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ULTRAMAN II


Cast:

There is no cast...


What the box says:

Strange and eerie phenomen from outer-space are causing terror and panic on Earth! Giant pre-historic monsters are awakened and start attacking cities and towns everywhere. The Earth Defense Force tries to desperately to fight off these attacks, but is not able to cope with them. ULTRAMAN, the intergalactic, martial-arts hero, must again come to the rescue, and try to restore peace and harmony to an embattled world!


Plot:

In a space station, 2 guys are talking and then notice some strange glow envelope the Earth.

The Earth Defense Force is trying to explain the numerous freak occurrences that have been happening lately like mysterious letters appear in the sky. The EDF reorganizes scientists and soldiers into Emergency Science and Defense Squads (ESDS for short).

Captain Adams is asked to lead the Far East Zone ESDS. He agrees if he gets an advanced ship, the Super Star.


Fat Man, AKA Marconi wants to join the ESDS. Glen, the designer of the Super Star wants to join the ESDS, too.

At the ESDS base, Lieutenant Ann Johnson has joined the squad. Marconi, Adams, and Glen are also present. They have a strange robot cyborg thing that looks like little robot from the Black Hole porked an Ewok.

Harris, the last member of the team, has yet to arrive from the space station.

Harris is flying to Earth when suddenly, a red glow surrounds his ship. Harris and Ultra Man are facing each other. Ultra Man tells him some of what's happening. Ultra Man needs to use Harris’s body to exist on Earth. Harris awakens on his ship, thinking that it was a dream.

In the polar region, an iceberg cracks. Ultra Man must warn Earth aboutthe prehistoric monsters that have been awakened. Harris finally meets up with the rest of the ESDS.

When the alarm sounds, the team heads off in to action. Ann finds this small star and hands it to Harris. He realizes the meeting with Ultra Man was real. They all load up in the Super Star and are airborne. One of their scout ships lands on the iceberg. Marconi and Harris take samples. They get off the iceberg as it starts listing badly, and the iceberg breaks apart freeing the polar monster.


The ship follows the monster. They have to stop it before it gets to the heavily populated coast, but various cool weapons are tried but fail. The polar monster with its freezing breath is close to the coast. Each of the ESDS members attacks in their fighters.

The polar monster splits into multiple monsters. Now, they have 4 polar monsters to fight. Harris hears a voice tell him to place the star on his forehead. The transformation scene begins, and Harris becomes Ultra Man who grows to giant size. Ultra Man kung fues one of the monsters. 2 of the monsters freeze each other. The narrator informs us that Ultra Man has a short supply of energy on Earth. The star on his chest is a color timer, and he becomes weaker as the color changes. Ultra Man is about out of energy. He uses a beam to destroy the monsters and flies away. Ultra Man turns back into Harris, but Harris is to keep the secretof him turning into Ultra Man a secret.

After the fight, everybody thinks that Ultra Man is great…Well he saved no telling how many lives. Harris even mentions how great Ultra Man is. I’m not sure if Harris winked when saying this like in every one of the old Max Fleischer Superman cartoons.

A new power plant is being powered by a whirlpool when a tornado attacks and destroys the plant. At the ESDS base, Harris and Ann are going to investigate it. We learn that Ann’s birthday is really soon. Marconi has a pendant that Glen made to give to Ann, and he is less than happy to learn that Harris is going on a mission with Ann not him.

Ann and Marconi are flying to the site. Marconi claims that Harris is sick, when in fact, Marconi locked him in the locker room. Marconi tries to get some brownie points with Ann because Harris isn’t there.

They investigate the wreckage. Marconi gives Ann the pendant which she refuses for some reason. Marconi throws it away, but Ann picks it up.

Harris is flying to where the tornado will strike next. Ann and Marconi catch up with him. The tornado is attacking a dam, and the tornado is alive. Marconi rushes the tornado to attack it, but he crashes. While Harris checks on him, the tornado captures Ann.

Back at the base, Marconi blames himself for Ann. Well, it is his fault. The ESDS need to destroy the tornado’s power supply. They decide to set a trap to lure the tornado. The ESDS base will crank up their power generation to maximum to lure the tornado to them.

Glen, Marconi, and Harris fly off to engage the tornado, while the base attacks the tornado. Marconi is going to find the tornado’s power supply. Glen realizes that Ann’s pendant has a homing device in it. If she could activate it, they’ll be able to find her and think that she’s at the power supply.

Harris turns into Ultra Man and grows to fighting size. Ultra Man can’t seem to do any damage. Marconi finds the heart of the tornado and Ann, who activates the pendant. Everyone knows where to strike now. UltraMan charges the heart. He destroys it and grabs Ann Marconi’s planes to get them out of the tornado before it explodes. Ultra Man flies away.

That night, the ESDS are celebrating Ann’s birthday except for Archer. He drives away, wondering about Ultra Man.

The ESDS has finally have gotten some leave due to things have calmed down. Suddenly, they are being recalled to duty. A big red cloud is heading towards their base. The Super Star is prepped for flight. Flocks of birds are trying to escape the red cloud. Various ways are attempted to disperse the cloud. The cloud is alive. Marconi gets a sample of the cloud. Glen takes the sample to the ESDS base to study it. Several weapons are used on the cloud to no effect.

Glen has the cloud sample analyzed and discovers the cloud isn’t a gas. It really is alive. More lab tests reveal rain congeals the cloud into a solid mass.

The cloud monster attacks whatever is around it. Marconi and Harris attack it. The monster is underwater. The Super Star attacks it. They’re


trying to keep the creature from destroying the dam. Harris lands and turns into the giant sized Ultra Man. Sunlight weakens the monster, turns it back into a vapor cloud state. Ultra Man takes the cloud into outer space. After this mess is over, they get a prank call about another red cloud. Hilarity ensues…

A giant crocodile monster is attacking the city. The military responseis totally ineffective against it. Glen and Marconi convince them to quit wasting their missiles. Marconi rushes the creature with a rocket launcher, and he opens fire and somehow kills it.

We learn that giant crocodile was underground, awakened by explosions. The monster’s corpse is being hauled away. The monster isn’t dead, it has incredible regenerative abilities.

Timmy finds a small strange lizard. He hears that the authorities believe that a baby monster is nearby. Timmy sneaks it into his room and hides the lizard.

Back at ESDS base, Marconi is pacing around waiting to hear the test results on the crocodile. The next morning, Marconi learns that a single cell of the crocodile can grow into another giant monster. He rushes off to search the area to find the crocodile.

In a cave, Timmy is feeding the monster, that hasn’t gotten that much bigger. But, it has grown.

ESDS are searching.

Marconi is talking with some kids who mention Timmy has a strange lizard. Marconi has a time convincing Timmy to let him see the lizard, but Timmy relents. Back at the cave, the lizard has grown even bigger. Timmy wants to keep it, and Marconi tries to convince him the creature will grow into something dangerous. It is hard to think the animal is dangerous when an annoying brat named it “Baby”. Timmy, who can’t accept reality, gets mad and runs off.

ESDS are heading to where Marconi has told them the monster is. Marconi convinces Timmy to go to town with him to get supplies to build a cage for Baby.

By the time the ESDS arrive, Baby has grown into an adult giant monster crocodile. Glen heads to the Super Star. In town, people hear about the monster. Timmy is angry that Marconi told the ESDS and heads back to the cave.

The Super Star can’t seem to scratch the crocodile. Harris sneaks away to transform into the giant-sized Ultra Man who fights the crocodile.

Whiny Timmy doesn’t believe that Baby is a giant killing machine. Can’t the giant crocodile eat this kid so he will stop whining? He’s crying when he realizes this is his fault.

More copies of the crocodile monsters are fighting the surrounded UltraMan. Marconi thinks that salt water weakens them. Ultra Man tosses them into the sea, killing the monsters. He flies away.

Timmy is sad when he realizes if not for Ultra Man the town would have been destroyed. Harris rejoins the rest of ESDS and no one mentions that he missed the fight.



What I say:

The old Japanese cartoon dubbed into English. Children of the 70s and early 80s remember them. I can remember a few but not their names. It always had a guy turning into some kind of super hero to fight monsters. Most of the time, they had a cool vehicle. The one I remember the most the guy had a 3 wheeler and would gain superpowers. The guy not the 3 wheeler which became like a giant mecha...

I have to mention my biggest problem with this DVD. I had to get a bad DVD because the sound is royally screwed up. That and the inside of case that holds the DVD was broken. So, if you hear something shaking a DVD case try to find another copy that doesn't rattle. I would be mad if I hadn’t paid more than a $1.50 for it. Everything sounds like it was dubbed by chipmunks. It made several parts hard to follow and others painful. If an annoying child on a cartoon is bad, imagine the same child talking like “Alvin” crying about Baby. I accept your winces....

I have never seen any of the live action Ultra Man shows. From what I’ve heard, it sounds a lot like the cartoon. A group of scientists investigating monsters and one of them turns into Ultra Man. It would probably be good to explain the difference between Ultra Man Tiga and Ultra Man Dyna but I don’t know.

Ultra Man II holds up surprisingly well, I thought. The animation is fairly good. I’ve seen better but seen worse. The monsters do have a kind of generic feel to them. But, were you expecting each monster to be on par with the angels that are fought on Neon Genesis Evangelion?

This is good example of how anime was more than 20 years ago. It is hard to imagine the differences between it and say Princess Mononoke. But, this is a cartoon plain and simple. It may be made in Japan and technically anime. I have to think of it as just as a cartoon. What is the difference between Ultra Man II and G.I. Joe? They have the same audience. I would have watched both of them back in the day. What am I saying? I probably watch both of them now if given the chance.


2 1/2 NINJAS

Quotable Dialogue

"I want that ship."
"It wasn’t a dream. Ultra Man did take over my body."
"Don’t frighten me like that."
"Tornados strike the ocean"
"It’s unbelievable to me that a cloud can become a living thing."
"You aren’t a monster, are you?"


Morals of the Story

Shouldn’t the military have physical requirements? (See Marconi the Fat Man)
If you become a superhero, nobody notices you always disappear when the hero saves your friends.