Power Rangers Beast Morphers Episode 8 Review: The Cybergate Opens

This Power Rangers Beast Morphers review contains spoilers.

Power Rangers Beast Morphers Episode 8

So far, Power Rangers Beast Morphers has had three pretty successful episodes. The premiere, ‘End of the Road’, and ‘A Friend Indeed.’ What made those work was the characters with relatable emotions.  We were drawn in by Devon’s understandably cocky attitude. We felt Zoey’s drive to take on big problems and putting the weight of responsibility solely on her shoulders. We understood the Beast Bots desire to impress their new friends.

The problem with the other episodes is they’re too jammed packed with plot. It makes for a nice summary on Wikipedia (ex: Ravi has to try and save Roxy) but they didn’t give important plot beats time to breathe. They all felt rushed, skipping over potentially interesting ideas.

It leaves Beast Morphers with an overall feeling of wasted potential. All the plot elements are there for an engaging series but it just isn’t paced correctly to let any of that potential be acted upon. The good episodes are nice but they also (besides the premiere) have suffered from pacing issues. This episode is sadly another example of that. On paper the idea of Nate becoming a Ranger is excellent. I am totally down for the tech genius that hasn’t been taken seriously as an adult being thrust into a situation where he’s forced to become a Ranger.

All the pieces are there but the pacing kills it. Nate is suddenly amazing as a Ranger. Of course in Power Rangers we’re used to people suddenly knowing how to use their powers, but it skips over the conflict that could make this really engaging. If Nate was able to morph but then wasn’t as good as fighting, it would keep the “you need to stay in the base” reasoning alive. He is still their tech genius after all.

Instead he’s amazing out of the gate. Oh yeah, and his robot becomes a Ranger to. Whoa okay, not giving Nate any time to shine by himself? Plus we have what should be a big moment of Evox nearly being freed? Any one of these plot points would make for a great episode by themselves but smashed together it makes them all feel weak. I get that Power Rangers is a harder show to pace than most, what with almost always being required to have at least one ground fight and one megazord battle, but other seasons have managed to do it effectivly. 

It’s a shame because Nate deserved a solo focus episode that really explored what he’s all about. You don’t need to tell us five billion times he wants a brother. Let him spend some time with Ben and Betty. You know, the BROTHER and sister duo you have on the show. Let them have a relevant part in the story besides being an easy way to move the plot along. Which hey, better than what most comedic duo’s have gotten in Power Rangers for the last few years.

Steel is a great character and, again, the potential for him is there. Nate wanted a brother so badly but Steel looks like he’ll try to take the spotlight from him. Be careful what you wish for, Nate! Steel won’t be everything you pictured. There’s an amazing episode that could be done about expectations for the people in your life. It could also play into the familial relationships that Beast Morphers is slowly filling itself with. I’ll ignore how chill everyone was about Nate just casually inventing a robot/human because sure, whatever.

Beast Morphers seems to just keep kicking the can. Everything is set up for something good but oh wait, gotta jam some more PLOT in there. I swear, just let the show breathe for a moment. Let a little status quo set in. It’ll make episodes like this feel bigger. It also doesn’t help they spoiled the Ranger reveals before the episode aired. Really takes all the excitement out of it.

With the start of the hiatus we now have a good chunk of Beast Morphers to analyze and… well, yes, it’s better than Ninja Steel. It doesn’t take much but Beast Morphers did it. For a lot of fans that’s enough. The fast moving plot and generally likeable characters may do it for some people, but I’m still left wanting more.

I want Beast Morphers to give those characters more time to develop and to let the conflict play out. Take what was so effective in the premiere and really get into it. I can see the writers have a lot of great plot moves planned but they won’t land if we don’t let these characters bump up against each other a bit. Give them the time to learn real lessons and let them grow and change.

Yes, it’s better than Ninja Steel. But honestly? We should want more.

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Shamus Kelley is a pop culture/television writer and official Power Rangers expert. Follow him on Twitter! Read more articles by him here!