The producer of Power/Rangers responds to YouTube and Vimeo take-down

The recently released Power/Rangers fan film has been pulled from YouTube and Vimeo following threat of legal action, and now the short film's producer Adi Shankar has released a statement expressing his disappointment.

"Today, I was deeply disappointed to learn that Saban Brands decided to attack my Power/Rangers 'Bootleg Universe One-Shot' film," reads a post from Shankar made available on Facebook.

"To all the viewers that enjoyed this film, I consider this an outright infringement on freedom of expression and individualism. I set out to make this film because I am a childhood fan of the Power Rangers. As children our retinas are burned with iconic images and as we grow older these images come to represent crucial moments within the trajectories of our own lives.

!This film is a homage to the original creators of the Power Rangers, and a parody of a television series we all grew up loving. Films like my Power/Rangers 'Bootleg' are vital expressions of creativity in our troubled world. If we suppress this creativity and become passive participants in the consumption of the culture we live in, we implicitly allow a dangerous precedent to be set for the future of the internet."

Shankar later thanks Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg for continuing to host the short film. Power/Rangers was quickly taken down from Vimeo after its creators receiving complaints from Saban Brands. Shankar's representative Ash Venkatram told TMZ at the time that the team will keep the video on YouTube until they are sent a formal cease and desist letter. The film has since been removed from YouTube.

Polygon recently spoke with Brad Newberg, an intellectual property partner at the law firm of McGuireWoods LLP, about the legal grey area that exists around this matter.