After the delightfully crappy Fireman, it was time for the Northern California debut of the evening's main event,
Ultraman: The Next! Considering how terrible most
modern Japanese sci-fi movies are, my expectations were pretty low. The film is unfortunately an all too serious, Top Gun-like retake on the same story as the original Ultraman series, hitting every action movie cliche beat to beat. It was hard to believe the film was made last year, with its lame hair metal soundtrack, cheap but short computer graphics sequences and 80's feel. I found myself bored waiting for each predictable plot point to come around. And the action scenes, the film's only saving grace, were too few and far between. The fights between Ultraman and the monster were pretty cool- fairly believable "man in suit" monster effects, with really amazing miniatures depicting the
neon lit Shinjuku district of Tokyo. But, it wasn't long until a poorly animated CG Ultraman was zipping through the sky in a terribly staged sequence, and I was taken out of the movie again. Ending in typically sappy melodramatic fashion underscored by Bon Jovi-esque guitars, Ultraman: The Next was mercifully over. The Castro crowd applauded enthusiastically, but I was not impressed. With luck, the film will be a success and we will see more Ultraman projects in the future, but here's hoping they put more thought into the next one.
After a break, the 2 special guests from Japan, monster maker Shinichi Wakasa and Ultraman/monster designer Hiroshi Maruyama took the stage.
Mister Lobo's questions weren't terribly interesting, but it was still great to hear from artists behind the scenes on the modern Godzilla and Ultraman franchises. They hinted of a future Ultraman project and, as we heard at last year's Godzillafest, Japanese monsters are hankering to destroy San Francisco on film! The crowd was very appreciative and respectful and the guests were gracious, even as Mr. Lobo jumped off the stage mid-response to shush a chattering child.
After an aborted attempt to give away the rare Ibanez Ultraman guitar, it was time to try again, this time to someone in attendance. Earlier before the feature, Mister Lobo drew all the names from the box set up at
Amoeba. But since none of the people were in attendance, they gave the theater crowd a second chance to enter (why, oh why did I not go to Amoeba last week!). So, fingers crossed, we waited as the winning name was drawn by Wakasa and Maruyama- and
this guy Eve from the band
Foreign Telegram won. He promised to play it in concert, so if you want to see it in person, go check out the band!
The finale of the evening was the very appropriate final episode of the original Ultraman series (with its wicked cool opening credit sequence)! The episode featured the final appearance of the original
Ultraman after his defeat by the monster Zetton and the first appearance of his commander,
Zoffy, who went on to aid Ultraman Ace and Taro in other series. This episode was cracking good fun, with a hilarious last minute rescue by Dr. Iwamoto and his super-weapon that he just completed yesterday.
All in all, Ultramania was a resounding success. The universal enthusiasm of the audience and near capacity attendance Saturday night shows that sci-fi events like Ultramania have great potential. With any luck, I will see you at Ultramania 2006!
