Grace Sterling

This article is about a/an ally in the Power Rangers comic sub-franchise by Boom! Studios.

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Grace Sterling
Red Ranger (1969)
Gender:	Female
Seasons:	Mighty Morphin Power Rangers (Boom! Studios)
Colors:	Red
Homeworld:	Earth
First Appearance:	Mighty Morphin Power Rangers (Boom! Studios) Issue 17
Red Ranger (1969)

Grace Sterling is a billionaire, philanthropist and the CEO of the tech company Promethea, and formerly the Red Ranger and leader of the 1969 Power Rangers. She is an original character to the Boom! Studios comics storyline.

Character History

Grace as a young woman

Youth and Career at NASADA

Not much is cannonically known about Grace Sterling's youth. Eventually, she ened up working at NASADA ; working her way up to the head of the secretarial pool. She applied to be part of NASADA's moon landing mission, but the prevelant sexism at the time prevented her from being accepted into the program despite passing the Mercury astronaut tests at the top of her class. 

Time as the Red Ranger

On the night of the U.S. landing on the moon in 1969, Grace was watching from NASADA's headquarters. Afterwards, on the roof of the NASADA command center, her co-worker Marcus tried to raise her spirits and say that times are changing, but she resigned herself to the possibility that her dreams of being up in space will never come. At that moment, she was teleported by Zordon and Alpha 5 to the Command Center; where she was recruited along with Vietnam War veteran Terona Washington, college student Daniel O’Halloran, British singer and songwriter Jamie Gilmore, and KGB intelligence analyst Nikolai Chukarin to go to the Earth's moon to stop the newly-awakened Psycho Green from completing his mission to free Rita Repulsa from her prison. Grace accepted the mission once she learned she could get her wish and be on the Moon, and brought the team together by encouraging them to at least try to go along with it. Thus they became the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers, with Grace herself being the Red Ranger and the de facto leader due to her experience at NASADA. 

Once they arrived at the Aitken Crater, Grace had a brief moment where she cried tears of joy as she touched the lunar surface. The moment was ruined a bit by her team bickering, but she soon got the situation under control; sending Jamie and Nikolai on reconaisance while she, Tenora, and Daniel examined Rita's dumpster prison. Suddenly, Psycho Green attacked first by kicking Nikolai so hard that he would have flown off into space had Grace not caught him, then by crushing Jamie to death with a boulder. Daniel and Tenora then attacked, but Psycho Green shattered the visor to Daniel's helmet which caused him to asphyxiate to death. Grace, Nikolai, and Terona managedto form a modified version of the Power Blaster, but rather than destroy Psycho Green, it energized him to take on a larger, more powerful form. The three Rangers retreated to what would become Rita Repulsa’s Moon Palace and found one of the defense cannons that took down Psycho Green’s ship. Nikolai took the cannon, told Grace and Terona to make the world worth fighting for, allowed Psycho Green to swallow him whole, and fired the defense cannon which killed himself and Psycho Green.

Back at the Command Center, Terona and Grace were furious at Zordon over the deaths of Daniel, Jamie, and Nikolai; with Terona saying that it was irresponsible of Zordon to send people not trained in either using their powers or working together into battle, and Grace livid at the apparent shallowness of Zordon's apology. Her anger was magnified by Zordon's insistence that they would have to surrender their powers now that the danger had passed. She insisted that they could use the powers they have to fix the world and do so much more like ending the Vietnam War or the Cold War. Zordon refused as this would breach his code of ethics, as it is not their place to interfere in mankind's affairs, even if the intent is good. Both are disgusted by Zordon's actions, and end up leaving the Command Center; with Grace still in possession of Psycho Green’s dagger.

Founding of Promethea

At some point after the events on the Moon, Grace Sterling left NASADA. She then startet to develop the company Promethea which would fulfil her promise to Nikolai to make the world worth saving. Promethea would eventually evolve into a major player in Silicon Valley; eventually taking up its own small island complex in the San Fransisco Bay. Promethea would actively recruit the brightest minds of the time to work on specific R&D sectors of tech and research; with everything from alternative energies, dark matter experiments, and more falling under its corporate purview. At one point, Billy Cranston applied for an internship at Promethea, but then withdrew due to his duties as a Power Ranger.

Dealings with the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers

Following the attack on Angel Grove during the Black Dragon arc, Grace offered her and Promethea's aid to the cities affected by Rita's attacks and those attacked by the Black Dragon while he was in control of the Zords. She also defended and supported the Power Rangers efforts to help others on a news program when public opinion was divided on them. She had plans not only to rebuild, but to use her resources to build a better tomorrow.

Grace met the Power Rangers in person in Dubai, asking for their help in retrieving two of her workers whose plane was lost in the Carpathian Mountains and shows them the location of Finster who may have been involved in the disappearance. After the Rangers rescue the pilots from Finster who held them captive for experiments, she offers the Power Rangers a chance to work with her and use her resources and guidance to help the world. The Red Ranger refuses as he doesn't want her people getting hurt and the Power Rangers are an independent organization, which she understands but says the offer is still valid if he or the others change their minds.

As Finster's new generation of Puddies was causing havok, Grace dropped the niceties and arrived at the front door of the Command Center demanding to see Zordon. It was then that Grace informed the current Rangers of the 1969 team, and telling Jason that she understood better than anyone the heaviness that comes with the responsibility of being the Red Ranger. At that point, Jason agreed to work with Grace on handing the situation of Finster's random new Puddies. But the longer they worked with her, the less comfortable they were with her methods; from holding an untransformed Puddy in its human state a virtual prisoner at Promethea, to having her own Mechazord, to practically turning Vancouver into a marshall law state. 

"Shattered Grid"

Unbeknownst to the Rangers, after being dragged from the World of the Coinless to the main world, Lord Drakkon was captured and held as a prisoner at Promethea. Eventually, Billy was snooping around and found Drakkon held at Promethea. This caused a huge rift between Jason and Grace, and he decided to not work with Promethea and Grace again. While discussing Grace's actions with Zordon, the Saba from Drakkon's world snuck into Prometha with the intention to kill Drakkon. However, things did not go as planned and Drakkon broke free, decapitated Saba, and teleported away with his damaged Morpher.

Personality

From her earliest appearance, Grace Sterling is presented as a smart, capable, even generous CEO. This aligns with the younger version of her we see in 1969. However, simultaneously getting her wish to see the Moon, watching three colleagues die, and having her Ranger powers taken away all in the space of one day has left a psychological toll on her. She is not affraid to make decisions that are for the greater good; whether it's jumping in with her Mechazord, turning an entire city into a quasi-police state to find one of Finster's enhanced Puddys, or holding Lord Drakkon prisoner without telling the Rangers.

She feels a great deal of empathy towards Jason, her successor as the Red Ranger. She often described the weight of leadership from being the Red Ranger as taxing, and offered to make "that helmet a little lighter" by assisting Jason and his team. However, her secrecy in capturing Drakkon and containing him in her facility created a massive rift between the two, and consequently crippled their trust in one another. 

While she may walk along morally gray territory in her work, Grace is far from evil. This can be seen in her description of her many interrogation sessions with Drakkon, as she detailed that he derives a perverse pleasure from recalling the number of and names of all the rangers whose lives he has taken. Such recollections of her time with the wayward Black Dragon Ranger clearly sickened her, and their interactions were inordinately distressing to Grace, as while she detests some of the moral gray areas of her work, Drakkon willingly and gladly crossed the line long ago in his time. Seeing such a willfully sadistic ranger in existence horrifies her, as he represents what Grace has tried to avoid becoming as a result of her traumatic mission to the moon in 1969. 

Notes

Behind the Scenes

• Grace is the first female Red Ranger in the Boom! Studios timeline followed by Britt.