Also the Kobe Earthquakes happened that year as well.
Yeah, 1995 was not a great year for Super Sentai.
I still love Ohranger but it was unfortunate what the show had to go through.

I was unaware the earthquake happened the same year.
Not a great year for Sentai? It wasn't a good year for Japan in general...

It wasn't just due to the Sarin gas attacks. There was a pretty bad earthquake around the time as well. Considering those behind Sarin were a cult and can be viewer as terrorists, a Sentai show going back to the more war like routes and featured an invading terror armor that destroyed the city probably wasn't the greatest timing. So they did what they felt they had to do, except so much was already written that the show jumps back and form from old school dark and war Sentai to Zyuranger like, so that plus the events created for not a lot of good public image.

Still sold toys like hotcakes though. I wonder how well it would have done though if they kept with the original tone. I remember reading an old article that talked about how Sentai nearly "died" due to Ohranger (if anything nearly killed it it was Fiveman apparently). It ended up talking about how while children adored Zyuranger the adult fans didn't take well to it because they wanted more serious stuff that was akin to the 80s or Jetman. Dairanger ended up being the opposite; adults loved it and kids didn't like it as much.

Absolutely. No objections there.

I heard that the reason they planned to go for a serious route was because they wanted to commemorate Goranger's 20th anniversary, which probably explains the militaristic elements of the show(and Miyauchi).

Apparently the ratings were really low to the point to where Toei contemplated just ending it. They went on with Jetman as the possible final show. But it did gangbusters so they did Zyuranger and so on and so forth.

Indeed that was the reasoning. They even wanted to model the team after the Gorangers in terms of character.

Gokaiger Gokaiger Gokaiger
Zyuohger is good so far as well

I don't think ratings really matter in comparison to toy sales (Which is how Go-Busters stayed afloat. Didn't Go-Buster Ace sell like hotcakes?)
How did Fiveman do poorly enough to almost bring the franchise down?

And favorite anniversary? I dunno. Like, only Gokaiger milked the anniversary aspect. Beyond that, Gaoranger had Vs. Super Sentai and Boukenger featured AkaRed and his merry band of past Sentai heroes, but both of those were specials with little bearing...
So I guess Gokaiger by default...