War of the Gargantuas (or Frankenstein no kaiju: Sanda tai Gaira) is a sequel of sorts to Frankenstein Conquers the World.

In this film a Frankenstein monster, now covered in a green algae like fur emerges from the ocean and attacks some ships and eating people. Frankenstein is blamed although scientists are baffled since Frankenstein neither lives in the ocean, nor does he eat people.

The military sets up attacks and does surprisingly well considering their record in past kaiju movies. All mysteries are solved when a second Frankenstein's monster, known as Sanda, shows up seemingly to help the sea-Frankenstein (Gaira.)

War of the Gargantuas was one of the last of the great Japanese kaiju films on my list to be watched. In a way, I'm almost a little sad knowing that the list is so small that when gems like this are finally released here my list gets shorter and shorter.

Either way, for a kaiju film it's a good one with plenty of monster scenes, tons of action and the human drama is kept to a minimum. It's defintely worth picking up.

Also, I've reviewed Rodan twice before so I'm not going to review it again. Just get this disc and enjoy!

Labels: 31 days of movies, Japanese, Kaiju, Tokusatsu

Tonight in the middle of a marathon of shows I managed to finish up the first volume of the 1972 tokusatsu series, Kikaida (aka Kikaider.)

Kikaida is about a humanoid robot named Jiro who was created by Dr. Komyoji to fight against the evil Destructoids (evil robots) of the DARK organization that the doctor was forced to build. He goes around fighting a new monster each week while he and Dr. Komyoji's children seaarch for their lost father.

The show is really just another of the many Japanese live action shows for children made in the 1970s with one major exception, every character here is human sized. As is the case with these types of shows, everything is rather silly since the target audience was the under 10 year old male demographic so don't take it too seriously.

DARK is a strange organization lead by the sinister and somewhat eccentric Professor Gill. For whatever reason their main robots have names and characteristics consisting of a color and an animal. Their foot solders on the other hand look like luchadors from Mexican wrestling and they go around chanting "DARK" in a rather annoying fashion similar to the Miniblin from The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker.

Kikaida is a lot of fun but if I have to say anything bad about the release it's that it's rather expensive. I know that such niche shows are seldom cheap, though I have been spoiled by the releases of Iron King and Super Robot Red Baron as well as all the super cheap subtitled Godzilla and kaiju releases. I could definitely see myself picking up the rest of this show tomorrow if it averaged out to $1 or so an episode but for now I'll just keep watching the used bins, Amazon and eBay for the rest.

Labels: Japanese, Tokusatsu, TV Shows

Classic tokusatsu fans rejoice! Iron King is here!

Iron King is a 26 episode series made in the vein of Ultraman and other such super heroes. Japan is under attack by various groups and, of course, they employ the latest monster robots. So who does Japan have to protect themselves against such treachery? Well a singing cowboy tough guy and his goofball red hat wearing sidekick who just happens to have the ability to transform into a giant robot super hero.

The show is excellent and really has a way about it that is unlike anything I've ever seen. There's tons of action and in the first two thirds of the series very interesting plot lines with bands of ancient Japanese nomads seeking revenge against the Yamato people. Later in the series the show shifts the enemies to aliens and the whole thing takes a turn downhill.

Still, despite a lackluster third story arc, I can heartily recommend Iron King to anyone who likes this sort of thing. Tokusatsu and kaiju fans will probably already own it but even if you're not a usual fan and you like weird Japanese stuff, this could be for you.

By the way, I used to be convinced that there were just some things that would never see a release here in America legally. I never thought even after the Ultraman discs were released that we'd see gems like this. What's next? Well BCI has some more series in the works including the already released Super Robot: Red Baron.

Labels: sci-fi, Tokusatsu, TV Shows