Ninja Firebird
The secret Wind Ninja Academy near Blue Bay Harbor, CA has been attacked in an unprovoked strike by the evil Lothor and his army of space ninjas! Though the administrator Sensei Watanabe put up a gallant fight, he was unable to prevent the school from being destroyed, all of its students and teachers from being kidnapped & held within Lothor’s orbiting insect-like asteroid base, and himself from being forcibly transformed into a guinea pig! The only hope of victory and justice now lies in the hands of three less-than-average students from the Academy who were fortunate to escape capture because they skipped their lessons that day. With his son, Cameron, providing the technical expertise & know-how behind the scenes, Sensei instructs the students in how to become the Earth’s greatest defenders- the legendary Wind Power Rangers!
Cameron "Cam" Wantabe- the Green Samurai Ranger- designed & created the Ninja Firebird as a much-needed addition to the Zord arsenal as a result of the evil space ninja master Lothor’s increased attacks. Cam used his experience, in working with the Mini-Zord technology from the Thunderstorm Megazord, to create the Ninja Firebird. This finally allowed all of the Megazords to morph together into one giant machine- the all-powerful Hurricane Megazord.
. . .
The Ninja Firebird forms the head, crown, and hands of the Hurricane Megazord;
each section coming from it its own separate Power Sphere (or just "Sphere", for short):
Power Sphere #15- launched from the Samurai Star Megazord- contains the crown of the Hurricane Megazord. This section forms the tail of the Ninja Firebird.
Power Sphere #16- launched from the Storm Megazord- contains the head & face of the Hurricane Megazord. This section forms the body of the Ninja Firebird.
Power Sphere #17- launched from the Thunder Megazord- contains the two hands of the Hurricane Megazord. This section forms the wings of the Ninja Firebird.
This is how it changes into its bird mode:
Tail
- The tail is ejected from its Sphere…
- …and begins to rotate along its central joint…
- …bringing the two halves together.
- Finally, the two small wing-like sections begin to rotate out…
- …and extent to their full length to complete the change.
Head/Body
- The body is ejected from its Sphere…
- … and rotates along the two joints in the middle…
- …bringing it around a full 180 degrees to complete the change.
Wings
- The two halves are ejected from their Sphere.
- The claw-like fingers of the hands rotate outwards…
- …to provide room for the wing sections and thumbs to rotate out…
- …completing the change.
Final Assembly
- The wings attach to the body by snapping the thumbs into holes in the back of the body.
- The tail attaches to the body via a clip underneath it that snaps into a hole on top of the body.
- As an added option for the toy, underneath it there is a set of small
wheels that can be rotated out so that it can be rolled along a flat surface.
This little machine animal kind of reminds me of a sparrow wearing a Greek helmet, or an ancient mythological Japanese bird.
There is a large gap underneath it, but this can be easily overlooked. The points of attachment are strong, but can be separated with ease. However, on the two hands, the joints for the mini wings & thumbs are a little tight, so you want to take care with them.
The Ninja Firebird features no weapons of its own; however, one time it was used to distract a monster so that the Rangers could make a temporary escape & regroup.
For those of you wondering what the differences were between the Ninja Firebird from "Power Rangers Ninja Storm", and its original Japanese counterpart- Karakuri Ball Set #04- Tri-Condor from "Ninpuu Sentai Hurricanger"- they were only cosmetic:
- The lettering on the Power Spheres has a slightly different font. Also, because of US toy regulations, small holes have been punched into both halves of each Sphere so that, if a young child were to put one in their mouth, they wouldn’t choke on it as easily.
- Originally, there were two Tri-Condor sets; one for the series, and a special version that came out at the same time as the "Hurricanger" movie. The only differences between these two sets was the movie version had white-colored Karakuri Balls (KBs) as opposed to the normal gold of the TV version, and there was a pendant included that could be worn as a necklace (used by a character in the movie).
Pleasantly enough, there was no difference between the Ninja Firebird and the TV-version of the Tri-Condor; the changes were only to the Power Spheres. And, there were few changes to the DX Samurai Star Lighting Megazord, which was the only way English-speaking audiences could get the Ninja Firebird. This is helpful because, at the sacrifice of the KB #09- Spin Bee, you could get a perfect Tri-Condor set, and a near-perfect DX Tenkujin in the same US box for less that getting the two Japanese sets separately.