Mack Hartford

"I can't tell the difference between my programming and my personality."

- Mack Hartford

Mackenzie "Mack" Hartford is the main protagonist of Power Rangers: Operation Overdrive. He is the Red Overdrive Ranger and the son of Andrew Hartford. He initially started his existence as an android, until being turned into a human by the Corona Aurora.

Early Life
A man named Andrew Hartford wanted a son and, due to his work, was never able to meet the right woman. He then built an android and named him Mack. Mack was programmed with memories of his fathers own childhood, so he could live as a normal teenager. Andrew and his butler, Spencer, then photoshopped old photographs to include pictures of Mack when he was a "child." Mack continued his existence not knowing of his true origins. Outgoing and enthusiastic, he was sheltered by his father and had the desire to prove himself. Mack is heavily into adventure novels and other escapist fantasies. He was the only Ranger not deliberately recruited, being involved in Operation Overdrive by accident and against his father's initial wishes.

Kick Into Overdrive
Two years after his activation his father had found the Corona Aurora, and it had released Moltor and Flurious from their imprisonment. The Sentinel Knight then appeared to Andrew Hartford to convince him it was now his responsibility to protect the crown and its jewels from evil. Andrew then went to work building the Overdrive Rangers' powers, zords, and weapons.

Andrew then recruited Will Aston, Dax Lo, Ronny Robinson, and Rose Ortiz to be Power Rangers, as it was his intention to become the Red Ranger. After convincing that group to become Rangers, he altered their DNA to have genetic powers. As Mr. Hartford was about to get his enhancement, Mack walked in, interrupting the procedure. This caused an impromptu meeting between Mack and Andrew. Moltor's Lava Lizards then came to the Hartford estate, causing the Rangers to have to take off. Andrew gave the Rangers their morphers, and had them go ahead. Andrew was about to morph, but was captured by some Lava Lizards, causing his morpher to break free. Mack picked up the morpher and morphed into the Red Overdrive Ranger. He led the other Rangers to a victory over the Chillers and Lava Lizards. He showed bravery and quick tactical thinking in his first battle and was quickly accepted and trusted as leader by the other Rangers.

After returning to base, Moltor captured Mr. Hartford and the Corona Aurora. Mack led the other Rangers to Moltor's lair and saved him, but couldn't get the crown. After defeating one of Moltor's giant monsters, Andrew gave his blessing to Mack to become the Red Ranger. He was given a suit and what was assumed to be a genetic power - super strength.

Brownbeard's Pearl
Mack is also very understanding of the meaning of a team. When Will was having difficulties adjusting to working with a team, due to only doing solo work for his whole life, he helped him. With Mack's leadership, the team found the three scrolls, which when combined, turned into Neptune's Sword, which led them to St. Lucia. At St. Lucia, they found the Eye of the Sea. After realizing that the Eye wasn't a jewel of the Corona Aurora, the team traded it to Brownbeard for a pearl. The Pearl turned out to be the first jewel of the crown.

Toru Diamond
After reading upon the Hou-Ou bird, Mr. Hartford concluded that it would lead them to the next jewel. Will tricked Miratrix in order to get to the parchment, but unfortunately freed Kamdor from his jewel prison. After the Rangers retreived the parchment, Moltor sent a creature named Tyzonn to retreive it. Mack, realizing that Tyzonn wasn't evil, convinced him to join the Rangers to save the world. Tyzonn used citrus acid in lemonade to get the location of the jewel hidden in the parchment. Mack and Tyzonn took the Sonic Streaker to the volcanoe to get the Toru Diamond. The two jewels were later used to turn Tyzonn back to his true form.

Blue Sapphire
When an expedition camp is attacked by new villains known as the Fearcats in Brazil, the Rangers worked with Tyzonn to stop them. Flurious tests his gyros on the Fearcats, Mig and Benglo, turning them into powerful cyborgs. It's a race against time for the Rangers to save Tyzonn and stop the Fearcats from destroying San Angeles. The Rangers traveled to Norway and raced Moltor to the mystical hammer Mjolnir. Moltor retrieves it first, the Rangers then attempt to take Mjolnir back. Tracing the connection between the Cannon of Ki Amuk and Mjolnir, the Rangers travel to Mexico and are ambushed. In the process, Loki appears, masquerading as Thor, and steals Mjolnir. To get it back, Ronny disguises herself as the goddess Freyja. After the Rangers use the Cannon of Ki Amuk and Mjolnir to get the Piedra Aztec del Compás it gets stolen by Moltor. Moltor sends Blothgaar to fight the Rangers. Mack is blasted by the Compass and is overcome by a serious case of a bad luck, which should have been impossible since he was a robot. The Rangers then used the compass to find the the Blue Sapphire, which was stolen by Kamdor and Miratrix.

Star of Isis
"One Fine Day" revealed Mack's memories of a happy childhood ten years ago don't match with reality, with Andrew mentioning Mack first appeared only two years ago; additionally, he was unable to pass through the Fearcats' forcefield in the same episode, despite maintaining continuous physical contact with Tyzonn and Rose who had already successfully passed through. In the final scene of Ronny on Empty II, Andrew was initially startled to see Mack's choice of Halloween costume, that of a robot. (Andrew's, fittingly, was that of a Frankinstineish mad scientist).

Mack was finally revealed to be an android when he was affected by the same computer virus created by Kamdor's monster that infected the BattleFleet Zords and the base's computers and he awoke to find his head not attached to his body. He was shaken by the revelation to the extent of not thinking he was needed in battle, and Spencer had to snap him out of it by reminding him that, despite his origins and the identity crisis, he was loved. The other Rangers showed support when they found out - as Tyzonn stated, they'd accepted him and he was an alien - but Mack seemed unwilling to forgive his father for keeping it a secret, refusing to talk with him.

Pink Emerald
In "Red Ranger Unplugged" he had a brief identity crisis, unsure if his hobbies were really his or just programmed into him, though he soon got past this. He is still resentful of his father for lying to him, and by Home and Away Part 2 he had started referring to him simply as "Mr Hartford" and saying he can't be angry because "androids don't have emotions".

In "Way Back When", the other Rangers plug Mack in the main computer to see his memories, so they could find more info about the Jewels of the Corona Aurora.

In the final episode "Crown and Punishment", Mack realized his father cared for him when Flurious threatened to destroy Mack for the jewels, causing Andrew to trade the jewels for Mack. After this, Mack began calling him "Dad" again. Mack uses up all his power in the final battle with Flurious to destroy the villain, but unfortunately, depleting his own power and causing severe internal damage. The other Overdrive Rangers rushed him back to Andrew, who sadly informed the Rangers that the damage to Mack's systems was too severe to be repaired, and while another android could be built - that android, while it would look like Mack, would not be the Mack they knew.

Moments later, the Sentinel Knight arrived to offer his congratulations, and was perplexed by the Rangers' reactions; using the power of the Corona Aurora (placed upon Mack's head) to not only revive Mack, but to turn him into an actual human being. With Operation Overdrive succeeding in its mission to find the Jewels of the Corona Aurora, and the other Rangers leaving to return to their pre-Ranger lives, Mack is living his fondest wish, and is currently travelling on adventures with his father overseas.

Genetic Power(s)

 * Super-Strength: Mack can lift objects upto several tons,but his strength limit is currently unknown. He can also deliver strikes much more powerful than the average human's.Using his newfound strength, he has lifted many an item, including gigantic boulders, trees, his team, and his butler. The Rangers do not seem to be able to use their genetic powers while transformed, though their morphed outfits give them a boost in strength regardless.

Trivia

 * Mack beat out Justin Stewart as the youngest ranger making him the first youngest Red Ranger and team leader of the Overdrive Rangers.
 * Mack's Red Ranger's helmet is seen inside the remains of Alphabet Soup in the Power Rangers: R.P.M. episode Ancient History. If this was canon and not a callback gag, that would mean Mack had died trying to prevent the Venjix virus from spreading further.
 * He's the second Red Ranger to not be born human. The first was Aurico, who is an Aquitian.
 * Suprisingly, he's not the first artifical Red Ranger, as Psycho Red and the Red Cyborg Ranger were both artifical. He is, however, the first artifically created Red Ranger to not be a copy of the existing one.
 * In Operation Overdrive's first episode, when Mack first morphs, before the sequence starts, he is seen wearing his normal clothes, but then, in the actual Morph sequence itself, he's wearing the Overdrive team uniform.
 * When Mack battled Moltor, He used his Overdrive Tracker to use Moltar's weapon to Morph.
 * In the first episode of the Overdrive series right before he starts the Morph sequence, he'll take the Overdrive Tracker Morpher, and when he opens his hand, the morpher's Turbo wheel will spin the Morpher for a second before he closes his hand again and activates the Morpher. This little Morpher spin becomes a trademark for Mack in the later episodes. But in the last episode, he doesn't spin his Morpher. This means he is the First Red to spin his Morpher, but Antonio Garcia became the second Ranger to spin his Morpher just before he can morph.
 * This is a quirk that was carried over from the original Sentai Series.
 * Mack's personality is different from his counterpart, Satoru.
 * Mack is based on and named after Bruce Kalish's son, Mackensie.