Power Rangers Director Thinks PG-13 Rating Hurt Box Office Takings

Earlier this year, the 'Power Rangers' were brought to the big screen once more for a franchise reboot from director Dean Israelite. A relatively-unknown cast of five Rangers were brought on board, with Elizabeth Banks playing the film's primary antagonist in Rita Repulsa and Bryan Cranston taking on the role of Zordon.

A new age of 'Power Rangers' were born earlier this year

Earning good-to-great reviews and enjoying a brilliant promotional trail ahead of release, 'Power Rangers' unfortunately didn't do amazingly well at the box office. With a production budget of $100 million, the film did make a net profit in the box office, taking in $140.2 million. Much more would have been expected when the film was given a green light, however.

Without a sequel confirmed, the future of this new Rangers universe is one that's already on the rocks. Action figure sales are enjoying a high and the Rangers are currently sat as the number one brand in that regard, so that could prove enough reason for another film moving forward, but it's definitely not a dead-cert as it should be with a franchise this recognisable.

Elizabeth Banks stars as the villainous Rita Repulsa

Now, those who worked on the film have started chatting about why the movie may not have seen the amount of success they first thought. Could it be something to do with the PG-13 rating?

"Not only do I think it, but there's been market studies on it, and the findings have been that if the movie were rated PG - I don't want to go into the specific numbers - but if the movie had been rated PG, there would have been more traffic. I think parents were unsure if they could bring their kids to the movie, which surprised me, because the movie is a tame PG-13," Israelite explained in a chat with Screen Rant.

He expanded on his comments, adding: "We did a lot of preview screenings, and to me, it felt like a seven-year-old might be scared, but in a good way. They liked that they were scared of Rita, but they still came out of the movie enjoying it, they liked what was going on. I think we really tread that line well, so it was disappointing that parents didn't know that they could take their kids to it."

Now that the film is hitting home release, Israelite went on to talk about his hopes that a boost in sales may come from parents checking out the film themselves and realising that it would be fine for their kids to watch. Whatever the case may be, the 'Power Rangers' franchise is one that deserves a lot of attention; we hope that a sequel is in the works and will be officially announced soon...

More: Bryan Cranston On Voicing Monsters For Old 'Power Rangers' Episodes

'Power Rangers' hits 4K, Blu-ray and DVD release on June 26.