Toys, Collectibles, Collectables, Comic Books, The Beatles, Beatles, Marvel, DC, Jewelry, Rick & Morty, Cartoons, Antiques, Pop Culture, Fandom, Cosplay, Geeky, Nerdy, Unique Items, Handmade, Crafts, Collectibles, Toys, Pop Culture, Memorabilia, Comic Books, Star Wars, Nightmare Before Christmas, Star Trek, Sometimes Cool, Antiques, Marvel, DC Comics, Jewelry, Crafts, Satchels, Unique, Geek, Nerd, Sci-Fi, Antiques, Beatles, Cosplay, Fandom, Vintage, Vinyl, For Sale
I got a nice surprise at the tail end of last year when the Japanese import, SHIN GODZILLA, actually played in a Las Vegas cinema, and so I was able to review it for this blog. Despite a glowing recommendation, I didn’t praise it nearly enough - flaws though it may have it is without question a modern cinematic masterpiece of haunting visuals paired with a beautiful music score that have just stuck with me for months after having seen it. I will be happy to update that review upon the film’s eventual Blu Ray release (Where the heck is it? In the meantime I look forward to the first ever Godzilla anime film, Godzilla: Kaiju Planet; Toho should have that complete by December 2017).
Imagine my delight a few months ago when I found out that there would be an equally limited engagement (one night only, bizarrely enough, on Super Bowl Sunday) of two of the more recent theatrical features in the Japanese produced Ultraman franchise. Both Ultraman Ginga S: The Movie and Ultraman X: The Movie had been dubbed - for better or worse - into English by William Winckler Productions. I’d gained familiarity with Winckler’s dub work from some super-robot mecha-anime, in particular DVD theatrical versions of Gai King, and Danguard Ace, which are Toei Animation TV series that precede Beast King Golion and Armored Fleet Dairugger XV (those, in 1984, were combined to become Voltron: Defender of the Universe here in the states). They were sincere and faithful dubs, but ultimately kind of bad dubs that included voices from sci-fi writers David Gerrold and Donald F. Glut among their cast, as opposed to professional voice-actors, so I was very nervous about this. (If you are not aware of the work of Donald F. Glut, I’m not sure we can still be friends). Regardless, it’s not every day that Ultraman features get screened in the West - in fact, almost never - however these features were being screened at Las Vegas’s newly opened Eclipse Theaters: a deluxe, adult’s only movie house that offers a full open bar, a lounge area, and a kitchen that serves you even as you watch your movies. While it’s fairly exquisite and caters to independent, hard to find productions, I didn’t find it to be quite as worthy of its deluxe, adults only prices! Cool idea, though. I was also well aware of this before proceeding: the Ultraman franchise, wholly unfortunately, has been in a creative rut since around the mid 2000’s, as facing stiff competition from both Kamen Rider and the Power Rangers/Super Sentai franchises, have forced creator-franchise owners Tsuburaya Productions to gear the Ultraman TV shows and their theatrical feature tie-ins ever more towards the kiddie-set crowds. (Of course, revenue from toys and merchandising create far greater profit than advertising during the actual programs or theatrical ticket sales do. It didn’t help that some of their adult oriented product, in particular the Ultraman Nexus TV series and the Ultra Seven X experimental webisode series, were both failures in finding excited audiences). Now, even as an adult fan of this franchise, reaching all the way back to seeing the original English dub of Ultraman on TV in 1979, it should say something that even I had little interest in either the Ginga or Ultraman X TV series iterations. I couldn’t be sure if I would be able to follow these films, as they are intrinsically tied into their respective TV series. (Confusingly, all three, Ginga, Ginga S, and X are mere miniseries with only eleven to thirteen episodes each; I am not even sure what that is about, then). That said, I knew of the dreadful concept behind the Ginga/Ginga S series, and the reason I avoided it like a plague: the Ultra heroes and even some of the famous kaiju (Japanese for supernatural monsters) had all been imprisoned as “spark dolls” (read: actual action figures used in the series) that the hero would have to collect and connect to his transformation device in order to free them or borrow their powers! Naturally, toy partners Bandai, despite an overwhelming marketplace of various Ultraman figure types already on the market, created an entire “spark dolls” toy line that could be used to connect with a role-play transformation device so that kids would have “catch ‘em all!”. Gag. To make matters worse, even trying to read the backstory/mythos of this particular series is one convoluted concept after the next. All this in 26 episodes? Gag and barf. I initially had higher hopes for Ultraman X, which featured some excellent design work in all areas, including some design influence from the recent excellent Ultraman manga, except for the ridiculous modular science patrol mecha vehicles (these are usually pretty odd in any given series anyway, so I could look past it). However, this series took a similar approach and replaced the “spark dolls” concept with “cyber cards”, which allow the science team to cyber-enhance classic series kaiju with armor, or even Ultraman X himself (whose suit is already bad-ass as it is, but looks cumbersome when weighed down with the cyber armor). Naturally, in the real world, kids MUST actually try and collect all of the real cyber-cards and slot them into a toy version of the X-tablet through which the titular character regularly converses with his science team. I know - I just lost most of you already. But, damn, it’s not every day that I have a chance to even see Ultraman productions anymore, as Tsuburaya keeps a tight control over the releases of the franchise, due to fears of copyright violations they normally won’t even allow for DVD or Blu-Ray imports into the U.S.; even where English language tracks have been available before! And to be able to see them on the big screen? At a deluxe theater? Where I can order sliders and eat like a pig (and did) while watching the features? Sign me up! And lo, I was actually giddy with excitement as Ultraman Ginga S: The Movie started. There was an explosion of color and hi-def visuals, this movie dropped all of its pretensions and got right down to brass tacks: it opened on a lush, alien-jungle world with Ultraman Cosmos doing battle with a seijin (alien) kaiju, Etelgar, who can cross time and dimensions to battle Ultramen of various multiverses; neat because you’ll need only that nugget of info to realize why there are so many of the freakin’ Ultra-series heroes that show up in this here one dang movie! Cosmos’ appearance was a delight to me as the Ultraman Cosmos TV series was the last Ultra-series that I actually watched, and even actor Taiyo Sugiura returned to his role as Musashi Haruno, the human form of Cosmos. It was a thrill to see that he’d actually gained some age and now supported a more mature visage (he looked barely older than a teenager in the original series!). So, you see, this seijin kaiju Etelgar had attacked some planet with a princess on it but lied to her and convinced her that the Ultramen were evil and were desperately using their powers to try and convince her Etelgar himself was bad…- never mind Etelgar’s big scary, skeletal face! Now she uses some of her own magic powers to attack the science team of Ultraman Ginga’s world, and fend off defenses beset by some other Ultramen. Ultraman Zero shows up and helps the human forms of both Ginga and Ultraman Victory (also of the Ginga series) realize they have to fight together, literally, as one. For some unexplained reason only this will defeat their enemy. Also, Ultraman Zero is a huge prick. There’s some more Ultra Crusaders that show up, all recognizable from various iterations of the series, and there are about a thousand fights and flips and laser beams and big giant explosions to behold from the science team members to the giant Ultra heroes and kaiju and…well it just kind of goes on and on and on like that! I know - its kiddy garbage and I just lost the remainder of you whom had made it this far! My only source of joy in this mess came from trying to identify all of the Ultra heroes, which becomes difficult as with the recent series they change forms three or four times (gotta’ push as many of those action figures as possible)! And get this, in the most homo-erotic plot-point ever, the human forms of Ginga and Victory, already both acting and looking very gay throughout many scenes in this film (not that there’s anything wrong with that) actually merge their consciousness into yet another new hero form for Ginga, fusing him with the ability to recreate Zero’s crossbow-made-of-light weapon (I can’t keep up with all the fancy terminology the Japanese give to these things) with which to destroy their enemy. Yeah, I was constantly reminded of the late, great Roger Ebert’s line in his review of the very first Power Ranger’s movie, “It’s as close as you can have to absolutely nothing and still have a product to project up on the screen.” By the end of it I had a headache and wanted a drink, but I couldn’t bring myself to pony up the 13 dollar asking price at this “deluxe” theater. Fortunately, Ultraman X: The Movie; as it is celebrating the 50th Anniversary of the ULTRAMAN franchise; proved to be a lot better, if only lightly so. For one thing, it plays upon and tries to answer a mystery that has been bugging franchise fans for, well, 50 years! This film ties in directly to an episode of the original Ultraman entitled, “The Blue Stone of Bahradi”. In brief, this episode takes place in a fictional Arabian country of Bahradi and shows that they (the very Japanese looking Arabians of Bahradi) harbor and worship a statue of another member of the Ultraman species, one that visited Earth in the distant past and then left them with the titular Blue Stone to protect themselves of impending kaiju attacks (and yes, imagine that: as the Science Team investigates, one kaiju, Antlar, actually does! Go figure!). So just who the heck was this other, earlier Ultraman represented by the statue? Never quite answered. The Ultra-series phenom lost some of it’s luster throughout the early 1980’s, and attempts to revive the series throughout the early 90’s were projects that fizzled because - too put it mildly - they were just awful. It wasn’t until 1996 when Tsuburarya Productions were pretty much on the ropes and backed into the corner they were forced to radically rethink their concept and created Ultraman Tiga. It was in this series that anime-influenced design came into the picture, coating everything from the hero to the Science Patrol team uniforms, weapons and vehicles that gave everything a fresh, new, enticing look. All of the kaiju costumes that appeared in this series were superbly designed and executed. The scripts, while throwing back to many concepts directly from both Ultraman (1966) and the highly regarded Ultra Seven (1967), were excellently structured and tight in their suspense; also excellently updated for a contemporary setting. The miniature work in the series was also especially superb, matching the live action locations in exacting detail! It was a series so good that it even came over to the US dubbed, poorly in goofy comical voices, and aired on Fox Kids TV in 2001! (Fortunately, the DVD release of the series removed the dub entirely and included faithful subtitles for the more grounded, sometimes somber Japanese dialogue). And the hero, Ultraman Tiga, wasn’t just red and silver this time out: he was multicolored and lively in all aspects of appearance. Indeed, Ultraman Tiga started the whole multi-form hero concept by switching his colors from blue and silver (for speed and agility) to the classic red and silver (for strength and endurance) or his natural form which combined both. This both surprised many fans of the original shows, but they responded with positive excitement, and it delighted children, who now needed three different action figures with which to recreate their hero’s battles! In brief, in the pilot episode, it was shown that Tiga had been lying dormant within in a pyramid in the wilds of Japan’s forests, but also trapped within the form of a stone statue – one that looked, probably unintentionally at the time, similar to the statue shown in “The Blue Stone of Bahradi”! And yet, there was no way to tie them together, as Tiga’s series starts an entirely fresh timeline in a world in which no other Ultra heroes are even known of. (Note, too, two other Ultra beings in statue form are completely destroyed in that Tiga pilot episode - who were they, then?). Tiga gets the extra article in his nomenclature because he was discovered in the (ahem) “Tiga region” of Japan! Much later in the series, there is an amusing episode where Daigo (Tiga’s human host) travels into another dimension to find that the original Ultraman TV show was “just a show” based on an incident that creator Eiji Tsuburaya (the FX genius who was directly responsible for Gojira/Godzilla) supposedly actually witnessed: Tiga and original Ultraman teamed up to fight that episode’s seijin kaiju! And I’ll be honest here; I am not sure if I could follow enough in the dubbing - or if my desire for a good hard stiff drink was clouding my ability to pay attention - I am not sure that Ultraman X: The Movie answers any of these questions, or just makes further unnecessary connections. It does, however prove to be a mildly enjoyable romp; subdued and more subtle when compared against the previous engagement! In Ultraman X: The Movie, a flamboyant archaeologist with a viral internet sensation show is about to, with his crew in tow, enter a recently discovered ruin in the forests of - yes, you guessed it - Japan! A female archaeologist who originally unearthed the tomb and her young son are also in the area trying to prevent him from desecrating the site without any formal study of what they might actually discover within. He cares only about the viewership of his show, and proceeds, where he eventually discovers a mysterious blue stone. Taking the stone from the site, of course, is a bad idea, despite all the dire hieroglyphic warnings around, and it leads to the appearance of two classic Ultra series kaiju, one of which is Antlar from the “Blue Stone of Bahradi” (a terrifically designed cross between an ant and a beetle) and Golza, the kaiju from the pilot episode of Ultraman Tiga). Naturally, the young son is familiar with the science team of the Ultraman X TV series, and he helps them whip up cyber cards to create the exact two heroes needed to defeat these nemesis, original Ultraman and Ultraman Tiga (it says a lot for Tiga’s continued popularity that he is still such an iconic Ultraman hero even 20 years since his series aired). Simply enough, the two heroes join Ultraman X in the battle to use the powers of the blue stone to defeat these kaiju, while the science team continually amps them up with powers and weapons from various other Ultra heroes series via these cyber-cards. For all of this convoluted goofiness, it is also kinda’ neat! Ultraman X: The Movie is a lot more compact and focused more on its human characters; this proves to be key in enjoying it. At one point, the mom becomes trapped under debris and only the TV archaeologist can save her. Will he do it, or will his own selfish sense of self-preservation allow him to leave her behind? I liked this film much better than Ginga S: The Movie, but it was still just great seeing all of this Ultra action on a big screen! And yet, for as much as I still have love of the Ultra series and its concepts and want to collect them and keep up, it is kids-only appeal in productions such as these that prevent me from doing that. There is nothing I can gain from these series that I don’t already get in both the Transformers and Godzilla franchises, which offer higher quality and sophistication, fused with much darker themes and imagery. Final summations: Ultraman Ginga S: The Movie [one star]Ž - Good production values, but the special FX weren’t anything better than what we get in the regular TV shows; story is just plain wacky and I didn’t care about any of the characters; I also hate - with a passion - seeing the human forms interacting inside the Ultra-heroes consciousness! Ultraman X: The Movie ŽŽ[two and a half stars] - Less convoluted and more humanistic story; special FX were okay but not spectacular; having only three Ultra heroes means more time spent on dynamic kaiju battle choreography.
0 Comments
|
|