Trivia / Captain Power and the Soldiers of the Future

• Creative Differences: A major contributor to the show's cancellation after only a single season was that the Mattel execs who commissioned the series saw it as little more than a vehicle to sell toys to children, while the writing staff (including J. Michael Straczynski) saw it as a serious sci-fi story, with rather heavy themes involving nuclear war, fascism, and AI revolt.
• Executive Meddling: In an article from Starlog magazine, the writers and producers talked about how the series was going to become Darker and Edgier (as if it weren't dark and edgy already) and break away from the half-hour commercial format that Mattel wanted. Among the highlights that were mentioned included Overmind and Dread abandoning the whole idea of digitizing humanity in favor of simply exterminating them wholesale, the Power Team picking up a Dark Action Girl (callsign Ranger) to replace Pilot, Captain Power slowly eroding towards a Heroic BSoD while Hawk ended up becoming the de facto group leader, and eventually Soaron doing a Heel–Face Turn when it becomes clear he's been replaced by Blastarr as The Dragon. Needless to say, the head honchos at Mattel were pissed at the season finale - which would have signaled the beginning of the shift - and pulled the plug on the show before we could see the transition.
• Show Accuracy/Toy Accuracy: None of the action figures look like their TV counterparts, and their weapons are inaccurate. Even more glaring is the packages have a perfect image of how the characters looked like in the show.
• What Could Have Been:
  • The canceled Season 2 had scripts written for it, but it was never produced. More information can be found here.
  • Even with Season 1... well, after Babylon 5, one can only wonder how much better it would have been if the show hadn't been so Merchandise-Driven and J. Michael Straczynski could have focused more on the characters and story.

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