things without their power like previous teams!  Good! :)  Meanwhile,  Taylor can't morph and is very injured; being chased after Putrids helping the Cellphone Org.  She finds help in two very creepy looking twin boys as they use their powers to help her.  So...Taylor's not gonna ask how they can do that? Who are they?  And how they can heal her like that?  Could be a trap for all she knows but hey, I guess since they saved her and healed her, returning the favor is at least she can do right?

So she uses her military experience to sneak them back into the Air Force Base as they use their random magical powers to bring her to a dark area where there is a very deep cliff, they direct her to get two flowers at the very bottom for her.....ok....huhhhhhh??? O_o  But Taylor says yes to this and almost dies thanks to doing this by falling down trying to make her way down.  Of course, thanks to the other rangers' efforts in destroying one of the Org's antenas, she's able to morph and save her own damn self by grabbing the flowers at the base and flying back up to give it to them.  For her bravery, they give her........two big old seeds....-_-....Anyway, Taylor soon rejoins the other rangers and they use their combined weapons to form the Savage Sword to destroy Cellphone Org.  Soon Toxica and Jindrax arrive so she can make him grow as the rangers summon the Wild Zords for help.  They form the Wild Force Megazord but the Cellphone Org's attack is too powerful for the megazord to handle.

That's when our favorite weirdo twins return to use the flowers Taylor got for them to turn into.....new Wild Zords......yaaaaayyyyyyy....-_-  Yes, once again, the rangers need random new zords to save the day FOR them.  While the Black Bear Zord and Polar Bear Zords are cool looking and have an awesome display of their own individual abilities.....I'm just SOOOOO annoyed already by this season's structure:  A lost Wild Zord is calling a specific ranger, Princess Shayla knows nothing about it, New Org is too much for the rangers, rangers get new weapon or zord to help them, suddenly Shayla remembers something about that specific Wild Zord....like he randomly being excited about the "Bear Brothers being back...."  -_-  So Wild Zord can disguise themselves as humans??? Explain that Shayla??? Makes sense given the later half of the season but Shayla is making no sense as a mentor as even Zordon contributed into the advancement of the rangers' development in terms of arsenal (weapons AND megazords) as well as an overall team.  It's the Wild Zords always coming out of no where to help the rangers, NOT Shayla, so why is she even there then??? O_o  Anyway, so with these two new Wild Zords, Alyssa and Max can use them to summon them and attach them to Wild Force Megazord to form the Wild Force Megazord: Double...Knuckle.....-_-  So after destroying the Cellphone Org with this new formation, the Wild Force Megazord suddenly disassembles as the Red Lion cries out in pain.  As the rangers wonders what is going on, Cole is deeply worried of course.  At least we got a nice, serious cliffhanger to end the episode.  So far, the season is serious mixed and sloppily written, while there are some interesting elements, the show is falling into a systematic and honestly, problematic cycle more basic than the first season of the show.  BUT....this was a nice little highlight in Taylor's development and backstory as well as showcases the Wild Force rangers as a competent team when unmorphed.  At least that's something, right? O_o

Final Morph: C+