Edinburgh Fringe comedy review

Kiwi comedian Nic Sampson really did play Chip Thorn, the Yellow Power Ranger, in the 14th series of the franchise 18 years ago, and this clever, funny delight imagines what his life would have been if that had been the pinnacle of his career. 

His alter-ego is a washed-up has-been clinging to that one moment of minor success – simultaneously resenting the fact that he now ekes out a living attending fan conferences and making personalised Cameo videos yet deludedly hoping he’s got enough residual star power to launch a spin-off movie and get his spy thriller published.

Set at a Comic Con reunion – his fellow Rangers conveniently delayed en route –  Sampson makes bold statements about the ‘integrity of the legacy’. A big claim for a series which revolved around teenagers who could transform into king-fu fighters, robots, inanimate objects and – for his series – wizards, given that Harry Potter was getting big at the time, so why not nick that idea? 

By the time he was in the show, subtitled Mystic Force for his season, the franchise was desperately short of ideas and throwing all sorts of bizarre nonsense into the mix. It’s easy to mock, but Sampson does so artfully in this slick fusion of fact and fiction.

Meanwhile, the ‘character’ of Sampson is a masterpiece of self-deluded hubris. He certainly considers himself way superior to his fans – rubbing his hands with sanitiser after each encounter, for example, an old gag, but very subtly executed – but the base is a cash cow ready to be milked.

We’re urged to crowdfund his gritty reboot of the Mystic Force characters, while he shares an extract from his novel Maverick – both dreadfully written with prose so agonising clunky he makes Garth Marenghi look like Ernest Hemingway.

Meanwhile, side skits feature a surreal parody of Mark Wahlberg’s insane daily routine – featuring a lot more owl action than the Hollywood A-lister – some on-point audience interaction and him recording a self-tape audition for a role in True Detective, as hammy as you could hope it to be. 

His alter-ego's delusion, conceit and refusal to move on is a heady mix, which Sampson exploits in this pacy, silly, character study of how his life could have turned out, had he not been so inventive and talented as a comedian.

Review date: 23 Aug 2024
Reviewed by: Steve Bennett
Reviewed at: Assembly Roxy