Last week we took a look at the male members of the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers from Hasbro’s Lightning Collection. Back when the show was red hot in the early 90s, all of the action figures of the Rangers were the same figure with a different head and decal on the chest. That isn’t going to work for a figure line aimed at both collectors and adolescents and Hasbro obviously knows that. That’s why they did a male body and a female body for the line and that’s why the women are getting their own write-up as today I’m looking at the Pink and Yellow Rangers from Hasbro’s Lightning Collection.

The Yellow and Pink Rangers sharing a body sculpt makes sense, though it also kind of doesn’t. The Yellow Ranger was sort of infamous from this era because Saban chose to cast the late Thuy Trang as Trini Kwan to portray the teenager under the mask. Of course, she was never really under the mask as none of the American actors were since that was footage taken from Japan where the Yellow Ranger was portrayed by a male actor. There are some pretty humorous images online too that really drive that fact home. Technically speaking, the action figure of the Yellow Ranger should probably utilize the male body type, but since American audiences associate Trang with the role it would be kind of weird to have a very masculine Yellow Ranger on our shelf. This figure is already not screen accurate because of this choice, and yet, I think it’s the right move and it’s not something I’m bothered by and I can’t imagine anyone is.

Trini and Kimberly use entirely new parts when compared with their male counterparts. Despite that though, they’re still engineered the same way so the figures feel pretty familiar. They’re just more slight than the men with thinner limbs and smaller hands and feet. They obviously have unique headsculpts and Kimberly differs from her teammate in that she has an extra piece of plastic for her skirt piece as she was the only female Ranger in the Japanese version. They stand at about five and three quarters inches, which is roughly half an inch shorter than the males. They look pretty good in relation to the male figures, though I think you could argue Hasbro went a little too far in slimming these two down. Their limbs probably don’t need to be quite this slight as these are pretty athletic women, and the thinness of the limbs apparently necessitated a compromise when it comes to the articulation. Their proportions also look less appropriate than the men. I can’t decide if it’s the torso that is too long, or the legs. Something just doesn’t look quite right to me and I notice it more with Kimberly than Trini.

Like the men, these figures mix colored plastic with painted plastic. And like the men, it’s a problem. With Trini, she mostly looks okay. The yellow is quite bright with her torso being ever so slightly darker than the limbs. I have to be looking for it. Kimberly is another story. Her torso is quite a bit darker than her limbs to the point of being near purple. The pink on her helmet appears to be a completely different shade of pink, as does the skirt. She’s a mess, and to make things worse my figure was quite bow-legged out of the box as she comes packaged in a rather awkward position. I had to heat her legs up to try and straighten them out and they’re definitely better now, but not good enough. Trini is a lot more interesting to position and move. Her paint is fine and she might be the cleanest one I’ve received. It also helps that yellow paint slop just isn’t going to be as obvious as a darker color, but it’s good.

The articulation with these figures is nearly the same as the male ones, but it also works a little differently due to the sculpt. We’ve got a ball-peg at the head, hinged shoulders, elbow swivel, single-jointed elbows, and swivel and hinged hands. Shockingly, Kimberly has a vertical hinge on her right hand for her bow. I don’t know what it is about a bow that made Hasbro decide she needed this hinge, and the others didn’t, but at least they got one hand right out of 14 in this line. Trini, sadly, still has horizontal hinges to deal with. The women having single-jointed elbows instead of double-jointed ones is something I can only assume was brought on by the thinness of the arms. Hasbro used a hinged, ball, peg system so that’s why they have a swivel at the elbow instead of a biceps swivel. It’s a bit more awkward looking, but the figures can still curl their arms past 90 degrees so it’s not a huge downgrade. The diaphragm cut is where things get a little worse. It’s still a ball-joint, but it’s far less effective. There’s a lot of gapping when the figure arches back and the range of motion in general is poor. I attribute this to the lower portion of the torso not sitting further inside the upper piece. The ab crunch is also still here, but even more useless than with the men. The belt floats and can be adjusted and for Kimberly it’s attached to the skirt. The hips flare out, since these are women, and reduces the range of motion there. The men couldn’t really do a split, and the women are even worse which is a shame as I feel Kimberly’s signature move was the jump-split-kick. There’s a thigh swivel and double-jointed knees to go along with a boot cut and ankle hinges with rockers. The ankles are still the star of the show. Overall, the articulation is okay, but definitely worse than the men. Kimberly’s skirt also further reduces her range down there and her bow legs make just standing straight like the phony product shot on her packaging impossible and far less elegant than it could be.

Trini comes packed with a pair of gripping hands for wielding her Power Daggers. The little sai-like knives look fine and she has no trouble holding them, she just misses the proper hinges for her hands. Kimberly has her Power Bow with a gripping left hand to hold it and the specialized right hand for knocking an arrow. She also has a silver arrow she can hold, but it doesn’t work particularly well or look all that good. She also has an energy arrow which is far more accurate to the show and easier to wield. And it also looks a hell of a lot better than the silver arrow. It’s a translucent pink with the form of an arrow at the front and looks quite good. Trini has two, yellow, translucent, sparks for her daggers that make me think of pom-poms. They’re fine and it adds a little flair to her posing.

Like the men, both women come with a second set of hands and a Blade Blaster. For Trini, she has another gripping right hand that is meant to be used in tandem with the Blade Blaster. She also has a style pose left hand that’s similar to a karate chop. Kimberly comes with a left fist and a style pose right hand in the same shape as Trini’s chop hand. This is pretty smart on Hasbro’s part as it gives the women a set of stylized hands to share, should you want to. And I seem to recall at least the Pink Ranger using such poses in the show. Neither woman comes with the collapsed Blade Blaster or the knife version, which is a bummer because the blaster version doesn’t fit Kimberly’s holster as well as it does the other Rangers. Curiously, Kimberly’s blaster is painted differently from all of the other ones opting for a metallic silver instead of white. I think this actually looks better, but it drives me a bit crazy that hers is different for no apparent reason. She also doesn’t have a proper trigger hand and neither default hand works particularly well with the gun.

Of course, both have a second, unmasked, head. Thuy Trang’s likeness is okay. I at least know it’s her, but it’s not as good as Jason or either Tommy head that came with his figures. Kimberly looks awful though. It does not look anything like Amy Jo Johnson to me. The hair looks fine, so I guess she’s not as bad as Zach since both his hair and his face looked terrible, but it doesn’t really matter if she’s as bad as Zach since she’s still bad. It’s a good thing I don’t value these optional heads because I’d be livid if I did. Their long hair also makes articulation much trickier than before. Trini is okay, but Kimberly kind of locks in place once seated so she basically can’t move her head in this form, but you’re not going to use it so who cares?

Since these are the last of the Mighty Morphin figures I will review, it feels like a good time to talk about how the weapons work. Just like in the show, the weapons can combine to form a clunky looking mega blaster of sorts. The axe is the base and the bow clips into the front of it while the sliding action on the axe serves to hold it in place. The daggers and Billy’s twin, mini, tridents peg into the underside of the bow while the sword slots on top of the axe and bow. It’s easy to assemble, though a little tricky to get one of the figures to actually hold it properly. I was able to finagle the pose from the show with Billy and Zach grabbing one end of the bow apiece and the women basically just placing their hands on Jason, so it’s doable. There’s no screen accurate blast effect packaged with anyone though, but that probably would have made it far more difficult to pose with added weight on the front. This gun has always looked kind of silly, but I love crap like this. I love that the weapons combined on the show and I would have been irritated if the toys could not do the same.

The female portion of the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers brought with it a mixed bag. Generally speaking, this sculpt does not function as well as the male figure and that’s disappointing because there’s no reason why it shouldn’t work just as well. Despite that though, I’ve actually enjoyed posing the Yellow Ranger. Her weapons are simple, but not restrictive, so she has a lot of freedom. I’m also happy with her paint as she turned out about as well as the White and Green Rangers. The Pink Ranger though is another story. Her articulation is slightly worse, but what bugs me more are her warped legs and mismatched colors. She’s definitely the worst of the bunch and what’s working against her is I never liked her helmet in the show very much. She looks like an alien or something. She’s not a good figure which sucks because she’s been the hardest to get. I had to pay over retail for her because Hasbro stopped shipping her, possibly because there’s a new version out done in a metallic paint with a different actress likeness. I’m curious if that one is any better, though the metallic paint made it a non-starter for me as she wouldn’t fit in with the rest of my display. And if I didn’t need her to complete that display, I wouldn’t have her. She’s the worst figure I’ve purchased in a long while.

But you need the whole team! And that’s where Hasbro gets you. They know they don’t have to hit a home run with each figure in this line because collectors are going to buy them no matter what since they want a full team of Power Rangers. And now that I have a full team plus the Green and White Rangers, how do I feel? Pretty good. This is a case where the end result is better than the sum of its parts. I have issues with these figures, some more than others, but I’d rather have a full team than just a lone Green Ranger. And even though the scale is obviously way off, I do like having these guys with my vintage Bandai Megazord which displays better with this set than it did the vintage sets. I suppose that would mean it’s “Mission Accomplished” on Hasbro’s end, and that’s how it is with mass market action figures. At least now, after almost 30 years, I finally have a set of Power Rangers toys!