Season 24, Episode 14: The Royal Rival

"The Royal Rival"

Episode 14

Air Date: September 16th, 2017

....Ummmmm who in the costumed department that outfit for Princess Viera was appropriate in any type of way??? O_O  My goodness, I have never seen something looking more dumb and unflattering on a character but actress Ruby Love (Nice name! :) looks completely ridiculous! It's hard for me to take the story seriously sometimes when the character of focus looks like some kind of live action action figure!  I guess that's the only real part of the episode that was so irksome and I know this is Power Rangers where the villains can look as idiotic as Luthor did in Ninja Storm or even Divatox during Turbo, but Viera's Lion Galaxy attire was so distracting; making it hard for me to truly be invested in her character. O_o  Her story and set up is definitely new: a princess from a far off galaxy, the Lion Galaxy as Mick mentioned a couple episodes ago actually, trying to prove her wrath and power by going on Galaxy Warriors to defeat the Rangers in battle to show how much of a threat she is.  Alongside her is Drillion, a bodyguard of sorts that protects the Princess but quickly is swayed by Galvanax to turn on the Princess to become the new ruler of the Lion Galaxy since many have questioned the Princess' position on the throne.  Things of course take a turn when Sarah, during Drillion's attack of the city, saves the Princess when she's falling; drawing the Princess toward the Pink Ranger and wonder more about the rangers in terms of morality.

I enjoyed the scenes with Sarah and Viera as they got to know each other, especially since Viera wasn't wearing her royal blocky costume! -_-  What?!!! Ewwwww!!! lol I liked the whole thief sequence and how Sarah teaches Viera about what truly matters. But let me just bring up the fact that Sarah is a freakin' genius like Billy was and is just going to high school like everyone else when she can make a machine that can make any food into a delicious cookie apparently???? O_o  Sounds incredibly stupid, especially that broccoli and fish cookie (EWWWWW!) and shouldn't something like that make Sarah into some kind of child prodigy that is making headlines and working with scientists in a lab??? O_o  This universe sometimes makes no sense! lol Anyway, with Drillion turning on the Princess and Viera herself learning about what really matters yada, yada decides to help the rangers when Drillion attacks her and the rangers to destroy them all.  While the rangers try their best to fend off Drillion, Viera promises to return with a weapon that can help them defeat Drillion. Turns out to be her own ship, the Lion Fire which we actually got a glimpse of when the Nexus Prism briefly showed it in a vision.

As the rangers' megazords are no match for the powerful warrior, Viera soon arrives.....in her hideous royal wardrobe with the Lion Fire ship to force Drillion into a retreat.  While the rangers are thankful, Galvanax is ANYTHING but pleased and use his own ship to fire all weapons at Viera's ship; shooting it down right out of the sky. While the day may have been saved and Sarah gets some true catharsis when the poor young boy returns  tell her teacher about how she helped him and his sister make money so he can go back to school.  Apparently, it works THAT fast??? O_O, Viera appears walking away from her damaged ship as the episode leaves on a "to be continued"! So far, a very interesting story about humanity and reform as well as helping those who seem bad but are only misguided in their will to survive through criminal activity.  It can be overly campy, especially Viera's....ok I'll stop! But it was entertaining enough for me to enjoy most of it.

Final Morph: B