Weekly Ranger Review: Mystic Force Episodes 21, “Koragg’s Trial”

It is time for a new Ranger Review, where Koragg’s honorable ideal is put to the ultimate test, in Episode 21 of Power Rangers Mystic Force, “Koragg’s Trial”.

Review

“Koragg’s Trial” is, as the name suggests, a Koragg focus episode. When Imperious blames Koragg for the Ranger’s retrieval of the Legend Warrior powers, Koragg contacts Nick for battle. Using it as a trap, Imperious poisons the Manticore Megazord. In retaliation, Koragg absorbs the poison and saves the Rangers, claiming he will only win with honor. Imperious now leaves it to the Master to decide if Koragg’s loyalty is true. To settle it once and for all, both Imperious and Koragg duel Daggeron. The other Rangers save Daggeron. The Master deems Koragg worthy, as he has a flashback of a young child wrapped in a red blanket.

It’s common place for Power Rangers to have clip-show episodes. They’re easy on the budget, a kind refresher to people that may have missed some episodes, or have forgotten some plot points. This clip-show in particular is focused on Koragg. His battles, his struggles, and of course footage of nearly every time his honor has saved the Rangers from being defeated once and for all.

While sometimes clip show episodes are randomly placed, this one was scheduled with care. With the second arc on the verge of wrapping up, big things are in store for Koragg, and it’s important that all the viewers keep his actions fresh in their mind, especially going into the next set of episodes.

While the episode was a fluffed up clip show, most of it was actually new, plot relevant footage. The battle by the lake shows us just how strong Koragg is with his magic back in hand, as if it wasn’t for Xander showing up at the perfect moment, they would have been defeated. The attempt on infecting the Manticore Megazord with a virus was genius on Imperious’s part, but was played off as yet another look at how Koragg’s honor really does make him uniquely, well, good.

The one revelation of this episode happened at the very end of the episode after the Master accepts Koragg’s loyalty. He has a vision of a child wrapped in a red blanket. Viewers know that blank is identical to the one carried around by Nick earlier in the series, which is also the same blanket Udonna’s child Bowen was wrapped in in previous flashbacks. The Udonna-Nick connection was already apparent earlier in the series. While there have been hints that Koragg might be involved, the facts are most definitely there now.

Other than the end revelation, there’s actually very little to say about this episode in general. Xander’s sudden appearance has some editing problems, and all of the events in this episode were more or less quick steps to push Koragg in the final part of his story. For those keeping up episode by episode, that last few minutes was all one really needed to see before moving on to “Heir Apparent”.

VS. Magiranger

“Koragg’s Trial” is an adaptation of Mahou Sentai Magiranger’s “Stage 31”. I use the term adaptation rather loosely here, as next to zero plot elements of the episode were actually used in Mystic Force. However, the battle by the lake and the following Megazord battle were both lifted from this episode.

“Stage 31” features Meemy (Imperious) and Wolzard (Koragg) bickering like normal. Meemy summons a mold monster that can spread itself from human to human, feeding off their blood until it opens its eye and the host dies. Makito (Green) gets infected. While Lunagel (Clare) and Hikaru (Daggeron) tend to the infected humans, the other four go to fight Wolzard. Makito eventually saves them, causing Wolzard to transform into Wolkaiser. The five form MagiLengend, but get infected with a new mold. The siblings are saved by Wolzard, not wanting to battle them this way. Back in Infershia, Wolzard has a memory of blue skies, time with a family.

Bits of the episode were certainly used, with a “cold” knocking Xander out of the first few minutes of the episode so that he can save the four remaining Rangers just like in Magiranger. The mold plot was obviously dropped in favor of focusing on the Koragg clip show elements.

Both episodes focused on the same character, setting up the big reveal to come in future episodes. It was clever for the Mystic Force production team to use the fact that this episode had no actual monster of the day to instead focus on Koragg’s honor and mysterious past.

Next Time

In the next Ranger Review, darkness rises, a new light shines, and secrets are revealed in Episode 21, “Koragg’s Trial”.