Zone Fighter Episode 4: A Very Special Guest Star

 

Shozo Uehara is one of the most important writers in tokusatsu history. He not only was head writer on The Return of Ultraman, he is most renowned for writing the first 5 seasons of both the Super Sentai and Metal Hero franchises for Toei. He shares co-head writer credit on the infamous Japanese Spider-Man series, and his notable anime credits include the first two episodes of Fist of the North Star and head writing credit on Space Pirate Captain Harlock.

Uehara has one more notable credit under his belt too. He wrote the first ever TV appearance of Godzilla.

ZONE FIGHTER

EPISODE 4: "INVASION! THE GIANT GAROGA ARMY - ENTER GODZILLA"

Written by Shozo Uehara

Directed by Ishiro Honda

Original Air Date: April 23, 1973 

Hotaru and Akira watch the night sky, hoping to see some sign that their home, Peaceland, is still out there shining brightly. However, they spot a Terror-Beast Missile shooting in the sky. The next day, Hotaru investigates the crash site with Takeru and Hikaru but the missile is nowhere to be found. The group splits up to find any sign of the Terror-Beast when Takeru is ambushed by a toy plane (what the HELL, guys?).

Behold: the ultimate murder-weapon

Takeru is injured, but he battles the assailant. When Hikaru and Hotaru arrive, they recognize him as a fellow Peacelandian: Sachio. Sachio plays dumb, acting as if it wasn't his intention to hurt Takeru. However, only Hotaru is convinced, blinded by seeing her once-lost love once again. When he visits the Sakimori family, he tells them about how he survived the destruction of Peaceland and the remorse he feels for accidentally leaving his family behind. However, even Yoichiro isn't entirely convinced by Sachio's act.

During an evening drive back to Sachio's place, Hikaru, Sachio and Hotaru are ambushed by Wargilgar. Hikaru transforms into Zone Fighter and combats the monster while Hotaru and Sachio watch. Just as Fighter's victory seems assured, Wargilgar attacks Hotaru. Sachio saves her and fires on Wargilgar with a special laser, causing Wargilgar to vanish.

Side-Note: I haven't mentioned this before, but the Sakimori family makes their money developing new toy ideas and selling them. Probably something to spread peace through the smiles of children, though that hasn't been touched on yet. The only reason I bring it up now is because it's finally relevant to the plot.

A few days later, and Hotaru accuses her father of being callous to Sachio. After the monster attack, the Sakimori family allowed Sachio to work in their toy lab. However, Sachio seems to be preoccupied making toy tanks and machine guns, toys of destruction instead of toys of peace. Convinced that her parents are just trying to tear the two of them apart, she grows colder to her family. Meanwhile, Hikaru privately confides to Yoichiro that there is reason to be suspicious.

I have now seen toys do more harm than good in this show. Yes, that is a gun in its chest.

The next day, Yoichiro and Tsukiko kick Sachio out of their home. Hotaru finds out while she searches for him and out of anger says she now hates her parents. She goes into Sachio's room and plays a music box that Sachio built for her. However, the melody activates the toys Sachio built and turns them against the Sakimori family. After several minutes of chaos, Hotaru closes the music box which ends the rampage, but not before Hikaru is shot in the arm.

Sachio's audition for The Brady Bunch wasn't very successful.

Then, the family receives a televised video message from Sachio where he finally unveils his true colors. After Sachio unleashes Wargilgar on Tokyo, Hotaru heads out to find him. The Self Defense Forces sortie to battle Wargilgar, but its devastating flame breath attack annihilates numerous buildings and their armaments. Hikaru, unable to sit back and watch the rampage any longer, transforms and jumps INTO THE TELEVISION, which allows him to warp to Wargilgar's location.

I see we've already reached Superman levels of ass-pull powers.

As Zone Fighter and Wargilgar begin their second skirmish, Hotaru confronts Sachio and threatens to shoot him. Sachio mocks her, claiming she can't shoot the man she loves.

But she does.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=thhaf-bKWyg

Sachio then transforms into a Garoga soldier, and fights Hotaru after she becomes Zone Angel. Zone Junior arrives as Angel loses the upper hand, and allows her to escape. Embarrassed by losing to a kid, Sachio transforms once again into the giant monster Spyler. Spyler teams up with Wargilgar and the two begin to gang up on Zone Fighter. Outmatched and injured, Fighter's loss seems imminent.

BUT!

Junior reminds Angel that one of the key functions of their Zobots is to call upon a very powerful ally, the defender of justice and the King of the Monsters himself. Angel fires off a Zobot and within seconds, Godzilla appears!

No worries, big guy. It's cool to be a huge movie star AND do TV work these days.

Godzilla immediately turns the tide of the battle by taking on both monsters at once and ripping off Spyler's dorsal fin. Energized from watching Godzilla's strength, Fighter re-enters the battle. The tag team focuses on one monster each. Godzilla destroys Wargilgar with his devastating atomic breath, and Zone Fighter finishes Spyler with a one-two punch of his Meteor Missile Might followed by his new attack, the Meteor Proton Beam. Godzilla and Zone Fighter pose, their first battle together a strong victory.

The Zone siblings return home and Hotaru apologizes to her parents for the way she acted. Tsukiko muses that Sachio must have been corrupted by the Garoga's power, hence his turn to evil. Knowing that the battle ahead will continue to bring hardships and many tears, the Sakimori family's bond is made tighter than ever before.

THOUGHTS AND IMPRESSIONS

This was straight up a '70s Godzilla movie in only 24 minutes. It had it all: multiple monster fights, city destruction, a scene where the military battles the monster, and a dramatic day-saving appearance from Godzilla himself. The production values were definitely higher this episode too because the special effects look pretty great considering the show's schedule and budget (like I said, they had TWO giant monster fights!). Wargilgar's flame attack is pretty intense, and actually catches part of Godzilla's suit on fire at one point. Plus, seeing exquisitely detailed miniatures get blown up never gets old. The special effects this episode were once again handled by Kawakita, but it honestly looks indistinguishable from what Nakano was turning out at the time. It would probably be several years before his own trademarks would really form.

Practical FX 4eva

So yeah, as a Godzilla fan, this episode was a freaking treat. Knowing that Honda was behind the camera as well also gives me this weird feeling that I'm watching a new Godzilla movie from the man who created it all. Though I can't imagine he was too pleased having to direct lines like "Godzilla is a Monster of Justice so when we're in trouble, he might help us!" Still, the '70s Godzilla films have a very warm place in my heart and this episode fits right alongside Gigan, Megalon, and the Mechagodzilla films. Sure, Godzilla's role isn't very substantial here and his appearance is not foreshadowed AT ALL. But it honestly reminds me of his role in Godzilla Vs. Megalon, he's there to serve as the monster that turns the tables for our hero. Just substitute Jet Jaguar with Zone Fighter.

The rest of the episode is okay. Hotaru is pretty much nothing more than a love-struck damsel. She spends the entire episode completely blind to Sachio's off-putting behavior. Maybe if Sachio's introductory scene left some room for interpretation instead of doing a miniaturized recreation of North By Northwest on poor Takeru, then maybe Hotaru's behavior could have been easier to latch onto. Still, seeing her actually pull the trigger on Sachio was pretty cool. Even if this empowering moment was undercut by Junior saving her by slapsticking the bad guy into submission.

*sigh* Look, for '70s Japanese television, this was groundbreaking for women's representation.

For it being her first episode as the lead, Kazumi Kitahara does an okay job. She seems to handle the melodrama of the whole situation well enough, and you do feel her torment just a bit as she's forced to shoot the man she's been crushing on for years, but family comes first always. It's not the greatest dramatic showcase, but Kitahara does way more in this one episode than Kazuya Aoyama has done as Hikaru in the entire series.

 

Of course, your mileage of this episode will really depend entirely on your views of Godzilla as a world protector. If you're someone who can't stand the '70s Godzilla films, do not even bother. But if you're like me and you like your Godzilla in all shapes and sizes, then you're going to have a great time.

But in the next installment of Zone Fighter, the Sakimori family will now have to do battle with another famous Toho monster, and Godzilla's greatest foe.

NEXT TIME: 

"SHOOT DOWN KING GHIDORAH!"

I somehow feel like that's not going to happen.