This is MJ. I'm an author, I'm an artist, I'm an analyzer. Find all my work at MJMunoz.com.
This is Ultraman Zet Episode 3. The Ultraman Zet Episode 3 review. I'm calling this episode
Ultra Presser. I'm going to go ahead and get right into it. My topics for the episode are
budget cuts, hay fever, the pressure of the presser, a robot to rival Ultraman, and Gamora
did nothing wrong. Sort of. So here we go. Budget cuts and cutting costs. So I was delighted by
the fact that this world of Ultraman Zet has a monster defense force storage that has an actual
budget that needs to prove their efficacy, that needs to legitimize their need for an increase in
budget or a maintenance and increase in budget. And basically has to prove that they are worth
it because that's really cool. That's a more hard sci-fi idea and I like that. I'm pretty sure that
popped up in Evangelion 2, or in Evangelion as well. So that's another fun little connection
between the two, which I feel there's a conversation between some Evangelion and Ultraman and some
Ultraman and Evangelion. That's the sense I'm getting. So with that said, I will talk about
the sub-subject of this, which is cutting costs. And I think that the crew and, I don't know,
producer or executive producer, I don't know how you quite define all of that, made a very
interesting cost-cutting decision for this episode in a few places. One of them would be that the
drones that were taking Gomorrah to the island, his new island home while he's hibernating,
I think they were literal actual life-sized functional drones that you can buy and utilize
for whatever. I'm pretty sure I noticed cameras on their faces and from what I've seen of drones,
because I don't dabble in them really, or I don't dabble in them, so I've never used a drone,
I don't intend on using a drone, I've never priced drones. That's not true. I might have looked at
one time because I heard of people using drones for a tripod, basically as a tripod, and I thought
maybe I should do that. And I looked at prices and I think that it was going to be too costly,
so I decided not to. But regardless of that, I noticed that these drones were actual drones,
and that made me laugh, it made me happy. And actually, now that I think about it some more,
they very well may have been, because they were large, they very well may have been drones that
were used or are used in the Super Riot productions, because I know for a fact that Super Sentai and
Kamen Rider, which are tele properties, do use drones in their fight scenes. I don't know, that
is to say I have not seen any obvious evidence that I can recall this time that Super Riot production
uses drones in their fight scenes, or any of their recordings really, so I couldn't say. But it
wouldn't surprise me if they did, and even if they don't use them for fight scenes in the same ways
as Kamen Rider and Super Sentai do, I still believe that they would have them at least to test things
out or make use of them in some sort of way. They could have been, you know, some sort of production
cost and they were repurposed in that way. So again, the costs are being reduced to make the show in
the show when they're talking about budget cuts, budget cuts and, you know, having a not so flush
wallet, which is kind of a fun, kind of a fun thing for me. So there were, let me see, one or two other
things that I thought were good cost cutting measures that were taken. I failed to think of them at
the time, but that drone thing was definitely one of them. That was a lot of fun. Oh, well, here's a
simple one. I'm sure that Gomorrah suit was empty until it absolutely needed to not be empty anymore
when Gomorrah was waking up. So having an empty suit hauled around, that definitely works as something
to cut costs. Okay, moving on to hay fever. I find it kind of hilarious that hay fever is what awakens
Gomorrah and causes all this damage and this rampage and almost puts the, puts storage at risk of losing
their budget because of Haruki having a difficult time fighting Gomorrah. I do really like at the end
that the American branch official of the, gosh, what is it called? I don't remember. It's the United
something or other, I believe is what the international anti-monster something or other. Anyway,
whatever that's called, that guy, Steve Bills? Anyway, I don't know, but regardless, he liked that
Sevinger had such a hard time with Gomorrah because Ultraman even had a very difficult time
with Gomorrah and he recognized the fact that Sevinger was able to keep up with Gomorrah as
well as it could was evidence of its efficacy, its usefulness, and that these people in the Japan
branch know what they're doing and they are a good choice to give more money to or to not cut the
budget up because they're going to use it effectively and well. So that was cool. But again,
just this idea that Haruki and Gomorrah both suffer from hay fever and that's that's what wakes them
up is kind of hilarious and also kind of interesting from a, I don't know, real world, again, hard sci-fi
perspective. It's just something I hadn't thought about that a kaiju would have allergies, but I
guess they could. Why not? Although I think the scale of the pollen would have to be, it would
take a lot to make them have an issue, but I mean, Gomorrah wasn't sneezing the whole time. It was
maybe two or three times the most that they sneeze. So enough of that. Moving on to the next topic,
the pressure of the presser. I enjoy the fact that Haruki messed up his last mission by knocking
that observatory out of commission and I believe effectively destroying the entire thing, which is
not good. And I like that he had a redemption, a chance at redemption and that it all coincides
to make it so that the storage's budget is on the line and they need to make good with this
presentation and they're going to have a press conference sort of thing with their backers who
are part of the international group. And it's interesting that they get that opportunity and
it creates all this pressure for them, like I said, and then they're put in a great position to see
the transport going on and to be in the path of Gomorrah when things go poorly as they do. And
that definitely makes things more exciting. You actually get to see them, you know, Yoko on top
of the roof shooting at Gomorrah and saying one of the coolest lines I've heard in the show so far,
which is, if your eyes are itchy, let me scratch them for you. With my bullets is the unset part
of that, which is really awesome. But it put these people in danger and it put them front and it put
storage's efforts front and center. And it was a high pressure situation, even though it should
have been simple. And I really love the line. I love how they set that up by making us believe
that the likelihood of Gomorrah waking up was super low, especially with Yuka saying that there
was, I think, a one or less than 1% chance that Gomorrah would wake up. And, you know, statistically
speaking, such and such, and Hibikura was very excited about that. Oh, good. So that was really
neat that they set it up like that. And then when you start to notice, I think him sniffling and
then definitely by the time he sneezes, you realize, oh no, this is not going to go well.
But that was really an effective way to build up the tension and make it a lot of fun. And then
having the press there, that TV channel with all those, I think there were bystanders just watching
as well as the ground crew from storage that was supporting Sevenger with the power courts and such.
That was all really neat. And each of those elements added to the pressure and added to
the stakes and made it even more desperate for Sevenger to be able to defeat this Kaiju and
ultimately for Ultraman 2, because like I said earlier, he was having trouble and had to step
up and only through something from a few episodes ago, or I think the first episode, yeah, so a
couple episodes ago, which was Yoko finding that Ultraman medal and then hanging on to it.
Was he able to defeat Gamora because having the Ultraman medal allowed Haruki and Zet to become
one of the coolest forms, a really fun form for me, which is this beta smash. And yeah, he was a lot
of fun to watch. I'm going to move on to the next topic, a robot to rival Ultraman. So I wonder,
is it wise for humans, frail as we are, to have robots that can rival Ultraman? I would say it's
clear so far that Sevenger is not as strong as Ultraman and it's interesting that we have robots
like Sevenger and because there is the Kaiju threat, their existence is legitimized, but as far as we
know, there has been no war waged by one nation against another by use of their giant robots,
probably because the power needs of the giant robots are so great that it would cost a great
expense upfront and then you might only get a very short window of time to use it. For example,
Sevenger's three minutes of battery life and it wouldn't be an effective weapon, so other weapons
are more effective. It's interesting to think of the Mecha as a weapon. Sevenger is a weapon.
It's a weapon meant to defend against the threat of aliens and Kaiju, but it is, when it comes down
to it, a weapon and it can be used for good or evil. And you got to ask the question, if
storage continues to develop these machines, these fighting robots, these weapons, and the goal is to
make one that rivals the strength of Ultraman, then other than, I guess, mutually assured destruction
or the idea that they will be left defenseless in the event that something bad happens, what's to stop
some human group from creating a fighting robot that can rival and surpass the strength of Ultraman
and attack and kill Ultraman for some reason? I guess there is nothing to stop that from happening.
And I like that that idea is set up in this episode so early on in the show when you have
no idea what exactly the show is. Well, you have some idea, but you don't know where the show is going, and
it kind of creates another opportunity for things to develop in a different way. And you have to
wonder, you know, is that a possibility? Is that something that's going to happen? If so, when will
it happen? And who would do it? It certainly wouldn't be storage. It would have to be some other group,
right? And are there other Kaiju fighting groups across the world? It sure sounds like there are.
We have yet to get exposed to many of them because we are so fresh in the show and there's more to
explore and, you know, we got to stick around and find out, I guess. Okay, so my last thing is Gamora
did nothing wrong, right? Sort of? I don't know. Yeah, Gamora definitely did some wrong. I'm not a
you know, I think I haven't finished watching Comrade or Black Sun, but I think I agree with
stop kaiju hate, and I'm wondering if there needs to be a stop kaiju hate, which if you've watched
Concrete Revolution at all, that's in there. If you haven't, you should because it's really cool.
But if kaiju are part of the natural ecosystem, then why must they be exterminated and treated as
something just to be killed? Storage was not doing that with Gamora. Initially, they were trying to
transport Gamora peacefully and non-violently to a place where in the event of Gamora's reawakening,
or cessation of hibernation, however you want to say that, that the kaiju would not be able to
cause a great threat to people and would therefore not need to be
exterminated or put down or however you want to phrase that. And I appreciate that. I think that's
good, and I think it's lamentable that the only solution that Zed has at this time is to go ahead
and kill a kaiju that's getting out of hand because I mean what else are they going to do? Just let
people be killed? Let's say it's not murder. Let's say it's just an animal rampaging and attacking.
Are they going to kill a kaiju? Are they going to kill a kaiju? Are they going to kill a kaiju?
Rampaging and attacking. Are they going to let people be killed for that? I don't think that's a
good idea. That doesn't seem moral or just or utilitarian to me. So on multiple standards of value,
I think it's a bad thing to let kaiju rampage and it's kind of a necessary evil you could say
to kill a kaiju when you have to. And I guess if you leave it at that, you could always
just assume that you have to, but that doesn't mean you have to. You're free to explore other
possibilities and I would like to see more of that because that just makes sense to me.
I like the kaiju fighting stuff. You know, it's cool. I've watched all of Z before. I know what's
coming in Zed and it's just interesting to me that the way things are being done is interesting to me
because each episode gives us more information and it kind of dulls it out in such a way that
we're learning more about this world and eventually we're gonna have some really interesting questions
asked about the world and I think that's a lot of fun. So anyway, I really enjoyed this episode.
Excuse me. The fights were very exciting. Beta Smash is fun. Everybody up in the office or up
in the building watching the fight, cheering it and you know slapping high fives and celebrating
and things like that was really fun. That was just, it was so fun. It was almost infectious
cheerfulness and happiness and excitement and that was really, really interesting to
to watch and to feel come across because it just made me happy. I smiled. I had a big smile when
everybody else was having a big smile so that's kind of fun. But yeah, this was a really good
episode. I really liked it. There was a lot of good stuff to talk about and I think I'm going
to go ahead and get out of here. I don't believe I have yet updated my outro for this so I'll just
let you know that if you go over to MJMunios.com, specifically if you go into the show notes for
this episode, you will see a link to something called Ava and the Glow Bug or Grow Bug and that
is a children's picture book that I have written that is inspired by Ultraman and if you're liking
Z, I think you'll like it. So go ahead and check that out. It will be in the show notes. I don't
have illustrations yet. I have some sketches but they're not on the website but I do have a desire
to turn this into a full-fledged children's picture book and you might see a campaign about that in
the near future. So I hope you do and I hope you support it because if you like Ultraman and Kaiju
stuff then I think you should like this book I'm working on. So anyway that's it. I hope that you
are well, you be well, and you do well. This is MJ signing out. I hope you enjoyed that. Go to
MJMunoz.com to leave any questions, comments, or other feedback you might have. There you can
find all of my analysis, art, and fiction. I cover books, tokusatsu, comic books, anime, and more.
Look around. You're sure to find something else that you'll enjoy as well.
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