Now, my tape stuffed up so I don’t actually have the opening teaser, but I remember it pretty well. Simply, it’s Justin’s birthday, but when he goes to the shed, the other rangers seem to have forgotten, barely want to talk to him and don’t even to let him in. Because of course, they are planning a surprise party. Justin gets very upset, and walks away, where he spies a bike leaning up against a dumpster with a note on it saying that bicycle is for him.
As he gets on the bike, the little periscope pops up from a water-filed barrel. Watching Justin, Divatox reveals that a monster planted the bike for Justin for some unknown reason. Sure enough, just as Justin is riding away, the monster (called, oddly enough, Big Burpa, with sound effects to boot) appears and, trapping Justin on the bike, it then makes the bike shoot off. Justin notices that the odometer counts backwards. The bike then takes Justin all over Angel Grove, knocking bins and people over, typical comic relief stuff. Meanwhile, Alpha and Dimitria become aware of Justin’s problem.
Back at the shed, Lieu. Stone and the other four rangers are preparing for the party when Stone remembers that he’s left something back at the Youth Centre. Once he’s left, Alpha calls the rangers, tells them about Justin and Big Burpa and they teleport to the Power Chamber. Once there, they find out about Big Burpa and Justin and split up, Tommy going after the monster and Adam, Tanya and Kat looking for Justin. Tommy morphs, catches up to the monster and races it in his Turbo Cart. The monster escapes, and seeing as the others can’t find Justin, they all grab their Turbo Carts and join Tommy. However, again, the monster escapes, and so Adam, Tanya and Kat then head off to find Justin.
Justin is currently racing through Angel Grove park. Just as he works out that the backwards-counting odometer really means that the bike is a detonator, the other three arrive, unmorphed, and chase after him. After Justin has told them about the bike, Adam calls Tommy, telling him to forget the monster - the bike is the detonator. Justin then rides the bike onto a pier, trying to dump it in the river. As a periscope pops up, watching him, he realises that the bike floats and rides it back up onto shore. Divatox is rather happy watching Justin, and she pulls a bag of popcorn out of Porto’s head aquarium to eat.
With one mile remaining before the bike explodes, Kat and Adam tell Justin to jump onto the grass. He tries this, but his foot is stuck to the magical bike. Then, morphed Tommy arrives on the scene in a neat teleportation effect. As Justin rides by, he calls up the Red Lightning Car (it ain’t a zord. I don’t care what the show calls it, but it ain’t a zord. It’s a futuristic looking car, maybe, but no zord) and drives off after Justin. Setting the car on cruise control, he gets up onto the roof, dives off and rescues Justin. Red Lightning drives away (smart car. I wonder how much per episode the car makes?), and the bike falls over. But the still spinning wheel is enough to finish the countdown, and the bike explodes (with Justin and Tommy safely in the distance). Justin says that he’s glad that it’s over, but Big Burpa arrives and tells them that it isn’t.
The all morph (‘cept for Tommy, because he was morphed already) and beat up Burpa. Justin then goes after the monster one-on-one, and he fights it pretty well, even breaking it’s sword with a well-aimed kick. He knocks the monster down, then the others get there to help him. Watching from afar, Divatox orders them to fire the torpedoes. The torpedoes fly through the air, and once hitting the ground, Big Burpa grows, before subsequently blasting the Rangers. The Rangers then one by one call on their Turbo Zords. The Power Rangers then form the Turbo Megazord.
Big Burpa charges the Megazord, and the Rangers give control over to Justin. He gets the Megazord to do a flying kick which sends the monster stumbling, before firing on the monster with the chest laser cannon. Tommy then calls on the Power Saber, and the Megazord performs the spin-out, which completely destroys the monster.
Back at the shed, Lieu Stone returns only to find that Bulk and Skull, the chimp versions, have made a complete mess of it. However, they get things clean again, and when Justin arrives at the shed and the teens show him in, once everyone shouts "Surprise!" Justin couldn’t be happier. Well, he is a little sad because his father couldn’t be there, but as it turns out, the teens thought ahead - Justin’s father walks out and gives him a big hug.
Watching from a periscope in the punchbowl, Divatox is annoyed by the kindness and happiness going on, and reveals that she never even got a gift or a card when she was young so why should anyone else? Elgar then tells her that he cares about her, to which Divatox responds, "Oh that’s precisely the problem." The show ends with Divatox watching Justin hug his dad and tell him, "This is the best birthday ever."
Well, what an episode this one was. And I don’t mean that in a good way. Well, I did enjoy the episode a little bit, and I can’t say that I hated it. But seriously, this is the kind of episode that makes me understand why I just didn't like Turbo that much. It left me feeling ‘eugh’, and while some of it was good, it just wasn’t that enjoyable for me. There are a few short reasons for that (Tommy got to be the hero, the whole show focussed on Justin) but the majority of reasons are going to take longer.
Firstly, there was the plot. Now, I know that I usually don’t mind very much if a plot is a little threadbare. I mean, after all, it is a kid’s show. And the whole ‘one of the heroes is upset about something birthday-related’ is a very common theme in kid’s shows, but I have a question - haven’t we seen this done before? At least twice? I mean, off the top of my head I can think of at least one episode in season one where it was Zac’s birthday, and he thought the others had forgotten his birthday and went off and got himself into some trouble when they had been planning a surprise party all along. What, were the writers on holiday in Bermuda this week?
Secondly, this episode has me seriously leaning towards ‘intelligence-challenged’ for practically all of the characters. Justin is on a bike that is about to explode. But it takes someone else to come up with the solution of jumping off the bike? How hard could that have been? Then of course, there was Tommy’s rescue of Justin. He sees Justin is on a bike that is about to blow up, and he goes out of his way to call up Red Lightning, sets it on cruise control and then jumps off the roof to rescue Justin. Why the heck didn’t Tommy just sit back, relax and watch the detonator blow the little shrimp into oblivion?
Thirdly, there was an over-abundance of Sentai footage in this episode. I know, I know, but seriously, whenever we saw Big Burpa with no Justin there were Japanese people all around. Not to mention the Japanese signs, road-markings and symbols on the monster’s cloak. Although, I am willing to put this down to Angel Grove having a ‘Little Tokyo’ that is larger than Tokyo itself.
And that brings me to the monster - was it just me or did Big Burpa become exceedingly annoying in as little time as possible? I mean, listen to those burping noises that she kept making - they got unimaginably irritating by the end of the episode.
Although, I must admit, despite the episode’s failings, it did give us a zord battle that was up to scratch, and for that we must be thankful and grateful. As long as we get a decent zord battle, I can forgive the show for some of its ills.
Okay, despite everything that I’ve just said, I just have to give this one to Justin, for his wonderfully sarcastic, "If anybody’s got any ideas, now would be a real good time to speak up."