It's tough being new. Coming from a neanderthal family, I know this very well, particularly when I went to a new jr. high halfway through the 7th grade. There were popular and unpopular kids all through elementary, but things didn't really kick off until recess was eliminated. You had to work fast in impress when going to a new school, or get shunned till graduation. I didn't make the cut.

My main problem was that I was trying too hard. I was trying to be too cool (I wasn't), too funny (I'm still not), and too smart (I was WAAAAAY too smart), and ultimatly ended up just being mean and bitter through 8th grade. I didn't find a niche until high school, when I cut the theatrics and just went on with my day.

You know what never found a niche? Captain Power and the Soldiers of the Future. Oh, look, it's all coming together!

For the uninformed, Captain Power is the television equivalent of a 12-year old me, sitting alone in the hym, wearing a ratty sports jacket and trying to find a cool way to give someone the finger. There isn't anything wrong with Captain Power.

In fact, I'd say it was ahead of it's time. Released a month before Star Trek: The Next Generationm it came during a time of low success in sci-fi television shows. The storyline follows Captain Jonathan Power and his four team members fighting a guerrilla war using special suits that give them powers, beating the Power Rangers to the punch by six years. The stories were more adult in nature, violent and with a sense of doom through out the series, despite being advertised as a kid show. It was very flashy visually for it's time as well, being one of the first shows to use regular CGI characters. And then there was the interactive aspect of the show, which I'll touch upon in a minute.

The show was a failure, however, cause nobody knew what to make of it. Adults wouldn't watch a kiddy show as advertised and kids couldn't follow along all that well.

Well, if the popular girls in 7th grade are to be believed, first impressions are everything, so here's the first episode of Captain Power, entitled "Shattered".

We join our story already in progress. REALLY in progress. Almost all the backstory is given in the opening credits thanks to a cigar-smoking narrator. We got your future war between man and machine, and machine wins. But paper covers machine. Anyway, now the humans live in secretly underground, and do their best to stay out of the way of Lord Dread, the evil machine leader guy. Then Captain Power showed up! Hurray! And his friends! Major Matthew 'Hawk' Masterson! Lieutenant Michael 'Tank' Ellis! The millionaire and his wife! Sergeant Robert 'Scout' Baker! Corporal Jennifer 'Pilot' Chase! And they had robot suits, and started blowing up robots.

That's it. That's all you're gonna get for this first episode. More of the backstory was revealed slowly through the show, but for newcomers, 90% of what your about to see will make no sense at all.

We open with most of the Soldiers of the Future hiding behind some rocks, while Scout, a tiny man in the tiniest costume, runs around, killing guards and imitating said gaurds using holograms, all to sneak into an enemy factory. What the factory is for will never be explained, ever.

TED: Stan?

STAN: Ted?

TED: I know we're just supposed to do our jobs and whatever and not worry, but, um...

STAN: The giant green spot?

TED: Yeah.

STAN: I think Lord Dread just wants to show our enemies how minty fresh we are.

TED:: So, not targets?

STAN:: Of course they're fucking targets!

That's where the show's interactivity comes in. You see, several toy guns were released soon after the show's release. Kids would point these things at the TV screen, and every time the trigger was pulled while aiming at a green spot, points were added up. The idea was to watch the show with a friend, and try to get a higher score by the time the end credits rolled around.

So, Scout sneaks in and places some timed explosives, but manages to trip the world's most obvious security system. It doesn't help that the guy was running full-pace through through enemy walkways while in disguise. With Scout trapped inside, the SOTF begin to blast a hole in the front door, all the while making fun of the fact that Hawk is old. And by old, they mean 35. I'd love to give more character development for these guys, but we seem to be on a need-to-know basis.

Her name is Pilot. She pilots things. 12 years before Farscape.

Meanwhile, in what appears to be the big top in the annual robot circus, Lord Dread looks over damage reports. That's Lord Dread. No, he's not a Borg. This was about a year before the Borg showed up. God, I really want to give you backstory, I really do. There's a reason the leader of the machines is part human, a fairly good one. But if the episode doesn't tell you, then I can't either. Tough titties.

The SOTF return to their secret underground base, massage their lack of bruises, and shoot the shit. But not all is right in HQ. A mysterious message appears on one of the computer monitors, signed Athena. Captain Power is taken aback. Athena was an old pre-war buddy in college, and the message, a chess move, was their private joke. The message is traced back to a ruined San Fran. It's not clear if the area is safe, so the crew consult Mentor.

Mentor is a floating blue man in a tube.

...

..

.

WAAA

Power and Pilot make their way to Frisco, which is thankfully radiation free. I guess the nuclear holocaust was fought with normal bombs. Captain Powers goes on ahead, while Pilot keeps an eye on the ship. I should point out that Powers and Pilor are the unoffical item of the show, so throughout the episode, Pilot helps Power's find his obvious ex-girlfriend rather grudginly. So when Pilot decides to leave the ship to examine some flashing street lights, it's not so much that she's stupid as she's upset and not thinking clearly.

God, I hope that's what it is.

Cause quicker then you can say "cause quicker then you can say," Pilot gets gased by a mysterious assailant in Casshern cosplay. The people trying to save the world, ladies and gentlemen.

Captain Power gets jumpy and dons his power suit, and then heads downstairs in a ratty old bookstore. Downstairs is a chess set, and Power decides to pause to get all weepy and sentimental. The people trying to save the world, ladies and gentlemen. He has flashbacks (complete with ripple effects) to when his young self and Athena would play the world's most boring game and make googly eyes at each other.

Though admittadly cuter with the shorter haircut, Athena is a tad less googly. She barely gets a hello in before trying to blast a hole in Captain Power's chest, claiming "it's the only way," then turning tail and running.

This doesn't sit well with Lord Dread, whose plan was the capture Captain Power alive, using Athena, who was until recently a war criminal, as bait. Lord Dread summons Soaron, the next in line of Lord of the Rings based villain names. Soaron is the show's crown jewel: a completely CGI evil robot, voiced by a cranky guy talking through an electric fan. Soaron sails off to San Fran.

Thankfully, Athena is really, really bad at killing people, and both Captain Power and Pilot turn out OK. Pilot crawls back into the ship and orders for reinforcements, while Captain persues his ex. Luckily, Athena is not a very good runner, either.

Right outside the bookstore, Athena and Power have a little Mexican stand off, and Athena gives Power a history lesson. Athena was part of something, and some shit went down, and things got shitty. Athena ended up captured, and refusing to give up any information, is DIGITIZED!

Digitizing is a lot like Chrunchitizing, only instead of ending up in an animated world of evil milk monsters and peanut butter cearel, you end up in what was considered a computer in 1987. Similar to WonkaVision, the prisoner is broken down into information and is stored till Lord Dread summons them.

Eight years before Pokémon.

Athena describes the feeling as being touched everywhere 24/7. She knew that they planned to digitize the Captain, and decided for him that death was a far better option. Unfortunatly, now they're both screwed. Soaron pops in, and with Power too weak to fight back or run, they wait for their fate, deciding it's best to go at it together then alone. Awwww.

Luckily for them, San Fran must have been a pond skip away from wherever the SOTF base is, and Hawk manages to drive Soaron away from our future-war-love-birds. If San Fran was that close, why didn't the entire team go the dead city. Power in the numbers and all that. The people trying to save the world, ladies and gentlemen.

The SOTF make quick work of Soaron, though being the main underling on a TV show, he doesn't suffer any real damage. I hate this TV logic. If the grand ruler (Lord Dread, Lord Zedd, whatever) is able to create one immortal soldier, then why do all the others fall over from a light breeze? The people trying to stop the people trying to save the world, ladies and gentlemen.

Back at SOTR HQ, Power and Athena have one last moment together before Athena shuttles off to a survivor camp. And what a better moment to spend that moment by playing a computer version of world's most boring game. I'm glad to see the "came with the computer" game package for Windows 95 remained intact after the huge robot war. And that concludes the first episode of Captain Power and the Soldiers of the Future. It's not all that bad, really, and in the end, it was some bad marketing decisions that brought the show down, not from a lack of fan base. But I don't know, if I had seen this when it first came out, I probably wouldn't have come back. I don't require everything to be laid out for me. Lost wouldn't have a fan base if it explained anything. I just kind of wish I knew who the blue man in the tube was, you know.

As I watch the interactive trench run during the end credits, I realize just how awesome a Captain Power movie would have been.