The Cobra Strikes

Power Rangers: Lightspeed Rescue, Episode 16

Original Airdate: 5-27-2000

Last Time: The cobra tattoo kept a-hurtin', the same ol' monsters kept a-losin' and Captain Mitchell kept a-being a terrible father...in'.

In the infirmary, Ms. Fairweather is examining Ryan's tattoo. Ms. Fairweather claims she's "never seen anything like it," and then immediately tells Ryan that it will be fine so long as he doesn't morph. Well, I'm glad that the non-doctor was able to come to such a definitive conclusion based on something she has no experience with. In Mariner Bay, Diabolico has darkened the sky and starting shooting down red lightning because shit just got real.

Diabolico confronts the Rangers in person and starts beating the fuck out of them. Credits!

Diabolico decides to combine the remains of his last three monsters to form Trika, Diabolico's last chance monster. Trika starts beating the Rangers as well. Down in the aquabase, Ryan sees this, but knows that he cannot help as American-made footage of this fight would be prohibitive in cost, also, it would kill him. The Rangers get hurt some more and deicde to run away.

Later, the Rangers return to the aquabase and I guess the monster decided to take a half-day or something rather than destroy the city. Ryan is bummed that he's useless, and decides to kill his tattoo cobra, presumably with some sort of mystical laser removal vision quest.

At the ziggurat o' moral dubiousness, Bansheera is reminding Diabolico and the audience that it's the Big D's last chance to kill the Rangers. Back at the aquabase, the Rangers are whining about how much they suck when Captain Mitchell decides that it's time to use the Rangers' latest toy: the Battle Boosters. Dana walks in to reveal that Ryan is gone, and the Trika monster has decided to cut short its siesta and start blowing up the city.

The second Trika-Rangers bout starts poorly, so Ms. Fairweather decides to send the team the Battle Boosters. That settles Trika's hash, and the monster starts getting killed. Meanwhile, Ryan is investigating some ruins and finds a snake statue, which he immediately starts yelling at. This somehow causes a snake monster to pop out and start fighting the lad.

Back in the city, Trika dies, and Diabolico realizes that he's only got one move left, and so makes himself giant-sized and starts wrecking Mariner Bay. Carter calls on the Supertrain. Meanwhile, Ryan is still fighting the snake monster. The Supertrain gets its ass kicked and manages to get a hole blown clear through its torso. Captain Mitchell decides to send in the Lightspeed Megazord, despite the fact that it's much less powerful than the megazord that just got crippled. Oh, and Ryan's still fighting the damn snake, and manages to kill by means of a falling pillar. For some reason, killing the snake monster means that Ryan is free from the curse of the cobra tattoo. Great?

Anyway, the Lightspeed Megazord gets trashed by Diabolico, but Ryan shows up with the Max Solarzord, and the zords combine into the new Lightspeed Solarzord. Diabolico, like me, is unimpressed, and is able to repel the new zord's attacks. Unfortunately, his return volley somehow energizes the Lightspeed Solarzord, which swiftly blasts him to pieces.

Back in their lair, the demons are depressed that Diabolico is dead until his powers flow into Impus, because, well, the season is damn sure going to last more than sixteen episodes.

In the aquabase, the Rangers celebrate right until the klaxons of kalamity go off. Impus transforms into his pupa phase, and Queen Bansheera shows up to tell the Rangers that they're all still going to totally die. To Be Continued!

Next Time: Meet the new boss, same as the old boss...