Below are pictures from the 2006 Ultraman Festival I attended in Ikebukuro this Saturday, thanks to a free admission ticket from my anime section friends at Columbia.
For those who don’t know, 2006 marks the 40th anniversary of Japan’s original primetime superhero. Ultraman tells the story of a young man sent from a distant star in a galaxy far, far away to protect earth from evil monsters and giant dinosaurs that threaten the planet’s destruction.
As the series continued on, a whole family of Ultra-characters was created, including a mother, father, and many other female and male Ultra-siblings. The current Ultraman series running on television in Japan (and in a feature film starting next week) is Ultraman Mebius (ウルトラマンメビウス). I dare you to successfully pick him out of the pictures below without reading the captions.
Unlike the subsequent Masked Rider and Power Ranger series that featured superheroes of regular human height and origin, Ultraman in an alien who possesses the ability to grow himself to epic proportions (rivaling Godzilla in stature). In addition to his trademark chops and karate kicks, Ultraman can also shoot beams of light energy out of his hands to dispatch his foes.
As you can see from the pictures below, the Ultraman Festival was mostly a series of displays featuring the various good guy and bad guy costumes featured in the show. There were also weapons on display as well as TVs that would show footage from the various series.
The event was absolutely packed to the brim with kids. In what can best be described as the nursery school from hell, kids ran, shrieked, cried, fell, and walloped their way through the different exhibits. There was a line to take your picture with Ultraman, as well as a small tram that ran in a circle, but since I saw no one over the age of ten partaking in the activity (save for the kids’ parents), I decided against getting in line.
The highlight of the festival was the Ultraman Live Stage Show that plays every hour on the hour. This was a comical rendition of the popular television show that had Japanese people in rubber Ultraman costumes jumping about the stage and walloping on Japanese people in rubber monster costumes. Because the monster costumes were made entirely out of foam rubber, Ultramen would often fall right off the back of the monsters when they tried to dive on the evil creatures for that WWF finish. The kids got a kick out of the action however, which is all that matters.
Because no actor could speak through an Ultraman costume, all the audio was recorded and played through the theater’s sound system. This led to the Ultraman actors on stage using wildly overstated body language and gestures to accompany even the simplest bits of dialogue. William Shatner would have been proud. The only character not in rubber was a Gaia / Mother Earth–like character played by a young Japanese woman.
Her job was to stand downstage left, hold a disco ball, and look anxious throughout the entire show. Whenever Ultraman took a particularly nasty spill from a baddie’s punch, she would prompt to audience to get involved by yelling “saynoh,” which means “come on” or “repeat after me.” This was the audience members’ cue to scream “Gambare Ultraman” or “Don’t give up!” in reply. This call and response bit happened a good 23 times throughout the thirty minute show.
At one point during the show, Ultraman collapsed on the stage, seemingly defeated at the hands of a samurai sword wielding skeleton cyborg. After a quick “saynoh” from our billowy blue dress clad MC, it was everyone’s chance to clap if they believed in ferries…uh, I mean Ultraman. By this point, I had ceased participating. Call me coldhearted if you must, but Ultraman rose from the grave and defeated the evil skeleton king even without my screams and applause.
Somehow, deep in my heart I knew he would!
B.E.W.
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