Tag: Showa

Ultraseven Ep. 43: Nightmare of Planet No. 4

~ Ryan Harvey

Directed by Akio Jissoji. Written by Shozo Uehara. Airdate July 27, 1968.

Last week, we had director Kazuho Mitsuta’s masterpiece. This week, we have director Akio Jissoji’s masterpiece: a dystopian planetary tale unlike anything in the Ultra Series before or since. A mix of The Twilight Zone, Star Trek, Planet of the Apes, and Jean-Luc Godard’s Alphaville. It’s the most brutal episode of the show, and it’s astonishing to me that it ever got on the air. The network must have given up on Ultraseven ever pulling back a younger audience, because this is an unapologetic work of adult science fiction. Children hoping for giant monster fun won’t enjoy seeing fascist firing squads mow down dozens of innocent people. 

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Ultraseven Ep. 42: Ambassador of the Nonmalt

~ Ryan Harvey

Directed by Kazuho Mitsuta. Written by Tetsuo Kinjo. Airdate July 21, 1968.

Dan and Anne are enjoying a trip to the beach, their romance nudging forward. Across the waves, they can see Seahorse Ocean Base, which is conducting research to create seafloor farms and cities. A young boy approaches Anne and warns her that the Ultra Guard must stop this interference with the ocean floor, or “something bad will happen.” He dashes off before Anne can find out who he is. Immediately afterward, Seahorse Base explodes and sinks, taking with it Mansanari Nihei’s brief cameo role as a technician. 

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Ultraseven Ep. 41: Challenge From Underwater

~ Ryan Harvey

Directed by Kazuho Mitsuta. Written by Bunzo Wakatsuki. Airdate July 14, 1968.

As “Challenge From Underwater” begins, it feels like it could be an episode of Ultra Q shot in color. We meet a team of amateur paranormal investigators who have come to Lake Ishu to follow rumors of sightings of water creatures called kappa. It’s hard not to see this “Japan Kappa Club” as an analog to the Ultra Q cast. Their leader, Sumitani (Masami Taura), is a science-fiction author like Jun; the one woman in the group, Fujishima (Kazuko Miyakawa), is a photographer like Yuriko. The difference is that these people treat probing into the unknown as a lark, nothing to be taken seriously. Sumitani even says they’d like to date kappa — a damn weird thing to admit.

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Ultraseven Ep. 39 & 40: The Seven Assassination Plan

~ Ryan Harvey

Directed by Toshihiro Iijima. Written by Keisuke Fujikawa. Airdate June 30 & July 7, 1968.

Alien races have targeted Ultraseven before, both in his giant form and as Dan Moroboshi. But Alien Guts has an elevated kill plan. As monochrome footage plays of Seven battling a kaiju (not stock footage; it’s new, with a monster called Aron), Alien Guts carefully analyzes Seven’s abilities and lays out their plot. Killing Dan isn’t sufficient. They must defeat Ultraseven in a public, humiliating way to break Earth’s resistance. It’s kin to the opening of From Russia With Love, as SPECTRE plots the ultimate defeat and debasement of another “Seven,” 007. The tone is set from the opening scene: this is going to be a major event, a two-parter that will push Seven and the Ultra Guard to their limits. It wildly succeeds.

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Ultraseven Ep. 38: The Courageous Battle

~ Ryan Harvey

Directed by Toshihiro Iijima. Written by Mamoru Sasaki. Airdate June 23, 1968.

Ultraseven has the fewest kid-centered episodes of the classic-era Ultra programs. This is one of the exceptions (along with “The Eye That Shines in the Darkness”). Dan promises a boy who’s terrified about his upcoming heart surgery that he’ll be with him at the hospital during the procedure. But wouldn’t you know it: a giant alien robot starts attacking traffic jams to consume cars. That will sure cut into Dan’s free time. Dan has to go hit a home run for the kid or something.

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Ultraseven Ep. 37: The Stolen Ultra Eye

~ Ryan Harvey

Directed by Toshitsugu Suzuki. Written by Shinichi Ichikawa. Airdate June 16, 1968.

As the prelude to another dastardly alien attack on Earth, an attractive young woman deceives the Ultra Guard and steals Dan’s transforming device. We’ve seen something like this before — more than once — but this episode features an interesting twist in how the aliens operate that shows the developing dramatic maturity of Ultraseven. 

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Ultraseven Ep. 36: A Lethal 0.1 Seconds

~ Ryan Harvey

Directed by Samaji Nonagase. Written by Hiroyasu Yamaura. Airdate June 9, 1968.

Samaji Nonagase is back directing a suspense-filled episode that goes full ‘60s spy-fi. This is as close as Ultraseven gets to turning into a straightforward action show. There’s a special effects finale where Seven battles an alien ship, but the actual peak of the action is the lethal fraction of a second in the title — and it’s a duel of human vs. human, revolver vs. revolver. 

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Ultraseven Ep. 35: Terror on the Moon

~ Ryan Harvey

Directed by Toshitsugu Suzuki. Written by Shinichi Ichikawa. Airdate June 2, 1968.

Captain Kiriyama’s close friend in the Terran Defense Force, Kurata (Hiroshi Minami), makes his second appearance on Ultraseven after his introduction in “The Man Who Came From V3.” That story put him at odds with Kiriyama in an ethical bind over the best way to handle an alien menace. This episode has the two friends working as a team from the start as they head into space to confront the consequences of one of their past missions. 

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Ultraseven Ep. 34: The Vanishing City

~ Ryan Harvey

Directed by Hajime Tsuburaya. Written by Tetsuo Kinjo. Airdate May 26, 1968.

Several Ultraseven episodes have a tricky time balancing the mysterious science-fiction stories of its original premise with the spectacle of kaiju fights and space duels that viewers expect from something titled “Ultra.” Some episodes split the difference and go for mood in the first half, big action in the second. “The Vanishing City” executes one of the better mergers of Ultra Q eerie SF mystery and Ultraman supersized action. The tone of weirdness is consistent, even when the climax is Seven pursuing a roly-poly hedgehog monster through the labyrinthine streets of an empty city stolen by aliens who need real estate.

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