Power Rangers Jungle Fury: Bad to the Bone

It’s been a minute, but welcome back to the Jungle my friends. Last time, we covered the two parter, Ghost of a Chance, a pivotal episode which saw our heroes enter the spirit world and emerge with a new power up in the form of Jungle Master Mode and a new Megazord. Also of note, RJ fought Dai Shi one on one and had his animal spirit damaged by a devastating attack. And, even more importantly, poor put upon Fran wandered into the loft and learned the Rangers’ secret identities. More on that development in just a minute.

Our episode opens in Dai Shi’s Castle, Where Dai Shi is fuming after after taking the L last episode and venting his frustrations on a horde of Rinshi. Camille quips that at this rate, they won’t have any warriors left to send against the Power Rangers before revealing her latest monster, a Pig Beast. As the Pig heads off to keep the Rangers busy, Carnisoar and Jellica enter the throne room, none too pleased at their student’s failure, especially after Dai Shi blames said failure on their teaching. The two overlords beat down Dai Shi for his insolence for a bit, but when he’s out of earshot, Carnisoar admits that Dai Shi has a point. They clearly need a greater source of power if they’re going to stand a chance against the newly powered up Jungle Rangers.

We finally return to Jungle Karma Pizza where Fran is now fully aware of the Rangers secret. We sadly do not follow up from where we left off, shame, I would have liked to see that, but Fran generally seems happy to be friends with the heroes of her city. Well, now that the dynamic between these characters has shifted so dramatically, one would think that the Rangers would have start treating Fran with more respect. Then Casey wipes up pizza sauce with Fran’s new blouse. Well, never mind then. Our heroes are assholes. However, before Casey can learn to be more considerate, RJ is suddenly overwhelmed with pain, clutching the spot where Dai Shi struck his animal spirit. Not wanting to alarm the others, RJ plays it off like it’s just a pulled muscle and heads up to the loft to rest.

Later while out on a delivery in the sweet company motor scooter, which I already like better than the Strike Rider, seriously, it even has a mini oven to keep the pizza warm, Casey finds himself lured into a trap by the Pig Beast. The Pig Beast is strong and wields a segmented staff made of sausage links, which seems silly, but is actually deeply disturbing when you consider the monster is himself a pig. It’s a bit like a flail made of human intestines. Casey holds his own just fine, but calls for backup just in case, leading to yet another scene where our so-called heroes have to run out and leave Fran to run the Restaurant alone, brining the count up to, I don’t know, let’s say eleven. At least the Rangers don’t have to make up some half-baked excuse anymore. Anywho, as Casey is dealing with the creepiest pig I’ve seen since that one really weird episode of King of the Hill, Theo and Lily arrive and together they engage Jungle Master Mode. The Pig Monster goes giant sized but the rangers roast him quick with the power of the Jungle Master Megazord in Shark mode. You know, it’s too bad Jungle Karma is a vegan restaurant, with what’s left of Link Hogthrob here, you can run a special on meat lovers for months.

Back at Dai Shi’s castle, Camille seems unconcerned with the Pig Beast getting smoked into a Christmas Ham and already has her next monster, a Porcupine Beast, ready to go. However, what’s really important here is that Carnisoar and Jellica have been talking and have decided they should revive the last overlord, The Bear Overlord of the Land, Grizzaka. Dai Shi thinks this is a bad idea since he doesn’t trust Grizzaka but Carnisoar sends Camille to revive him anyway, expressing concern for her wellbeing as he does. Keep in mind, Carnisoar and Jellica aren’t exactly trustworthy themselves and Dai Shi keeps them around, and the overlords have never expressed concern for Camille before now. Good lord, this Grizzaka guy must be a real asshole if even these guys don’t want to work with him.

On their way back from fighting the Pig, the Rangers encounter the Porcupine Beast, who proves fairly formidable, managing to best Lily in a one on one confrontation, forcing the Rangers to retreat.

Back at the loft, RJ pulls Porcupine quills out of Lily’s back while eating raw meat, something no one seems concerned about. More concerning is that Lily’s attitude seems to have shifted from sweet and considerate to rude and irritable, something anyone with two brain cells to rub together can see is a result of the Porcupine’s quills. As the Rangers leave, RJ’s wound starts acting up again, causing him to tear his clothes like Hulk Hogan while screaming in pain.

Meanwhile, Camille has found Grizzaka’s final resting place and uses the final life talon to resurrect him. More on that later.

At the restaurant, while the others are swamped with the after school rush, Lily has traded in her regular clothes for a biker jacket. Seriously, how have the guys not put two and two together yet? Maybe it’s because they’re both so distracted by how smoking hot she is in that outfit. And not for nothing, Anna Hutchison is rocking the biker babe look, so I guess I can’t blame them. Fran on the other hand has not fallen victim to the feminine wiles of hot biker Lily and walks up to yell at her. Keep in mind, Fran is now fully aware that Lily is a martial arts master who can call upon the power of a cheetah and she still isn’t backing down. Fran may not be a Ranger, but she’s got some serious guts.

Casey and Theo head up to the loft to find RJ, but he’s nowhere in sight, and what’s more, the loft is a mess. Theo, once again missing the obvious red flag, thinks that RJ is just bad at cleaning up after himself as the alarm goes off. Theo and Casey spring into action, encountering a nasty looking Wolf Beast. The Wolf Beast wipes the floor with our heroes before running away, leaving Theo and Casey both battered and very confused. But no time to worry about that, because the Porcupine Beast is back for round two

Back at the restaurant, Lily is still acting like a jerk and would rather gorge herself on wings than help her friends. Fran is so fed up with her bullshit that she swipes Lily’s Morpher and is ready to help the boys herself. Lily attacks Fran but in the scuffle, another quill is dislodged, snapping Lily back to normal. Lily apologizes to Fran and heads off to help the boys. As Lily leaves, RJ walks in the front door looking like he picked a fight with a grain thresher and heads up to the loft without a word.

Back in the city, Casey and Theo are getting their asses handed to them by the Porcupine Beast. Lily makes her grand entrance by leaping off her motorcycle and drop kicking the monster. Nice. Our heroes engage Jungle Master Mode and beat the monster until he grows big, The Jungle Master Megazord in Elephant Mode finishing the spiky creep off for good.

Back at the tomb of Grizzaka, the Land Overlord has indeed been resurrected, but is not yet fully revealed to us. All we see is Camille cowering in fear of the deadly warrior before telling him she’s been ordered to bring him to Dai Shi’s castle.

Later that night, Fran and Lily make amends properly and have a laugh about the whole thing, Fran even trying on Lily’s leather jacket and mimicking her attitude to boss around the boys. I think Fran really needs to keep that jacket. However, before our episode fades to black, a wolf howl is heard in the distance, indicating that the mysterious Wolf Beast is still out there.

Bad to the Bone is an okay episode, but not anything particularly special. Hot biker Lily was fun, sure, but one of the heroes getting turned into a jerk against their will due to external influence is nothing new, especially for power rangers. Also, the Pig Monster at the beginning, while amusing, was basically pointless. Still, some important plot threads such as RJ’s condition worsening, the mysterious wolf creature and the resurrection of Grizzaka come about in this episode so I guess it sort of breaks even. My biggest complaint here is that we don’t spend a ton of time on Fran now being in on the big secret. I mean, this is a major development that changes the character dynamics in a big way, but the show does not treat it as such, and what’s worse, the Rangers are still big jerks to poor Fran. I’m not ready for that rant just yet, but this episode will definitely be used to illustrate my point when that day comes. In any case, next time, my favorite Ranger in the Franchise finally makes their debut in Friends Don’t Fade Away.