Column by Joshua Moore

Who’s ready to have their personal garden of 1990s childhood memories harvested for a quick, near effortless profit?

My own memories are in the path of Disney’s mouse-operated plow. In January 2010, the company will begin re-airing the first three seasons of “Mighty Morphin Power Rangers” in re-mastered form on ABC Kids.

The implicit reasoning behind Disney’s choice to bring the original “Power Rangers” out of retirement instead of adapting the latest Sentai series (the source of all Japanese footage seen in “Power Rangers”, as has been the norm for 13 years), probably resides in  plans to sell to a new generation of kids something that that will appeal to the nostalgic side of teenagers and adults who grew up with the show.

Recurring problems in reviving a franchise, as illustrated over the years by “Star Wars,” “Transformers” and “Masters of the Universe,” are that diehard fans can become discontented with the direction a series is taking with its re-launch, critical changes made in trying to appeal to the masses alienate fans and attempts to recreate the magic that a franchise conjured during its original run fail. However, even if a revival effort is unsucessful, it can generate interest in prior installments. So it is somewhat of a double-edged sword.

George Lucas caught lightning in a bottle when his original “Star Wars” film turned into a blockbuster hit, which allowed him to produce two more successful and well-respected films in creating the franchise’s original trilogy. Flash forward to the late ‘90s, when Lucas decided to produce the prequel trilogy of films, because by that point in time, the technology  was sufficient to support his vision for the movies.

The “Transformers” brand is not unlike “Power Rangers” in that the TV show’s primary purpose is to act as a 20-minute advertisement for the toys. The release of the Michael Bay film in 2007 and its sequel released this past summer encouraged squabbles within the fandom, and ignited debates over whether designs of the characters were faithful to the cartoon and whether they were Hollywood popcorn flicks with robots tossed in or genuine “Transformers” representations.

Regardless, based on box office returns, the general public loved the movies, and interest in the “Transformers” brand has skyrocketed over the past few years and even cued the re-release of the original seasons on DVD many years later.

The story of “Masters of the Universe” is more tragic than that of the other two narratives. After a short-running cartoon that spawned a commercially outstanding line of action figures, the “MOTU” franchise struggled to find its footing among the daunting array of ‘80s cartoons and continually fell flat with mainstream audiences as it tried to redefine itself several times up until the early ‘90s.

In the first half of this decade, a new cartoon paying great respect to the old cartoons was developed, which embellished much of the characters’ lacking qualities. The new toy line even provided some of the most beautifully sculpted action figures ever designed for children.

Still, the new series met the same fate as its predecessors and wasn’t around long enough to ignite a “MOTU” fire within the hearts of today’s children, but it did succeed in bringing the franchise back into the forefront of prior fans’ minds and created a huge collectors’ market for the action figures; so some success was achieved.

What does all of this tell us? Given the decline in “Power Rangers” TV ratings over the past few years (although one could attribute that to Disney’s mishandling of the show’s schedule and lack of heavy promotion), yet constant fixture in the top-10 in action figure sales, giving the series that catapulted the brand into the homes of millions a re-boot probably is not a bad move on Disney’s part.

Not only can they still air the show and use it to propel toy sales, bringing back the most familiar “Power Rangers” team will encourage product design geared toward adults and collectors. And though it’s not likely to recreate the success that occurred in the ‘90s, it doesn’t hurt to put the original series out there for the current generation of children to enjoy.

As the transition to the next decade occurs, I expect many more ‘90s properties to be reexamined for their relevancy in today’s market. Whether you like it or not, your memory garden is always open for business and improvement.

For now, Disney is more than welcome to replant the seeds of my childhood, but they should avoid the overuse of pesticides and extraneous machinery. The old-fashioned methods work fine for these crops.