• Retail Price: $3.99
• Writer: Ryan Parrott
• Artist: Marco Renna
• Cover Artists:
  • Main Cover: InHyuk Lee
  • Legacy Variant Cover: Eleonora Carlini
  • Incentive Cover: InHyuk Lee
  • Incentive Cover: Eleonora Carlini
  • Incentive Cover: Rian Gonzales
  • FOC Reveal Cover: Javier Fernandez
  • FOC Reveal Incentive Cover: Javier Fernandez
  • Incentive Cover: Rian Gonzales
• Synopsis: Rescued by the Power Rangers, Candice reveals there’s a deeper threat to earth than previously realized! The revelation will force Zordon to grapple with his ancient past and, for the sake of Earth, make a plea to a potential ally no one expects. But Tommy takes matters into his own hands which leads him to a collision course with his former allies!

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The issue begins with our usual flashback to 10,000 years ago, this time at Zophram’s funeral. After it concludes, Zartus tells Zordon that he does not agree with leaving the Zeo Crystal, and the Bandoras’ Palace, on Earth’s moon, but Zordon says he’s planning to have an observation outpost placed on Earth to keep an eye on things. Zartus then tries to convince Zordon to make him Supreme Guardian so that he can live the life he’s dreamed of. But, after everything that’s happened, Zordon doesn’t feel that he can just lead a normal life, and that this is his life now. He then offers Zartus the Chief Guardian position, which he agrees to.

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Flash forward to almost the present, specifically the point during last issue when Zartus finished talking to Tommy about trust and teleported back to his ship. This time we stay with the Rangers, who return to the main chamber of the Command Center, where they are greeted by Zelya. She explains that Lord Zedd let her go after he told her the truth about Eltar. She also reveals that there were 3 planets that she’d been sent to supervise to see if they were worthy of joining the alliance. After she had said they weren’t, they were all later destroyed by the Empyreals.

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The Rangers are suspicious because it’s Zedd, so Zelya plans to go to Zartus’ ship to investigate. Despite the fact that they have been doing a good job of driving away anyone that could help, Zordon sends the Rangers out to try to recruit them anyway. So, while Kim, Rocky and Adam head to the Juice Bar to do homework instead, Tommy and Aisha head to Promethea. This doesn’t go well, but Grace does agree to think about it. Afterward, Tommy sends Aisha to convince Billy to come back and apologize, while he has a talk with Matt. He’s worried that, like him when he was the Green Ranger, someone is pulling Matt’s strings, but Matt reminds him that Grace isn’t Rita and he isn’t Tommy.

While all of this is going on, Zelya tells Zordon, privately, that Zophram is Lord Zedd. Soon after, Zordon contacts Zedd, not believing that it could be true. But, Zedd proves it by repeating the first rule of supervision: never eat the food. With this, Zordon tries to appeal to his good side and get his help against Zartus, but Zedd refuses. To make matters worse, Sentry Force Four have picked up Zordon’s call, allowing Zartus to figure out that Zordon knows. As such, he decides that now is the time to set things in motion.

On Earth, Kimberly, Rocky, and Adam are still working on their homework when they get a somewhat garbled call from Zordon, asking them to check out some Eltarian activity south of Angel Grove. A quick morph later and they are at a rock quarry, where they are attacked by Sentry Force Four.

Back at the Command Center, Billy creates a diversion to keep Alpha busy so that he can sneak in and apologize to Zordon. But before Zordon can react, he has to tell him to hide, because, just then, Zartus and 2 of his soldiers teleport in. After dropping their false pretenses, Zartus reveals that he’s been behind everything. With all that has happened, Zordon basically renounces Eltar and states that he is now Zordon of Earth. With that, Zartus uses his staff to smash Zordon’s tube, and declares that the war has begun.

Story – 3 of 5: Well, we get about half of what I thought had been skipped last issue. We get the scene of Zelya telling Zordon and the Rangers about Zartus, but we don’t get to see Zordon’s initial reaction to learning about Zophram being Zedd. I’m not a fan of so much flashback, but I guess it works better than just revealing everything in chronological. Kim showed a little more attitude towards Zordon as well, to the point where she didn’t even attempt to recruit help. That seemed a little out of left field. In fact, why did only Tommy and Aisha try to recruit anyone? If there was that much danger, I would think having the whole team asking for assistance would mean more than just 2 of them. And then to have them just go to the Juice Bar rather than preparing for the battle they know is coming doesn’t make sense either. I mean, it makes sense as far as getting everyone in their proper places, and having the Command Center empty when Billy shows up, but there really isn’t a good in-story reason for it. I also wonder if that garbled call from Zordon was actually the SFF setting up their trap. If they can intercept Zordon’s call to Zedd, they can fake a call to the Rangers. Also, In the scene of Zartus on his ship, his dialog at the beginning of the scene indicates that this is taking place just after the Yellow Emissary has been reborn as an Empyreal, which is a nice nod to continuity.

Art – 4 out of 5: Not much to say about the art that I haven’t said before. I like it, it’s consistent, and things stay interesting in an issue without much action. My only problem is with the scene at the Juice Bar. I don’t know if this is a problem with the writing or the art, but it appears that Rocky, Adam, and Kimberly answer Zordon’s call at the table, stand up, and morph. While the Juice Bar does appear to be devoid of patrons, we do see Ernie, or at least his mid-section, at the counter right before their communicators beep. So, unless they moved to their favorite little alcove between panels, Ernie just saw them morph.

Overall – 4 out of 5: The art helps make up for the problems I had with the story, but the Juice Bar scene, added to my problems with the story, knock the score down a notch. Still, I recommend this issue, especially since it is a direct lead-in to The Eltarian War.

On a related note, I’m not sure what the BOOM! supplied synopsis means with “Tommy takes matters into his own hands which leads him to a collision course with his former allies!” All he did was talk to Matt. No one else was even in the room, let alone any of his former allies. Maybe something was changed at some point.