Power Rangers Lightning Collection King Sphinx

I have a weird relationship with Power Rangers. I never was a huge fan of the series, though it actually does check a lot of boxes in my array of interests. Most of what I remember is watching the OG Mighty Morphin. I think I watched the Ninja stuff, and then I want to say Turbo was the “third iteration” and my interest kind of fell off around that time.

These monsters though in the Lightning Collection Line. Everything about them really hits for what I am liking now. And I admit, I’ve been a bit of a sucker over it, because I’ve picked up most of them and inevitably, they go on super clearance because apparently no one is buying them. I think the only one I didn’t go for was Pumpkin Rapper, which sometimes I kind of regret.

King Sphinx was the other release along side Pumpkin Rapper in wave 1 of these monsters. I like him, he’s big and bulky and tough looking. I think part of what helps my enjoyment of these figures, versus the more hardcore Power Rangers fans, is that I am not a hardcore fan. It seems like these monsters are, mostly accurate to the source material, but they are a bit more, we’ll say, stylized, to fit the aesthetic of the line. For example, King Sphinx’s face is kind of off quite a bit.

It’s kind of an odd choice. These are almost all unique molds, by the nature of their designs. So why not make it super accurate? Also, Power Rangers is a live action show. These monsters all exist as giant human sized costumes. There isn’t the problem from adapting a 2D comic to cartoon design to a 3D figure media where you need to figure out how to make things work in the real world and not make the faces look weird at head on angles or something. These are all based on real world actual physical things.

That said, I think I prefer the stylized look. They look much more menacing and much less goofy. It’s also possible they are based on some comic designs as well or something, though I have never seen a Power rangers comic.