Trivia / Power Rangers Wild Force S1E34 Forever Red

• Ascended Fanon: Attempted, as the writer was a participant in the Scorpion Rain hoax and he stated that he considered certain elements of that to be canon while writing it. Fan acceptance of this has been mixed despite near universal love of the episode itself.
• Blooper: Despite Leo de-morphing, you can clearly see him in full Galaxy Red form when the generals run up to all the gathered Red Rangers.
• Deleted Scene: The episode was originally intended to be an extra-long special, and a number of scenes were trimmed or removed when it was made into a regular episode. These scenes are available online, as part of production footage. The bits that didn't make it include:
  • Bulk and Skull have a much longer scene, referencing all of the show's old foot soldiers (including ones from Power Rangers Lightspeed Rescue thru Power Rangers Wild Force that they never met on-screen): Bulk is trying to one-up Skull (forgetting that Skull was there for all of it). Skull is trying to avoid Professor Phenomenus. Tommy was retired and was the owner of Bulk and Skull's resort; he isn't aware of the Machine Empire until Andros calls him. The trimmed scene gives the impression that Bulk and Skull (who are nervous of Tommy) are aware he's a Ranger and that Tommy has already been working with Andros; as the line about "I'm retired" never aired, Power Rangers: Dino Thunder would follow the implication that Tommy was active and reveal that he was working in secret (under disguise as a science teacher) to prepare for Mesogog's return.
  • The Wild Force Rangers break up two kids fighting, who claim they're playing Power Rangers, and tell them Power Rangers "don't fight people, so you shouldn't either". Carter Grayson informs the other Rangers that only Cole has been "selected" for the mission and the others can't come, and Cole tells Max "it is important for you guys to stay and protect Turtle Cove". The kids were called Ray and Manny, after two Power Rangers webmasters.
  • In the final draft after Leo said "Andros, we got here as soon as we could." Aurico said sheepishly, "Sorry, I always forget to turn right at the Andromeda Galaxy."
  • Andros' original reason for why he's a great Red Ranger was "I killed Zordon" (Jason was shocked to hear Zordon was dead). This was redubbed to "I saved two worlds!", likely because it's disturbing for Andros to brag about killing Zordon.
  • At the end of the episode, T.J. had more lines saying, "I mean... (laugh) it was like Pepperonis and cheese and... and heat. And it was hard to breathe. It-It's a great story!" Eric says during this, "Yeah! May the Power be with Ya!" Jason also said, "Yeah, and I heard it was burnt and crispy and ...all kinds of stuff!"
• Executive Meddling:
  • This was going to be a two-part episode that would have ended with the rangers summoning their respective megazords and taking down Serpentera together. Disney however did not like the idea of spending money to create the CG zord footage as they didn't have toys to promote and told them to cut it into one episode as the team-up was just expensive in general^note Ironically, the proposed idea is exactly what happened in the closest Sentai equivalent, Gaoranger vs Super Sentai, had happened earlier in Super Sentai World, and what would also happen in Gokaiger Goseiger Super Sentai 199 Hero Great Battle.
  • More meddling came from Bandai, who produced the toys for the franchise at the time. After Disney refused to fund the episode, the writers asked Bandai for money. They agreed, but only if the episode promoted the Wild Force Rider toy, which is why Serpentera, Lord Zedd's most powerful super weapon, gets taken out by a motorcycle...
• Milestone Celebration: This episode is officially the 10th anniversary of Power Rangers, featuring 10 Red Rangers from 9 different teams despite the fact the franchise was only 9 years old when this episode aired.
• The Other Darrin: Because David Bacon was unavailable at the time of production, Christopher Glenn voices the morphed Aurico here.
• Prop Recycling: The Machine Empire's generals are the Big Bad Beetleborgs. No, seriously.
• Role Reprise:
  • All of the Red Rangers who were present all had their original actor, especially Austin St. John as Jason Lee Scott and Jason David Frank as Tommy Oliver. The only exception was the Red Alien Ranger, who was voiced by Christopher Glenn this time around and Rocky DeSantos, who was not present at all.
  • Paul Schrier and Jason Narvy also returned as Bulk and Skull.
• Spared by the Cut: Either Leo or Aurico was going to be killed off.
• Uncredited Role: The late Scott Page-Pagter and David Walsh have uncredited roles as Steelon and Auromon, two of the five generals.
• Wag the Director: Austin St John claims he pushed for Jason's line "you didn't think I'd let you do this without the original Red Ranger", in order to show the character with "more bite".
• What Could Have Been:
  • There were four separate outlines: one by Koichi Sakamoto, one by Jonathan Tzachor, and two by Amit Bhaumik. The first outline involved the villains (who have already destroyed a colony) planning to attack Earth and assaulting various Red Rangers, whose introductions are staggered throughout the story. The second outline had all the Red Rangers, introduced in brief showcase scenes, being separately gathered by Alpha 5 to Angel Grove, where they surprise the "Five Metallic Warriors" upon arrival. The third had Andros gathering the Red Rangers (via Tommy) after discovering a cult are trying to resurrect Dark Specter, and involves all ten fighting a resurrected Specter; this draft brought all the Rangers together early on, so they could interact more. Most of the elements from this draft would survive into the fourth. Bhaumik hoped to include a reference to Maligore - Specter and Maligore used the same costume - and claim Dark Specter was an adult of the same species. It is unknown how Alpha 5 survived the attack on Eltar in this draft of the script, but it is known that in this case he was to serve as the mentor in place of Tommy.
  • Bulk (without Skull) appeared in the third outline. In the second, Tommy was going to pass up a T-shirt of "the famous two-man rock band Bulk & Skull".
  • Steve Cardenas was originally contacted to appear as Rocky, but he moved and changed addresses without notifying the production team and they could not find him in time to film. Rocky would have only participated in the battle as the MMPR Red Ranger if Austin St. John proved unable to make filming or become Tommy's butler if he was.
  • During an online interview, Amit Bhuamik revealed that he wrote a falling out between Jason and Tommy and that Jason would have "turned punk" sometime after the events of Turbo: A Power Rangers Movie and before the events of "Forever Red", only to have Jason reunite with Tommy and become friends again. This would explain why Jason comes off as arrogant during this episode. However, the scene was ultimately cut out to keep the episode 22-minutes long.
  • Scenes that never made it to filming, but can be seen in a draft script online, include:
    • Cole met Alpha 7 on the Megaship. It involved Cole being scared and surprised he was in space, and Alpha 7 saying "Ay yi yi! Where'd you grow up, in the jungle?" and as Cole was going to tell him he was born in a jungle, he came face-to-face with Alpha 7 and jumped startled. As Alpha 7 introduced himself, Cole wanted to know "Wha-What is a Alpha 7" but said it as if he was scared; and Alpha 7 said he was "a fully sentient, multi-functional automaton and a walking database of everything relating to the Power Rangers" and Cole said (Looking scared and sick), "I think I liked it better when I was on earth..." This and the next scene would have allowed Richard Steven Horvitz to record more lines for the Alpha 7 character.
    • A scene between Tommy and Alpha 7 on the Megaship was cut that involved asking Tommy what was wrong, and Tommy replying that things have been awkward between him and Jason since they found those stories on the internet, in a reference to slash fanfiction featuring them together. Also, during this scene, T.J. and Eric were having drinks by the synthetron and talking (As if like old friends), and Cole is trying to talk up an enthusiastic Jason.
    • Venjix blasted Cole and Leo and Aurico arrived on the Red Jet Jammer and then blasted the Machine Empire generals. But in Amit's final draft, they arrived and blasted Venjix out of the hangar of the moon base. Tommy acknowledged them by saying, "The Red Galaxy Ranger and the Red Alien Ranger!" and Leo said " This battle isn't just for the Rangers of Earth," and Aurico added, "This is for heroes everywhere!" Not to mention, Leo (Like Aurico) didn't appear unmorphed in Amit Bhuamik's final draft.
    • Other materials cut from Amit Bhaumik's final draft include: Steelon originally said "Zedd was a fool to leave this buried here." Andros recorded a message on his Astro Morpher saying, "Andros here. This is worse than I thought, they've almost finished digging it out."; Andros originally said his morphing call "Let's Rocket!" before leaving the moon; Bulk and Skull originally both answered the call; when Cole first met Carter he added "Who are you?"; Wes's Ranger title was addressed as "Time Force Red"; T.J.'s middle name "Jay" was censored, Carter was tongue-tied when trying to say T.J.'s full name and T.J. winced when his name was heard; Automus saluted at the speech and said "For the glory of the Royal House of Gadgetry!"; Alpha 7 originally didn't say "It's all ready Tommy!"; Venjix alternatively said "Excellent work. At last King Mondo, we can finally avenge you. The Earth and all their Rangers will pay for what they did to you and our glorious evil empire!"; Jason cracked his knuckles as he said his "Miss King Mondo" remark; Steelon pointed out "Red Rangers! Eight of them?"; and the Generals originally joined in the Cog battle. Also, they had alternate pair-ups. Jason and Cole paired up against Venjix like in the episode, T.J. and Wes fought Automus, Andros and Eric fought Gerrok, Carter and Aurico fought Steelon, and Leo and Tommy fought Tezzla.
  • It is rumored, but unconfirmed, that Amit's plans included:
    • Catherine Sutherland was supposed to make an appearance at the end of this episode as Tommy's wife picking him up from the NASADA space port. A draft of this scene, confirmed by Amit Bhaumik on Facebook when asked, also had Kimberly pick Tommy up and be confirmed to be his wife as well.
    • Wes and Eric originally contacted Trip in the future to see if the future had changed in one draft.
    • In one draft, Ryan Mitchell, the Titanium Ranger, was going to be the new captain of the rebuilt Lightspeed Aquabase.
• Word of God: At one point, it was rumored that the script went through many drafts. However, Amit Bhaumik confirmed in 2012 that this was not the case.
• You Sound Familiar:
  • Past rangers Walter Emanuel Jones, Catherine Sutherland and Archie Kao respectively voice Gerrok, Tezzla and Venjix.
  • Alpha 7 is voiced by Richard Steven Horvitz, who previously voiced Alpha 5.

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