Season 11, Episode 34: General Deception, Part 2

"General Deception, Part 2"
Episode 34
Air Date: October 3rd, 2003

So the rangers continue to get their collective asses kicked when they decide form the Hurricane Megazord.  Little do they know, Zurgane is using their finishing move to retrieve the last of the rangers' megazord power before his megazord is destroyed and he ejects out of it just in time.  As the rangers celebrate Zurgane's apparent destruction, Cam doesn't believe they've won yet and feels it was "too easy" before heading back to Ninja Ops with Tori.  Meanwhile, Zurgane shows Lothor the disc he used to clone the rangers' megazord power as Shimazu and Vexacus overhear and plan to move forward with their plan.  Apparently, his plan involves just watching and waiting from this point on in the episode....ok...not much of a plan, more of procrastinating at this point.  Jesus Vexacus, I had so much faith in your villainy and all you do is talk menacing so far but don't do much of anything.  Ehh!

Anyway, back at the camp site, looks like the guys' food was eaten by a bunch of wild animals and after some mildly humorous banter about being ninjas in the face of survival, they each decide to go off and catch some food for the night.  Back at Ninja Ops, Cam and Tori discover that Zurgane was only fighting them to copy their megazords' powers and it seems he will be using them for something more for his plan when suddenly a new and even more badass megazord rises to fight the rangers.  It's Zurgane in his self dubbed "Hyper Zurgane Megazord".....sigh....at least the megazord itself is awesome and able to match the Hurricane Megazord blow for blow until it outfights and knocks the rangers down so hard that Vexacus and Shimazu are front row center to witness him go for the final blow.  Luckily, Cam reminds us of that stupid looking guitar weapon and summons the Mammothzord to help them.  Unfortunately, Hyper Zurgane Megazord (sigh....) is too powerful even for the Mammothzord; forcing the Snesei to quickly call the rangers back to Ninja Ops as their zords retreat in a typical ninja smoke exit.

While Zurgane uses his megazord to attack the city now that the rangers' zords are badly damaged, Cam stays behind to fix them while the rangers go out.....sigh....in their gliders and tsunami cycles......-_-  Ok, I get the Sensei giving them advice to continue the fight without their zords as well as using the Sentai footage in conjunction with that little motivational message but wouldn't Hunter's Glider Cycle, not to mention Shane's Battilizer make more sense to use here.  I seriously, for God sakes, what were the gliders suppose to do.  Distract him to death!? -_-  Anyway, after Zurgane leaps out his Hyper Megazord and kicks the Wind Rangers out of their stupid flying useless plot points, the 5 regroup and proceed to face off against Zurgane who is able to beat the crap out of them pretty well.  Luckily, Cam manages to fix the zords in time and arrive with them to finish off Zurgane.  As they all retreat in their respective zords, the rangers form the Hurricane Megazord while Zurgane prepares to finish them off with his Hyper Megazord.  Luckily, the rangers manage to combine forces with the Mammothzord this time (which sort of reminds of the Ultrazord formation from Season 1 actually! O_o) to fire all weapons at Zurgane and destroy his zord once and for all. While the rangers sleep it off at the camp site, to Tori and Cam's hilarity, a deeply damaged Zurgane tries to regain his strength...until Vexacus arrives to really finish him off and destroy him forever! As badass as this moment was trying to be, in the context of Ninja Storm, Zurgane's demise feels a little flat and Vexacus' plan honestly sucked considering he just waited until the 3rd act of the show was over to own Zurgane instead of really forming a very devious plan that made Zurgane lose because of him and not just waiting for him to fail....as usual.  Meh!  They can't all be like the In Space villains I guess; especially the marvelous backstabbing suspense that was Darkonda.  Anyway, a solid two parter that moved the plot along but in the end, the start of the villain in fighting wasn't as strong to begin with and seems to only be meandering until the end of the season. Oh well...:(

Final Morph: B-