Zone Fighter Episode 21 – Muteki! Gojira Ooabare
Zone Fighter Episode 21 – Muteki! Gojira Ooabare
aka 無敵! ゴジラ大暴れ aka Invincible! Godzilla’s Violent Charge! aka Invincible! Godzilla Rages
1973
Written by Shinichi Kanzawa
Directed by Kohei Oguri
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This is how we do!
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Godzilla! Godzilla’s back! Hooray! Godzilla will save us from tedious Zone Fighter, at least he should, because he’s the whole freaking reason I’m watching this show! In fact, this episode isn’t that bad. It’s significantly creepy, featuring the Garoga doing some pretty horrible things. It also introduces a whole new perspective on the Garoga that presents a universe of trouble and possibilities.
We find out this episode Godzilla lives in a cave. Not just any cave, it’s a cave with an automatic split-open door, and it’s in the middle of an abandoned rocky terrained area just minutes from downtown Tokyo. Geographic craziness aside, the main question is, who built Godzilla’s home? Because I doubt it was Godzilla stomping around with carpenter’s tools. Maybe Godzilla got all his sons together and had them construct a house. But then we don’t see those sons, so maybe not. Godzilla is a minimalist, because it’s not decorated, and Godzilla just sits in the center of the cavern. Probably meditating, maybe composing music in his head, or reviewing and analyzing past battle victories in his mind. You know, kaiju thoughts. Godzilla keeps in practice by sparring with Zone Fighter, probably because he misses his friend, Jet Jaguar. Come visit, Jet!
Can’t a Godzilla watch the National Cheerleading Championships in peace without Zone Fighter begging for help?
This episode rules for several reasons. One is that Godzilla is in it. Another is that the Garoga totally gun down a whole lot of people in this episode. They kidnap Akira, and the hostage trade with the Zone Family actually feels dangerous. This is the episode where the Garoga most feel like an actual threat and not a bunch of goofy idiots in masks and costumes. There are only a few random points in other episodes where the Garoga are threatening, here they are mean for almost the entire run. It ads to the enjoyment of the series immensely to see the villains being so destructively evil. Something they should have done more of.
The monster in this episode is Jellar, who is a space blob found on a distant planet. The monster is also Kastom-Jellar, who grows from a part of Jellar that’s ripped off by Godzilla. Yes, this means there are two monsters. Double your pleasure, double your fun. Jellar and Kastom-Jellar are different enough to tell apart despite their origin as from the same being. Neither of which have what it takes to defeat Godzilla and Zone Fighter working together, despite Zone Fighter’s best efforts to fail.
Guest director: Teruo Ishii
Jellar is brought to the Garoga at Earth by other Garoga. Specifically, it’s presented to Baron Garoga, who up until this point seemed to be the leader of all Garoga, by White Garoga, who appears to be equal in rank to him. This means that there is a whole hierarchy of a Garoga Empire beyond the group that is garrisoned at Earth. The Garoga are more than just a bunch of thugs in a space station, they are a galactic empire with far reaching grasp, and the defeat of the group at Earth would just lead to more showing up. The entire series is only a tiny drop in the bucket, whatever victories Zone Fighter achieves are minor, and at some point the Garoga might just declare not worth the budget sinkhole and blow it up. They’ve sent comets to crash into Earth before, they might already be mad at the costs of a fruitless invasion. Heck, the Garoga might have other planets with other heroes that are stopping their advances. The point is we don’t know, because their is so much mystery about what is happening. And the worst thing is the series ends before the Garoga are defeated, so whatever gains are done, the evil is still out there, until it’s eventually retconned when the series is rebooted at some point in the future. If that ever happens…
But enough about futures and things, it’s all about the here and now, and we must go watch Godzilla and Zone Fighter battle some alien space goo, Garoga kidnap Akira, innocent people get gunned down, and subtextual soccer fantasies. If you need a Zone Fighter refresher, check out the Zone Fighter Splash Page!
The monster is convinced Zone Fighter is a schoolgirl!
Read more…
Categories: Television Reviews Tags: Godzilla, Japan, Jellar, Kastom Jellar, Kohei Oguri, March of Godzilla 2014, Shinichi Kanzawa, tokusatsu, Zone Fighter
Zone Fighter (流星人間ゾーン)
Zone Fighter
aka 流星人間ゾーン aka Ryuusei Ningen Zoon
1973
This is the splash page for the Zone Fighter reviews, because we need a page with all the info so I don’t keep repeating it over and over and over again. Laziness breeds efficiency! Zone Fighter is Toho’s tokusatsu series that was broadcast in 1973 for a total of 26 episodes (two 13-episode blocks.) The peaceful Zone Family’s peaceful planet Peaceland is destroyed by the evil Garogas, so the Zones head to Earth to hide out under the name Sakimori. But you can’t run from evil alien goons, and soon the Garogas are hanging around Earth in a giant satellite in the sky trying their darnedest to get those nasty Zones. Zone Fighter and his family fought a variety of evil Terror-Beasts under the control of the Garogas. Godzilla, King Ghidorah, and even Gigan pop up in a few episodes, which is why people care about this show more than Robot Detective. Eventually, they all fall victim to the power of cancellation, and the story is never completed with the ultimate destruction of the Garogas (or the Zones, if you cheer on evil like we always do at TarsTarkas.NET!)
So who are the peaceful Zone Family of Peaceland, Land of Peace? (Now Land of Pieces!) Let’s Meet the Zones!
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Recurring/Important Cast –
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Recurring Monsters –
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Categories: Cinema Articles Tags: Bakugon, Balgaras, Barakidon, Destro-King, Detragon, Dorora, Dragon King, Garaborg, Garoga Gorilla, Gelderah, Gigan, Gilmaras, Godzilla, Goram, Grotogauros, Gundarguiras, Hideaki Obara, Isao Zushi, Jellar, Jikiro, Kabutogirah, Kastom Jellar, Kazumi Kitahara, Kazuya Aoyama, Kenji Sato, King Ghidorah, Mogranda, Needlar, Red Spark, Sachiko Kozuki, Shadorah, Shipudoro, Shiro Amakusa, Shoji Nakayama, Spideros, Spyler, tokusatsu, Toru Kawai, Wargilgar, Zandora, Zone Fighter
Attack of the Galactic Monsters (Review)
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!
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Monster Roll Call!
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Categories: Movie Reviews, Ugly Tags: fan films, Garaborg, Gigan, Godzilla, Jellar, Jikiro, Kastom Jellar, Ryo Ikebe, Spideros, tokusatsu, Wargilgar, Zandora, Zone Fighter
