Twenty-four years after Zordon first recruited teenagers with attitude, it continues to be morphin’ time. The newest series in the epic sci-fi martial arts kids saga Power Rangers premiered last January as Ninja Steel, carrying on the legacy of intergalactic protectors of peace and conquerors of evil.
There have been 23 incarnations of the series spread over 25 seasons and three movies, and even after all those hours of Putty punching and monster wrestling, there are still aspects of the Power Rangers universe left secret and unexplained.
In real life, of course, most of these mysteries and inconsistencies are due to the fact that like the original series, the Power Rangers shows were Frankensteined together from footage shot in the US of American teenagers and footage pulled from various incarnations of the Japanese Super Sentai franchise. Sometimes, a single episode would use footage pulled from several Sentai shows, and creative editing could only go so far.
That leaves it up to the fans to put their mark on the universe and try to suss out explanations for fun and fulfillment to the various nitpicks of the hallowed Ranger legacy.
Here are the 15 Power Rangers Fan Theories That Completely Change The Show (And The Movie).
Zordon is the original White Ranger
Season 3 of Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers established that all of the Rangers’ Power Coins were originally created by a being called Ninjor in the Temple of Power. More importantly, it was established that Ninjor was the only one who could create Power Coins in the universe, which begs the question: how did Zordon conjure up a Tigerzord Power Coin to transform Tommy Oliver into the White Power Ranger?
There's one simple answer: he didn’t. The Tigerzord Power Coin was created by Ninjor for the original White Power Ranger: Zordon.
The theory by CapRegionJourno on Reddit states that Zordon, long ago during the war with Rita Repulsa and Lord Zedd, was a member of a Ranger team himself, perhaps even the original Ranger, and wielded the Tigerzord Power Coin.
Eventually, Zordon became trapped in a time warp that forced him to use his containment tube to maintain a presence on Earth, but was left unable to morph though he was still bonded to his power coin.
After Tommy lost his Green Ranger powers, Zordon recognized the need to maintain the team’s fighting power and sacrificed his own White Ranger power to pass it to Tommy.
Rita’s summoning of Goldar destroyed the world's economies
In the 2017 Power Rangers movie, Rita forms fan-favorite villain Goldar out of actual gold siphoned from underground. Goldar ends up being roughly the size of the Megazord, both dwarfing the buildings around them. Shots of power lines compared to the size of the Megazord’s leg show that both giants must be at least a few hundred feet tall.
Fun fact: all of the gold on Earth ever mined could fit in 3.42 Olympic-sized swimming pools. So, just eyeballing Goldar, you can tell that he’s of comparable size and mass. Once defeated, that gold remains around Angel Grove, which means that the US just amassed an amount equal to all the gold in the world overnight.
Commodity markets would be thrown into chaos as the value of gold plummeted and the economic shockwaves would no doubt ruin smaller, less-stable countries.
The Morphing Grid is a sentient being
The Morphing Grid is the amorphous, mysterious power source of all the Rangers, which they tap into to gain their powers. In a lot of ways, it’s like The Force from Star Wars. Worthy individuals wield its powers, it confers powers of strength, mental feats, and it can affect the physical world.
One other way in which it’s apparently like The Force is that it seems to have a mind of its own toward balance and self-preservation. Lord Zedd describes it in Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers as seeking to balance good and evil forces.
Throughout all of the Power Rangers series, various characters lose and gain morphing powers at critical times, almost as if an intelligence is at work. Fans theorize that the Morphing Grid is intelligent, subtly influencing the balance of power in the galaxy.
Divatox’s fiancé is the twin brother of Dark Specter
Divatox is the main villain of Turbo: A Power Rangers Movie, the follow-up to their first cinematic adventure cursed with a decidedly smaller budget. As an intergalactic pirate queen, she attempted to resurrect and marry the demon Maligore and use his power to rule the universe. Obviously, the Rangers put the kibosh on the ceremony, but Divatox returns to menace them in Power Rangers: In Space.
Weirdly, though, the main villain of In Space, Dark Specter, happens to look exactly like the demon Maligore. When he recruits villains and monsters throughout the galaxy for his evil organization, Divatox is one of them and even comments on the uncanny resemblance to her beau.
In real life, the reason is that they simply reused the puppet for Maligore as Dark Specter for budgetary reasons, but in-universe fans theorize that the two entities are related, perhaps even twin brothers.
The Rangers teleported before being hit by the train
The 2017 Power Rangers movie at times felt like it was trying to throw the greatest hits of the original series on screen, and most people recognized the more obvious touchstones: the Megazord, the Power Coins, Alpha 5, and The Zeo Crystal.
However, one theory by BlindEditor on Reddit holds that one of the most ubiquitous Ranger abilities made it into the movie without us even knowing it.
Teleportation was a staple of the Rangers in the original series, allowing them to be recalled to the Command Center and sent out on missions in the blink of an eye. In the movies, it’s shown that the kids aren’t entirely in control of their powers at first, so why would they have mastered their ability to teleport?
When the van that they’re driving in is hit by a train and they wake up unharmed in their homes the next day, it’s not a plot hole. Instead, it’s a result of them instinctively and unconsciously tapping into their Ranger powers in a crisis situation.
The asteroid that strikes Earth in a flashback is what actually creates the original Dino Gems
In the first episode of Power Rangers: Dino Charge, we learn that in prehistoric times an alien Keeper crash-landed on Earth with a cargo of precious Energems-- crystals of unspeakable power.
He entrusted them to the bravest dinosaurs of prehistoric earth for protection. Unfortunately, an asteroid is seen striking the earth in a flashback, and... well, we all know how that turned out.
However, it turns out that this may reveal the origins of the power source for an entirely different season of Power Rangers. Since the Dino Gems from Dino Thunder are said to have been salvaged from the meteor that killed the dinosaurs, some fans think that they were actually created from power bleeding out of the Energems during the impact and infusing the minerals of the meteor, literally creating two Ranger teams with one stone.
Ivan Ooze is never released in the main continuity since his story takes place in an alternate universe
One of the many highlights of Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers: The Movie was the villainous Ivan Ooze, played to scenery-chewing perfection by Paul Freeman.
Ivan was an ancient tyrant sealed in a crystalline prison under Angel Grove who was accidentally uncovered and released by Lord Zedd and Rita Repulsa, crippling Zordon and destroying the Rangers’ powers.
In the movie, the Rangers are forced to trek for a new source of power and discover new animal totems, new Zords, and awesome new movie-budget uniforms.
What’s weird, though, is that Ivan Ooze is never mentioned in the Power Rangers TV series. Come Season 3 of MMPR, nothing in the movie has happened. The Thunderzords are destroyed by a different baddie entirely, and the Rangers once again have to quest for new power coins.
Thus, most fans believe that the MMPR movie exists in its own, separate continuity ,while in the main timeline, Ivan Ooze still slumbers, and without his attack the Rangers were delayed in acquiring their new Ninja powers and Zords.
Zordon, Rita, and Alpha 5 have no idea that the Rangers’ Zords could even form the Megazord
No matter what incarnation of the Power Rangers you were watching, forming the Megazord was practically a once-an-episode occurrence. It was their go-to tactic for any monster bigger than they were, usually after some token attempts by individual Zords to fight them.
Naturally, it had to make an appearance in the 2017 Power Rangers movie. It looked more like Megatron than Megazord, but at least it still formed the same way: by having all five Zords merge together.
The wrinkle is that Rita, originally the Green Ranger, seems completely shocked that the Zords have merged together. She stands dumbstruck and bellows “How!?” as the Megazord rises from the pit containing the Zeo crystal.
We don’t actually see the Megazord in the flashback at the opening of the movie, and it would seem like a pretty important time to form it. Softhandsam on Reddit theorizes that not even Zordon knew that the Zords could come together to form a single entity, and it took the power of the Zeo crystal to enable the transformation.
Power Rangers: Megaforce is actually a training simulation run by Tommy
Power Rangers: Megaforce and its sequel Super Megaforce follow a team of Rangers who come together to defeat the Warstar aliens and their massive invasion Armada.
In Super Megaforce, they gain the ability to morph into any previous team of Rangers to counter threats, and it all ends in a massive battle with every past Power Ranger joining to repel the X-borgs of the Armada. If you think that sounds a little far-fetched, you’re not alone.
Cestro from RangerBoard theorizes that the two seasons are actually Tommy Oliver’s plan to form a new team, as he’s done in the past, but with a twist: none of it is real. The Rangers are in a Matrix-like simulation designed to minimize danger while training and evaluating their abilities.
It explains the inconsistencies with past continuity in the series, such as no one knowing that Power Rangers or Aliens are real, as well as the slightly different designs of certain machines and locations like the Lionzord and Corinth, since Tommy Oliver had no first-hand experience of them.
Lord Zedd, Rita, and Divatox aren't destroyed by the white light of Zordon because they are capable of love
One of the most spectacular finales in the Power Rangers canon was the last episode of Power Rangers In Space, where the Red Ranger successfully shattered Zordon’s containment vessel, allowing Zordon’s light to cascade throughout the universe and annihilate evil.
We see Zordon’s essence turn villain after villain and monster after monster into dust, including Dark Specter. However, there are three villains who escape the shockwave unscathed, and end up merely reverting to humanoid form: Rita Repulsa, Lord Zedd, and Divatox.
The theory goes that the reason why they were spared by the Z-wave is that they were all essentially good beings who were capable of love-- Rita loved Zedd and, in her own twisted way, Divatox loved Maligore. Their emotion and ability for empathy spared them from death, and so the Z-wave merely cut out the corruption of Dark Specter to restore them to their original humanoid forms.
Billy is the Phantom Ranger
The Phantom Ranger was a mysterious ally who worked with the Rangers in Turbo and In Space. Clad in black and silver with powers tied to Zordon’s planet and the Morphing Grid, his identity was never revealed.
Producer Shuki Levy initially imagined the Phantom Ranger as the embodiment of the spirits of past fallen Rangers, as a sort of “Ghost Robot." However, fans have long speculated that the Phantom Ranger was in fact Billy Cranston in disguise, and series writer/director confirmed that was to have been the revelation had the finale of Power Rangers In Space not been cut down from three parts to two.
Billy was the gadgeteer genius of the Power Rangers into the Zeo era, and the Phantom Ranger’s powers seem technology-based. When the Pink Ranger asked who he was after he rescued the Turbo team, his response was, “A friend.”
Everybody knows that if someone in disguise says “a friend” when you ask their identity, they’re totally someone familiar, and you should probably just start rattling off people you know.
Z is actually the daughter of Danny Delgado
In the first of two parentage-related fan theories, we have take a look at Z, the yellow Ranger in Power Rangers: SPD, frontrunner among Power Rangers series . Z’s full name is Elizabeth Delgado, a last name she shares with a former Ranger: Danny Delgado.
Danny was the Iron Bison Ranger of Power Rangers: Wild Force, but the timeline works out so that any kids that Danny had after that series could be roughly around Z’s age.
Danny spent a lot of time trying to get with his teammate Kendall in Wild Force, so it isn’t so crazy to think that love finally won out and they may have got together. The two might have had kids, one of whom proudly carried on the Ranger legacy, even if she didn’t inherit her dad’s color.
Kimberly is the real mother of Skull’s son Spike
Chances are that, if you were a kid growing up in the '90s, you either wanted to be the Pink Ranger or she was one of your first fictional crushes (opinion seems split between her and loner badboy Tommy Oliver). However, it can’t be denied that she was an awesome Ranger who never suffered fools lightly, including the bumbling duo of Bulk and Skull.
Eugene “Skull” Skullovitch had a deep crush on Kimberly. Throughout Zeo, Turbo, and In Space, Skull received a nice dose of character development, eventually becoming a police officer, private detective, and business owner.
He revealed some hidden depths (he can play classical piano) and a heroic side, even heroically posing as a Ranger to buy the real team some time in the finale of In Space. Thanks to a few touching moments shared with Kimberly towards the end of MMPR, fans have speculated that the two eventually hooked up, and that Kimberly is actually the never-seen mother of Skull’s son Spike.
Tommy is actually a clone
In Dino Thunder, viewers are reintroduced to Tommy Oliver, a palaeontologist who forms the team after helping them harness the Dino Gems. However, it doesn’t fit that the worst student of the original Rangers not only got his PhD in a subject as difficult as palaeontology, but did so in an almost impossible amount of time since his arc in PR: Wild Force.
He must be Tommy Oliver, though... right? It’s not like there’s just some other Tommy Oliver running around with a bunch of time on his hands.
Or it might be that. Since, back in MMPR, a clone was made of Tommy Oliver by the Wizard of Deception, given Green Ranger armor, and let loose on the team.
The clone, taking the name “Tom," was defeated, before being thrown back in time and choosing to stay in colonial Angel Grove to help the locals. Some fans believe that Tom somehow returned and took his own path, eventually becoming the Dr. Tommy Oliver that helps form the team in Dino Thunder.
Zordon is a calculating, evil mastermind
Let’s ignore the fact that Zordon’s classic order to Alpha 5 to recruit “teenagers with attitude” could easily be read as “bring me some child soldiers.” Zordon presents himself as an unimpeachable force of good, the last bulwark of the forces of light against Dark Spector and his abominations.
However, pretty much all of that comes from the disembodied cranium himself. Zordon seems to have contingency plan after contingency plan, and frequently doesn’t let his Rangers in on these schemes until they become necessary.
He withholds vital technologies and abilities from them until the last second under the pretext of “not escalating” battles, but does that really sound like the behavior of a wise mentor or a stingy, calculating overlord who doesn’t want his easily manipulated foot soldiers getting power above their station?
Add to this the fact that his very essence is basically a galactic WMD in the finale of In Space, and there’s something fishy about the big head in the fish tank.
---
Do you know of any other mind-blowing, universe-shattering Power Rangers fan theories? Let us know in the comments!