Tuesday on Tape #6 - The Guyver

#6 - The Guyver (10/16/12)

Tuesdays on Tape Rating Scale™

Previews: .5/1
Soundtrack: .5/.5
B&T: 1/1.5
Graphics: 1/1
Sound Effects: .5/.5
Likable Characters: 0/1
Memorable Moments/Quotables/Emotion: 1/1.5
Total: 4.5/7

Rent or Buy?: Rent

Personal Thoughts: The Guyver is the 1991 American live-action film based off the Japanese manga/anime. As far as American live-action movies based on anime go, this one is pretty decent. It does its job well. I went into The Guyver expecting lots of monster suits, and that's exactly what I got.

The Kronos Company has created a mechanical suit thing called the Guyver, and our hero finds it. The company wants it back, so they send a bunch of anthropomorphic monsters to fight him.

Now, I've never read the original manga or seen any of the anime. I have no clue how this stacks up in a side-by-side comparison. I can say that this tape was a visual feast! Monsters galore! Unfortunately, it's not 100% greatness. Mark Hamill's character feels ultimately pointless, which is problematic given the amount of screentime dedicated to him. The other characters aren't too interesting either.

I got a good kick out of the scenes at the movie set, but not a whole lot of other stuff stuck out apart from the suits. I mean, suits are awesome and all, but this movie is going to score lower on our rating scale because we just don't have a category for monster suits. A lack of real characters hurt this one on the scoreboards especially.

My colleagues thought this was fun but unsubstantial. I guess I agree, but I think I may have liked it more than they did. I'd probably buy (not rent) the VHS again if I had to do all over.

Find of the Week (12/9/12 - 12/15/12)

X-Com: UFO Defense (PSX)

Value: $70 on eBay for incomplete copy

Actual Cost: $5

This find is what prompted me to document my great finds. This one was found at my favorite local flea market. My buddy Benny was playing my copy of XCOM: Enemy Unknown for the Playstation 3 (great game, by the way) and made casual mention that they had the Playstation port of the original at some game store he visited recently. After bugging him for more details, he remembered it was at a video game booth at the flea market, hidden away in a stack of games in generic paper sleeves.

It was a Sunday, and the flea market wouldn't be open again until Wednesday. I waited, a bit nervously, I admit, and drove there the first moment I could. We found the game right away. It was much to my surprise that the game was priced at $5! Normally this booth eBay checks games it knows to be rare. Luckily this Playstation gem slipped through the cracks.

My copy is incomplete, unfortunately, but I'm so elated that I don't even mind. The original X-Com: UFO Defense ranks in my top 10 games of all time (right behind it's sequel, Terror From the Deep, actually). I had kind of resigned myself to the thought of never being able to play. I surely wasn't about to pay $70 for a port of a game I could play on the PC for free. Still, it's one of my favorites, so I am elated to now own it for the Playstation.

How does the port hold up? It's pretty awesome. It's not quite as fast as playing in DOSBox. It has load times when going to the battlescape screens. The controls are quite clunky at first. It uses up one whole memory card. But, the gameplay is all there. The loading times encourage me to play "ironman"style with no reloads to try and avoid losing fallen soldiers. The controls get easier over time. I have all my Playstation saves backed up onto my PS2 hard drive. It even exceeds the original in one area, the soundtrack. Overall, it's quite awesome.

I am playing on Genius difficulty, and it's quite brutal in the early stages of the game. I may have to go back down to Veteran difficulty, because I can't beat the first month's terror mission for the life of me. That's something I don't want to do. I'll probably stick through with it for a few more tries. I want this to be a hardcore experience.

Surely, that's only fitting for a hardcore game find!

Tuesdays on Tape #1 & #2: Gunhed & Ocean Drive Weekend

The first two tapes featured in Tuesdays on Tape were viewed before the Tuesdays on Tape Rating Scale™ was established.

#1 - Gunhed (9/4/12)

Personal Thoughts: Gunhed was alright. The trailer made this look like the best mech movie ever. Basically, a group of scavengers break into an abandoned factory and get killed. One guy survives and finds a giant mech to fight back. The sets and special effects (GRAPHICS!) were awesome. Sadly, nothing really happened. Gunhed lacked action, suffered from poor pacing, and often times made no sense. I think this might be the case of a movie butchered during localization. Who knows? All I know is that it's a rent at best.

#2 - Ocean Drive Weekend (9/11/12)

Personal Thoughts: Ocean Drive Weekend is a Troma-released American Graffiti ripoff. A couple of college guys go to meet some girls at the beach. It is everything you would expect. It was humorous, but not hilarious. I liked the low budget feel and goofy charm of the southern actors. Overall, I'd recommend this movie to any fans of nostalgic comedies like American Graffiti and Porky's.

It's also worth noting that Ocean Drive Weekend is a VHS exclusive and can be found for no more than ten bucks tops.

Please Don't Feed My Kaiju - Ultraman E02

Ultraman E02 - "Shoot the Invader"

Alien Baltan is incinerating the city!

We continue our kaiju madness with episode 02 of Ultraman. "Shoot the Invader" is closer to what I expected from the series than episode 01. There's a ton of kiddy comic relief. I'm not complaining. The punchline at the end of the episode even made me laugh.


This tale is narrated by the goofiest Science Patrol squad member Ito. Aliens have arrived via invisible flying saucer and are freezing everyone in sight. Japanese officials agree to let the Science Patrol send Ito and Hayata to investigate after their first man is frozen. The space creatures, known as Alien Baltan, confuse their enemies with optical illusions and then freeze them with laser beams from their claws. The Science Patrol rayguns don't have much effect on the aliens, so Hayata decides to take a diplomatic approach. The aliens, using the Patrol's own affected member as a mouthpiece, explain that they have destroyed their own planet and are here to take over earth. It turns out that the Alien Baltan brought 60 billion of their own microscopic race and they're all hovering in the sky in their invisible ship. The creature we saw earlier is their biggest member. Hayata says screw that, and all hell breaks loose. The Baltan grows to 50 meters and smashes Hayata with its giant claw (!). Soon it starts tearing apart the city. Hayata, of course, uses his capsule, transforming into Ultraman and vanquishing his foe (and the space ship).


While the pre-fight plot is certainly juvenile in tone, it's never stupid. I didn't laugh at the childish joke about Ito wearing slippers, but I didn't get offended either. I liked to use of Ito as narrator. Ultraman definitely surprised me there, showing that it's not a one man show. Other characters show up again, like the charming little boy, yet the focus is really on Ito and Hayata. This episode did a good job building a connection with the two. I really hope Ito gets some more major roles. 


The empty building full of humans frozen in mid motion was kind of neat. The episode, despite its short length, really put over  the danger of the alien invasion. There's a scene showing a deliberation of Japanese officials and Science Patrol about how to handle the menace. The Alien Baltan really seemed more serious than Bemular from episode 01. The scene on the rooftop with the aliens speaking through the frozen Space Patrol member is actually really neat. I wouldn't go as far as to say it was creepy, but a little kid might be spooked by the monster. Really though, aside from a couple of Godzilla movies, the point of kaiju isn't to be scared but to see giant monsters fight!



The fight in this movie was a lot cooler than the first episode's cheesy wrestling. Most interestingly, it takes place at night. There are more model buildings too, as the fight takes place in a city as opposed to the rural area. My favorite scene in the show is when the Alien Baltan flamethrows and entire model skyscraper. Also of note is the show where Ultraman grabs the Baltan and flies with him through the silent night sky. The battle becomes an aerial dogfight, ending with the alien kaiju going down in flames. Despite being all of four minutes, I loved it all. The only thing negative I have to say is that the monster design wasn't nearly as appealing as the first episode. I guess I like the Godzilla rip off look of Bemular more than the insect-meets-crab look of this episode's monster. Nothing looked bad, but I've seen much cooler looking Ultra Monsters.


All in all, the show was very good. I liked it better than the first episode, even if the monster wasn't as cool. Ito makes a good lead protagonist. Special effects were really nice for the time, and the kaiju fighting was top notch for a short show like this. I'll continue watching the show and hope that the next episodes are as good!

Please Don't Feed My Kaiju - Ultraman E01

The genesis of this blog happens to be coinciding with the beginning of my fascination with kaiju--that is, giant Japanese monsters. I'm certainly no stranger to the kaiju genre, having seen at least a dozen in my lifetime. This recent interest, however, is sparking in my a desire to watch and review as many kaiju movies as I can this winter.

Let me preface this all by saying that I really love Heisei era Godzilla. Always have. My favorite kaiju movie so far is Godzilla 1985 (or more accurately, The Return of Godzilla version). My favorite colossal beast is Gamera. I think it will be interesting to see how this changes by the end of this project.

My first kaiju review for Please Don't Feed is not going to be a movie but rather an episode of the classic tokusatsu series Ultraman. Ultraman is a cool choice for this feature because each episode has a new kaiju for Ultraman to fight and there's only 39 half-hour episodes, making it a very light time commitment. The original Ultraman series is available super cheap on DVD. I ordered the entire series released by Mill Creek on four discs for less than $8 shipped. Without further ado, let's review Ultraman episode one!

Ultraman E01 - "Ultra Operation No. 1"

Bemular and Ultraman are about to tango!

I watched this episode earlier today with English dubbing turned on. Generally speaking, I prefer neither subs nor dubs and greatly enjoy both. The Mill Creek DVDs I own contain both English and Japanese audio tracks with English subtitles. The subtitles are translations of the Japanese dialogue and thus differ substantially (enough to distract) from the English dubbing. You may still find yourself turning them on occasionally, however, as there is footage that never received dubbing that is included even when you have English audio turned on.

This episodes plot involves Science Patrol team member Shin Hayata chance encounter with a UFO orb. Hayata crashes his ship into a floating ball, taking him to the verge of death. The other party in the crash happens to be Ultraman. To make up for nearly killing poor Hayata, Ultraman decides to merge their two beings together. Hayata can now morph into Ultraman for a limited time using the beta capsule. Prior to the crash, Ultraman was in pursuit of the 50 meter tall dino kaiju Bemular. Bemular lands in a lake and decides to re-emerge the next day. Hayata and the Science Patrol immediately attack Bemular with no negotiation. Their lasers and missiles have little effect. The giant lizard bites Hayata's submarine and attacks the others with heat breath. Hayata uses the capsule to become Ultraman and makes easy work of Bemular. The monster tries to escape in its pod but is blown out of the sky.

The first episode was a lot better than I expected. I was surprised at the tone of the show. I expected something much more juvenile. Don't get me wrong--the show is quite kid friendly, but not to the point where it becomes a distraction. The episode does manage to maintain a semi-serious science fiction tone throughout. Once Bemular appears, things start to resemble the action shots of the 1958 film Varan the Unbelievable. It very well could have been Varan stepping out of that lake and being bombarded with missiles (and boy, did he get hit with a TON of missiles).

The special effects were fairly decent. Ultraman obviously didn't have the big budget that a feature film like Godzilla did, yet nothing looked too silly. Bemular didn't look too scary, mostly because it was shot in full lighting. On the other hand, it sure did look like a monster that could squash you handily. The miniature models were present in small doses although I would have liked to have seen more. The models are limited to a few cabins being crushed as Ultraman and Bemular tussled about.

The most disappointing thing about the episode is Ultraman's super sloppy stuntwork. I have seen clips of the show before, so I knew to expect. That didn't stop me from frowning seeing the amateur, unchoreographed wrestling between our hero and his foe. Whoever played Ultraman looked like a hyperactive 5 year old in that suit. One particularly embarrassing moment saw Ultraman deliver a horrid elbow drop/body splash to the downed Bemular. Honestly, the kaiju fighting is worse than the cheesiest scenes I've witnessed in the Godzilla and Power Rangers/Super Sentai franchises.

Your mileage may vary. I normally don't like retro shows from the 60s or 70s, but Ultraman was pretty decent in that regard. Despite my displeasure with the suit fighting, I really liked the visual look of the kaiju. The Ultra Monsters have some of the best kaiju design available. If you're a kaiju fan wondering whether you should pick Ultraman, I say go for it. The entire original series is available for under $10. It cost me all of $0.20 to see the first episode of Ultraman, and I think it was totally worth it.

Check it out!