Warning: The following contains spoilers for the Netflix special Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: Once & Always. Netflix reunites most of the original Mighty Morphin Power Rangers team in their 30th anniversary special Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: Once & Always, and it does it with a lot of references to the franchise. Mighty Morphin Power Rangers premiered in August of 1993 with a cast that featured five teenagers chosen to fight a sorceress from another planet. For the first several seasons of the franchise, most of the main cast remained intact until new seasons meant whole new casts and whole new themes, beginning with Power Rangers Lightspeed Rescue.
In the 30th anniversary special, Power Rangers Billy (David Yost), Zack (Walter Emmanuel Jones), Rocky (Steve Cardenas), and Kat (Catherine Sutherland) reunite to stop a robotic version of an old enemy from capturing fellow Rangers. They do it with Minh Kwan (Charlie Kersh), daughter of the original Yellow Power Ranger Trini, finding out the truth about her mom and her mom’s best friends. The special might focus on the adult lives of the Power Rangers, but it has a lot of callbacks to their teen years in the ‘90s.
The Masked Power Ranger Voices
Kimberly (Amy Jo Johnson), Tommy (Jason David Frank), and Jason (Austin St. John) don’t physically appear in the special, though the Power Rangers they’ve played in the franchise do appear masked and in the initial fight, captured by Rita Repulsa (Barbara Goodson). The sounds that the audience can hear of their fighting - though they don’t actually speak - are audio pulled from the original series.
The same is true for Trini when she calls out “Billy” and dives in front of him. That’s audio that was used when Trini would witness Billy in danger from one of Rita’s monsters in the show’s original run.
The Radbug 2
The flying car that Billy has might be a new model, but it’s not a new idea. It’s the newer version of his Volkswagen Beetle convertible that he had in the original series. Billy frequently experimented on the car, including finding a way to make it fly, just like the one in the special. Trini often helped him with his experiments in the original series.
Snizzard And Mighty Minotaur
Fans will certainly remember that Rita Repulsa is the original villain of the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers series. Snizzard and Mighty Minotaur are also both from the first season of the show and get a robotic upgrade here.
Mighty Minotaur first appeared in the Season 1 episode “Teamwork” in which Kimberly and Trini try to organize a neighborhood cleanup, and Snizzard first appeared in the episode “Foul Play In The Sky” in which Kimberly ends up having to fly her uncle’s plane after it is attacked. In his original appearance, Snizzard was actually voiced by Bryan Cranston, who inspired Billy's last name, and who returned for Lionsgate's 2017 Power Rangers movie as Zordon.
Minh’s Training Moves
When the audience first sees Minh begin her training, her moves are reminiscent of Trini’s in the original series. That’s because Trini spends a long time perfecting the Praying Mantis style of Kung Fu, learned from her family, and passes that style down to Minh in her teachings. There’s even an entire episode devoted to Trini learning it and having to fight a Praying Mantis monster on her own. Rita mentions the style when she first fights Minh.
Zack Raises Minh
Of all the Power Rangers that could have raised Minh after Trini’s death, it’s Zack who stays with her. That might seem like an unusual choice for the audience since Zack and Trini didn’t seem closer than the other Rangers, but it works as an interesting Easter egg - intentional or not.
Zack, Trini, and Jason all left the show at the same time as part of a Teen Peace Conference, so the three did have the chance to bond outside the group. In real life, the three actors left because they wanted to be part of the actor’s union and increase their pay wages, but the executives behind the show kept the series non-union.
In an alternate comic book timeline, when Kimberly meets up with Trini and Zack after they all have given up their power coins to new team members, Trini and Zack have been traveling and teaching martial arts together in South America. They’re also dating at the time. The choice for Zack to raise Minh could be a nod to that.
Another great Zack detail is that after Jason and Tommy are both captured and out of commission, it’s Zack who originally leads the team morphing calls because he’s the next highest-ranking team member. He was always Jason’s backup among the original five.
Zordon And The Z Wave
Rita’s evil essence is able to return in a robotic form because Billy tries to reconstitute particles from the “Z Wave.” Fans of the Zordon Era might remember that as the wave of good produced when Zordon sacrificed himself in the Power Rangers In Space series. He allowed Andros (Christopher Kyhman Lee) to destroy his containment so that the energy from his death would purge the evil from the enemies of the Power Rangers all across the galaxy. Rita is one of those enemies.
“After All These Years, I’m Free.”
Rita makes this statement when her energy is able to transform Alpha-8 into her new robotic form. It’s a riff on her emerging from her space dumpster prison in the original Power Rangers series, a moment that is later seen in the 30th-anniversary special when she attempts to open a time portal.
Harvey Garvey
When the Rangers are interrupted while visiting Trini’s grave on the anniversary of her death, the Minotaur breaks through a headstone in the cemetery. That headstone is for Harvey Garvey, and he apparently died in 2022, just like Trini did. That character might be memorable for Mighty Morphin Power Rangers fans.
The character was a talk show host in the original series who offered the Power Rangers their first chance to appear for an interview on live television - and they didn’t have to reveal their identities. Harvey was played by voice actor Kim Strauss, who also provided voices for several of the monsters and allies of the Rangers over the years.
Bandora Protocol
Not only is Rita’s palace on the moon named the Bandora Palace, but the Rangers also enact Bandora Protocol to contact all the Power Rangers in the world, and to have Kat and Rocky teleport in to help their old teammates. Rita is based on the Witch Bandora from the Sentai series that provided footage for the original Mighty Morphin Power Rangers.
Fans will glimpse on the computer screen just which locations are reached out to because of the Bandora Protocol. Those include Reefside, Turtle Cove, the Astro Megaship, Terra Venture, and Osaka. While the Astro Megaship was home to the In Space Rangers and the Terra Venture was the colony for the Lost Galaxy Rangers, Reefside, Osaka, and Turtle Cover are on Earth. Reefside is where the Dino Thunder Rangers work. Turtle Cove is home to the Wild Force Rangers. Osaka is home to the Dino Fury Rangers.
Once A Ranger, Always A Ranger
When Rocky and Kat show up to help the team free the captured Rangers, they are both given secondary power coins to access the Mighty Morphin powers of the Morphing Grid. While they’re both warned of the danger, they both decide the danger doesn’t matter because, “Once a Ranger, always a Ranger.”
That phrase has become the motto of every team-up in the Power Rangers franchise and fuels the idea of bringing back past Rangers for guest appearances. It also appears in the credits of the special to honor Thuy Trang and Jason David Frank, but it actually has its roots in another Power Rangers special. It’s the title of an episode in which Power Rangers from five different teams are brought together under the leadership of Adam Park (Johnny Yong Bosch) to help a new team of Rangers. It’s been used ever since and even provides the inspiration for the name of this special.