ThePower Rangershave starred in all manner of bizarre stories over their historic TV career, with certain episodes standing out as being especially strange. Originally created using footage from theJapaneseSuper Sentaitokusatsu series, the franchise was created with the addition of new footage with American actors meant to bridge the cultural gap. This mishmash of ideas often created some incredibly weird one-off episodes.
Many ofPower Rangers' strangest episodes earn their title through their odd villain of the week, which are sometimes incredibly weird even by the standards of the series. Others attempt new formats or crossovers unique to the series, making for memorable, if perhaps poorly-informed, novelties when placed among the wider range of the franchise. Throughoutmany years and multiplePower Rangersseries, the helmeted heroes have endured some truly odd circumstances.
10Presto Change-O
Power Rangers Ninja Steel
If onePower Rangersseries stands out as particularly strange compared to its peers, it has to bePower Rangers Ninja Steel.The entire show revolved around the idea that the Power Rangers were a test that alien monsters across the galaxy willingly pitted themselves against as part of a bizarre cosmic game show. As if alien invaders and the Power Rangers' abilities themselves weren’t enough to swallow, the episodePresto Change-Oindulged in some triple mumbo jumbo with the introduction of a whole new power system.
Here, the Blue Ranger Preston Tien suddenly gains magical abilities, styling himself as a classic stage magician with a snazzy top hat and tuxedo to go with them. The fact that these powers are entirely separate from his Blue RangerMorphin Grid abilitiesis an odd choice, not to mention the fact that they feel totally incongruous with the ninja theme of the series. That’s not even to mention how this concept might interact with the arcane abilities featured in Power Rangers Mystic Force.
9Sticks And Stones
Power Rangers Samurai
The Power Rangers have fought all manner of strange rubber-suited creatures over the course of their career, but few are as memorable as the Nighlok Negatron fromPower Rangers Samurai.Rather than battle the Power Rangers with weapons or energy blasts, Negatron had quite the unique manner of attacking - Leveling insults and harsh truths at the Rangers with quick verbal jabs that would convert their emotional pain into physical trauma. In his battle with the Rangers, Negatron zips around before quickly rattling off a mean comment about his opponent, sending them flying with invisible force.
This odd combat style resulted in some hilarious moments, such as the Red Ranger somehow being able to brace himself for impact with a steely look, only to be flung away with Negatron’s second verse. The only thing funnier than Negatron’s grating voice is the manner of his defeat, with Emily the Yellow Ranger revealing that she was bullied so much as a child that she’s more or less numb to Negatron’s attacks. Only thePower Rangerscould make an episode in which low self-esteem saves the day.
8Shell Shocked
Power Rangers in Space
Considering how unique thePower Rangersuniverse is, it seems odd for them to crossover with other heroes, particularly those not from a tokusatsu orSuper Sentai-related property. Yet that’s exactly what happened inShell Shocked,an infamous early episode ofPower Rangers in Space. Here, the Power Rangers join forces with none other than Leonardo, Donatello, Michaelangelo, and Raphael, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.
More specifically, the crossover features the reptilian quartet from the only live-actionTeenage Mutant Ninja Turtlesseries to-date,Ninja Turtles: The Next Mutation,which was airing around the same time asPower Rangers in Space.While the latter is considered to be one of the bestPower Rangersseries ever,Ninja Turtles: The Next Mutationis widely considered to be one of the worstiterations of theTeenage Mutant Ninja Turtlesaround, making the strange crossover even stranger. The episode resulted in the infamous .gif of the Red Ranger and Leonardo shaking hands while their compatriots cheer.
7Stranger Within
Power Rangers Mystic Force
Presto Change-Owouldn’t be the only timePower Rangersarbitrarily introduced a new suite of powers for a given Ranger to enjoy unrelated to the Morphin Grid, as seen inPower Rangers Mystic Force.Compared to otherPower Rangersseries,Power Rangers Mystic Forceused its fantasy theming to justify all manner of strange creatures. In the two-part episodeStranger Within, Vida the Pink Ranger is turned into a vampire by the villainous Flytrap monster.
Seeing Vida attack her fellow teammates is quite the shock, and her vampire makeup manages to actually be quite startling. Vida’s curse also apparently gives her the need to wear a gothic lolita dress rather than her usual style. But it’s the manner of her transformation that takes the weirdness cake, with the Flytrap monster somehow managing to moonlight as a DJ before turning a whole rave full of attendees into his profane minions, including Vida.
6Another Song And Dance
Power Rangers Zeo
By their nature, the Power Rangers crossbreed with genres of all sorts, with each series reflecting a new theme, such as feudal Japan, fantasy, or even police and crime. It was only a matter of time before the Rangers got their chance to shine with a musical, even if it was only a one-off episode rather than an entire themed series. While the latter may have been too much for thePower Rangersproduction staff to conceptualize, a singularmusical-themed episodecertainly wasn’t out of the question, as shown in Power Rangers Zeo.
What makesPower Rangers Zeo’s attempt at a musical episode particularly strange is the fact that the show doesn’t fully commit to it. Only Tommy Oliver and Tanya Sloan end up being cursed to sing their words by the villainess Queen Machina, leaving the rest of the Rangers to simply stand around awkwardly while they sing completely a cappella, with no instrumental music to speak of. Somehow,Power Rangers Zeomanaged to make the concept of a musical episode even stranger than it already is.
5Island Of Illusion
Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers
The original season ofMighty Morphin' Power Rangerscertainly wasn’t immune to the odd strange storyline, as demonstrated by the nonsensical plot of the episodeIsland of Illusion.This episode wouldn’t be the first time the Power Rangers got away with skirting the majority of an episode’s runtime with a clip show, re-using existing footage from previous episodes to save a quick buck. But it was the set-up ofIsland of Illusion’s anthology mini-sode that was so particularly bizarre.
Here, Rita Repulsa traps the Rangers on the titular island, which manages to manifest their greatest fears. To confront them, the Rangers think back to previous moments from the show where they demonstrated courage, justifying the use of old clips. Inexplicably also thrown into the mix is the island’s sole resident, Quagmire the leprechaun, whose presence is not explained at all. Quagmire gives each Ranger the exact same speech about confronting their fears every time they manage to do so, resulting in a disconnected fever-dream of an episode that feels like being stuck in a time loop.
4Rocky Just Wants To Have Fun
The originalMighty Morphin' Power Rangerswere able to wring a bad guy out of all sorts of mundane problems, always having some moral or lesson to impart upon young, impressionable viewers. These tendencies sometimes resulted in utterly absurd episodes likeRocky Just Wants to Have Funfrom the second season of the original series. Here, Rocky is cursed by a spell from Lord Zedd, causing him to become obsessed with the new pachinko machine installed by Ernie.
Rocky’s unpopularreplacement of Jason as the Red Rangerisn’t helped by this episode, which quickly depicts him as a lazy, carefree leader keen to shirk his responsibilities in favor of playing games. It isn’t long before the pachinko machine is turned into the Pachinko Head monster, which manages to turn five of the Rangers into living pachinko balls. Even byPower Rangersstandards, this villain and plotline are particularly silly.
3Movie Madness
Power Rangers Time Force
Seeing the Power Rangers transform into theirSuper Sentaicostumes and duke it out with various monsters is arguably the core appeal of the franchise. That makes it all the more bizarre thatPower Rangers Time Forceopted for an episode in which the Rangers don’t transform at all, instead stranding them in their human forms inMovie Madness.Thanks to the cinephile monster Cinecon, the Power Rangers end up being split up and scattered across various alternate dimensions themed around various movie genres, such as Westerns and martial arts films.
The Rangers don’t have access to the Morphin' Grid in these alternate realities, meaning they’re forced to get by on their martial arts skills and wits alone with no transformations in sight. Weirdly, this ends up making for one of the bestPower Rangersepisodes ever, as the team are given a chance to prove what they can do out of their uniforms. Each split-up group gets a satisfying moment all their own as some of the Rangers end up enjoying acting out the movies Cinecon maroons them in.
2Lost And Found In Translation
Power Rangers Dino Thunder
Despite the relative popularity of Japanese media in the West today, it’s easy to forget that around the time of the earlierPower Rangersseries, it was quite fashionable to make fun of anime, tokusatsu, and the like. Despite having their roots in a literal tokusatsu show,Super Sentai,the Power Rangers themselves sadly weren’t immune to this trend, talking down to their predecessors in the infamous episodeLost and Found in Translation.Here, the American Rangers come across an episode ofBakuryuu Sentai Abaranger, the Sentai seriesPower Ranger Dino Thunderwas based off of.
The Rangers spend the entire episode belittling their Japanese counterparts, wondering aloud how anyone could prefer the original to their own adventures. The episode felt quite disrespectful to the Rangers' source material for no good reason, not to mention the fact that it remains one of the most awkwardly meta episodes of the franchise even today. The episode can only be compared to the likes ofTeen Titans Go!meeting their 2003 counterpartsonly to ultimately poke fun at them.
1Trouble By The Slice
Power Rangers Turbo
While episodes likeMovie Madnessprove that the Power Rangers are sometimes at their best delving into weird or unconventional ideas for episodes, entries likeTrouble by the SliceinPower Rangers Turboare there to dissuade the franchise from getting too creative.Power Rangers Turbowas a particularly odd series even byPower Rangersstandards, featuring a batch of Rangers with car-themed power fighting a space pirate. One infamous episode stands out for an especially weird villain with some bizarre powers to match.
The pizza-themed villain Mad Mike does battle with the Rangers inTrouble by the Slice,managing to bake the team into a literal pizza pie during one of their battles. The visual of the half-baked Rangers helplessly pawing around while stuck inside the crust of a massive fake pizza is an odd one indeed, made almost fetishistically disturbing by the dim lighting and cheap production value. There’s something ambiguously nauseating about this peculiar scene that makes it stand out among the roster of strangePower Rangersepisodes.
