Unless this is your first time at this site, you already know of my love for Power Rangers. Hell, even if this is your first time, you probably ended up here because of one of the Power Rangers images I “borrowed” from some other blog. Whatever the case, I’ve had a mad-on for Zord-commanding heroes ever since the first airing of “Day of the Dumpster” in 1993. Yes, I’m that old and still following this stuff. Anyway, ever since the thrifting shifted into high gear a few years back, I’ve been taking in “orphaned” zords. For those not “in the know”, Power Rangers control robots called “zords”, which can combine to form Mega and even Ultrazords. In toy form, most zords are sold as complete Megazords that break down into their composite parts. When purchased new, they cost anywhere from $30-60. When the show first hit, I made a point to get all the standard Megazords. 15 years ago, the amount of Megazord combinations per season would max out around 3. Then, Saban/Disney completely lost their shit. I swear Power Rangers Wild Force had about 87 zords. They were even introducing new zords in the series finale! Needless to say, I kinda gave up collecting around that time. They were introducing new toys that would only be seen onscreen ONCE. The last “new” Megazord I purchased at retail was the Turbo Megazord back in 1997. So, I’ve had quite a bit of catching up to do. Little did I know that I would take care of a big chunk of that gap in one week.
Everything you see here was acquired within the last seven days. Yeah, I don’t understand it, either. I just struck at the right time, I guess.
First up, we’ve got the Galactabeats from Power Rangers Lost Galaxy. I’m not sure if they’ve done it since, but that was the first season they weren’t actually called “zords”. The premise was that they were sentient beings that could assume a mech form to allow them to combine. If you spend a lot of time thinking about it, it’ll weird you out. I mean, the Rangers were piloting living, breathing things that turned into robots. Anyway, I was at one of my usual thrift haunts, and noticed the Red Lion in a grab bag. Whenever this happens, my Spidey Sense goes off, as I know that people don’t tend to just donate ONE zord. So, there’s usually a good chance that there are more! I found the Blue Gorilla on the shelf, and eventually found the yellow and pink galactibeasts in other grab bags. I tore the place up looking for the green one, but to no avail. Regardless, I got 4/5 of a Megazord for $7. I wouldn’t be surprised if I found green sometime soon. Why? Read on.
While searching for the Green LG Galactibeast, I noticed another grab bag with a tiny ambulance in it. As I looked closely, I realized that it was the Pink zord from Power Rangers Lightspeed Rescue. After searching a bit more, I found the blue zord from that same season. I already had red from an earlier trip, so now I have 3/5 of that Megazord combination.
A couple days after that last hunt, I found myself in another thrift store where I lucked out again. It was clear they’d just dumped a bunch of Rangers stock on the shelves, and I immediately found the black, and white Wild Force zords in a grab bag. As I moved down the aisle, I found the red and blue zords in another bag.
A COMPLETE Megazord for less than $5! The funny thing about this was that I was really only just looking for yellow. You see, I bought a huge box of zords/transformers at a thrift store about 6 months ago, which included every core WF zord except yellow, which forms the head.
Randomly, I also found the Black Bear zord from the series, which is an alternative arm.
When I first found the grab bags, I didn’t notice yellow in the pack, so I continued searching, and stumbled upon the Jungle Fury Jungle Master Megazord (which is comprised of the Gorilla, Antelope and Penguin Spirit Zords) . It’s missing a piece of the penguin zord on the foot, but the electronics still work and it was only $2. It was at this point that I reinspected the grab bag and noticed yellow had been inside the whole time! So, now I have almost 2 complete WF Megazords.
Friday, while searching yet another thrift store (yes, I have a problem), I came across part of the Super Samurai Clawzord.
Saturday, however, was when I made my favorite discovery. At, yes, a different thrift store, I was making a final pass down the toy aisle when I saw the Power Rangers in Space Astro Megaship. I already have a smaller, playset version, but I never had the deluxe version of the toy. It was odd that I didn’t buy this when it first came out, as I was still pretty into Power Rangers at the time. In any case, this zord was in GREAT condition, except it’s missing the NASADA shuttle that forms the head. So, it can’t form the Astro Megazord at this time, but I’m confident I’ll find the shuttle one day. Plus, it’s a lot better than the $40 the used toy store is charging for it in the exact same condition. Oh, and did I mention I only paid $2 for it? Here’s where fate comes into play: remember the Ranger lot that I bought during the Time Dig? If you remember, that lot included the Astro Megaship shield. Well, the Time Dig actually took place a few hours before I found this Megaship, yet both trips complemented each other, as I’m that much closer to a complete Astro Megazord. This just reaffirmed my commitment to “rescuing” zords, as you never know if the rest of the set is around the corner in some thrift store!
There’s no way to explain these coincidences other than Ranger fate. Excellent hunting!
Finally a person that puts some real work into a blog. I do like what you have done with the blog.