movie_show_critic
"VR Troopers" (Virtual Reality Troopers) was a syndicated live action show produced by Saban from 1994 to 1996. Saban also created the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers series.The series hoped to profit from the obsession with virtual reality in the early 1990s as well as the success of Power Rangers. It featured early video effects and CGI mixed with Japanese stock footage from three different Metal Hero Series: Superhuman Machine Metalder, Dimensional Warrior Spielban, and Space Sheriff Shaider. This kind of adaptation technique, turning multiple shows into one show, was originally used in anime with shows like Robotech and Voltron. This was the first and only time this was used for a Tokusatsu adaptation. On May 7, 2010, the copyright for VR Troopers was transferred from BVS International to SCG Power Rangers.The series was deemed successful, but not as successful as the Power Rangers franchise. Unfortunately, for the series, the Japanese footage was quickly exhausted due to extreme cases where multiple Tokusatsu scenes were put together in a single episode to the point stock footage had to be reused multiple times throughout the series. Similarly, another Saban program, Big Bad Beetleborgs, would do well but ultimately end quickly due to a lack of stock footage. Both series were adapted from the Japanese Metal Hero genre, which ended in Japan around the same time. The show spawned a toy line and a video game for the Sega Genesis (Mega Drive).PLOT SUMMARYSaban's VR Troopers was the first official "sister series" to the most popular "action fighting kid show" at the time, Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers. Much like it, this was an Americanization of a Japanese Tokusatsu children's program by Toei Company LTD.The show focused on three young adults in their late teens, Ryan Steele, Kaitlin Star, and J.B. Reese, living in the fictional West Coast town of Cross World City. They regularly attended and were teachers at "Tao's Dojo", a karate studio. Ryan was the most focused martial artist; J.B. was the computer wizard; while Kaitlin was a photographer & budding reporter for the local newspaper, the Underground Voice Daily. One day, Ryan's search for his long- missing father led him and his two friends to a strange laboratory. Inside, a digitized head of Professor Horatio Hart, a friend of Ryan's father Tyler, explained the truth about his life's work of having developed extremely advanced virtual reality technology in secret. "VR" is a dimension existing alongside our own; within it lie mutants and monsters bent on conquering both worlds. The main ruler of these is a creature known as Grimlord, who, unbeknownst to anyone on Earth, has a human identity as billionaire industrialist Karl Ziktor. As Karl Ziktor tries to overcome the barriers of the true reality to allow his armies easy passage from virtual world, the responsibility falls to Ryan, Kaitlin, and J.B. of defending the planet on both sides of the dimensional barrier. They have assistance in the form of armored bodies having incredible firepower. This included eventual additions to their arsenal, such as a Turbo Cycle, Techno Bazooka, and a flying, laser-blasting Skybase.Other regular characters on the show included Jeb, Ryan's hound dog, who, after an accident in Prof. Hart's lab, is now capable of human speech; Woody Stocker, Kaitlin's wacky hat-loving boss at the Underground Voice Daily; Percy Rooney, the local mayor's nephew and Kaitlin's bumbling rival reporter; and Tao, the wise martial arts sensei who owns the dojo and a family friend of the Steele Family. Recurring villains include General Ivar, a vicious rocket-shaped monster with his own tank; Colonel Icebot, a cold-blooded virtual menace; Decimator, a sword-wielding warrior; the Skugs, gold-headed foot soldiers, and more throughout.During the second season, the show changed format very slightly. Ryan's father was finally found (having been restored to normal off- camera) and quickly left to help the government research further Virtual Reality-based technology. With him came Ryan's new V.R. armor and an upgrade to his powers. Grimlord's base of operation switched from a dungeon to a massive spacecraft, and added new Generals such as Doom Master and his Vixens, Oraclon, and Despera. The Skugs now had the ability to become more powerful in the form of Ultra-Skugs.
Rage Ragger
well thats my statement anyways.I liked VR-troopers as a kid. this series was a combination of the Power rangers and Starwars.it had it's childish goofs, but the fighting scenes where fun to watch for me at that age. I'm not gonna judge this series for having childish contents. couse it is A KIDS show!.besides that it had a decent story.you have your standard villain that wants to take over the world. with his robot army. and I find that the Robot army gave it a little more realism. couse in the power rangers you can clearly see it's a lame ass monster costume.the whole Trooper thing was all about special crystals that acted as battery's. for powering high technical suits. unlike the first negative comment that was given, this series had it's value for me. + I still like the themesong LOL
dinoballz
VR Troopers was 1 of many cashing in projects by the Saban & Levi money factory. The stars of this show fought a slightly more realistic but still, far too melodramatic battle against some of the most extravagant cardboard boxes ever made.Of course, not just the enemies were made of cardboard, true to the success-formula of power rangers, fortresses, vehicles and anything else you can't find anywhere else in the human world were made for a few nickles, and merchandised for thousands and thousands of dollars.So my conclusion is pretty much my title, because even though it was lame... it wasn't as lame as the Power Rangers.
Delta Matt
It boggles the mind when you think of what executive meeting was behind the creation of this one. "Hey, I've got an idea - let's do Power Rangers with a slashed-in-half budget!" That doesn't sound like such a good idea to me - mainly because it ISN'T a good idea.Here's your premise - two guys and a girl go around fighting a decadent capitalist who moonlights as the evil Virtual Reality Warlord "Grimlord". They also like to take out his entire army in every episode (goons with such incredible names as Fist-bot and General Eye-bar. Obviously they didn't have the imaginative "Transformers" authors when they came up with the names). It's not such a hard task, as a mop and a bar of soap would be more effective at world domination than Grimlord and his minions.
As one might expect from this type of show, the characterization of our three "heroes" is slightly optimistic. I'm currently 20 years old, coming on 21 - which isn't too far off the age of the three VR Troopers in this "TV Gem". I enjoy singing in my band, going to rock clubs, going to the pub, sitting in front of the tele and listening to a bit of music - which is pretty typical, I'd say. Whereas Ryan, Kaitlin and J.B. have full time jobs, and enjoy going to the Dojo and beating up bad guys in order to save the world in their FREE TIME. Right. If someone asked me whether I wanted to become a VR Trooper, the first question would be "How much?" and the second would be "who's covering for me at the week-end?". As the VR troopers a) seem not to get paid at all (despite the fact that their students debts will still be BLOODY high) and b) drop whatever they're doing 24/7 to go off and play with Grimlord, they must be insane.Of course, you could argue the fact that without them, the world would be in danger. However, you would be ignoring the fact that no matter how many times Grimlord's army shoots at anything, they never hit the target. So we're really in no danger. And for an Evil Warlord, Grimlord's really not that evil. It seems to never have occurred to the guy that as his army is completely incapable of making the slightest dent on the teen-age heroes when in costume, killing them in their sleep would be the easiest option. After all, Grimlord knows exactly who the VR Troopers actually are, in a bizarre plot point. How long do you think Bruce Wayne would have lasted if the Joker knew who he was? Not too long, really.While all those issues are slightly silly, there are some aspects of the show that are nothing short of annoying. In a few examples:1) The way the scene of a fight will shift from a rock face to open land to a forest to a lake and back to the bloody rock face again.
2) When in costume, the VR Troopers compensate for the fact that we can't see their lips by nodding their heads around inanely. It looks ridiculous, and if I talked to one of them, I would point and laugh.
3) The dog. It talks. Strange really, as the motion that the dog makes whilst talking looks incredibly like the motion that a normal dog makes when chewing on something. And the words are (of course) completely out of sinc. Also, the dog's favourite insult is blowing a rasberry at someone. This is obviously achieved by filming the dog putting it's tongue out, and playing it in reverse. And they do that on a regular basis. It's not funny, it's annoying.4) "Forces of darkness, empower me. Take me back to my virtual reality." Every damn episode. Anyone with a basic education in English could tell whoever wrote that that the second line is a few syllables too long. But Hell, "poetic license". Or in this case "complete-absence-of-poetry license".5) The features of the programme that were SUPPOSED to be amusing were anything but. For instance - that newspaper editor.HOWEVER - after all this, this show has perhaps the highest recommendation I could possibly give. And why, you ask? It's one of the funniest things I've seen in my life! It goes into the same bracket as "The Final Countdown" by Europe - things that are so bad, they're brilliant! Forget that it's attempting to be serious, and you will enjoy it as much as "Blackadder", "Fawlty Towers", or any great sit-com which you enjoy.If you can, watch the episode with "The Doggy Rap" in it. Conclusive proof that not only can white men and women NOT rap, but some black men can't either.Not to mention the fact that the "actress" playing Kaitlin is very attractive. I'm a red blooded male, after all.