Power Rangers

Power Rangers is an ongoing superhero franchise which is currently owned by The Walt Disney Company. more...

Given a new title and theme annually, the franchise is headlined by similarly self-replicating television series and is directly tied to the vast merchandising empire owned largely by Japanese toy company Bandai.

The show is adapted from the Super Sentai series of yearly serials, but is not an English dub of the original. Rather, it is a 'new' production with English-speaking actors spliced in with the original Japanese footage to varying ratios. Due to the very Japanese nature of many of Sentai's stories and design, the American shows are always at least slightly changed to fit a Western audience. Much of the toy line (specifically the zords) is similarly adapted from pre-existing Japanese counterparts.

The franchise was known as Mighty Morphin Power Rangers during the first three seasons of the television show, after which the title began changing every year, beginning with Power Rangers: Zeo. The official umbrella name is now Power Rangers, though the uninitiated will still refer to it with Mighty Morphin. The umbrella name used by the Disney networks and stations on television is Power Rangers: Generations.

The Power Rangers series was distributed by Saban Entertainment from 1993 until the end of 2001 and was broadcast on the Fox network. The franchise was purchased by Disney as a part of a Saban buyout between 2001 and 2002, and the show continued to air on Fox until its Fox Kids package was dismantled in the United States. Since Fall 2002, all Power Rangers shows have aired on various Disney-owned networks (ABC Kids, ABC Family, Toon Disney and Jetix channels worldwide).

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