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| ULTRAMAN
: | THE SPACE RAY OF TERROR
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Reviewed by Andrew Borntreger on 1 April 2008
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Children are forever drawing something. For the longest time, my son had an infatuation with spiders. He would draw black spiders, red spiders, yellow spiders, hairy spiders, big spiders, little spiders, and even spiders with more than eight legs (no, I don't let him watch freaky science fiction horror films - thanks for asking). In Japan, one little boy loves to draw a very simple monster that he calls Gabadon. It is nothing more than a vague 2D outline with legs, an eye, and a mouth.
Gabadon might be cute, as children-invented monsters go, but he turns into a menace when mysterious cosmic rays bombard the Earth. Mixed with sunlight, the rays cause the drawing to come to life! The creature waddles through the city, groaning and squeaking like some sort of huge canine chew toy. I'm not kidding, the monster looks like a lump of foam and latex, and it squeaks when it walks. Little Andy (my son) thought Gabadon was hilarious. He nearly fell off the couch laughing. I just shook my head and reminded myself that I used to be that young, and stupid things made me laugh back then, too (I still think that "The Three Stooges" are funny).
The Science Patrol engages the monster, but they are bewildered by its behavior. Gabadon disappears at sunset and reappears in the morning looking more like a real creature (the children add details to the drawing at night). As kaiju go, the monster is fairly docile; it wants to sleep all day. Ide makes two terrific suggestions that are shot down by the rest of the Science Patrol. At first, he tells the others to let Gabadon sleep; shooting at the monster just gets it angry. Who wouldn't be grumpy after being woken up by tanks shooting at them? Then, after the team discovers that the monster is actually a drawing that comes to life when the sunlight hits it, Ide proposes waiting until sundown and erasing the drawing.
Ide usually annoys me, but he is spot on. It is a low point for the Science Patrol that they insist on attacking Gabadon. Eventually, because he falls into a river and is about to drown, Hayata transforms into Ultraman. Ultraman appearing, then just wandering off while a monster is afoot would look funny, so the towering silver protector engages Gabadon. In an effort to keep Ultraman from being the bad guy, he does not kill Gabadon in front of the children. Instead, Ultraman carries the groaning monster into outer space and turns it into a constellation.
Gee, that's much better. Never mind the fact that I am sure Gabadon froze to death in outer space, and the "stars" that make up the constellation are actually chunks of monster in orbit that reflect light because they are covered with ice.
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| Things I Learned From This Show: | |
|  | Sidewalk chalk + unusual sunspot activity + young artists = the annihilation of Mankind.
| | | People are always looking for reasons to not come to work.
| | | Under the right circumstances, justifying the use of a water cannon against a playground filled with happy children is pretty easy.
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| | | 4 mins - No, it's a prehistoric shmoo.
| | | 7 mins - The government hates it. That thing is definitely a huge shmoo.
| | | 10 mins - "Hey, it looks a lot darker over there."
| | | 23 mins - Are the kids sitting in a hamster cemetery?
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