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Ranger Ranker! #16 – Power Rangers Operation Overdrive

The One Where the Disney Rangers (And Adam) Come Back

Welcome back to Ranger Ranker! It’s an anniversary season this time, with Power Rangers’ 15th anniversary, so let’s not waste time and get into it! But first,

Let’s Talk About Purpose

What makes a hero do heroic things? A hero might be heroic due to choice – placed in a dangerous situation, they may choose the heroic path. They may be heroic due to their nature – doing good simply because that’s what one is supposed to do. They may be heroic due to responsibility – maybe they have power in some way and are driven to use it to help. But regardless of the underlying reason, what all these heroes share is a sense of purpose: a reason for doing the good that they do. A compelling hero’s sense of purpose is their driving force; it’s something that propels the story forward and explains why the hero is the way that they are. In Power Rangers, the heroes are often chosen in some way, whether by circumstance,1 personal choice,2 or by a value judgment from a powerful figure.3 This choice often sets the tone and type of purpose that drives the team to do good – they have the heroic responsibility to live up to the powers they gained by accident, or they have chosen to dedicate themselves their heroic jobs, or they have the natural qualities and instincts that make them heroic. One of the things that makes Power Rangers special as a franchise is that it says that anyone and everyone could be a hero, given the right chance and the heroic sense of purpose to choose to be a hero.

In Operation Overdrive, the Rangers are chosen by Andrew Hartford for their unique set of skills and are granted superpowers via the universal superpower of vast amounts of wealth and advanced technology. Hartford does this because he feels responsible for putting Earth in danger by disturbing the Corona Aurora and releasing the evil brothers, Flurious and Moltor, upon the world. His purpose is to set right what has been set wrong, and with his great power,4 comes the great responsibility to use that power5 to create a team of superpowered heroes and outfit them with giant transforming robots to stop villains from beyond this world. The Rangers themselves are effectively employed by Hartford, but are similarly driven by responsibility – they must use the powers they have been given and the skills that only they have to stop the villains that only they can stop. Interestingly, the crossover episode throws a wrench in this sense of purpose – their powers are stripped away and their skills turn out not to be as unique as they had thought when a team of veteran Rangers appears that can do the job that they are no longer capable of. They are stripped not only of their powers, but their purpose, and are left adrift. They attempt to return to the mundane lives that they lived before, but find that they are no longer satisfied with a normal life – they still feel that sense of purpose but have no way to productively direct it. Ultimately, they do find a way to aid the veteran Rangers without their powers and they reaffirm their choice to become heroes in the first place, and when their powers are restored, they take up the mantle of Rangers with that renewed purpose.

More than other seasons, Operation Overdrive seems to have a better, consistent sense of purpose. More than just being generically heroic and defending the earth, there’s always a reason behind what the Rangers are doing in any given episode. The show always has a goal in mind that it’s chasing – there’s always a next artifact to find or puzzle to solve. This gives the season a feeling of forward momentum that other seasons can lack, and a feeling of a faster pace than some other seasons. Some of this is obviously due to the reduced episode count from the lowered budget, but it’s also due to its construction as a world-spanning race to collect the five scattered jewels of the Corona Aurora. That sense of purpose behind everything the Rangers do is noticeable and gives this season a weight that it otherwise might not have. So let’s get into it! Put on your adventuring hat and get ready for:

Power Rangers: Operation Overdrive is the 15th anniversary season of Power Rangers, airing in 2007 on Disney’s ABC Kids channel. Does it live up to the weight of that anniversary? There’s only one way to find out:

Adaptation

Operation Overdrive’s guiding star is evident from its opening sequence – Mack dreams of himself as an Indiana Jones-style pulp hero going on globetrotting adventures in search of mysterious ancient artifacts. The season was meant to be a world-spanning adventure with exotic locales and setpieces. However, Disney’s management was not exactly conducive to this vision. The show’s budget was cut once again, making its lofty plans difficult to execute. The diverse environs of Aotearoa are used to double for numerous worldwide locations, from Egypt to Japan to St. Lucia to Florida, to mixed effect, and there was a push to use more and more stock footage over original material. 

Plot

Andrew Hartford is an indescribably wealthy6 globetrotting adventurer. On one expedition, he comes across the mythical7 Corona Aurora, a magical crown that once contained five magical jewels that, when combined, hold the power to rule the universe. The crown was once sought after on a distant planet by two brothers, but the crown’s power cursed them, transforming them into elemental monsters. The crown’s guardian split the jewels from the crown and scattered them on a distant, uninhabited8 planet. But it turns out that planet was Earth all along! Oh no! And when Hartford disturbs the crown, he brings the two brothers, Flurious and Moltor, to Earth, seeking the power of the crown and its jewels. Under the guidance of the crown’s guardian, Sentinel Knight, Hartford brings together a team of unique individuals to become Power Rangers and retrieve the Corona Aurora before the brothers can, intending to lead the team as its Red Ranger. However, in the heat of battle, his son Mack ends up being the one to use the morpher and become Red Ranger in his stead. 

The Rangers chase after the jewels to mixed results, attracting the attention of more villains in the form of the individualistic Kamdor and Miratrix and a faction of feline villains9 known as the Fearcats, but gain the aid of the alien Tyzonn who had been brought to Earth against his will by Moltor after a disastrous encounter with the Fearcats. In the process of fighting four distinct groups of villains, bonds are forged, the jewels and crown are found, stolen, and traded, and secrets are revealed. Most notably, Mack is discovered to actually be an advanced android created by Mr. Hartford and given false memories of a full adult life as Hartford’s biological son. 

This revelation triggers a bit of an existential crisis in Mack, who has to reckon with his identity and reason for being in the face of his entire life up until now being a lie. This culminates in him becoming reckless and self-destructive, viewing himself as expendable and worthless, since he’s not a “real” human. Ultimately, Mack sacrifices himself in one final attack to defeat Flurious, the last villain standing who manages to acquire the complete Corona Aurora and transform himself into an all-powerful monstrous form. However, with the power of the Corona Aurora, Mack is able to be brought back as a real, biological human and everyone lives happily ever after and no one has to reckon with the Frankenstein problem at all ever.

+329 pts

Music

After some drama with Disney over the theme song for Power Rangers Mystic Force, longtime composer Ron Wasserman cut ties with the series in Operation Overdrive, along with the composer Bruce Lynch who had composed music for the series since Ninja Storm,10 leading to new composers being used for this season. And the results are… kind of not great, as you might imagine. The theme song itself is pretty bad, with nonsense lyrics that somehow make last season’s hip-hop-inspired theme look good. And when the most exciting musical moment of the season is a medley of themes from past seasons11… well, that kind of says it all.

-254 pts

Fights

With the reduction in budget for the season and the emphasis on reusing Japanese footage over new original footage, the fight scenes definitely suffer. There’s a lot of dramatic slow-motion being used, as well as the focus on using lots of explosions for excitement. The novelty of the Rangers having civilian powers is kind of wearing thin too, especially with the choices of powers not really lending themselves to interesting fights. Super speed being reused is fine, but super strength is a pretty generic choice and the remaining three – invisibility, “springiness,” and heightened perception – don’t really work in fights.

+10 pts

Miscellany

It’s really interesting watching them try to pass off Aotearoa as so many different locales this season. Who knew that Florida had such impressive mountains? And the attempts to make all of the mythological artifacts that were originally very culturally Asian come from cultures all across the globe are equally amusing. The Norse god Thor using a hammer with a Japanese dragon motif, for example, is quite the sight. Granted, this was always going to be an issue with the reuse of Japanese props and footage, but the globe-spanning nature of the season does exacerbate the problem. I say “problem” but honestly I find it a little endearing, if that makes any sense. The messiness of the adaptation is part of the appeal! I’m here for it, despite how my nitpicking may sound.

Cumulative Score: 3002 pts!

The Good Guys

We’re putting a team together. They’re the best at what they do, and what they do is have an incredibly weird assortment of skills.

The Rangers

Mack Hartford (James MacClurcan)  

Rich Kid. Super Strength. Is actually a robot.

  • Color: Red
  • Zord: Dump Driver/Sonic Streaker
  • Signature Weapon: Drive Lance
  • Strength: 100
  • Smarts: 5
  • Coolness factor: 5

Another instance of a Red Ranger having basically nothing going on for much of the season and then a late-season reveal recontextualizes their whole deal. In this case, it’s the reveal that Mack is actually an android, built by Mr. Hartford two years ago, making him the youngest Power Ranger in series history so far. This triggers an existential crisis in Mack – previously he had been an adventure-loving, sheltered, kind of spoiled individual, but afterward he distances himself from Mr. Hartford and begins taking unnecessary risks and exhibiting self-destructive tendencies. Does a robot have real emotions and human feelings? It doesn’t really matter because he gets turned into a real boy by magic at the end, so he never truly has to grapple with being an artificially-created consciousness.

Dax Lo (Gareth Yuen)  

Stuntman. Super Springiness. Is actually terrible on camera. 

  • Color: Blue
  • Zord: Gyro Driver/Cement Driver
  • Signature Weapon: Drive Vortex
  • Strength: 3
  • Smarts: -1
  • Coolness factor: 2

Oh my god Dax is so annoying. The eternal stuntman, always replaced by a “real” actor for the “real” moments in films, he’s meant to be The Fool character. He’s ostensibly fun-loving and carefree, but he really just comes off as an idiot most of the time, interjecting nonsense into the conversation seemingly every time he opens his mouth. Oh, how he vexes me.

Ronny Robinson (Caitlin Murphy)  

Racecar Driver. Super Speed. Is actually really into Halloween.

  • Color: Yellow
  • Zord: Dozer Driver/Drill Driver
  • Signature Weapon: Drive Claws
  • Strength: 5
  • Smarts: 7
  • Coolness factor: 10

An adrenaline junkie who can drive anything with or without wheels, Ronny is in the same “crazy one” archetype as Kelsey from Lightspeed Rescue, but with a clearer skillset. She also has a tendency to get into trouble a lot and need rescuing, which kind of feels like she’s getting the short end of the stick as a character. She does have a minor romance with Thor,12 who mistakes her for Freya, so that’s kind of fun at least.

Will Aston (Samuell Benta)  

Thief.13 Super Perception. Is actually not evil.

  • Color: Black
  • Zord: Speed Driver/Crane Driver
  • Signature Weapon: Drive Slammer
  • Strength: 6
  • Smarts: 9
  • Coolness factor: 15

The sarcastic, cool guy, lone wolf of the team, Will is just too cool for school most of the time. This leads to friction early on as he’s not much of a team player and isn’t used to relying on others, and is used to good effect when he appears to betray the team as part of a double-cross ruse. He gets better over the series and does truly seem to care for Mack and the others by the end of things. His whole background is being a thief for good, “stealing” things to expose the flaws in the security systems, but honestly, they just wanted a thief character but needed him to be ostensibly heroic. Lean into the bad boy thing and commit, I say.

Rose Ortiz (Rhoda Montemayor)  

Grad Student. Invisibility. Is actually secretly into pirates.

  • Color: Pink
  • Zord: Sub Driver/Shovel Driver
  • Signature Weapon: Drive Geyser
  • Strength: 3
  • Smarts: 20
  • Coolness factor: 3

She’s the all-purpose smart one, with her expertise going from physics to technology to universal mythology,14 as is common with smart characters in fiction. But she’s also coooooool because she chews gum and is irreverent while she fixes malfunctioning devices. Really, she just is there as exposition and plot momentum, bringing us from one ancient relic to the next in the chase for the Jewels of the Aurora. It’s not a bad character archetype to be in, but it is an unrewarding one.

Tyzonn (Dwayne Cameron)  

Rescuer. Metallic Transformation. Is actually deeply uncool.

  • Color: Mercury
  • Zord: Flash Point Megazord
  • Signature Weapon: Drive Detector
  • Strength: 10
  • Smarts: 1
  • Coolness factor: 1

Tyzonn is an alien from the planet Mercuria, chasing the evil Fearcats to Earth but becoming entangled with Moltor, who conscripts him into his army before the Rangers are able to bring him onto their side. He’s a fish out of water on Earth, and quite a bit socially awkward, but his heart is in the right place.15 He previously was a Rescuer, part of an organization that, well, rescues people. It’s not that deep. He lost his last team in a cave accident caused by the Fearcats and is committed to bring them to justice. He may have a little bit of survivor’s guilt and trauma from that. Just a tad. A wee tiny bit.

The Team

I’ve always been down on chest emblems in the suit designs, and these suits are not winning me over. They’ve got the Operation Overdrive logo on the chests, which is like, a compass or dial or something? It’s not great. The helmets are vaguely vehicle themed, which ends up being pretty same-y across the team. The one good aspect are the chrome belts and bands around their arms and legs, which give a nice visual break in the otherwise pretty bland suits.

As for the team chemistry, it’s shocking how little there seems to be. It’s another team that’s brought together by their skills, much like Lightspeed Rescue, but unlike that season, there’s little professional camaraderie or esprit de corps. They just kind of are there as their jobs because Hartford asked them to be, and they mostly don’t even seem to like each other. They should be a mesh of interlocking gears, but instead you kind of ended up with a team full of self-centered loners.

Ranger Ranker:

  1. Ronny – It’s hard not to compare her to Kelsey, but honestly, she’s everything I feel like Kelsey should have been, and it turns out that that’s pretty fun. +2020 pts
  2. Rose – The (second) most least unlikeable of them all! Seriously, this is hard because it turns out that I don’t really like any of these people. +1093 pts
  3. Mack  – I feel like they could have played up the “only two years old” thing a bit more by making him even more of a sheltered idiot early on. He’s still a sheltered idiot, though. +751 pts
  4. Tyzonn – How is he more of a himbo than the two-year-old robot? +504 pts
  5. Will – Sooooo cooooooool. And by “cool” I mean “antisocial and obnoxious” +228 pts
  6. Dax – I hate. -173 pts

These are all just such unlikeable people. Even Ronny, who has the most going for her, comes off as selfish and obnoxious as much as she is cool and unflappable. Everyone else is just so insufferable and difficult to work with. I guess that reflects on Mr. Hartford’s abilities16 as a mentor/leader/organizer. Not that Hartford is particularly likeable either, now that I think of it.

“Overdrive Accelerate!”

To kick off this morph sequence, the Rangers have to roll their Overdrive Trackers along a surface like they’re revving up a toy car.17 I think that’s actually pretty neat, and it leads to a lot of fun variations on that action throughout the series. After that, the Trackers project their Ranger suits and gear onto a holographic screen, from which it attaches to them and morphs, similar to the S.P.D. morph sequence, but less dynamic. But the cool part is the spinning rev-up thing. That probably made a really cool toy.

Overall Team Score: 598 pts!

With Special Guest Rangers…

Veteran Rangers

When the Overdrive Rangers lose their powers after a combined assault by every villain damages the Morphin’ Grid, the Sentinel Knight assembles a team of veteran Rangers past and future, in the form of Tori,18 Kira,19 Bridge,20 and Xander,21 led by Adam22. It’s the fifteenth anniversary of Power Rangers, you see, and we can bring back representatives from all the Disney teams, plus Adam as a special treat. The veteran Rangers temporarily replace the depowered Rangers in fighting against Thrax, son of Rita and Lord Zedd,23 while the Overdrive Rangers return to their ordinary lives, except for Mack whose ordinary life kind of sucked, so he goes looking for a magic sword. Thrax unites the rival factions of villains into a new evil alliance, which inevitably falls apart after they lose one (1) battle against the veteran and repowered Overdrive Rangers, who get their powers back when Alpha 624 helps to fix the Morphin’ Grid from the inside.

It’s really fun to see the Rangers of the past few seasons come back, even if we only get one per team. And Adam is one of my all-time favorites, so even better having him back. We don’t really get a lot of depth on what’s been going on with any of the veteran Rangers, aside from Bridge, who has been promoted to Red on top of his promotion to Blue at the end of his season. Apparently Sky is now in charge of all of Earth’s S.P.D.? That’s a fun little addition to the lore, even if it only makes a little bit of sense. Tori gets basically nothing, and Xander and Kira only slightly more. But I do love seeing them, and if I had to pick my returning team out of those seasons, it wouldn’t be far from this selection.25 The fight scene with all of their theme songs playing in a medley is great, even if they couldn’t get any of the Mighty Morphin’ music back due to rights issues, presumably. As for the story of the crossover, it doesn’t really reflect well on the current team, who gets sidelined once the new Rangers show up, so there isn’t a lot of interaction between the teams until the final fight. I think it’s probably unfair to say that the Overdrive Rangers just give up after being replaced, but it does highlight how bad of a job Mr. Hartford does as a mentor that he basically abandons them for the new team, when his old team clearly needs his support in the moment.

Gear

Overdrive Trackers

The Rangers morphers, which as mentioned above, have this cool spinner wheel thingy that’s involved with the morph sequence somehow. Years before fidget spinners existed, even! I guess they also do other stuff, like scan for the Jewels of the Corona or whatever. That’s cool too, kinda.

+741 pts

Excelsior

Excelsior is a magical sword looked after by The Warrior Goddess, who is a statue or something. It’s the only thing that can destroy Sentinel Knight, according to Thrax, which makes it the most powerful sword in the universe, possibly? Sentinel Knight bonds with the sword to form a corporeal body, and then Mack is able to bond with Sentinel Knight to form his battlizer, so I guess it’s technically part of the big Special Red Power Up for this season. 

+777 pts

Drive Weapons

The weapons in this season don’t combine to form a bigger, cooler weapon, but I guessssss they’re fine on their own. They are at least useful for practical tasks, like digging and shooting water or whatever, but they’re also kind of silly looking. I’m a fan of the big hammer, though. More big hammers please.

+410 pts

Mjollnir

Speaking of hammers, Thor’s hammer shows up, and it’s got a cool AsianNorse dragon motif on it. Anyway, the Rangers shoot it out of an ancient magical cannon to blow up a big rock or something. So that’s fun.

+602 pts

Zords

DriveMax Zords

The DriveMax Zords are all different types of vehicle, from sky, land, and for some reason sea. I guess it makes sense that they want to be able to do underwater adventure stuff, but having a submarine as one of the Zords does mean that there always needs to be a convenient channel or beach or lake or something all the time for the Zord group shots. Apart from that one, these Zords are pretty standard, you’ve got the one flying one and three driving ones that are all pretty ok, I guess. The Dump Driver is pretty useful I guess because it gets hands, but the other two Zords are always just kind of hanging out there. In Megazord mode, it gets a big shovel and pickaxe, which is a pretty cool differentiation from other Megazords and keeps in line with the treasure hunting theme of the season. Unfortunately, the two interesting weapons usually just get combined together to form a big sword just like every other Megazord ever.

The DriveMax Zords are fine, even though I hate the internal caps in the name. As individual vehicles, they hearken back to the Lightspeed Rescue Zords or Turbo’s Rescue Zords, but don’t get quite as much to do. They just never get much chance to show off any special abilities or anything in vehicle form except for the Dump Driver. As a Megazord, it’s also pretty standard, though it does get some customizability in the form of the auxiliary Zords swapping in for its various arms and doing various different things. More on that later though, I guess.

Coolness of Form of Transportation

  1. Gyro – I just love gyrocopters, okay? They’re so impractical yet so fun. +739 pts
  2. Speed – It’s weird that the racecar Zord goes to Will instead of Ronny, but racecars are still basically the coolest type of land vehicle. +552 pts
  3. Dozer – Bulldozers are kind of cool I guess. Overall, the most neutral on this one. +350 pts
  4. Dump – While this particular dump truck is pretty cool, with its big robot hands and dual-container design, who fantasizes about driving a dump truck? +300 pts
  5. Sub – So, it only works when there’s water, right? That’s… that’s great. +42 pts

DriveMax Megazord

Primary Weapon: Drive Digger/Drive Pickaxe/Drive Saber

Finishing Move: Saber Slash – The engine on the Megazord’s chest revs up a series of gears and belts, powering up the Saber, then the saber forms the Overdrive logo in the air and slashes through it at the enemy.

Total (group) score: +499 pts

DualDrive Zords

The DualDrive Zords are made up of the DriveMax Megazord’s four auxiliary Zords and the Sonic Streaker, a tricked out plane or something. Individually, the Zords26 can swap out for arms of the main Megazord, making a drill hand or claw hand or shovel hand or horrible CGI goo-shooting hand, in various combinations, but all together with the Sonic Streaker, they can form a whole separate second Megazord, the DualDrive Megazord. The two Megazords can also combine, using all 10 Zords to form the DriveMax Ultrazord, which can fly thanks to the Sonic Streaker forming wings on its back.

This is, in my opinion, a much more sensible way of handling the auxiliary Zords than the past couple seasons have done, where the auxiliary Zords are just kind of also present, and often don’t even get a pilot. Here, each Ranger gets to be the pilot of one DriveMax Zord and one DualDrive Zord, and the mix-and-match nature of the auxiliary Zord system doesn’t feel as tacked-on as when there just are a bunch of extra arms for the Megazord running around

Coolness of Construction Vehicle

  1. Sonic Streaker – Not a construction vehicle. Still pretty cool. +627 pts
  2. Shovel Driver – Most resembles a hand. +589 pts
  3. Crane Driver – I guess it’s kind of like a grappling hook crane? +544 pts
  4. Drill Driver – Very inconvenient for a hand replacement, honestly. +498 pts
  5. Cement Driver – CGI goo. And not the tasty-looking kind of goo either. +50 pts

DualDrive Megazord

Primary Weapon: Drill Hand

Finishing Move: Full Power – The Megazord fires multicolored lasers out of its hands and knees, converging on the enemy.

DriveMax Ultrazord

Primary Weapon: Drill Hand (again)

Finishing Move: Full Power – The Megazord flies into the air and the solar panels on the Megazord’s chest fire a flaming bird at the enemy

Total (group) score: +922 pts

BattleFleet

Boat with wheels! The Battlefleet is a giant battleship made up of a bunch of smaller ships that don’t really matter. It gets around the “needs water” problem of other aquatic Zords that we could name by being amphibious. Plus, the other Megazords can ride around on top of it! For… mobility or something. I don’t know. As a Megazord it’s got big streamroller fists that spin around for more power, but not the way you’re probably thinking! No, they spin around not like a rolling pin, but like a top, which must be incredibly inefficient from a rotational inertia standpoint. Anyways, it’s a big boat with wheels and there’s not all that much more to it than that.

Coolness of Fleet… Things…

1-5. Honestly they are all so insignificant and all basically the same anyway. +0 pts

BattleFleet Megazord

Primary Weapon: BattleFleet Rollers

Finishing Move: Maximum Power – A spinning belt powers the BattleFleet Rollers27 to spin around and punch the enemy real good.

Total (group) score: +444 pts

Rescue Runners

This is another Zord system that’s technically made up of individual Zords, but really is just used for its Megazord form. In its Megazord form, it has really springy legs? So it can jump really high using spring legs? And also duck really low by compressing its legs, which lets it dodge sometimes. It’s kind of weird. I’m not really sure where all that comes from, to be totally honest. 

Coolness of Vehicle

  1. Fire Truck – Everyone loves a fire truck. Also it’s the main Zord, so it’s bigger and better than the other two. +222 pts
  2. Ambulance – For some reason it can fly? But not with wings or anything, it just kind of does. +0 pts
  3. Police Cruiser – Boooooooo +0 pts

Flashpoint Megazord

Primary Weapon: Water Launchers

Finishing Move: Hydro Blast – The Megazord’s three Water Launchers fire a barrage while a giant wave is projected in the background. This somehow does a lot of damage.

Total (group) score: +320 pts

Mentors/Allies

Andrew Hartford

Andrew Hartford is a billionaire28 playboy adventurer, styling himself after Indiana Jones but without a real job. He causes all the problems of the series when he disturbs the Corona Aurora and frees Moltor and Flurious from their imprisonment on their corresponding elemental planets. The spirit of Sentinel Knight tasks him with fixing his mistake by forming a team of Rangers, and presumably helps him accomplish this somehow. Hartford kind of sucks as a leader and a father. And probably as a businessman too, because apparently all the Ranger tech comes from his unexplained company.

+285 pts

Spencer

Spencer is Hartford’s butler/manservant who hates his job but is still inexplicably loyal to Hartford. He’s also a master of disguise for some reason. It’s never stated outright, but my impression is that he’s terrible at literally every part of his job.

+176 pts

Sentinel Knight

Sentinel Knight once existed in a really cheap-looking humanoid form, but by the beginning of the season his powers have weakened and left him in only a semi-transparent spiritual form. By combining with the sword Excelsior, he is able to take on a corporeal form once again, and at the end of the series with the power of the Corona Aurora, he returns to his original, much less cool form. He’s seemingly incredibly powerful, able to gather Rangers from across time and space to form his veteran team when the Rangers lose their powers, but is also kind of ineffectual overall.

+431 pts

Random Citizens Lightning Round!

Brownbeard

A pirate and a g-g-g-g-ghost! He also possesses Rose for a bit so she can be a pirate too!

+513 pts

Thor

Thor! The God of Thunder! Apparently gods are real in the Power Rangers universe, which isn’t a total surprise, I guess, all considered. This doesn’t shatter anybody’s entire belief system or anything, at least.

+1033 pts

Jessica Jeffries

Jessica Jeffries is a newscaster and an old friend of Andrew Hartford’s, who interviews the Rangers and isn’t as cool as Harvey Garvey, the other Ranger interviewer in the series.29

+792 pts

The Baddies

Four, count ’em, four factions of villains this season! That’s a dang lot of villains! And I say this after a season where there were like 13 main villains, but possibly… too many villains? But it’s not the number of villains that’s the problem, but the handling of them. They’re just kind of all around at the same time, pushing each other out of the spotlight. At least with the Ten Terrors, they were thematically linked and only one or two of them was important at a time. Here, everyone’s just all up in everyone else’s business, jockeying for position and chasing the same goals. And the worst part is that it barely feels personal with any of the villains, save for Tyzonn’s grudge against the Fearcats. The Rangers are just one more faction in the race for the jewels of the Corona, and that’s not a great dynamic for villainy.

The Big Bads: Flurious and Moltor – Belligerent Brothers

Many30 years ago, Flurious and Moltor were human31 brothers who sought the power of the Corona Aurora. But in seeking it, they were cursed! And turned into elemental monsters and sealed away on distant planets. Until just recently, when Andrew Hartford accidentally disturbed the Corona Aurora and freed them… somehow…? So they come to Earth, where the Corona Aurora has been split apart and hidden to gain its power once again. And they hate each other. Like, a lot. They keep bumping up against possibly teaming up to beat the Rangers and they keep double-crossing each other because they can’t let go of their old grudges, which include something about a little red sled. Moltor is probably the least interesting of all the villains of the season, not least because he never has anyone to talk to or interact with. He gets ignored for most of the latter parts of the season anyway, and in the end, Flurious destroys him after blowing up his volcano base. Flurious at least is the ultimate villain of the season, outlasting everyone else. He also gets the most screentime, though most of it is spent just reacting to things that happen and very little of it is spent on actual villainous acts.

Score: +2222 pts

The Other Big Bad: Kamdor – Ninja Nemesis

Kamdor is an intergalactic criminal who got trapped inside a crystal two years ago while saving Miratrix from some unspecified “trouble.” Miratrix frees him using a technobabble laser device, and the two of them stay on Earth to try to obtain the power of the Corona Aurora. He’s cool and mysterious and has vague ninja powers. He and Miratrix are kind of the underdog/wildcard faction of villains this season, but tend to be quite successful in their plots, despite not having a lot of manpower or firepower. His relationship with Miratrix is complicated – she views him as a partner, but calls him her master, and he never really treats her as an equal, though never quite like a minion either. In the end, he grows frustrated with her continual failures32 and abandons her, eventually trapping her in a jewel like the one he himself was trapped in. He has a rivalry with Will, and ultimately is defeated in a one-on-one duel with the Black Ranger. 

Score: +5848 pts

Yet More Big Bads: The Fearcats – Feline Foes

The Fearcats are a dangerous gang of intergalactic criminals who Tyzonn has chased to Earth. They are violent and power-hungry, hunting for any artifact that they believe can give them an advantage against their enemies. They focus on building destructive giant robots and enhancing their abilities with various magical artifacts. In their first encounter with the Rangers, they are destroyed, but Benglo and Mig are returned to life as cyborgs by the power of Flurious’s gyro devices. They immediately betray Flurious in return for this boon though, and strike out on their own villainous path. They aren’t explicitly searching for the Corona Aurora – they mainly are just around to cause trouble – and they find numerous other dangerous artifacts over the course of the season, including the powerful Octavian Chalice, which uses three more powerful artifacts to power it and create an unstoppable monster who the Rangers have to, well, stop. In the end though, their past catches up to them and Tyzonn is able to aid the Rangers in destroying them and settling his old score.

Score: +4276 pts

Henches

Norg

Norg is a yeti. An incredibly stupid, not particularly evil yeti. Flurious invades his home and makes it into his base of operations, and Norg is basically just fine with this and is glad to have company around. In the end, Flurious decides to rid himself of Norg and sets his minions on him, but Norg escapes and makes his way to Hartford Manor to befriend the Rangers. I don’t believe he ever quite knows what’s going on.

+1 pt

Miratrix

Kamdor’s partner-in-crime, Miratrix is introduced as a love interest for Dax, but betrays him instantaneously to steal a magic scroll. She’s deeply loyal to Kamdor and serves him faithfully for little reward because he saved her life once. Eventually, she turns into a giant bird monster due to magical nonsense, but she gets better. 

+622 pts

Fodder

Chillers

The Chillers are Flurious’s soldiers, but he loans them out to other villains on occasion. They’re the most often seen of the footsoldiers this season and they are booooooooooring. They’re basically like Putties with zero personality.

+2 pts

Lava Lizards

The Lava Lizards are Moltor’s forces, and unlike the Chillers, seem to be at least a little intelligent? Some of them even talk. Weird. They also get big sometimes for Zord fights, so that’s fun.

+176 pts

Monsters

One of the interesting things about the monsters this season is that many of them are thematically and visually tied to past Zords. Moltor, for example, shares a lot of visual motifs and silhouette with the Dino Megazord from Mighty Morphin’. This is due to the source Sentai, GoGo Sentai Boukenger, being an anniversary season and doing these visual callbacks as part of its celebration of the series. 

Monsters That Are Good (According to Me)

Blothgaar

Blothgaar is a dragon monster whose design is based on Lord Zedd’s Zord, Serpentera. His main plan is to use an Aztec compass33 to cause Mack to have bad luck. This works, despite Andrew Hartford seemingly believing that robots can’t have bad luck, which is pretty robot racist honestly Hartford, geez. Anyway, I like Blothgaar because of the way he pronounces the word “compass” really weird every single time.

Vulcon

Vulcon was originally a Lava Lizard, who wins a battle among all the other Lava Lizards, proving him the strongest of all of them. Moltor promotes him, transforming him into a stronger monster and planning to use the scale of a dragon to power him up further. Hey, we know a dragon! There was one just last season! And conveniently, Hartford knows him too, because Fire Heart’s scale turns out to be the MacGuffin of the episode. A fun little callback.

Magmador

Magmador has tentacles that can replicate weapons used against him, and I just love a copy monster. He isn’t particularly effective or anything, buuuuuuut… copy monster! Yay!

Top Hat

Just look at this guy. What’s even going on with him? He’s like a magician or something? And he’s got all sorts of props and crap, like a big umbrella and a snake that turns into chains. He’s barely a speed bump for the Rangers and he doesn’t even get credited,34 but just look at this goofball. I love him.

THE FINAL SCORE

We now begin the completely transparent scoring system, where I give a value (in Pts) to each of the major elements, and I also get to decide what those are. And also how much they have accrued in Bonus Points(pts) up to now.

  • The Team:  100 Pts 
    • Individual: Ugh, these guys. 5 tPts 
    • Together: They just… have no chemistry whatsoever.  10 tPts 
    • Leader: Mack is alright, I guess, as Red Rangers go. He at least has some interesting turns after his true nature is revealed, even if it’s mostly grumpiness. 100 tPts 
  • The Zords: 450 Pts
    • Individual: There’s certainly a lot of Zords. And the main ten are pretty cool and distinct, at least. 300 zPts
    • Megazords: I mostly like the Megazords, but they aren’t anything particularly exciting. 300 zPts
  • The Villains: 444 Pts
    • Leader(s): So many villains just crashing into each other and taking up each other’s screentime. 400 vPts
    • Henchmen: A severe lack of henchmen. That’s what happens when it’s All The Villains I guess. 100 vPts
    • Fodder: Pretty bland. 200 vPts 
  • The Monsters: The Past Zord theming is a neat little easter egg, but there are too many bland giant robots. Needs more whimsy.  200 Pts 
  • Story: The story is at least lively, if not interesting. 200 Pts 

Sudden Dramatic Points Right At The End: 

I just can’t get all that invested in this season, between the overstuffed villain roster and the underdeveloped main cast. This season is just lacking in so many ways, and it’s not just because of the budgetary and production issues.

-500 pts

After totalling all the scores for each section and normalizing the results according to the secret formulae that definitely exist and are not a screen to get me out of having to think about scores ever at all:

Power Rangers Operation Overdrive: 8,410Power Points

Let’s see the rankings!

Power Rangers Seasons, Ranked

  1. Power Rangers in Space35
  2. Power Rangers Dino Thunder36
  3. Power Rangers Time Force37
  4. Power Rangers Zeo38
  5. Power Rangers S.P.D.39
  6. Power Rangers Mystic Force40!
  7. Power Rangers Ninja Storm41
  8. Power Rangers Lost Galaxy42
  9. Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers Season 343
  10. Mighty Morphin’ Alien Rangers44
  11. Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers Season 245
  12. Power Rangers Turbo46
  13. Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers Season 147
  14. Power Rangers Wild Force48
  15. Power Rangers Lightspeed Rescue49
  16. Power Rangers Operation Overdrive – 8,410 PPs!

Sorry, Operation Overdrive, you just weren’t very good. When the best part of your season is the team-up that sidelines the main cast for the majority of it, that really says something. I said before that Lightspeed Rescue was a bland season at best, and while this season certainly isn’t as bland as Lightspeed Rescue, what it is isn’t exactly good either.

Anyway, that’s it for this installment of Ranger Ranker. We’re still waiting for news on the new Disney+ Power Rangers reboot, but it’s been rumored to be starting production soon, so here’s hoping that it’s not just another Mighty Morphin’ rehash. Until we know more though, there’s still plenty of Rangers to Rank, so be sure to come back next time for The One with the Pizza Place!