Breaking news: Tommy, “Sentient Colors,” and Drakkon would have been included in Netflix’s canceled YA “Power Rangers” reboot as “one of the most important people in the universe.”
Although Jonathan Entwistle’s attachment to rebooting the Morphin’ Grid has long since faded, he has finally spoken out and shared a wealth of details about his plans for the now-canceled Power Rangers reboot on Netflix, including the fact that Tommy Oliver would have been the show’s primary mythological character and antagonist.
The streaming behemoth’s own teenage superpowered drama, I’m Not Okay With This, and the UK television adaptation of Charles Forsman’s comic series The End of the F—ing World were both directed by Entwistle, who was hired to develop the new project when Netflix first announced plans to completely reboot the American Super Sentai adaptation in 2019.
After five years and just one update, TVLine’s Matt Webb Mitovich revealed in June 2024 that Entwistle’s reboot was “no longer moving forward at Netflix.” Hasbro Chief Financial Officer Deb Thomas had reassured investors during the company’s Q4 2022 earnings call that it was undergoing “continued development.”
Remarkably, not a single piece of specific information about Netflix’s Power Rangers remake ever reached the public, considering the internet’s nature and how long it had been in production.
Until May 21st, when he had an Ask Me Anything session with Reddit’s /r/movies community to promote his upcoming Karate Kid: Legends, Entwistle was asked a lot of questions about his Power Rangers work and then responded to them.
In the Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers Free-Comic Book Day Special (2018), BOOM! Studios, Zordon asks the Morphin’ Grid Emissaries for assistance in battling Dakkon. Art by Diego Galindo, Marcelo Costa, and Ed Dukeshire; words by Kyle Higgins and Ryan Parrot.
“As early as 2018, I had created an entire new universe for Power Rangers – kind of a multiverse (it was v fashionable back then haha),” the former reboot shepherd explained in response to a Reddit user who asked if the project would “have been a new take on Mighty Morphin’ or something new?” While I wasn’t specifically working on MMPR, Tommy Oliver, played by the late Jason David Frank, was the focal point of the universe. The mythology around him as one of the most significant figures in the universe since we all knew what he would become.
According to Entwistle, “it was essentially a time-bending, enormous story about preventing Drakkon from assuming control over everything.” The attitude of the TV show was more mystical and magical to begin with, and it had a really fantastic King Arthur sense. Jenny Klein, the show’s writer (who has written for shows like Netflix’s Jessica Jones and The CW’s Supernatural), also had a very great idea for sentient colors, but unfortunately, it never materialized. Which is terrible because I would have adored creating that universe!
