Everything You Need to Know About the Power Rangers [An Infographic]

A former Power Ranger killed a dude with a sword.

Did you hear about this? Have you heard about this?

Sorry. Sort of slipped into a Jay Leno impression there for a second. However, the headline is true: a former Power Rangers actor recently plead guilty to killing his roommate with a sword, an incident he'd previously claimed happened in self-defense. He'd been arguing with his roomate about a girlfriend, and then, well, this is why you don't keep a sword collection nearby if you have a short temper (and possibly some mental health issues).

Awww, man. Which Power Ranger was it? I bet it was the guy who played Tommy because once an evil Green Ranger, always an evil Green Ranger, amirite? It certainly couldn't have been...um...okay, it's literally been decades since I watched the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers. I remember Tommy, Amy Jo Johnson as the Pink Ranger, the fact that there was somebody named Billy and that the Black Ranger was played by a black guy and the Yellow Ranger by an Asian girl. That's about it. Who among them saw fit to shove a sword through a roommate's chest?

Why does it have to be one of them? I said a Power Ranger actor killed someone, not a Mighty Morphin Power Ranger actor. There's a difference. Fun fact: Power Rangers never actually stopped just because people my age grew up through the rest of the 90s and stopped watching. The show kept going and recreating itself, routinely changing up the costumes, Rangers and even title of the show ( Mighty Morphin Power Rangers became the Mighty Morphin Alien Rangers which became Power Rangers Zero which became Power Rangers Turbo and so on and so on). 24 seasons later, the show is still on the air, going by Power Rangers Ninja Steel these days. The actor, Ricardo Medina, Jr., who killed his roommate came from Power Rangers Wild Force (2002).

How could anyone possibly keep all of that straight? I'll simply forget I read any of that, and simply go on pretending as if the Power Rangers stopped at Mighty Morphin and are only just now coming back in the new Power Rangers movie that exists for, um, some reason (although one of its characters is possibly gay, so yay for progress).

But, wait, there's an infographic for that. Yes, friends, the good people over at HalloweenCostumes put together this handy dandy infographic breaking down the long and strange evolution of the Power Rangers, that hokey kids show that began its life in 1993 by wrapping American teenager melodrama around repurposed stock footage from the long-running Japanese Super Sentai TV franchise. Of course, since this infographic comes from a Halloween costume website there's an understandable emphasis on the ever-changing costumes, but there's also plenty of interesting factoids, such as the revelation that the Mighty Morphin Alien Rangers were called to Earth for a 10-episode mini-series when the original Mighty Morphin Power Rangers were turned into children. What!?! How did I not know about that? Oh, terrible-sounding 90s TV. You are the gift that keeps on giving.

Source: HalloweenCostumes.com