Directed by Noriaki Yuasa. Written by Niisan Takahashi.
Now for another movie break, this time for a “classic” of Japanese kaiju cinema. It’s a short hop from Ultra Q’s “Grow Up! Little Turtle,” a tale about a boy and his affection for a giant turtle who takes him to see a princess underwater, to Gamera the Giant Monster, a tale about a boy and his affection for a giant turtle who is causing mass destruction and death.
Continue reading “Toku Theater: Gamera the Giant Monster (1965)”
Directed by Samaji Nonagase. Written by Tetsuo Kinjo. Airdate Oct. 15, 1967.
This was the first Ultraseven episode produced, and it’s fascinating to see how much the crew already had a feel for the show’s possibilities and what made it different from Ultraman. It’s a better start than the first two episodes aired: “The Invisible Challenger” put the pieces in place, “The Green Terror” emphasized the serious mood, but “Secret of the Lake” demonstrates what Ultraseven can do when it swings into action with full confidence in its premise.
Continue reading “Ultraseven Ep. 3: Secret of the Lake”
Directed by Harunosuke Nakagawa. Written by Masahiro Yamada. Airdate Feb. 6, 1966.
The Ultra series frequently mines fairy tales for story material. Eiji Tsuburaya loved the idea of entertaining children, so it makes sense that his work would go in this direction.
Continue reading “Ultra Q Ep. 6: Grow Up! Little Turtle”
Directed by Samaji Nonagase. Written by Masahiro Yamada. Airdate August 21, 1966.
The first episode to focus on young Hoshino, the boy who wants to one day join the Science Special Search Party. Hoshino and his friends Chiro and Nobuku get swept up in a Hardy Boys-style story investigating smugglers along the wharf. Notorious smuggler “Diamond-Kick” (great name) has hidden his newest diamond shipment among bags of cacao beans, and the young detectives end up kidnapped when they start poking around the warehouses. It sounds like the kind of adventure tale a child might come up with. A child might also add a giant monster that comes up onto the wharf to throw everything into chaos. A monster who loves chocolate.
Continue reading “Ultraman Ep. 6: The Coast Guard Command”
Welcome to the most wonderful month of the year. The month of imagination.
October is one of my busiest months, where I try to cram in as much seasonal viewing and reading as possible. Fortunately, I’ve got The Ultra Project onto a regular schedule, with two posts going up each week on Wednesdays and Saturdays. I may have a few bonus posts pop up, but this is what you can expect for at least the next month. I already have all the regular October posts written and scheduled, with a special episode review falling on October 30th. I didn’t even have to go out of episode order to get this review to land on Devil’s Night. The timing just worked out, thanks to the Star of Ultra or something.
Thank you to all who have visited the site during its first month of existence. I’m hoping to draw more readers through October and keep the site moving until I fully break free of the Google sandbox. If you like my posts, please share them on social media. (That was my requisite bit of begging. Had to do it once.)
Directed by Samaji Nonagase. Written by Tetsuo Kinjo. Airdate Oct. 8, 1967.
Eiji Tsuburaya must have had a dictum about his shows: within the first batch of episodes, there must be a plant monster. Ultra Q has the giant flower Juran, Ultraman has a green lettuce sack called Greenmons, and now Ultraseven’s second episode brings us Alien Waiell, a walking stack of spiky mixed greens. It doesn’t look great, but it’s better than Greenmons. I’ll say it again: I don’t have much interest in vegetation monsters.
Continue reading “Ultraseven Ep. 2: The Green Terror”
Directed by Toshihiro Iijima. Written by Keisuke Fujikawa. Airdate August 14, 1966.
Rewatching “The Secret of the Miroganda” made me acutely aware of the budget fight Tsuburaya Productions was locked into during the early production of Ultraman. TBS may have given an enthusiastic greenlight to the show, but they were hesitant about the hefty price tag per episode, which was often more than double the cost of an episode of Ultra Q. The network forced the creative team at Tsuburaya Pro to cut costs at every opportunity. The situation improved once episodes started to air and the show became a popular sensation, but the early sacrifices the creative team had to make often poke through. “Miroganda,” only the second episode shot, has some of the most obvious.
Continue reading “Ultraman Ep. 5: The Secret of the Miroganda”
Directed by Samaji Nonagase. Written by Masahiro Yamada. Airdate Jan. 30, 1966.
Here’s a change of scenery, shifting from urban Tokyo to the desolate wastes of Antarctica. There’s another change, which is that Jun is the only member of the regular or semi-regular cast to appear. Without Yuriko and Ippei around to lighten the mood, this is the first episode to completely bypass humor — appropriate for a bleak, tense story set in one of the most hostile environments on Earth.
Continue reading “Ultra Q Ep. 5: Peguila Is Here!”
Written and Directed by Samaji Nonagase. Airdate August 7, 1966.
Japan faces a new atomic threat: an atom bomb with its safeties shut off is dangling from the body of a giant monster heading for shore.
And everyone takes this rather … casually.
Continue reading “Ultraman Ep. 4: Five Seconds Before the Explosion”
The Ultra Project is now live and out to the public!
I’ve worked on this site for about two months after several years of pondering it. I gave the site a beta-launch two weeks ago when I made the posts public, but I made no official announcement about it to anyone except for a friend who could provide feedback. But as of this morning, I’ve sent out the blast to social media — “Hey, look at this!”
Continue reading “We Are Live! Livewired Like Eleking!”
The Ultra Project 