SUMMARY:
[Recap of "Never Stop Searching"]
Streaking through space in Velocifighters, Elgar and a fellow Quantron seek and fire upon a NASADA satellite, sending it falling into the atmosphere of a nearby planet. Elgar claims victory in this mission to Astronema, whom orders him to make completely sure it was destroyed, because the satellite knows far too much. The V-Fighters then head down to find the trashed Sat on the planet Kalderon. Meanwhile, The Rangers rush to the Astro Megaship bridge, receiving an encrypted transmission from General Norquist of NASADA, who needs their help!
[opening credits]
Commander Gen. Norquist tells the Rangers (whom he luckily cannot see unmorphed, given it's a one way transmission) about the exploration satellite being shot down, and that it has 8 years worth of valuable information in it's data discs. He asks for their help in retrieving said discs, given that the Rangers now have NASADA's only space shuttle capable of making the journey. Transmission ends, leaving the Rangers to ponder why Astronema wanted that satellite so badly. They come to an assumption it may have seen something on the location of Zordon, so quickly they set a course for the fiery planet of Kalderon. Meanwhile at their destination, Elgar takes a mild vacation, lounging around and having his troop of Quantrons do all the recovery work. Just as he's about to apply more sunscreen, Astronema makes an angry call to her new henchmonster, asking him how he thinks he'll find the downed satellite loafing around like that. He jumps at the sound of her voice, breaktime over. Elgar tries mentioning the Sat may have crashed into one of the many lavarivers and burnt up, but she can't take any chances on it still being operational. The Dark Fortress' sensors begin detecting the Astro Megaship approaching the planet, so while Elgar & Company continue their search, Astronema deploys three Velocifighters to flank the Rangers' ship. As the V-Fighters begin coming up on the Megaship, Andros has all of his Ranger crew man battle stations, arming the Megalasers and shields at full. The Velocifighters fire upon the Megaship from behind, but once the Rangers get their craft turned around, the Megalasers start popping Robodrones off left and right. The final one is taken out by reversing the engine, backing up over it, and turning it into space debris with one quick laser strike. The Rangers cheer at their first successful Megaship/V-Fighter battle as a team, and continue on their course to Kalderon.
[Commercials]
The Astro Megaship finally makes it to Kalderon and the Rangers jump through their Jump Tubes, taking the Galaxy Gliders down to the surface. Once there, they unmorph to their Megaship Uniforms and wander around looking for the satellite in the scorching heat. They lose communications with Alpha, as he is telling them that the planet is basically one big active volcano! Elgar and his Quantron army bump into our heroes and soon an unmorphed fight breaks out. As the others knock around the metallic minions, Andros kicks it to Elgar, whom runs for it when he hears some kind of monster lurking nearby, named Clawhammer. The Rangers fear volcanic activity may be the least of their worries when they hear growling and stomping in their vicinity. While running for his evil life, Elgar runs straight into the blonde, curly with stars haired Astronema. She threatens to feed him to the monster for lunch unless he finds the satellite discs. Elsewhere, the Rangers continue to search, AMScanner no use and Morpher unable to contact Alpha. Ashley wanders off on her own, finding a piece of the satellite in some dead animal bones. Luckily, they find the rest of the downed NASADA satellite nearby and retrieve the memory discs from inside it, with only one badly damaged. Astronema & Her evil cronies appear on the scene, wanting those discs, leaving the Rangers no choice but to "Rocket" into action. Lots of fighting, and kicking, and punching goes on, Red Ranger using his Astro Blaster to fire at some Q-Trons. Black Ranger is struck down by Astronema's Wrath Staff, giving Pink Ranger a chance to jump her, but while getting tossed away, Cassie accidentally breaks off a small necklace of Astronema's containing a locket! She grows incredibly angry over someone touching her precious locket, kicking Pink Ranger aside, reclaiming it, and using her Wrath Staff to fire purple energy blasts at four of the Rangers! They're downed and captured, Andros falling last to the rage of Astronema. She takes the memory disks out of Red Ranger's hands, gives them to Elgar to guard, and has her crony tie up the defeated Rangers. Soon, our heroes are chained to the ground in a circle, left by Astronema to be eaten by Clawhammer. Just as the villains are teleporting away, Andros uses his telekinesis to make the discs fall out of Elgar's pocket. A lot of good it'll do them, Clawhammer is stomping his way to have lunch any minute now!
[Commercials]
Under the unbearable heat of the sun beating down on them, the Rangers can do nothing but lie on the ground, struggling to get loose before their fate is that of food to a giant seafood monster. With communications overheated and no way to get in touch with the Rangers, Alpha and DECA do a visual search from the Megaship and find them just as Clawhammer gets ready to have some sun-roasted Rangers. Not left with any options to save his friends, Alpha initiates the Astro Megazord transformation from the bridge and pilots from there with DECA's help! The Megazord lands on Kalderon's surface, taking on Clawhammer quite nicely, considering it's essentially being run by auto pilot. Victory can't come as easily with Rangers in control, so soon enough Clawhammer begins tearing into the Megazord, and tosses it over a cliff! The Megazord barely holds on to the ledge, as right below it lies a lava lake! Andros uses his trusty mental powers and drags an Astro Blaster into his hand to blast free himself and the others. The Rangers regroup, and rush to the Astro Megazord (picking up the data discs on the way). The Megazord is losing it's grip, Clawhammer about to hammer down the finish blow, when the Rangers make it back into the cockpit in time to block the attack. Now back in control of the Megazord, the Rangers take on the crabby crustacean, grabbing on to it's antennae and tossing him all around. Once they break off, it's time to bake some crawfish by picking him up and chucking him into the lava lake, for the seafood lover in you (without the drawn butter, sadly).
[commercials]
Later, on the Dark Fortress, Astronema asks Elgar for the memory discs, but upon revealing he seems to has misplaced them, she sentences him to play with so-evil-he's-never-shown pet named Scrudly. Back on the Astro Megaship, the Rangers transmit the information from the discs to NASADA, but find nothing on them pertaining to Zordon. Commander Gen. Norquist is happy to have the eight years of scientific research back in their possession, and commends the Rangers on a job well done (notice they are morphed while talking to him. This is a live feed, the earlier message was pretaped). Soon, the Rangers demorph, worry and wonder what was on the broken disc. To help relax after that scorching mission, TJ recommends they go snowboard in Switzerland via the SimuDeck. Alpha finishes the episode with a sigh of sadness over the failed possibility of finding their missing Eltarian friend.
[scenes from "A Ranger Among Thieves", end credits]
_BLOOPERS:_
Cassie causes an earthquake on Kalderon!; TJ initiates the 'cut' mechanism; Elgar gets shook out of shape; TJ & Carlos do a take one more time...
