Power Rangers might be going away for a long time. Currently the owners of the franchise appear to have no intention of continuing it in any large way and suits are being sold off. While comics are continuing there are no words on any other kind of mainstream media continuation. But for fans of Tokusatsu style shows in the west it is not all doom and gloom. For while the Megazords fall silent, a shining giant of light stands there to protect us.

I have brought up Ultraman a few times now. Reviewed the first episodes of the original, its sequel Ultraseven and even what was then the most recent series Ultraman Blazar. One time before I did an article trying to explain what an Isekai is, so perhaps I should do the same here.

While it’s definitely only in the post 2020 pandemic years that I have gotten largely into Ultraman, as brought up in my articles about my history with Tokusatsu I have a memory of a memory of watching an Ultraman show as a child. Over the years I’ve been trying to work out just what series that was and came to the conclusion it was the Japanese Australian Series Ultraman Towards The Future. I will get into that a bit later. However as mentioned it has only been in these last few years I’ve really embraced it. While friends linking me Kamen Rider episodes kept me going for the last half of lockdown, it’s been Ultraman and its optimism that in these dark years keeps me going.

The start of the Ultraman story is Godzilla. Sure we could go back to what inspired the original Gojira, but Godzilla is where the Kaiju boom all starts and it was the special effects director Eiji Tsubaraya who would go on to produce the titular super hero. After Godzilla he continued to work with Toho and many of its monster films. In the 60s though with the emergence of a television audience he proceeded to make a series with the goal of bringing the kaiju action to the small screen. That show was Ultra Q. I have reviewed an episode of Ultra Q already and I very much enjoy it. It’s basically twilight zone but often with giant monsters, an episodic series that sometimes has a recurring cast.

As Ultra Q came to an end Tsubaraya and his now production company Tsubaraya Productions were already well on their way to its next show. And through a live stage show we were introduced to Ultraman!

And now we can talk about the actual franchise.

To break it down to its core elements. Ultraman is a show starring a giant superhero Ultraman. While the name Ultraman refers primarily to the original character from the mid to late 60s, the term is used for multiple characters usually with an additional part added hence Ultraman Taro, Ultraman Max, Ultraman Blazar etc. Ultraman is an alien and either through merging with a human or assuming the form of a human, interacts with humans often working with a team that face giant monsters or other paranormal things such as aliens to protect people and the Earth. These human teams early on had very Gerry Anderson inspired vehicles and jets but in more recent series would gain their own Mecha to face giant foes.

While for most series the main danger comes from Kaiju, they often encounter human sized dangers such as aliens with the very second episode of the original series featuring the Alien Baltans. It’s worth noting that almost all of the human sized aliens seem to possess the ability to grow kaiju size so all big battles are against something about 50 to 60 meters tall usually. But there is more to Ultraman than just fighting monsters, yes that’s a major part, but there’s a humanity to him… ironically given he’s an alien. Some episodes delved into rather emotional moments. In the episode My Home Is Earth the hideous monster Jamila is in reality a mutated astronaut and had a very dour ending as they die, no longer able to handle the environment of their home. Phantom of the Snow Mountains features a monster brought out by the suffering of a snow woman as she’s attacked by people, and it only vanished due to her untimely death. Ultraman portrayed many of its monsters with more care than you would think for being monsters, sometimes never destroying them as there was a tragedy that they were just too big for our world and that was their only crime. This would be continued as the franchise went on, especially as many Kaiju became recurring and famous fixtures.

Ultraman was a hit, but Tsubaraya when asked to do more episodes, concluded they couldn’t do much more with the character. And so in Episode 39 Ultraman fell against the power of the Kaiju Zetton. While he was revived by his superior Zofi, he was separated from his human host and returned to the Land of Light.

The next series Ultraseven was intended to be completely separate from Ultraman and not part of the same continuity, which is why there were no returning Kaiju or aliens from the original show. This show starred Dan Moroboshi who rather than sharing a body with an Ultra, IS Ultraseven. Meaning he’s an alien posing as a human resulting in a different dynamic and viewpoint. Ultraseven is also well loved.

But things don’t exist in a vacuum. The 1970s energy crisis made Tokusatsu shows like Ultraman more expensive to produce so diminishing viewership combined with rising costs lead to interferences and budget cuts in Leo and making the next Ultraman show an anime 4 years after Leo’s closing. While the anime did see good numbers, the next live action show Ultraman 80 failed to bring in the numbers and the franchise would not receive a TV series again for a decade and a half. There were attempts to bring it over to the west, The previously mentioned Australian series coming out just before the Power Rangers boom, which is a shame as it’s a decent show and the first time they made a notable effort to show the Ultra and the human as separate people and even talk to one another… and the less than good Ultraman the Ultimate Hero, the American show where they were so afraid of damaging the suits its “action” scenes are… well you can guess by the quotation marks. But Eventually in 1996 Ultraman would return to the TV with Ultraman Tiga which was a well loved success.

In my recent years, a certain Retcon to Doctor Who has so disgusted and enraged me I have refused to watch the show until it is undone. As such I joke I have gone to another weekly monster show that started in the 60s that then had an over decades long hiatus over the 90s friendship ended with Doctor Who, now Ultraman is my friend. I can’t remember how I first found it. I had finished Kamen Rider 01 but Kamen Rider Saber had failed to grab me. Then randomly found Ultraman Z on YouTube, and this isn’t some fan upload, this was an official upload on the Tsubaraya YouTube page.

Today Ultraman is easy to get into, even for us in Scotland where they won’t sell any of the DVDs of the old shows. The YouTube page has been showing the classic shows primarily the Showa era ones weekly but also they have been uploading ones, and since Blazar, dubbing the newest shows as they come out too. After Z was done I watched weekly Trigger, then Decker, Blazar and currently Arc every Saturday when an episode is put up. But it’s not just been the TV series. Tsubaraya have been working with Marvel Comics to release a comic reimagining of the original Ultraman and Ultraseven, Now they are crossing over with Spiderman and the Avengers in the comics. Big movies came out too. Shin Ultraman made in the same vein as Shin Godzilla was a compressed modern take on the first series plus recently an animated movie Ultraman Rising was released on Netflix. Rising and Blazar are both very good watches for people wanting to check out Ultraman for the first time.

The downside is, they haven’t really been selling much of the merch. So if I want to get something a bit more than T-shirts or socks, like say action figures, or the weapons used, I need to import from Japan. Which, if from a character, monster or whatever I really liked I’m happy to do because I love this show, in the face of the pessimistic reality I can’t seem to escape from. Ultraman’s kindness towards a race he’s maybe only known for less than a year. How humans will often try to find a way to co-exist with the monsters, not always succeeding, but those times they do ring out. Even many of those classic Aliens that once were shown with nothing more on their mind than to take over the world, have appeared in positive lights happily living on Earth in secret and enjoying Earth culture. I think Zofi in Shin Ultraman says it best.

“Ultraman… Have you truly become so fond of humans?”

Well, I have become fond of Ultraman, it and a certain cartoon starring a blue dog are really what keep me going at dark times. I’ve still got much to see, out of the Hesei period I’ve only really seen Cosmos so far. I’ve caught a few marathon streams that showed me some of the movies. I watch more of the early shows when they come on, and I look forward to Saturday mornings to seeing what the next adventure with this giant brings as I have breakfast. With these dark times, take your pick on what element is dark for you, I find a little bit of light as I look up and see for just a moment that darkness broken by a giant of light.