Henshin Inspection presents Going Ultra! This is MJ. I'm an author, I'm an artist,
I'm an analyzer. Find all my work at MJMunoz.com. Prepare yourself for
hard-hitting Ultraman discussion and analysis. Ultraman Arc Episode 19 was
originally aired November 23rd 2024. Yes, I remembered that correctly. And it's
entitled The Transcending Wish. And this is the conclusion to the Ultraman
Blazar Ultraman Arc crossover connection. You know what that means. And yeah, I liked
the episode a lot. It was a lot of fun. I would say that it was a very good
conclusion to the crossover episode, mini series, whatever you want to call it. And
it was a lot of fun. It's kind of an interesting episode. It's almost
melancholy. And it almost feels... I don't know, not inappropriate. It almost feels
like it's not setting up the end game. I don't know if it's like wrapping up a
and like the A story or whatever to arc and then it's gonna move on and they're
gonna get into the end game or what. But I don't know. It's just kind of interesting
that they had one a four episode crossover and two that it had the tone
that it had. And it was really exciting to see Blazar here finally because we
hadn't seen Blazar at first. He was withheld. We got EarthGaron and then
finally we got Blazar here. And that's great. And well, I guess that's not true.
We start off with EarthGaron. Blazar showed up at the end of that last
episode, I think. And then this one... he wakes up in Hoshimoto City and then he
goes back. Okay, no. So yeah, EarthGaron is here. Blazar is here. All in this
episode self-contained. Not in episode 18 at all, if I'm remembering correctly,
which let me just double check that. Yeah, it doesn't look like there's any
cooperation. So anyway, that's just kind of interesting because we had, you know,
the Zangiel connection and I think that was a two episode deal. And then we have
the trying to put the genie back in the bottle trying to get rid of Helmarc or
Helmaroc, sorry, Helmaroc. And then finally here it happens. And it's
interesting. Like I said, it was a lot of fun. I'm a big proponent of Ultraman Blazar.
In fact, after this episode is released, I will release my Blazar review, my Blazar
series retrospective review, and then I'll get back into continuing with ARK
because it just struck me to do it that way. I already recorded the Blazar one.
It's done. It's ready to go. It's in the can, as they say, and it's just ready for
me to publish it. So anyway, but yeah, I like Ultraman ARK, but I like Ultraman Blazar
a lot. I like by the end of Ultraman Blazar, we got this really strong family
vibe or like, you know, team dynamic with all of Sguard. In this episode, we get to
see the Hoshi dash Moto city, which is an alternate reality. I guess it's the Hoshi
Moto city that exists within Blazar's world or, you know, Gento's world. And we get to see
kind of a tight knit family type of dynamic sort of with the captain and Rin
and Shu and Yuma is also, there's a counterpart for Yuma in Blazar's world
who works for Sguard and, or not Sguard, he works for, I guess, the GDF or whatever.
Anyway, he works with, like, he works in one of the groups that, you know,
everybody else from, well, at least Gento used to work in, and that's interesting.
You know, we get to see the larger world. We get to see the Sguard
group. We get to see the rest of the Defense Force doing what they do, which
is interesting because we got, you know, we get to see a decent amount of them
throughout Blazar and we're seeing our Hoshi Moto crew represented in this
other world doing something similar. So they're very much like the same type of
people doing similar things, helping their, you know, they're noble, they're heroic.
We get to see those traits kind of cross over and there's even a Yuma there who
is a squad mate of Ishido. Interestingly, the little stupid detail, Ishido in
Blazar's world doesn't like coffee. He prefers tea to coffee, which is hilarious
given, you know, what we have with Shu Ishido here in Ark's world. So that
was like a real nice fun little tidbit. We get to see Buzanga again. I noticed
that Helnorok has Gydo's head as like a pauldron almost on his left.
Shoulder Helnorok also has this like very interesting, it's like a Blazar as a
Kaiju design where he's split down the middle and has these different sides and
has this kind of like, you know, effect here going. And then like it was, I don't
know, it was just like it's an interesting subdued crossover and like Blazar, he's
you know, as uncommunicative in this crossover as he is in his show, which is
great that he stayed true. And the one interaction is he grabs, he reaches out
and grabs Ark's hand and he transfers some of his, I don't know, his chaos energy.
He transfers some of his chaos energy into him and then he is later able to
use the red and blue streaks and he throws, what does he throw? I guess Ark has a
sword. Yeah, he's a Sunglass Slasher. He's, did they just grab that from Toei or
what? Anyway, doesn't matter. He uses his own Sunglass Slasher thing as like a
Javelin, like Blazar's, you know, Javelin thing that he uses from the
black hole in his hand. And like that was really cool and we get to see them
fighting kind of simultaneously. Blazar was fighting Mazanga while Ark was
fighting Helnarok on his side of the rift. And there's like a real cool little
moment where they, from Ark's side, they push Helnarok back through the rift
because they don't really know it's there. And interestingly enough, the
people in Blazar's world, Ishto, says that they're pretty sure they understand, or
he hints that they understand that there's another world on the other side
of this rift. So they don't really want to push off Helnarok onto this other
world and cause these people to be hurt and killed and, you know, destroyed by
Helnarok's presence even if it will save them. So like it goes to show the very
noble sacrifice of them and it also makes the people in Blazar's world parallel.
Ark, where his planet, his universe, solar system, I think his entire solar system
or galaxy, maybe I don't know, is under threat that the Sun's gonna explode and
it'll destroy everybody, billions or trillions of lives. And in order to stop
that from happening they want to shunt off the energy into different points
and it's Lord Shizu or something like that. Anyway, that's his plan and Earth is
gonna be destroyed by this and that's how Ark came through and he's stopping him
and yada yada yada. So interesting, like the nobility of Ark where he is coming
here because he wants to stop this random backwater planet from being
destroyed, sacrificing like seven or eight billion people as opposed to
trillions of people. Like he's not willing to make that moral, like he's
willing to make the moral stand against that to save the lives of few, you know,
unadvanced people as opposed to the lives of trillions of, you know, more
advanced species or, you know, individuals. And like that's really cool and that's
really heroic and it's interesting that we see a parallel being made with Hoshi
Dashimoto and Blazar's world not wanting to push Hylnark off into Yuma's world
and have the same kind of, you know, death toll or, you know, something
analogous happen basically. And I think that's really cool, I think it's clever
writing. It's like kind of getting to the core of the show, the core of what Ark is
about, which is like that nobility and that like willingness to look for and
find another solution as opposed to just like sacrifice other people for
your sake, kind of like out of fear and ignorance. And I think that's pretty
cool. And I think I just figured out what Ark is about if I didn't know already.
This definitely like drove that point home. And I just, I liked it. It was an
entertaining episode, I liked his fight. The only thing I didn't like is that it
seems pretty obvious that Yuma is Ark. Like otherworld Ishido, Blazar Ishido or
whatever, the Ishido and Blazar's world figured it out. He said, I saw a giant
being of light fall to earth and then I went in to investigate it and then you
were there. So like it's obvious that you're this Ultraman. And then he's
basically talking to him, not telling him I know you're Ultraman, but you know
saying it without saying it. And then eventually Yuma goes off and fights. And
then like when he goes back to his Hoshimoto, he's been gone for five days
it looks like. And like there's a time dilation thing going on and then
somehow he and Ark and Blazar are fighting against Azanga who was
birthed from Helnarok and Helnarok at the same time and it's kind of weird. All
of this is that kind of retcon. Helnarok? It doesn't matter. It doesn't really matter.
Anyway, we're like yeah they're fighting at the same time even though the time
is dilated. So like what does that mean? It doesn't really matter. It's more about
the emotional connection we cut back between them seeing their fights. And
it's interesting that when Helnarok is destroyed in Yuma's world, then
all the eggs that Azanga had laid in, or I guess the eggs that Helnarok had laid
in Blazar's world are destroyed or taken care of or whatever. And that's you know
kind of a nice convenient little way to wrap things up. But still overall I like
the episode and I think it was good. It was entertaining. The fights were good. I
loved seeing at some point he's desperate. Ark is desperate. He slams his
left fist into the ground and then the red and blue lines start going up it
because he's getting this you know Ark power or Blazar power rather. And then
he it's interesting he gets a little cube like a Blazar cube which I assume
there's a toy for that. And then he's able to use his sunglass slasher thing
for the for throwing the javelin type thing which I mentioned earlier. And
that's what kills Helnarok and destroys his little egg sack egg producing thing
within his body. Which again I think the Helnarok design is supposed to be like
what if Blazar and there's no notes here on the wiki. Okay. It's supposed to be like what if
Blazar and like the Valoran guy were combined into like a Kaiju form. That's
what I'm picking up on it and I think that's interesting. Real quick about the
people who worked on it. So Toshinozo Nemoto has done a few episodes of Ark 5, 9, 16
and 19 to transcend wish which is this one. Light of Fear was 16. I don't remember
that. I guess that was the one that started off with the Mulgushen which is
the start of this Ark. So it was 16, 17, 18, 19. Four episodes. Goodbye Rain is a
really cool episode and Ocean on the Mountain Ridge I think was just okay. I
just I'm not like I'm super into it. He was a series composer for Macross Delta
from 2016 and Log Horizon in 2013. Musical composer or like writer of
turning the light novel into a series because I love Log Horizon. That was very
cool. Anyway that's pretty cool. And then the director is Masayoshi Takesui.
And he let's see what did he work on with Blazar so far. He worked on oh
1918. Okay so these Blazar episodes. You Are Give Us. Yes. And Message as well.
Welcome to Akebono Inn. Ocean on the Mountain Ridge and on the Kaiju's tail which was a
cool episode. And then for Blazar he worked on 11, 12, 20, and 21. Which I think
Night of Tripping and Stacks is episode 20. Battle in the Skies 21. Let's see
Nomoto worked on those two episodes of Blazar as well. So maybe they're like a
kind of collaborative team. Overall a good episode of Ultraman Ark. Kind of weird
because of the way it's positioning itself. Is it like wrapping things up
before the end game starts? I don't really know. It could be which would I
guess makes sense. But also just kind of an interesting way to go about it. So
that's it for the review. I've been very very busy writing. I have finished my
book Mockwing Mayhem. I'm just going through and doing some last-minute
double-checking that there's no typos and things like that in there. I'm going
to be developing a cover pretty soon. I'm going to be working on getting that
released. What's the book about? It's about magical bugs battling monsters. If
you want to know more than that what the book is about I can tell you in just a
moment. Let's see. So here's the one sentence pitch. Guided by their starglow
a brave band of magical warrior bugs battle sinister fiends to protect
children and their own hidden world from relentless evil. And anyway you can go to
growbugs.com to learn about this book and sign up so that you can find out. You
can get bonus content, a guide to the world of the grow bugs in Mockwing
Mayhem and also find out when the book is going to be released. So you can check
it out if you like the way I analyze stories. You like the stories I like. I
think you'll like this book because I'm trying to pour as much token slots of a
goodness into these books as possible. And just for fun I'll give you the back
cover blurb as well. It goes like this. Sinister Grimlings lurk in the shadows
always hunting for children. Only the grow bugs stand in their way. When a
Mockwing, a Mistborn Grimling, discovers a hidden grow bug fort it doesn't attack
alone. It calls an entire flock. Now chirp the bold and quiver the cautious.
Find themselves in a battle they were never trained for. Outnumbered and
outmatched. Can they survive the Mockwing's onslaught and save their
master? And even if they survive, how can two young grow bugs stand against an
entire deadly flock?