Power Rangers Movie Zord Designs Explained

When the Power Rangers movie Zords were revealed in late 2016, one thing immediately stood out to fans – the legs. All the extra legs.

Why did the Blue Ranger’s Triceratops Zord have 6 legs? Or even more astoundingly, why did the Black Ranger’s Mastodon Zord have 8 legs?

In a sit-down interview about Lionsgate’s Power Rangers movie with Collider, Director Dean Israelite explained the entire history that went into designing the Zords, and why some of them have those extra features.

In regards to the history of the Zords:

“The idea of the Zords is that they’re machines that take on the form of the most powerful organism on the planet. When these Zords came to Earth, dinosaurs reigned supreme, so they took on the mythology of these dinosaurs. That’s the mythology we put into the movie.”

In regards to the Mastodon’s 8 legs:

“The Zords are supposed to be inspired by those animals, not an actual literal version of them. We also looked at the Zord renderings in a 3D space, and how they move, and the Mastodon is so big that with added legs, it would just move better in a CG environment. The legs would make it a more nimble machine. It felt more practical. If you were an alien creating this machine, you’d want those added legs.”

On how the Power Rangers movie Zords compare to Transformers:

“We wanted to create a design that felt original and aesthetic to us. In Transformers, there’s a lot of angular shape designs. We wanted to bring a more organic design. So you’ll notice everything is very organic, from the ship to the suits to the Zords. They will draw comparisons to Transformers because they’re big robotic machines, but they’re actually very different. That bio-mechanical philosophy was embedded into everything we tried to design.”

Lionsgate’s Power Rangers movie hits theaters on March 24. Be sure to follow Power Rangers NOW on Facebook and Twitter for all the latest updates.