Megaranger itself is a very popular season. Now it's time for me to present it as an editorial of sorts but please do feel free to give constructive criticism on where I got wrong. For my speculation of why Megaranger got that popular, I really want to raise these issues that I think made Megaranger a huge hit during its time.
The three major writers and its producers. The producers were Shigenori Takatera, Kenji Ota, Naomi Takebe (she's not THAT bad) and Koichi Yada. So Takatera was an important producer who brought in good concepts. For the writers, we have head writer Junki Takegami, Yasuko Kobayashi and Naruhisa Arakawa. So they did take some ideas back in the 80s written by Hirohisa Soda, Toshiki Inoue and important secondary writer Kunio Fuji. The show itself tried to integrate some elements from Hirohisa Soda's era (mostly) which was way back before Toshiki Inoue undid himself and Yasuko Kobayashi did not yet burn out. At this point, the three major writers were still in their prime. Sadly, both Takegami and Kobayashi can be hit or miss.
The show itself revived some concepts from the Soda era and added a few elements from the Sugimura era. Heroes, villains and the like were a mixture of Soda and Sugimura elements. For the Soda era, you may notice how it revived the teenagers with attitude from Turboranger, Dr. Hinelar is a combination of Dr. Man and Dr. Lee Keflen, you might as well think that the series was in fact a huge tribute to Soda. But it' wasn't a complete Soda tribute, it was also a Sugimura tribute. Megaranger had the sixth hero and secondary combining robot along with it. The show tried to get old school and new school elements together.
Let's talk about character development and I will also discuss both heroes and villains. The Megarangers are shown to develop different traits as they progress. For example, Kenta the slacker becomes more serious with life and Koichirou becomes more relaxed but not to the extent he sacrifices his meticulous, serious character- rather he becomes more balanced. For the villains it was fun to see how Dr. Hinelar was actually a former friend of Dr. Kubota, which Dr. Kubota vowed to stop his former friend since the beginning of the series rather than a later plot inserted into the series. It was also fun to see how Dr. Hinelar can be a cruel, manipulative bastard yet he can also care about Shibolena who he regards as a daughter and he values Yugande to the point he betrayed Gurail. It was also fun to see him finally create his own evil Sentai which was part of a much bigger plan to where he plans to destroy Javious I slowly but surely. The plot pacing is easy to follow as well.
For the tones, Megaranger itself is well-balanced with lighter and darker tones. In here, the writers give the serious episodes the right amount of seriousness for what may be intended as a fun season. Megaranger is no-nonsense yet it has its comedy gold moments, which prevents it from becoming a slapstick of sorts (though you all know I don't hate Go-onger). You have a fair share of serious episodes and happy episodes. None of its comedy derails any quality plot. I would say the writers and producers were pretty meticulous.
Just my two cents!
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