Tag Archives: fan films

Attack of the Galactic Monsters (Review)

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Attack of the Galactic Monsters


1983 (Yeah, whatever!)

Directed by Godzilla, probably. Maybe. Just an educated guess!

Attack of the Galactic Monsters is one of two (so far) movies that have popped up recently purporting to be edited for American TV movies (usually attributed to Hawaiian TV if a location is mentioned), the other being Monster King Godzilla. This one popped up on the Archive.org website (!) and is largely a paste job set around the 1977 Toho movie War in Space. UPDATE: It looks like the Archive.org link is now dead. Be sad=( If you though War in Space was too boring and far too long, and had far too much characterization of the cast, this this is the movie for you! It chops out over 2/3rds of War in Space, and inserts footage of Godzilla kicking various monster butts from the TV series Zone Fighter, a tokusatsu series that guest starred Godzilla occasionally.

Both Attack of the Galactic Monsters and Monster King Godzilla have little real information about them. People theorize that they are legit, or they are a hoax, or mention that they may have seen the tapes at bootleg stands at cons. No one has any real proof in any way. If these are a big hoax, someone spent a lot of time on them, including transferring everything to a VHS tape before digitally saving it for the masses on the internet. One thing that is suspicious is there is no obvious gaps for commercials. I had lots of experience taping things off TV as a lad and know what a tape looks like when it’s paused to cut out commercials, and there are none of those artifacts that I can see. It is possible it was taped with commercials intact, but then they were digitally edited out before the upload. It is also possible that this is the master tape so of course there are no commercials. But neither explains the odd running time, 55 minutes is not really a good running time for a tv show with commercials. So who knows? What I know is I got some extra Godzilla flicks to review on here, and that is totally jawesome.

As so much is cut out from the War in Space film to shorten it and add in Godzilla fights, the movie makes little sense. They barely explain any of the characters’ names, and instead rely on you just going with it. So just go with it! I haven’t seen War in Space in like 20 years, so I needed a cheat sheet, but there should be enough info below to let you know what is going on if you have seen the film or not. Basically, in War in Space, aliens invade the Earth and blow the crap out of it. so Captain Takegawa and the flying drill ship the Gotem (design based on Atragon‘s Gotengo ship) goes to the alien planet to blow up some alien jerks. And there is a horned Wookiee with an axe. Go team Let the Wookiee Win!

The other stuff you need to know is about Zone Fighter, Toho’s best known tokusatsu series from the 1970s, where the Zone Family fought the evil Garogas, who attempted to conquer Earth via sending giant monsters. Zone Fighter and sometimes Godzilla would then horribly murder the monsters, until everyone was defeated by being canceled in the middle of the series. This movie uses up most of the Godzilla appearances and barely uses Zone Fighter at all, except for one sequence where he fights Godzilla. Will there be more info on Zone Fighter episodes shortly? Maybe….

People Roll Call!

Captain Masato Takegawa (Ryo Ikebe) – Captain of the Gotem and target of alien abduction. His daughter is Jun and she always gets kidnapped. It runs in the family.
Grinning Aliens – The villains from the planet WhySoSirius. The Garogas randomly running around in the middle of the alien footage from War in Space.
Hell, the Supreme Commander of the Empire of Galaxy – Jerk from Venus who blows up most of Earth. They then blow up Venus. Now he’s a Supreme Commander IN Hell.
Horned Chewbacca – What a Wookiee!

Monster Roll Call!

Godzilla – Godzilla. King. Monsters.
Zone Fighter – Zone Fighter is a member of the Zone Family who enjoys zoning laws and redistricting debates.
Gigan – Gigan, stop showing up in these awful films! I’m glad you die.
Wargilgar – Wargilgar loves flames. He loves shooting flames and he loves burning stuff up. He doesn’t seem to like being bathed in radioactive fire breath from Godzilla, though. What a hypocrite!
Zandora – Drill, baby, drill! Oh, wait, drilling leads to my demise? If only a lesson could be learned from this…
Jellar – Wishes he was a little bit taller. Wishes he was a baller. Wishes he had a girl that looked good and he would call her. Wishes had a rabbit in a hat with a bat and a ’64 Impala.
Kastom Jellar – Kastom Jellar grows from a ripped off tentacle from Jellar. That’s what happens when you don’t throw those old leftovers in your fridge away!
Jikiro – Jikiro has a magnetic personality. So magnetic he gets horribly murdered by Godzilla and Zone Fighter.
Spideros – OMG it’s a spider, squash it!
Garaborg – Garaborg was Plan C in the episode he was in, after Plan A – murder by cake – and Plan B – hypnosis kidnapping – both failed miserably. Garaborg also failed miserably.


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Monster King Godzilla (Review)

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Monster King Godzilla


1980 (yeah, right!)

Directed by Who the Frak Knows!

It’s March of Godzilla 2011, so let’s get right into it with some weirdo Godzilla flicks you probably haven’t heard of!

Monster King Godzilla is a Godzilla movie mashup that is a very truncated version of the movie ESPy mixed with fight scenes of Godzilla from a bunch G flicks randomly inserted. Part of a couple of films (2, really) supposedly from a Hawaiian TV station that edited them for broadcast. Whether or not that is true, I am not convinced at all (this is discussed more in the upcoming Attack of the Galactic Monsters review) but it is probably just a clever fake. Good job trying to make this look like it came from a VHS tape, it might even have been copied onto one. FYI, the title Monster King Godzilla comes from the Japanese name for the 1956 Godzilla, King of the Monsters recut when it was released in Japan in 1957.

The best piece of research I have found on this is a blog entitled Monster King Godzilla that has one post, entitled Monster King Godzilla, that is just a scan of the supposed VHS jacket the bootleg is from with the same text you see everywhere. Huzzah!

Here is the text that accompanied this film:

“Very rare Godzilla film made for Hawaiin TV in 1980 by Filmways TV USA, 99% stock footage and a bizare wrap around plot involving physic powers make this a very strange film. AVI is from a VHS purchased at the Chiller Theatre convention in the mid 90s. I have never found any record of this film anywhere else.”

Ignoring all the misspellings, either this guy purchased what is probably a hoax and released it himself, or he just made up this story after creating the hoax and is feigning ignorance about the film ESPy.

Whatever the case, it doesn’t matter, as this is a frakked up Godzilla film so we’re gonna review it for March of Godzilla 2011!

First of all, since ESPy is used as a template for all the Godzilla mashup footage, let’s take a brief look at the 1975 Toho ESP/spy flick. It was part of their “mutants” series of films, back when Toho was making wacked out 1970s films that are rather freaky to watch today. The UN sets up an organization called Espy filled with psychics and ESP people, to stop a group called Counter Espy, who are evil psychics and ESP people. Why Counter Espy is named first I have no idea, having not seen the film, but I am guessing because they are psychic! Being psychic probably explains all sorts of plot problems with ESPy. How convenient! Counter Espy tries to kill the Prime Minster of Baltonia:

Prime Minster of Baltonia


Espy stops them, and newbie Espy agent Jiro Miki (Masao Kusakari), his dog Cheetah, veteran Espy agent Yoshio Tamura (Hiroshi Fujioka), and girl Espy agent Maria Harada (Kaoru Yumi) must do battle with the evil Counter Espy leader Ulrov/Wolf (Tomisaburo Wakayama) to save the world from evil people who have special powers. No heads explode, which is a failing of the ESPy series, all one entries in it. Jun Fukuda directed this film along with War in Space, the other source film used in a Godzilla Mashup.

Godzilla flicks used in this film include
Godzilla vs. Megalon
Godzilla vs. the Smog Monster
Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla
Revenge of Mechagodzilla
Godzilla vs. Gigan

There are lots of quick edits and huge portions of ESPy is skipped as the film moves in in order to throw in all the Godzilla footage. So there will probably be some vary confusing things mentioned in the plot section, but it is accurate. Having not seen ESPy, I was at an even worse advantage, but I persevered because I’m awesome. You can be awesome too, all you need to do is read this review!

Who cares about the crappy humans, it’s Monster Roll Call!

Godzilla – Godzilla is the King of Monsters, and spends this whole film ruthlessly slaughtering all these throne pretenders.
Megalon – Megalon is a drill-handed lame-o cockroach who gets what’s coming to him.
The Smog Monster – Hedorah is all about the pollution and trying to kill Al Gore. Run for it, Gore!
Mechagodzilla – Godzilla’s robot double is also trouncing around. Why doesn’t Espy use their ESP powers to go all ESP on him? Lazy Espy stock footage scenes.
Titanosaurus – Titanosaurus proves you can be in more than one Godzilla film if some guy edits you into a fan film mashup. Keep dreaming the dream, Titanosaurus!
King Caesar – Hail to the king, baby! Oh, wait, we already got a king… Hm…
King Ghidorah – Hail to the.. We got way too many kings here! Jesus ain’t being born, we only got room for ONE king here, not three! Luckily, King Ghidorah gets beat up again! We’ll give King Caesar a pass because he’s awesome.
Gigan – Gigan is a loser who sucks. I hate you Gigan. But not as much as your mom hates you.
Anguirus – Yes, this blob is Anguirus who wasn’t quite edited out entirely. So now he’s in the Roll Call.


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Incognito Cinema Warriors XP – Episode 1 – Bride of the Gorilla (Review)

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Incognito Cinema Warriors XP – Episode 1 – Bride of the Gorilla


2008Official Site
Directed by Brandon Scott, Ryan P. Davis, and Rikk Wolf
Created by Rikk Wolf, Rob Atwell, and Kyle Chestnut

A dual review! Yes, TarsTarkas.NET attempts to get creative and review both a fantastic fan-series episode of Incognito cinema Warriors XP and the movie they riff on, Bride of the Gorilla! Will we succeed? Or will we just alienate our audience because there are no boobs in this movie? And what role will former President Taft serve? Find out all of this in the Dual Review, starting……NOW!

Incognito Cinema Warriors XP is a fan series produced in Kansas City, Missouri, that launched in 2008. For the two of you who read bad movie websites and have no idea, there was a show called Mystery Science Theater 3000 that riffed on bad movies, thus Incognito Cinema Warriors XP tries to follow in the footsteps of the greatest show that was ever made. No, not Salute Your Shorts! MST3K! Why else would I bring it up? Geez… So we have the same formula (one dude, two bots, evil scientist, awful movies, zombies) Okay, the zombies are different, because the plot is slightly altered. ICWXP has produced several episodes (three have been released as of this writing, with a few shorts and two more episodes in various stages of productions.) The production values are top notch, the kinds of things you want to see from a fan film. Their official site has downloads and wallpapers and images and stuff. There is also a secret section that will mail you 50 pounds of gold if you find it! Except that secret section probably doesn’t exist.

So the basic run-down of the show’s plot is: In an undisclosed Midwestern city (Kansas City), CORPS (Command of Re-Animate Processing and Suppression) fights zombies, but they all die except Commander Rikk Wolf, who ducks into the Cine-A-Sorrow Theater to hide out. There, he encounters two wise-cracking worker droids – Topsy-Bot 5000 and Johnny Cylon – and the trio is soon being threatened by the theater’s mad scientist owner Dr. Harrison Blackwood, who traps them in Theater 6 and forces them to watch his crappy movies. Because otherwise, Dr. Blackwood will open the doors and in come the zombies! So the riffing begins as the movies roll, mixed in with the required host segments. ICWXP promises that there will be a larger post-apocalyptic plot as the series continues, but as this is a fan series it can go in any direction. Looking ahead, they already have cast changes like most fan productions.

But first the Roll Call!

Commander Rick Wolf (Rikk Wolf) – agent of C.O.R.P.S. (Command of Re-Animate Processing and Suppression) trapped in Kansas City as it is overrun with the undead. He takes refuge in a movie theater that just happens to have talking robots and a mad scientist who forces them to watch crappy movies or else he’ll open the doors and the undead will feast on their flesh. Well, Rikk’s flesh, I guess the robots will just watch.
Topsy-Bot 5000 (Rob Atwell) – The more sarcastic and less liking of humans of the two bots. And he has popcorn for a head! His voice totally reminds you of Tom Servo’s first voice, and he even fills the Tom Servo role. Is 2’1″, 35 pounds, and 54 years old. See, I read the wallpaper.jpg! How much of that weight is popcorn?
Johnny Cylon (Zach Legler) – The Crow T. Robot because his arms work. Less likely to turn you into a gorilla. Is 1’5″, 15 pounds, and 51 years old according to his wallpaper.jpg.
Dr. Harrison Blackwood (Rob Atwell) – The deranged inventor who runs the Cine-A-Sorrow Theater and mysteriously disappeared, only to return as soon as Rikk Wolf is trapped in the theater to force Rikk and the bots to watch crappy movies.


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Star Trek: Hidden Frontier – 209 – Worst Fears Part I

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Star Trek: Hidden Frontier – 209 – Worst Fears Part I


2001 Official Site
Directed by Risha Denney

Not a cliffhanger! I don’t think I can wait another year to… Oh, wait, I don’t have to since the entire show is finished. That’s the power of procrastination! Laziness wins again. You can’t fight the lazy, because it won’t bother to show up to the boxing ring.

This is the end of Season 2, and what a magical ride it’s been. We had characters leave, die, and disappear. We’ve had new characters show up. We have the Grey invading multiple times. We got people with big ears. We got improved makeup effects. We got alternate universes and flashbacks. We even have Chimp Guy! Thus, it is the best season yet. But let’s get this episode out of the way!

Captain Ian Quincy Knapp (David W. Dial) – Still Angry! His brother was killed by the Dominion, and left Captain Knapp angry! Had a mysterious encounter during the Dominion War (The Dominion who killed his brother) with mystery aliens that made him angry, and now that he commands Deep Space 12 and the USS Excelsior he can take out his anger over his brother’s death with flaming kill-lasers. Did I mention his brother was killed?
Commander Elizabeth Shelby (Risha Denney) – Stop standing in Shelby’s way or I’ll kick your butt! Shelby’s back and being Shelby and stuff.
Dr. Henglaar (John Whiting) – Medical Doctor, Tellarite, and an actual interesting character. No longer wearing a pig nose and Muppet gloves thanks to John Whiting learning the magic of makeup effects. John Whiting rules. He’s really kosher.
Lt. Cmd. James Darwin (Cliff Gardner) – Darwin replaces Joseph Johns in doing whatever the hell it was Joseph Johns did. He’s sort of like an extra first officer for Captain Angry. Darwin was on the old USS Angeles show, so he is another holdover.
Admiral Nechayev (Renee Huberstock) – The best admiral ever is now a semi-main character, appearing in pretty much every episode and yelling at everyone. Renee Huberstock was a day player in several episodes in Season 1, now she has a permanent role, so they’ll need another person to play random background women. Will Captain Angry and Admiral Angry yell at each other? Heck yeah!

Guest Star Roll Call

Princess Illiana (Katie Moss) – Princess Illiana flees her homeworld which is under attack by the Grey, like they are every day for a million years or something. Then they want the Federation to send thousands of ships to defend their big ear culture in the middle of nowhere. Yeah, that will work! Illiana is a Tren’La, which is like a Cobra’La, except not at all. But she does have big ears, so big Spock gets all jealous. But Spock would never admit it, because he’s a Vulcan.
Aris (John Reynolds) – Illiana’s son who becomes friends with Artim and they pal around and become tactical geniuses who save the day. He’s got extra brains in those big ears. Or extra ear wax. That he uses to throw at people. The Ferengi regularly mock his tiny ears.
Commodore Cole (Jennifer Cole)- Oh, crap, I forgot to write up a bio of Commodore Cole! Oh, crap, I still didn’t write one and now this is published. Maybe next time!


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Star Trek: Hidden Frontier – 208 – Cowards Death

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Star Trek: Hidden Frontier – 208 – Cowards Death


2001 Official Site
Directed by Jennifer Cole

How dare you call me a coward??? I’ll kick your butt all the way to imploded Vulcan!

Captain Ian Quincy Knapp (David W. Dial) – Still Angry! His brother was killed by the Dominion, and left Captain Knapp angry! Had a mysterious encounter during the Dominion War (The Dominion who killed his brother) with mystery aliens that made him angry, and now that he commands Deep Space 12 and the USS Excelsior he can take out his anger over his brother’s death with flaming kill-lasers. Did I mention his brother was killed?
Commander Elizabeth Shelby (Risha Denney) – Stop standing in Shelby’s way or I’ll kick your butt! Shelby’s back and being Shelby and stuff.
Dr. Henglaar (John Whiting) – Medical Doctor, Tellarite, and an actual interesting character. Now with new and improved nose. He went to Space Dr. 90210. John Whiting rules. Miss Piggy has a poster of him on her wall.
Counselor Myra Elbrey (Barbara Clifford) – Betazoid, used to teach at the Academy. Survivor of the Grey attack on the USS Rutledge. Has a dog named Mr. Scott. Occasionally blonde.
Ensign Jenna McFarland (Adrianne Lange) – Half-Trill, Half-Human, all Navigation. I still don’t know if she has a worm in her belly. Is always there if you need the ship steered. Has amusing stories that she never gets to finish due to the plots developing. Her uncle’s name is Rufus.
Ensign Andrew Barrett (Tyler Bosserman) – Communications officer and brand new member of the third grade! Wooo!! A whole season later and he still has no character development. So let’s make something up. He is deathly afraid of oreoes, because an oreo killed his father. This is now canon.
Lt. Luko (Terence Schoshinski) – Who is this dude? – Luko is the replacement for Lt. John Martinez who is off doing…something…maybe they’ll explain it when he returns later in the series. Luko was on Voyager, so we know he’s used to being on ships run by morons. But he was also in the Maquis, so never trust him. As for a security officer, he gets shot and contributes to the death of a main character in his first appearance. Nowhere to go but up. Luko is a Bre’elian, which is funny because it rhymes with alien.


Guest Star Roll Call

Crewman Thalek (Beau Christian Williams)- An Andorian who is feeling blue. Because of crippling depression! He just needs to meet a nice Na’vi chick and settle down.


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Star Trek: Hidden Frontier – 207 – Fire in the Heart

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Star Trek: Hidden Frontier – 207 – Fire in the Heart


2001 Official Site
Directed by Dave Mason

Forget your Faith of the Heart, I got Fire in the Heart! Fire! Fire! That’s cool!. We have secret kids and things borrowed from a Next Generation episode. Plus a character’s hair is still obviously dyed. Which one? Well, figure it out! Do I have to do all the work for you? Pretend it’s a Slylock Fox or something. TarsTarkas.NET is promoting personal responsibility.

Speaking of personal responsibility, also guess which major character wasn’t being very responsible as to where he was sticking his p-due without a rubber raincoat! I hope he doesn’t get Space AIDS, which is like regular AIDS except aliens burst from your chest.

Captain Ian Quincy Knapp (David W. Dial) – Still Angry! His brother was killed by the Dominion, and left Captain Knapp angry! Had a mysterious encounter during the Dominion War (The Dominion who killed his brother) with mystery aliens that made him angry, and now that he commands Deep Space 12 and the USS Excelsior he can take out his anger over his brother’s death with flaming kill-lasers. Did I mention his brother was killed?
Commander Elizabeth Shelby (Risha Denney) – Stop standing in Shelby’s way or I’ll kick your butt! Shelby’s back and being Shelby and stuff.
Counselor Myra Elbrey (Barbara Clifford) – Betazoid, used to teach at the Academy. Survivor of the Grey attack on the USS Rutledge. Has a dog named Mr. Scott. Occasionally blonde.
Ensign Ro Nevin (Arthur Bosserman) – Science officer and Ro Laren’s brother. His hair is now more frosted than tiger-endorsed flakes!
Ensign Jenna McFarland (Adrianne Lange) – Half-Trill, Half-Human, all Navigation. I still don’t know if she has a worm in her belly. Is always there if you need the ship steered. Has amusing stories that she never gets to finish due to the plots developing. Her uncle’s name is Rufus.
Lt. Cmd. Robin Lefler (Joanne Busch) – Chief Engineer, and still dating Wesley Crusher despite the fact he ran off after last season. You may remember Lefler when she was Ashley Judd on the actual The Next Generation show. Has a bunch of laws that she will recite until you pull out a gun and kill yourself. Lefler’s Law Number 244 is “Recite laws until everyone dies!”
Lt. Luko (Terence Schoshinski) – Who is this dude? – Luko is the replacement for Lt. John Martinez who is off doing…something…maybe they’ll explain it when he returns later in the series. Luko was on Voyager, so we know he’s used to being on ships run by morons. But he was also in the Maquis, so never trust him. As for a security officer, he gets shot and contributes to the death of a main character in his first appearance. Nowhere to go but up. Luko is a Bre’elian, which is funny because it rhymes with alien.

Guest Star Roll Call

Traya (Crystal Huerta) – Captain Angry’s unknown daughter, Daughter Angry, who was secretly birthed by her now dead mother after Captain Angry was all “love ’em and leave ’em” or something. So they have a secret mission to rescue the child because I guess there is no Department of Child Services in the 24th century.
Chief Enan Kiril (Rob Caves) – A Trill guy on the bridge who is played by show driving force Rob Caves. Is there a worm in his belly? Let’s cut him open and find out. Where is my lightsaber?
Dr. Anderson (Suzy Kaplan) – Dr. Henglaar can’t possibly help everyone on the Deep Space 12/USS Excelsior crew by his lonesome, especially when he needs his regular mud baths. And then there is hiding from Deep Space 12’s meat processing plant, as they want to turn Henglaar into hickory-smoked bacon. Mmmmm….hickory-smoked bacon. So Dr. Anderson is the other doctor, the one who is related to Neo.


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