Power Rangers Coaster Force and Nitro: A Retrospective
All Hail Emperor Grumm or something IDK
On this day in Power Rangers S.P.D. (originally) Earth fell to Emperor Grumm and the Troobian Empire. To Celebrate, lets talk about my own series set around the same era, Power Rangers Coaster Force and Power Rangers Nitro and compare some plot points and predictions that can be translated outside the lore of the series.
The Lore of the Series
The idea of Coaster Force that made the wiki was the third iteration which follows that Jeffery Kensaki created autonomous robots that became known as Android Roller Coaters (or ARC’s for short) and Cedar Fair bought a prototype for their new flagship coaster at their flagship park, Millennium Force (the world’s first Giga Coaster) at Cedar Point in Ohio.
They soon formed a strong contract building more for their other parks (Valleyfair in the Twin Cities, Dorney Park in Pennsylvania, Michigan’s Adventure on the Lake Michigan coast, Worlds of Fun in KC, Knott’s Berry Farm in LA, and later Geauga Lake and Kings Island-also in Ohio, Kings Dominion in Virginia, California’s Great America in the Bay Area, Carowinds on the Carolina state line in Charlotte, and Canada’s Wonderland in metropolitan Toronto), but the program stopped around 2017.
Jump seven years till 2024 and all the ARC’s had been taken offline, but start stirring again from (with hindsight, post-pandemic neglect), Millennium Force crosses paths with her modern superior, Fury 325 from Carowinds. They end up nearly destroying each other until they end up in the hands of an engineering professor at California University, Reefside (or Cal Reef for short)-who repairs and upgrades them and enrolls them in the university as Melanie "Mel" Ourson and Fiona Mabalard respectively.
However, their secret as robots is reveled when they end up at a frat party hosted by Kappa Sigma Tau (all the frats are references, this being Kousoku Sentai Turboranger, what Nitro takes assets from)-which coincides with a kidnapped of students from an alternate dimension. Thus, Melanie and Fiona are joined by 3 frat members: Seamus Decker-responsible for the exposing, Peter Ishitori-the newest member, and Teddy Winslow-the head of the chapter, to become the Coaster Force Rangers. Our three human males use the Express Morpher (another TOQger carry over) while Millie and Fiona were rebuilt with an internal system to become. Teddy is the red ranger-based on Firehawk at Kings Island, Peter is the Orange Ranger-based on Railblazer at California’s Great America, Seamus is the Yellow Ranger-based on Ghost Rider at Knott’s Berry Farm, Fiona is the green ranger and Millie Blue-maintaining their pre-existing designations for Fury 325 and Millennium Force.
This team of 5 is soon joined by a crimson-navy pair of Steel Force (given the name Stella) from Dorney Park and Excalibur (Takshiel) from Valleyfair (stealing the engine soul from Corkscrew-who was the ARC head in that park’s lore).
It’s soon learned other ARC’s can transform as well since the Ghost Rider ARC is still active-which proves an old franchise adage that multiples of the same power puts a strain on the Morphing Grid.
Season 1 and the first 1/3 of season 2 revolve on a clan of classic monsters from a parallel world who want to eclipse the sun so their leader, Count Vladsmir can rule both the Human and Monster worlds (basically stolen from the 2012 Lego Monster Fighters line).
The last 2/3 focus on reuniting all the ARC’s to stop a rouge trio based on Steel Vengeance at Cedar Point and leader, with the corrupted core of Son of Beast in a female body, and their connection to an ancient Native American threat-the Boma.
Thus, some leave (Teddy), others promoted (fellow frat mates Michael Bolt and Wallace Hightower), and others take on new mantles (Stella and Takshiel take on the Nitro powers permanently, with Behemoth at Canada’s Wonderland taking Crimson and Corkscrew getting her powers back).
Predictions
Most of these come from coasters coming and going that get representation since Mystic Timbers was the last one canonically-but some did loose there’s and were reprogramed such as Mighty Canadian Minebuster’s ARC being retooled for Yukon Striker for the 2019 season. Originally, everyone was calling it Ziz since Behemoth and Leviathan exist and Ziz fit the lore from those two. At the end of the day, both names get representation.
Prior to the announcement of Yukon Striker, his name was Ezra, which fit with Jewish background of Behemoth, Leviathan, and Ziz-but I like the duel-coding as an Easter Egg as if the ride was supposed to be called Ziz before the park revisited the unbuilt Frontier Canada section to actually build it-which they have and it looks great.
However, that was more so bending to reality as I really wanted that big three to all have ARC’s-as I expected it would exist by 2025 and now they have a fourth top tier coaster that kind of fits the plot of the Wonderland episode where its frozen over in mid-summer.
Right when it was in initial works in 2018, Firehawk was removed Kings Island. Since the original source kept him cannon, I also kept it Firehawk-also it worked too well to devise a sentai version with Eejanika as Red Ranger to keep a loose Red/Air motif-although it breaks down quickly after that. Also the Sentai version, Jettacoasta Sentai Himitsuranger, had the core 5 all be robots based on coasters in Japan-which kind of predicted the previous Super Sentai anniversary season with Zenkaiger, which had 4 of the rangers be robots based on passed Megazords/robo. Not coaster-related, but I’ll count it.
I also canonically changed the ARC for Boomarang at Knott’s Berry Farm for Hangtime.
The page received no updates for the parks post-covid as Kings Dominion created Jungle X-pedition in 2022 and none of the coasters are updated to reflect that:
Reptilian is still designated Anna/Avalanche (maybe we can call her Tilly?)
The Intimadtors are still Intimdators. Carowinds’s was renamed Thunder Striker for 2024 and 305 at Kings Dominion as part of Jungle-X is now known as Pantherian as of this year (but was still called 305 for 2024)
The twins for each side of Racer 75 at Kings Dominion were never overhauled for that change and still coded as Rebel Yell (but this was a pre-covid change)
When Mantis became Rougarou, the ARC’s nickname was not changed, it’s still Mandy
There is no mention of a Volcano replacement at all simply because I got tired of waiting and Tumbli wasn’t it
Top Thrill Dragster and Wicked Twister still exist, both closed in 2021-and I was Sweeping Dragster midway the day of accident-but I had to head back to school before Twister’s last day, but it needed a new control panel so it was closed for a bit between the closure and announcement and the actual day
Vortex at Kings Island still exists, that closed in 2019
Time Warp at Canada’s Wonderland and Nighthawk at Carowinds just closed in 2024-so would’ve made the cut
Stinger at Dorney Park closed in 2017 and was exclusive to the comics as part of the plan-so this can be disregarded
Apple Zapple at Kings Dominion is still coded as Ricochet
Montezooma’s Revenge has been a whole mess-but they kept saying it was coming back and it is-so its fine
No Wild Mouse, Top Thrill 2, Rapterra, Zambezi Zinger, Orion, Iron Menace, let alone Siren’s Curse and the kiddie coasters-which were never counted to begin with or even the merger with Six Flags was unforeseen.
A rival to RMC’s steel track from Great Coasters International (GCI) had been seen with a dueling coaster concept, but the track we have right now I don’t think we had seen in use-but Zambezi Zinger uses it to do impossible and high stress areas for an otherwise wooden coaster and other coasters uses it retracking as well across both legacy chains and beyond.
Thus, if anything, it was the Sentai adaption with cyborg roller coasters based on Japan’s coaster icons kind of getting answered in Zenkaiger the only prediction since most was either corrected or just ignored since I had declared both seasons and spin-offs as finished years ago (still defunct series and connections to clear up, but no one cares).
Conclusion
The industry, and the people that love it, have grown and changed since the pandemic. My adaption of 2020’s Mashin Sentai Kiramager, Power Rangers Shining Spirits, is truly a time capsule of that era-and the concept of Turboranger itself how that time going through the end of high school (and possibly into the 20’s) is quite a special time.
For those who watched Koaster Kids (and later Thrills United) for many years, it is quite the sight seeing someone you admire grow up from a shy child who decided to face fears into a confident supervisor in ride operations at the old home park. The pandemic just through a wrench in their plans so while the story ended in video form, many of those bonds are still very strong-and that’s what I think really solidified doing my Kiramager adaption the way I did.
Change can be as fascinating as it is scary. Its a shame a story ends, but it means another can begin. Perhaps even like Sam, it’s one that makes history.