While Power Rangers is not typically known for its deep writing or well-developed characters, it does have bright spots of depth here and there. Different Drum is an interesting episode for its inclusion of a deaf character (not that she'd ever be seen again or anything) and making her deafness important to the story. It's only dwells on the "lesson of the day" aspect of her character for a moment before it becomes a "very special episode" of Barney. So is this episode actually deep? Maybe not, but for the first time in the show's short run, I think it was trying to be. If nothing else, it has a consistent theme and sticks with it.
While Kimberly is teaching a dance class at the Youth Center, she sees that one of her students (a deaf girl named Melissa) is having trouble keeping up with the other girls. Meanwhile Billy tries to dance and shenanigans ensue. Zack challenges Bulk to a dance-off, which naturally ends with Bulk covered in food after an impressive over-the-counter stunt. On her moon palace, Rita demands that Finster make a monster that can control people with music. He creates the Gnarly Gnome, and he promptly captures a few of the girls from the dance class and makes them practice a dance for Rita. Melissa witnesses all this happen, unaffected by the music due to her being deaf and all. After trapping them in a cave with an ordinary net, Melissa thankfully runs back to the Juice Bar to tell the ranger teens what happened instead of going to the police. Although considering Kimberly might be her only nearby friend who can understand sign language, I guess it's justifiable. The rangers arrive on the scene and take on the Gnarly Gnome, who can apparently go invisible and cause awkward hallucinations. Can the Rangers take him down? Will Billy learn how to dance?! This episode's just too hot to handle.
Different Drum is an unusual episode for early MMPR due to its civilian scenes being more enjoyable than the sentai footage that usually spices things up. I liked the teens' interactions (the dance-off between Zack and Bulk was great), and I give major props to Amy Jo Johnson for learning how to sign so professionally. It makes me wonder if she had that skill beforehand and the writers decided to use her, but either way it's impressive. That's not to say that Billy's mishap early on wasn't stupid as hell, but it was pretty funny to see him dance like a pro at the end.
The handling of the Sentai footage is pretty bizarre, considering that the Gnome has the power of invisibility for only one scene and never uses it in battle. There's a scene where the Gnome, Squatt, and Baboo all take a nap for a few seconds before Rita screams them all awake, and it all feels like needless filler. The Megazord battle is creative, but it's more disorienting than it is cool. This might be the first time the teens get involved with a monster of the week without Zordon or Alpha notifying them of what's happened, which is odd but isn't necessarily a bad thing. However, nothing tops the oddity of what happens during the ground fight: the rangers summon their weapons for the Power Blaster and call out their names. But the names are completely different, never mentioned before of since this episode. It must have been an early ADR session and they had to just go with it, but it's bizarre to say the least. We have the Cosmic Cannon, Battle Bow, Dino Daggers, and the Mighty Mace (Jason still calls his the Power Sword). It's a bit more creative than calling the weapons "Power [insert weapon name]," but at the same time, it's just too weird. Having not seen this episode is quite some time, my jaw dropped when Zack called out "Cosmic Cannon!" and probably will every time I watch this one.
So while it get really messy when it comes to the second half, the first half is full of plenty of good stuff. It's rare for Power Rangers to include real world issues like people with disabilities, so it's good to see the show pull it off cringe-free. It's a shame that the Sentai footage is used so haphazardly, not to mention that the Gnome's powers are never really established and thus come off as random. At least we get something memorable with the alternate weapon names, and a few good laughs from the ranger teens. Paul Shrier is a brave soul for doing that counter hop.
Mighty Morphin' Score: 7/10
Power Rangers Score: 5/10
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