Zone Fighter Episode 17 – GO! Faitaa Kinkyuuhasshin
Zone Fighter Episode 17 – GO! Faitaa Kinkyuuhasshin
aka GO! ファイター緊急発進 aka Go! Fighter Emergency Take off! aka Go! Fighter, Scramble
1973
Written by Satoshi Kurumi
Directed by Jun Fukuda
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Dancing with the Stars under the stars
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Today we have a very special episode of Zone Fighter, because the star of our show isn’t the Zone Family, but their crap. Yes, the focus is on Smokey the spaceship and Mighty Liner the flying car. I guess the Garoga forgot about the other Zone Family spaceship, the Pandora Capsule. But you know about it because you read the Zone Fighter Splash Page, where all that stuff is listed!
Garoga laugh because they’re in space in a Garoga Spaceship that is now sucking up the Zone Family spaceship Smokey into their own larger ship and flying away. That’s actually a cool power, but instead of dismantling Smokey or lacing it with lots of bombs that will explode whenever a Zone person gets in it, they just move the ship to somewhere else.
Each week a different monster barfs on Zone Fighter. Because Zone Fighter’s a freak!
Hotaru is awake at night looking out the window and Akira talks to her…
Wait a minute, Akira and Hotaru share the same room, and even have bunk beds????? WTF???? In a prior episode Akira was sleeping in the room where the phone was, which is near the living room. AKira is like a hot potato they move from room to room I guess. No one likes Akira.
Anyway, they both had the same dream about Smokey, which just goes to show how lame you are when you dream about your spaceship, in a world where you use your spaceship every day, making it not unique, so it’s like dreaming about your mom’s minivan.
The hell kind of ending was that, How I Met Your Mother?
They fly up to where Smokey is parked…and it’s gone! But an outline of Smokey remains, which is weird. At first I thought it was one of their other craft cloaked, but it doesn’t match either one, only Smokey. Maybe it is a decoy put in place to not trip alarms. It’s too hard to figure out without subtitles, I guess this will always be a mystery until someone comments below 8 years later after subtitled DVDs have been out for years like I’m some sort of idiot for not knowing.
Hotaru and Akira know the Garoga are behind it, and go home to activate the tracking beacon of Smokey and find where the Garoga hid it, which turns out to be near the Tanzawa woods.
Madballs’ dark reboot!
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Categories: Television Reviews Tags: Balgaras, Japan, Jun Fukuda, March of Godzilla 2014, Satoshi Kurumi, tokusatsu, Zone Fighter
Ironfinger 2: Golden Eye
Ironfinger 2: Golden Eye
aka １００発１００中 黄金の眼 aka Hyappatsu hyakuchu: Ogon on me aka 100 Shot, 100 Killed: Golden Eye aka Booted Babe, Busted Boss
1968
Written by Jun Fukuda, Ei Ogawa, and Michio Tsuzuki
Directed by Jun Fukuda
Ironfinger 2: Golden Eye returns to the world of Ironfinger. We have international criminals, jet setting fun, and a hero who is invincible kicking butt. As usual, the title changed for overseas export. 100 Shot, 100 Killed: Golden Eye became Ironfinger 2: Golden Eye, though in some locales it was turned into Booted Babe, Busted Boss! Those poor saps… The “Golden Eye” of the title betrays more of the Bond influence, for the few who couldn’t figure it out from the Ironfinger part, or for the Japanese audience. This is the last outing of Andrew Hoshino, so cry your tears now and then read all about it.
The tone is slightly altered in that Andrew Hoshino’s organization is hinted to be more criminal in nature, though Andrew himself is given a few more noble things to do. He’s pulled in under the story of avenging the murder of a Japanese citizen upon request of his young daughter. It turns into a quest to find the missing rare Samanta Gold coin, though that is just part of a bigger economic criminal conspiracy.
Golden Eye features world locations,Besides Japan, the opening of the film is in Beirut! This may seem amazing to modern audiences that anyone would spend time in Beirut, but things weren’t always the way they are now. Another thing Ironfinger 2 has is sheiks in blackface (also seen in Yellow Line). The characters are played by Japanese actors, but are painted up dark brown and treated as if they’re foreign. Both a good police officer and several of the villains feature this treatment. Also both of the Ironfinger films feature big boss villains who are Caucasian, though both are European in origin. I would guess this is to show both that the Japanese hero can defeat anyone in the world, including what would be considered traditional Bond villains, and that Japanese people can’t be the big villain because they aren’t evil, and it’s people outside their culture affecting their life.
A highlight of these Ironfinger films is the killer 1960s clothing. Every outfit Bibari Maeda wears is spectacular. The cool clothes help make the fun lifestyle easier to accept, as they’re dressed just like cool people, so they would naturally do cool things.
Andrew Hoshino has a pair of women to deal with, though his darker affiliation is reveal again as bad girl Ruby is who he is paired with the most, Mistuko Saito functions as a catalyst to get the plot to the various locations, but she’s far too busy being a star to drop everything to run around with a playboy spy. Freelance bad girl Ruby easily slips into this role, her various connections with Andrew happening frequently
The far more complicated plot deals with economic problems of late 1960s Japan, hidden treasure, and even a hint of environmentalism thrown in. The whole thing hinges on a missing rare gold coin, but the real crime is wholesale precious metals smuggling used to hold hostage parts of Japan’s economy. It seems like it should be a modern film, the economic battle having played out in a modified form in real life. Golden Eye thankfully just uses that as backdrop and keeps the focus on the missing rare coin, giving audiences who don’t understand complex economic issues something to follow, while those who are aware have an insight into why the villains have so many high powered goons.
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Categories: Movie Reviews, Ugly Tags: Akira Takarada, Andrew Hughes, Bibari Maeda, Ei Ogawa, Japan, Jun Fukuda, Makoto Sato, Michio Tsuzuki, Spies, Tomomi Sawa
Ironfinger
Ironfinger
aka １００発１００中 aka Hyappatsu hyakuchu aka 100 Shot, 100 Killed
1965
Written by Michio Tsuzuki and Kihachi Okamoto
Directed by Jun Fukuda
The world of 1960s spy films is a crazy place, filled with all sorts of local infusions of the James Bond formula. Jun Fukuda drops a pair of flicks that take inspiration from the jet-setting spy and the local Japanese yakuza and crime films. Like all good 60s spy flicks, things aren’t taken 100% serious, and Ironfinger is practically an action comedy. The era wardrobe and locations give flavor that can’t be reproduced any more, and our hero Andrew Hoshino runs around from country to country on his own agenda, that’s not as innocent as it first appears.
Ironfinger is a movie of the world. It’s original title translates to 100 Shot, 100 Killed, but it’s given a James Bond-esque retitle for overseas release. Andrew Hoshino himself is a man of the world, French-born Japanese who speaks both languages, as well as English, with ease. His “vacation” sees him embroiled in an international weapons smuggling conspiracy that reaches all over the Pacific Rim, running from Japan to Hong Kong to the Philippines. Ironfinger speaks five languages, has characters who get angry because the wrong language is being spoken, yet the story is universal enough to be entertaining to everyone.
Andrew Hoshino plays the innocent tourist caught up in crime and continually referencing his Mama. but it becomes abundantly clear that he’s more than he appears, but never so clear you understand just what he is. Secret agent, criminal, Interpol? Your guess is as good as anyone else’s. Even his name isn’t his own, he acquires it from the passport of a murdered friend. Hoshino has a string of running gags, beginning with where he’s constantly losing and getting back his hat (originally his murdered friend’s hat), the hat containing a concealed weapon. Hoshino is also constantly captured, spending the majority of the running time in custody of one gang or another. Yet he always manages to escape through the power of his mouth or his skills, falling upward and into the arms of beautiful women.
Ironfinger and its sequel Golden Eye were best known for the strong Godzilla alumni connection. Both star Akira Takarada and costar Akihiko Hirata had roles in the original film and many subsequent sequels, but Bond girl Mie Hama also pops up in a few Toho kaiju flicks. Director Jun Fukuda has long been connected to the franchise, even helming Godzilla vs. the Sea Monster, Son of Godzilla, Godzilla vs. Gigan, Godzilla vs. Megalon, Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla, ESPY, The War in Space, and episodes of the Zone Fighter tv series. These connections helped bump Ironfinger up the list for a Criterion release, and both Ironfinger and Golden Eye look fantastic and have nice subtitles. As these reviews are based on the streaming versions, I did not view any extras.
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Categories: Movie Reviews, Ugly Tags: Akihiko Hirata, Akira Takarada, Ichiro Arishima, Japan, Jun Fukuda, Kihachi Okamoto, Michio Tsuzuki, Mie Hama, Spies
Zone Fighter Episode 13 – Senritsu! Tanjoubi-no Kyoufu
Zone Fighter Episode 13 – Senritsu! Tanjoubi-no Kyoufu
aka Absolute Terror: Birthday of Horror! aka Hair-Raising! The Birthday of Terror
1973
Written by Jun Fukuda
Directed by Ishiro Honda
Zone Fighter vs. Birthday Cake! Only Zone Fighter could fight such a dastardly enemy. All others pale before him, even Godzilla is too yellow to appear to fight the birthday cake! Or, more likely, Godzilla knows this week’s enemy is lame and didn’t bother to return the producer’s calls! Godzilla is also watching his weight these days, thus skipping out on eating that sweet sweet cake.
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The Republican Presidential Debates continue…
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March of Godzilla 2012 carries on with a Godzilla-free episode, but there is still something for everyone to learn. What we do learn is that Japanese people sing “Happy Birthday” and write things on cakes in English. Also that if you hook a car battery up to a Terror-Beast, the monster gets a red force field that doesn’t work that well.
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Stop for me, it’s the CLAW!
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If you are Zone Fighter confused, check out the Zone Fighter splash page and learn you some Zone!
It’s Hotaru’s 16th birthday! Her family breaking out the cake and singing, including the Happy Birthday song that now requires huge royalties despite the fact it should have been public domain decades ago. But that’s a rant for another review. Happy Birthday, Hotaru! I hope you enjoy your cake…your DEATH CAKE!!!
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Forget Chocolate Rain, we got Orange Julius Rain
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Baron Garoga calls via TV to mock them because the cake is a bomb! Granted, that is dumb, so now they know to toss the cake, and Hikaru does, throwing it off a cliff. Then it explodes, too late to do any damage with candle shrapnel. If Baron Garoga would have just shut the frak up for 1 more minute, the Zones would be dead! The series would be over, and I could get back to reviewing a different tokusatsu series that I’ll end up not liking, either.
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I’m 70% Megalon!
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Categories: Movie Reviews, Ugly Tags: Ishiro Honda, Japan, Jun Fukuda, kaiju, March of Godzilla 2012, tokusatsu, Zone Fighter
Zone Fighter Episode 11 – Kanippatsu Gojira-no Sakebi!
Zone Fighter Episode 11 – Kanippatsu Gojira-no Sakebi!
aka In the Twinkling of An Eye: The Roar of Godzilla! aka In a Hair’s Breadth: The Roar of Godzilla!
1973
Written by Kazuhisa Hattori
Directed by Jun Fukuda
Godzilla is back! And Gigan shows up to get murdered! Zone Fighter makes up for the lame monsters of the previous episode by giving us what we want, classic Toho monsters pounding the crap out of each other. And more Zone Fighter murderous monster rampage.
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Godzilla grows increasingly bored in these lopsided fights, he now only does them for LOL fight moves.
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Another thing you learn thanks to Zone Fighter is that car racing in Japan at the time featured cars covered in taped on tarp for some reason. I have no idea why. Even all the windows (back window and sides) are covered, and the passenger side of the front window is also covered. All you get is the driver’s side windshield and an open passenger side window. And you wear goggles while test driving despite having a windshield.
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The washing machine is off-center again…
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If you are still Zone Fighter confused, check out the Zone Fighter Splash Page to get educated on the world of Zone Fighter.
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Word to your mother
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Categories: Movie Reviews, Ugly Tags: Gigan, Godzilla, Japan, Jun Fukuda, kaiju, Kazuhisa Hattori, March of Godzilla 2012, tokusatsu, Zone Fighter
Zone Fighter Episode 06 – Kingugidora-no Gyakushuu!
Zone Fighter Episode 06 – Kingugidora-no Gyakushuu!
aka King Ghidorah’s Counterattack!
1973
Directed by Jun Fukuda
Written by Juro Shimamoto and Akira Ishikari
We don’t need no stinking…subtitles? This episode has subtitles??? OMG OMG OMG! Looks like somewhere, somehow, I picked up a copy of Episode 6 that was fansubbed! Now we will know what is going on….and how boring it is! WoooOOOOooOOOOO!!!!111 Oh…and it’s a VHS rip of someone who took the DVD and transferred it to VHS for reasons unknown, so enjoy the terrible screencaps! If I had to suffer through them, so will you. MuHAHAHAHA! Evil Tars has spoken. And these screencaps will just get stolen by those thieving bastards at the Godzilla Wiki anyway, like many other images from TarsTarkas.NET.
Catch up with Zone Fighter on the Zone Fighter Splash Page.
Meteor Man Zone, why is your theme song talking about smashing Garoga’s ambitions? Why not just kill them? They are evil, and you have no qualms about murdering all their enslaved monsters…
So the scientists from last weeks episode were inventing a Blue-Green system to reduce CO2 and radiation emissions in the air, making this show pre-Al Gore awesome. But, of course, the Garoga are in league with evil billionaire conservative businessmen and their Global Warming denialism, so they send King Ghidorah to wipe out the Blue-Green System. BOOOOO!!!!!
I am not sure why in the last episode they kept making reference to blue-green while firing weapons at King Ghidorah that made me think it was the weapons that were called that, but, whatever, these shows don’t really have that much internal consistency in the first place!
Remember, last we saw Zone Fighter, he had lured King Ghidorah into space because that is totally a good plan to lure a space monster into space to fight there. Zone Fighter has the power to speak in the vacuum of space!
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Categories: Television Reviews Tags: Akira Ishikari, Japan, Jun Fukuda, Juro Shimamoto, King Ghidorah, tokusatsu, Zone Fighter
