Overview
This is the first Power Rangers series to not be a continuation of the previous series, with its own new cast and story. With the annual suit change that began with Power Rangers Zeo and the annual cast and story change starting with this series, this is the first series to follow the practice set by the Super Sentai series. However, Paul Schrier and Jack Banning reprised their roles as Bulk and Professor Phenomenus, respectively. Alpha 6 and the Astro Megaship were used again and Melody Perkins reprised her role as Karone three quarters of the way through the series and became the Pink Ranger. Originally Cassie Chan was going to absorb the Pink Lost Galaxy Ranger powers, but actress Patricia Ja Lee decided to quit after a dispute with the show's producers. This is also the first season to have sentient Zords and feature the death of a Power Ranger in battle (though Kendrix would be revived in the finale).
Thus, the Lost Galaxy season serves as something of a transitional series and also a unique one in Power Rangers history. It is neither completely self-contained nor a direct continuation, but a bit of both. The seasons would not begin to have completely independent stories until the following series, Lightspeed Rescue. The season's main villain, Trakeena, played by Amy Miller, has also been praised for the character's dark development, more unique for Power Rangers.
Lost Galaxy went through a great amount of re-writing, most notably more information surrounding the title, which really didn't have much to do with the Rangers. According to some of the show's writers, Mirinoi was going to be located in the Lost Galaxy, Zordon was going to be responsible for creating the Rangers' powers, and the Magna Defender powers were going to be linked closer with the Quasar Sabers. The romance of the Red and Pink Rangers, Leo and Kendrix, was going to develop more and be more important to the story, but due to Valerie Vernon's leukemia and departure from the show, the story arcs were scrapped. Despite high production values, the show's ratings faced an abrupt decline near the end of the season (in part because of the success of Saban's acquisition of Digimon), which led fans to believe that the studio wrapped up the series earlier than planned in order to cover their costs. Ironically, The Mystic Knights of Tir Na Nog saw its second season canceled in order to have its budget put into Lost Galaxy, and Lost Galaxy ended its run with lower ratings than Mystic Knights.
According to trademark documents, the original title for the series was slated to be Power Rangers Space Jungle.
Power Rangers Lost Galaxy is also the first out of all the seasons of the show to kill off most of its villains. It is also the series to use a villain costume from a past series of Super Sentai, and of that, it was Furio's costume, whose costume is from Denji Sentai Megaranger.
Read more about this topic: Valerie Vernon