Henshin Men

Travis needed time off for a family emergency, so Nathan brought in their co-host in “kamen” (ba-dum-tsh!), Michael Hamilton, to discuss The Birth of Ultraman Stage Show. Sorta. What you’re about to hear is actually an episode of Kaiju Weekly (Travis’s main podcast, which he co-hosts with Michael) that featured Michael and Nathan discussing this unique beginning for one of the greatest henshin heroes. It features new bookends recorded for you, Heroes of the Internet, where Nathan and his guest give Henshin Men’s trademark awards to the pseudo-pilot episode of Ultraman (1966).

From the Kaiju Weekly episode description: This week we cover the Birth of Ultraman Stage Show from 1966 with returning guest, Nathan Marchand of the Monster Island Film Vault Podcast and Henshin Men Podcast. We also cover a little bit of news and have some ULTRA-FUN along the way!

The Birth of Ultraman is available on blu-ray from Mill Creek on Amazon and Deep Discount. It can also be purchased for streaming on MovieSpree.

Follow Henshin Men on Twitter: @HenshinMenPod.

Listen to Travis and Michael’s main podcast, Kaiju Weekly, and Nathan’s podcasts, The Monster Island Film Vault and The Power Trip (which he co-hosts with Michael)

MUSIC:

-“Ultraman Theme Song” by Davin

-“Not Your Above-Average Joe [Standing Ovation]” by Ivan Hakštok

After an epic two-parter with the return of Hongo…it’s business as usual on Kamen Rider (1971). Your intrepid hosts Travis and Nathan are almost bored with the first in a long series of overplayed mind-control stories in the post-Hongo world. But at least the kaijin-of-the-week are fun. First, there’s Fly Man (who should’ve been by Vincent Price, for obvious reasons). He’s no Egyptas, but his constant buzzing is almost as entertaining. But nothing compares to “Faux-dan” (what’s his actual name, again?), who can “break wind” and inspire a conversation about sequels to the indie kaiju film Notzilla. Can you tell Nathan and Travis also run giant monster podcasts? All this and more in Henshin Men!

Kamen Rider (1971) is available to stream on Shout!FactoryTV and Tubi. Watch there to follow along with us!

Follow Henshin Men on Twitter: @HenshinMenPod.

Listen to Travis’s main podcast, Kaiju Weekly, and Nathan’s podcasts, The Monster Island Film Vault and The Power Trip.

MUSIC:

-“Kamen Rider - Let's Go!! Rider Kick (Cover)” by Eternal Melee

-“Not Your Above-Average Joe [Standing Ovation]” by Ivan Hakštok

FINALLY! Hongo has come back to Japan! And he brought his own pair of kick@$$ Rider Girls! (But what happened to Ruriko?) Nathan and Travis are overjoyed to see the OG Rider return, and in true superhero fashion, team-up (and fight?!) with Hayato in an epic two-parter coming off the heels of the crazy Christmas special. Shocker’s Japanese division has a new commander: Dr. Death/Dr. Reaper/Dr. Shinigami/Dr. Who (one of those is a pop culture reference, but not the one you’re thinking) played by a former member of Toho’s actor stable. Toei’s filmmakers took a bit more care than usual with these episodes to mark such an incredible occasion—but what a tease! Welcome to Henshin Men, heroes of the internet!

Kamen Rider (1971) is available to stream on Shout!FactoryTV and Tubi. Watch there to follow along with us!

Follow Henshin Men on Twitter: @HenshinMenPod.

Listen to Travis’s main podcast, Kaiju Weekly, and Nathan’s podcasts, The Monster Island Film Vault and The Power Trip.

MUSIC:

-“Kamen Rider - Let's Go!! Rider Kick (Cover)” by Eternal Melee

-“Not Your Above-Average Joe [Standing Ovation]” by Ivan Hakštok

There are a few pairs that go hand-in-hand. Peanut butter and jelly. Pen and paper. Bread and butter. Werewolves and Christmas. (Wait, what?!) Yes, Travis returns as Nate celebrates Christmas the Japanese way by eating a KFC dinner and watching Kamen Rider (1971). While the first episode they discuss is a bit typical for the show (despite the kaijin-of-the-week being “Bat-manta”), the second one—what a doozy! Col. Zol unleashes a werewolf virus, steals a little girl’s doll, and holds a costume “murder party”—before revealing that he, too, is a kaijin! A final boss battle ensues! Can KR2 defeat Shocker’s one-eyed super pseudo-Nazi? Listen to find out…after you watch the episode, of course. It’s a Kamen Rider Christmas tradition, after all.

Kamen Rider (1971) is available to stream on Shout!FactoryTV and Tubi. Watch there to follow along with us!

Follow Henshin Men on Twitter: @HenshinMenPod.

Listen to Travis’s main podcast, Kaiju Weekly, and Nathan’s podcasts, The Monster Island Film Vault and The Power Trip.

MUSIC:

-“Kamen Rider - Let's Go!! Rider Kick (Cover)” by Eternal Melee

-“Not Your Above-Average Joe [Standing Ovation]” by Ivan Hakštok

Travis needed some time off, so Nathan is joined by YouTube personality and sci-fi author Ryan “The Omni Viewer” Collins to discuss something a little left-of-center for Henshin Men: an anime. The Super Sentai parody The Special Combat Unit Shinesman (aka Tokuma Sentai Shinesman), to be exact. This hilarious OVA is a tale of corporate warfare with the Good Trading Company’s Shinesmen battling alien invaders disguised as a rival corporation secretly plotting world conquest. (Can you say, “Disney”?) It’s one of those comedies that’s surprisingly deep. Omni and Nathan connect this all-too-short but highly-quotable anime to C.S. Lewis’s famous quotation on fairytales and growing up, Looney Tunes, Mel Brooks, and even Dune, to name a few. What’d else would you expect from them?

Shinesman was released on VHS and DVD by Media Blasters under their Anime Works imprint. Both are long out-of-print, but the dubbed version (which was discussed in this episode) can be viewed here on YouTube.

Follow Henshin Men on Twitter: @HenshinMenPod.

Listen to Travis’s main podcast, Kaiju Weekly, and Nathan’s podcasts, The Monster Island Film Vault and The Power Trip. Check out Omni Viewer on YouTube.

MUSIC:

-“Shine/Shinesman – You are the Hero” by Hironobu Kageyama

-“Not Your Above-Average Joe [Standing Ovation]” by Ivan Hakštok

“Are you my mummy?” That’s the question Nathan is asked by Travis to start this week’s episode of Henshin Men. In today’s Kamen Rider coverage, as is the unwritten law of all popular entertainment, there must be an ancient Egypt episode featuring a mummy monster. In this case, it’s the proto-King Sphinx who can somehow understand Japanese but only speaks in gibberish that may or may not be ancient Egyptian. It’s even more confusing than it sounds. The next episode features another flower kaijin, but this one, Wolfsbane, is freakishly cool. It’s just too bad his poisonous gas is inconsistently deadly. But he ticks off KR2 so bad, he gets not one, but two finishing moves! Now, as for the unceremonious resurrection and second deaths of some defeated kaijin, that’s less impressive.

Kamen Rider (1971) is available to stream on Shout!FactoryTV and Tubi. Watch there to follow along with us!

Follow Henshin Men on Twitter: @HenshinMenPod.

Listen to Travis’s main podcast, Kaiju Weekly, and Nathan’s podcasts, The Monster Island Film Vault and The Power Trip.

MUSIC:

-“Kamen Rider - Let's Go!! Rider Kick (Cover)” by Eternal Melee

-“Not Your Above-Average Joe [Standing Ovation]” by Ivan Hakštok

Celebrate the 30th anniversary of Power Rangers with Michael Hamilton (Kaiju Weekly, The Kaiju Groupie Podcast) and Nathan Marchand (The Monster Island Film Vault, Henshin Men) as they embark on a quest through every season of this morphenomenal franchise. Coming January 4, 2022, to a podcatcher near you! IT’S MORPHIN’ TIME!

Follow The Power Trips on Twitter: @ThePowerTripPod.

Join the podcast’s official Facebook group: Power Rangers Legacy.

Nostril eye holes. That’s one of the many important things discussed in this week’s Henshin Men by Travis and Nathan. Why? Because both of the kaijins-of-the-week, Toadiller and Alkimedes, have their “eyes” on the tops of their heads, but the suit actors are obviously seeing out the masks’ noses. It’s not unlike what Travis brought up last week about the Kamen Rider costume. Besides that, they discuss the first (sorta) on-screen appearance of the Shocker Leader (using a brainwave scanner that projects memories as a movie), the best one-liner in the series so far (hint: it involves a password), and the career of actress/model Linda Yamamoto (who played Rider Girl Mari) and how it parallels the development of Japanese culture. You’re welcome.

Kamen Rider (1971) is available to stream on Shout!FactoryTV and Tubi. Watch there to follow along with us!

Linda Yamamoto's website and Wikipedia page.

Follow Henshin Men on Twitter: @HenshinMenPod.

Listen to Travis’s main podcast, Kaiju Weekly, and Nathan’s podcasts, The Monster Island Film Vault and The Power Trip.

MUSIC:

-“Kamen Rider - Let's Go!! Rider Kick (Cover)” by Eternal Melee

-“Not Your Above-Average Joe [Standing Ovation]” by Ivan Hakštok

Rainbow factories explode (again) and a Brazilian archer girl seeks revenge in this week’s Kamen Rider (1971) episodes! In the first KR2 adventure, Nathan and Travis marvel at the man-eating, multicolored Dokudahlian, a plant kaijin who has the power to turn any room he enters into a disco. He kidnaps women and forces them to manufacture poisonous drugs, because only women have hands delicate enough to do it. (Shocker, you sexist fiends!) Next, your dynamic hosts are entranced by Connie “the yellow jumpsuit wearing, bow and arrow wielding, and vengeance seeking vigilante” as she tracks Shocker’s steel-skinned monster, Armadillong. (Well, Nathan is—Travis is still too busy crushing on Taki). How come she never joined the Rider Girls as a regular cast member? This question and more is answered in Henshin Men, your favorite tokusatsu superhero appreciation podcast!

Kamen Rider (1971) is available to stream on Shout!FactoryTV and Tubi. Watch there to follow along with us!

Follow Henshin Men on Twitter: @HenshinMenPod.

Listen to Travis’s main podcast, Kaiju Weekly, and Nathan’s podcasts, The Monster Island Film Vault and The Power Trip.

MUSIC:

-“Kamen Rider - Let's Go!! Rider Kick (Cover)” by Eternal Melee

-“Not Your Above-Average Joe [Standing Ovation]” by Ivan Hakštok

Travis and Nathan come to another pair of Kamen Rider (1971) episodes that want so very badly to harken back to the “Hongo era”—by featuring a vampire trilobite and a plague-spreading anteater. Yep. Col. Zol performs a bizarre ceremony to resurrect a fossilized trilobite (that may or may not have been found under Godzilla’s foot) while the Rider Girls try ward the monster off with garlic. Because that makes sense. Ironically, the anteater proves to be one of the scariest and most powerful kaijins-of-the-week KR2 has fought! He even infects Goro the “Kamen Kenny,” forcing KR2 to finally learn a new move. In other words…this time, it’s personal! Welcome to Henshin Men, heroes of the internet!

Kamen Rider (1971) is available to stream on Shout!Factory TV and Tubi. Watch there to follow along with us!

Follow Henshin Men on Twitter: @HenshinMenPod.

Listen to Travis’s main podcast, Kaiju Weekly, and Nathan’s main podcast, The Monster Island Film Vault.

MUSIC:

-“Kamen Rider - Let's Go!! Rider Kick (Cover)” by Eternal Melee

-“Not Your Above-Average Joe [Standing Ovation]” by Ivan Hakštok