All anyone needs to create a Power Rangers villain is a stellar design. Rita Repulsa is a hilarious witch with a stellar fashion sense and a jester's hat. Goldar is a golden lion with wings and a giant sword. Most of the weekly threats are messes of animal parts, skeletons, and protruding weaponry. The final boss atop this concept used none of those design philosophies, instead creating an iconic alien adversary named Lord Zedd.
Two unfortunate factors pushed Power Rangers toward most of their creative decisions. The creative team had limited Japanese footage to pull from, forcing them to shape the story to fit the material. They were also always motivated by toy sales instead of traditional viewership metrics. This demand forced them to escalate, rework, reorder, and reintroduce villains consistently.
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Who was Lord Zedd in Power Rangers?
Lord Zedd is the self-proclaimed Emperor of Evil. He's the final boss behind all the villains in Mighty Morphin Power Rangers' first three seasons. The usual antagonistic arrangement for Power Rangers involves a group of identical mooks who exist to be quickly dispatched and a leader who mostly hangs out elsewhere making plans and sending out footsoldiers. Rita Repulsa was the first supervillain. Her escape from the space dumpster in the inaugural episode prompted Zordon to round up five teenagers and empower them as his emissaries. The Power Rangers beat Rita and her underlings soundly for a year, rarely struggling against putty patrollers or one-off monsters. In the first episode of season two, "The Mutiny," Zedd arrives to take Rita's job and defeat her enemies. Zedd terrified the other antagonists, forcing fans to imagine his history of cruelty and conquest. He swiftly put Rita back in the dumpster and assumed her role from the Moon Palace. He offered this quote as he emerged from a storm cloud:
I am Lord Zedd, Emperor of all I see. You have failed to complete the mission assigned to you. I will now resume command. Prepare the palace for my return.
Despite admonishing Rita, Lord Zedd adopted similar tactics with comparable failures. Zedd wielded an enchanted staff and several hand grenades that could animate and empower inanimate objects. His first attack destroyed the Rangers' original Dinozords. He couldn't celebrate as the Rangers swiftly used the leftover parts to construct the new and improved Thunderzords. Zedd innovated some of Rita's rudimentary ideas. She turned Tommy Oliver into the first Evil Ranger. Zedd doubled down on that concept to construct a team of Dark Rangers. His more esoteric plans included afflicting a Ranger with a pachinko addiction, ruining their reputation on a daytime TV show, and marrying the Pink Ranger. Zedd later marries Rita after being drugged with a love potion. Zedd never dies, but Zordon purifies him with a unique energy, turning him into a good-natured human.
Where else did Lord Zedd appear?
Lord Zedd returned to Power Rangers in several follow-up series. His debut episode was the season 2 premiere in 1994, and he's remained a fixture to this day. Here's a brief list of his appearances in more recent Power Rangers series:
- Power Rangers Zeo: Zedd and Rita celebrate a brief victory against Zordon, but the mighty Machine Empire ends their revelry. The semi-happily married couple plant a bomb, reclaiming their moon base and leaving for a brief vacation.
- Power Rangers Dino Fury: A necromancer resurrects an evil version of Zedd, effectively undoing his human transformation. He stuck around as a secondary antagonist, but the Rangers imprisoned him in a crystal.
- Power Rangers Cosmic Fury: Zedd escapes the crystal. Dino Fury Red Ranger, Zayto traps Zedd forever in an illusory pocket dimension that will only release him if his soul is noble. He imagines defeating the Rangers, but winds up trapped, serving Rita as a submissive house husband.
Who played Lord Zedd?
Ed Neill wore the suit and portrayed Zedd's human iteration in the first seasons of Power Rangers. Robert Axelrod provided the character's distinctive voice while also doing so for several one-off villains. Several other voice actors took the role after his 1998 exit from the series. Malika Lim, Zac Eubank, Stig Eldred, Andrew Laing, and Fred Tatasciore provided voice work for Lord Zedd. The 2007 game Power Rangers: Super Legends hired iconic game performer Steve Blum for Zedd, along with a cast of celebrated video game talent.
Lord Zedd is one of the most iconic central villains in Power Rangers' long history. The character was never especially deep, but his design and iconography kept him in the spotlight for decades. Zedd was the first American adversary the Power Rangers ever faced. He isn't based on a Super Sentai character. As an early example of the series' creative team learning from their ostensible source material, Zedd is a resounding success.
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