Directed by Akio Jissoji. Written by Akio Jissoji, Akio Satsukawa. Airdate May 17, 1997.
Akio Jissoji returns to direct an episode of an Ultra television series for the first time since Ultraseven’s “The Saucers Have Come” — a gap of almost three decades. (He did direct Ultra Q the Movie: Legend of the Stars in 1990.) Have the years mellowed his eccentric visual style and storytelling techniques? Nope! During his break from television, Jissoji has been directing experimental short films, and he’s gotten even weirder.
What sort of warped tale does Jissoji-san have for his return? Something quite basic: boilerplate alien invasion stuff. Alien Manon must locate a new planet to inhabit as their homeworld nears the end of its existence. They’ve picked Earth for their new home. But first, they must stop GUTS, so they lure Captain Iruma into a trap and take her hostage. Nothing groundbreaking here.
Execution, however, is everything, and “Flower” is a nonstop barrage of Akio Jissoji’s experimental visual idiosyncracies. Jissoji worked with his own production team for this episode, giving him the freedom to attempt whatever he could pull off within the budget and schedule. Dutch angles, dim lighting, off-center close-ups, rapid cuts to distorted images, diffused lighting, and imagery pulled from stage productions. It almost approaches overload, but it never stops looking fantastic or being compelling. This is an episode that opens with the camera staring up Horii’s nose as he sleeps. That’s the sort of style we’re dealing with. (Horii ends up sleeping through most of the episode.)
Springtime has brought a lull to the TPC’s activities, so the GUTS team decides to take a vacation together. Daigo loses the draw and has to stay behind to watch the base — the job Yazumi would normally be forced to do, but Iruma is warming up to letting the kid get outside more. The team heads out on a flower-viewing trip: a picnic among ancient statues and floating cherry blossom petals. It looks like the greatest spring hay fever nightmare imaginable.
The GUTS members frolic, lounge, and get intoxicated in what, I believe, is supposed to be an outdoor garden. In Jissoji’s hands, it’s more like a trippy stage production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream: a warped and blurred interior, purposely artificial and unreal. The rest of the world has this same dream-like distortion because there’s no way internal logic is going to prevent Akio Jissoji from making his visuals look interesting.
The alien storyline emerges when Daigo detects a distortion near the picnic spot that matches the signature of a UFO that appeared a month ago. Daigo flies out to investigate, and Alien Manon reveal themselves when they kidnap Iruma. Tiga engages with a giant Alien Manon, and for a moment it appears as if the fight will be a straightforward nighttime battle outdoors.
Hah hah, never mind! Jissoji goes full kabuki for one of the nuttiest and coolest-looking Ultra fights ever. Alien Manon and Tiga face off on a stage lit with laser lights. It’s more a carefully choreographed dance than a fight, backed with rock-show laser beams and kabuki-style percussion music. The rapid cuts to the faces of statues, falling cherry blossoms, distorted flower beds, and swirls of abstract colors that have featured throughout the episode all ramp up, and certain segments of the audience say, “Whoooooaa, far out!” It’s that type of thing. I love it. I couldn’t take a steady diet of this, but if you pop it into the episode schedule now and then, I’m happy.
Amid the psychedelic show are several intriguing character moments. Munakata gets the most interesting bits. We learn why he always drinks milk when he’s at the bar: he can’t hold his liquor. He’s a poet at heart, the sixth-best poet in the TPC (in a poetry club of six). When he recites a traditional Japanese poem under the cherry blossoms, Rena remarks, “Don’t do things that are out of character.” Only an episode like this can get away with such a sudden meta-comment. I guess Rena is so out of it from the wine and whatever is in the flower pollen that she momentarily saw through the fourth wall.
As the story wraps up, even the narrator soft-pedals (“petals?”) the alien invaders. Cherry blossoms are one of the reasons Alien Manon chose Earth as their target. How bad could these would-be conquerors really be when they can appreciate the beauties of cherry blossoms?
This isn’t one of Jissoji’s masterpieces, since it’s essentially a lark for him and his team to play around with the visuals. That still makes it one of the most memorable episodes of Ultraman Tiga. Jissoji will return soon with another episode, “Dream.” He originally planned to direct four episodes, but after his third one was canceled, he left the show. Well, enjoy what you get, and don’t forget to frolic for the nonce between battling aliens.
Rating: Great
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