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Sunday's episode will be #20 of "Ultaman Dyna":

As previously mentioned, Dyna is a direct sequel-series to "Ultrman Tiga", though considerably more comedic. The episode, "Alien Boy", deals with an adopted refugee child from the planet Laseta.

 

Guess I won't be watching this week, since I saw this one fairly recently.

 

I'm progressing my foray into the Ultraman franchise, I'm watching the blu-rays Mill Creek are releasing. I think my favorite show so far is Ultraseven it has what I liked about Ultra Q and Ultraman put together.

I'm watching Orb right now, while it's charming and fun I'm not sure I like it as much as Ultraseven and Ultra Q. I plan on watching Orb origin saga, Geed, X, and Return of Ultraman after this. I think going forward I'll be more selective with what I watch/buy. Can anyone recommend the shows for someone who likes Ultraseven and Ultra Q the most?

 

I've recently started on Ultraman Cosmos, which I thought I might like due to its reportedly more peaceful approach to dealing with the monsters, but it seems rather kid-oriented and I'm not impressed so far. I'm also confused about what continuity it's in. I gathered the Heisei series didn't return to the original Showa continuity until Mebius and the ones before that were in their own separate universes, save Tiga and Dyna sharing a reality. But according to the prologue movie, Cosmos is set in a world where people are already familiar with Ultramen (Ultramans? Ultraman-tachi?) before Cosmos first arrives on Earth. So is it a sequel to something?

 

Curious how does a more peaceful approach to fighting kaiju work? Non-lethal attacks? Diplomacy with the more intelligent kaiju?

It's interesting that Ultraman being a franchise that's been on so long, it has different entries can vary in quality and tone. The Mobile Suit Gundam franchise is similar in that certain spin-offs are meant to court a younger audience and generate new fans (Age, Build Fighters) and other entries are meant as something to tide over the old guard and the existing fanbase (Unicorn, Thunderbolt, The Origin).

Being new to the property myself I'm not sure if there are rules regarding different timelines, is one to assume that a series takes place in alternate universes unless otherwise stated? Gundam was good in that regard, a show would take place either in the Universal Century timeline or a different timeline complete with it's own calendar.

 

Something like that, I gather (I'm only 2 episodes and a movie into it so far), though there are exceptions for more evil/intractable monsters. The previous shows I've seen had some peaceful resolutions too, but they were usually in the minority.

I gather that the Showa-era seasons and the post-2006 seasons are mostly in the same universe, and the pre-2006 Heisei shows are in various separate universes. But that's what confuses me about Cosmos, since it's in a continuity where Ultramen are already a known phenomenon. But I've looked on two Wikis and neither one is clear on whether it's in the main Ultraman universe or not.

 

For similar shows, I'd recommend Ultraman Nexus (along with the accompanying film "Ultraman", aka "Ultraman: The Next") and UltraSeven X, as well as the two Ultra Q sequel/reboot shows. Ultraman Leo is supposed to be rather dark and mature, as well, though I have not seen a single episode of that show yet. It does have Dan Moroboshi as a supporting character, though.

The Ultraman Wiki has a Multiverse Map (2017), probably from a Japanese fan magazine. It does show Cosmos as its own seperate universe:

I have only seen the three movies and the first episode of Cosmos so far, so I can't say whether this is adressed in the show itself, but other installments of the Ultra Series have had references to legendary Ultras in the ancient past, most notably Ultraman Tiga. So, it might be a case where in this particular universe, the Ultraman of legend is still a fairly known figure in the present society. On the other hand, it might also be a case of the producers planing on the show being set in the Showa universe, and changing their mind later on.

 

Okay, thanks. I wish I'd done better in Japanese class back in college so I could read the text.

Or maybe it's just that the idea of Ultras being famous, well-known heroes was an established part of so many prior continuities that they kept it here, despite it being its own thing. If it was aimed more at kids, then I guess they just wanted to evoke that feel of Ultras being iconic figures that had been part of the culture since before the kids were born, so they created a universe where that was also the case.

Godzilla 2000: Millennium was vague in a similar way to Cosmos, because it treated Godzilla as an established presence in its world, although it was the only one of the five Millennium-era Godzilla universes that never explicitly mentioned the original 1954 film as part of its backstory (it did so in offscreen material, but not in the movie itself). The lack of specifics bugged me in that case too.

Thought I guess mainly it confuses me because it's only my third Ultraman universe, and in the previous two, Ultras were treated as a new discovery. True, in Tiga/Dyna, there had been ancient Ultras on Earth, but humans didn't know about them until the start of Tiga. And in the Neos direct-to-video series, there was a world of multiple Ultras like in the main timeline, including versions of a couple of Showa Ultra characters, but humanity was encountering them for the first time. So both universes contained "origin stories" for humanity's knowledge of Ultras as well as for the individual Ultra-bonded human heroes. I guess I expected that pattern to continue.

 

Watching the stream now, and for some reason there are no subtitles this week.

 

It's gingaman! Pretty cover art

 

I was shocked when to see Ultraman Orb: The Movie at Wal-Mart while I was there shopping last week. I've never seen anything like that there before, other than a few of the really popular animes like Dragon Ball Z.
I'm going shopping again tomorrow, and I'm tempted to get it. They have Orb on Crunchyroll, so if I do get it, I can watch the show on there first.

 

^I'm afraid physical Home Video releases of any Ultra production in my native Germany at this point is pure fantasy, let alone ones that make it to a local store. Aside from two VHS tapes from the 80s with re-edited versions of the 70s anime, the only Ultra poductions to make it even into German language versions were Ultraman X, which the German Crunchyroll streamed but did not garner enough excitement, and the current Netflix anime.


Anyway, Tsuburaya has listed the upcoming episode:

Episode #42 (hello, Hitchhikers), "Friend", of Ultraman Cosmos. We've talked a bit about this show in this thread, it's a pacifist variation of the Ultraman concept. As it is the 42nd episode, it's in the second half of the show's run and therefore should already have established characters and situations, so be prepared for weird side-characters showing up out of nowhere. I haven't seen the show myself, but I've seen the three accompanying films, and yeah, this show had some recurring concepts introduced in its run which were not common for other Ultra shows.
That said, the episode in question apparently features the peaceful kaiju Delgoran turned savage threat by the shows main antagonist, the Chaos Header.

 

I decided to hold off on the Orb movie this morning. I realized that I should probably at least start the series before I get the movie, that way if I hate the series I'm not stuck with a movie I have no interest in watching.

 

Thanks for the recommendations, those shows are all on my radar as for what to watch for my progression through the Ultraman franchise. I heard about Nexus being dark before and I'll definitely be checking out Leo since Dan shows up.

I recently finished Ultraman Orb on Blu-Ray and I can safely recommend the series. Gai is a good protagonist and I like that he has a recurring villain in the form of Juggler, they have a very Doctor/Master vibe to their rivalry. The supporting cast for the main character is also fun to watch. The Blu-rays do come bundled with the movie which I think should be watched after the series proper.

 

Tsuburaya has announced that Ultraman Z will be on their YouTube channel with subtitles starting this Friday the 19th at 8:30pmEST/5:30pmPST and each episode will be up for 2 weeks!




Tsuburaya is dominating Toei with how they handle accessibility to oversea fans.

 

English subtitles? The preview you embedded only has Korean subtitles.

Edit: Nevermind, found this article on Geek Culture, and the answer is 'yes'.

 

Episode 1 of "Ultraman Z"




This will be interesting. I've never seen an episode of "Ultraman"

I recognize one actor from Kamen Rider Wizard. Hisahiro Ogura played Wajima the antique shop owner and now he's Director KuriyamaI in Ultraman Z

 

For some reason, Tsuburaya did not do a livestream for this week's episode, but simply loaded it up. So, here is the series finale of "Return of Ultraman", aka Ultraman Jack, episode #51 "The 5 Ultra Oaths", featuring the return of Zetton, the final opponent of the original Ultraman in his show:

 

Ultraman Z's first episode now has 1,073,510 million views on youtube. That's incredible!

 

Seems like Tsuburaya is really happy with the huge numbers of international views of their episodes, as today they uploaded episode 34 of "Ultraman Leo" with English subtitles.


Seems like a good opportunity to also embedded the full first episode of "Ultraman Leo" which Shout! Factory uploaded some time ago, also with (non-optional) English subtitles: