Directed by Yoshikazu Ishii. Written by Keiichi Hasegawa. Airdate Nov. 27, 2013.
Picking up where the previous episode left off, Misuzu’s father, Seiichiro Isurugi (Hironobu Nomura), shows up on the school grounds, accompanied by two people from Ichinotani Construction. Isurugi-San has plans to demolish the elementary school and build a resort complex.
There’s a more immediate problem, however: the recent kaiju clash has created a time–space barrier now enclosing the school and mountain. Everyone is trapped — and nobody seems too upset about this. The newcomers, who know nothing of the existence of kaiju, Ultras, seijin, or cosmic battles, treat this astonishing phenomenon as a minor annoyance.
The plan to tear down Furuhoshi Elementary School doesn’t factor into the rest of the episode. Or the rest of the show. (Kenta says a monster would probably destroy the school eventually anyway. Won’t lie, that got a good laugh from me.) Everybody quickly forgets about the school and the barrier and goes to have dinner. The focus shifts to the plotting of Alien Nackle, who’s taken over Alien Valky’s job as the lackey of the hidden Ruler of the Dark.
Alien Nackle uses the Dark Spark to control the construction company’s designer, Kuwabara (Shohei Abe), and forces him to steal the Ginga Spark from Hikaru while he’s asleep. The theft of the Ultra transformation device is a time-honored tradition, a simple way to give the hero some conflict so he can’t turn into a giant and save the day too early. I can’t complain about it as a plot contrivance unless it gets reused too often. It’s a brief interruption here, and it ends up giving Tomoya something to do in the episode aside from providing exposition about the time–space barrier.
Following the show’s established formula, Nackle turns Kuwabara into Zaragas, the next recycled kaiju costume on the production’s checklist. Kuwabara barely counts as a character, so this is another case where the Dark Spark transformation has no real meaning for the characters or the audience.
Awkwardly dropped into the episode is Go Osato (Mitsuki Koga), the boxer who was turned into the monster Galberos for the kaiju boxing match in the last episode. Go is an old friend of Officer Kaki, a supporting character who hasn’t had much to do in the show so far. Nor does he have much to do here, since Go’s role amounts to a quickie arc to bolster the “pursue your dreams” message the show keeps flogging. Go was a champion boxer who gave up his dreams because of the pressures of success. (Hmm, I think I’ve seen this before — and done better.) But since we barely know who Go is, none of this lands emotionally. At this point, my goodwill toward the “follow your dreams!” theme is eroding rapidly, and this clumsy use of it isn’t helping.
Misuzu steps up to add some personality to this scattershot, limp drama. There’s some development of her romance subplot with Hikaru, and a bit about her relationship with her father. Her big role in the episode is finally transforming into a monster (an awesome one, Red King!) to fight Zaragas and give Hikaru time to locate the missing Ginga Spark. How Misuzu achieves this is fairly arbitrary, but not out of line for most Ultra shows.
As kaiju fight action goes, what we get on screen isn’t too bad. The fight still takes place in that same stupid field under an empty beige sky, but I like both Zaragas and Red King as monsters, and Zaragas gets a nifty body-spike upgrade. I’m uncertain about Red King as a heroic kaiju — it’s the monster you love to hate — but putting Misuzu in control of Red King and then working with Ginga to double-team Zaragas makes it easier to accept. Misuzu finally getting the opportunity to control a Spark Doll is a welcome development, and she picked Red King, showing she has quality taste in kaiju.
The alien underling, Alien Nackle, doesn’t fare as well as the kaiju. Alien Nackle is portrayed as stereotypically flamboyant and campy, a portrayal that has become the race’s standard in the franchise. Considering the horrific acts Alien Nackle committed in their first appearance back in Return of Ultraman, one of the most famously dark moments in the Ultra Series, this comic portrayal has never sat right with me.
This episode is supposed to be the post-hiatus launching pad for the final run of three episodes, but it lacks the energy and focus to get the job done. Still, it’s good to see Red King in unusual circumstances.
Rating: Poor
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