Podcast – Maser Patrol

In this episode, Kevin, Josh, and Lux sit down to discuss Netflix’s 2023 adaptation of Yu Yu Hakusho. As three relatively hardcore fans of the source material, we get into a fair amount of minutia comparing the new incarnation to different adaptations from years past, so it’d be good to have a passing familiarity with the property before listening… but hey, it’s a good idea to have a passing familiarity with Yu Yu Hakusho in general, so if you haven’t ever read the manga or watched the anime, now’s as good a time as ever to give it a shot (but don’t start with the Netflix series).

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In this episode, Kevin is joined by Alex, Connor, and Jared as the gang look back on the decade since Ultraman Ginga debuted, recapping all of the mainline Ultraman shows and trying to decide exactly what “New Generation” means. This is perhaps not a great episode for novices, but experienced Ultra-fans who want to get our perspectives on everything going up through Ultraman Decker (which, we neglected to mention, could be a play on “deca” being Greek for “ten”), excluding Trigger, since we covered it last year.

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Of course, we recorded right before the Decker movie hit, so we had not seen the teaser for the next series yet.

Also:

Jessica Tseang was due to interview the great Godzilla and Ultraman franchise actress Tomoko Ai at G-Fest this year, but wasn’t able to attend the convention due to a sudden emergency. Since Amanda was already on interpreter duty, Kevin stepped in as Jessica’s replacement for the interview.

We talked about Ms Ai’s career on Ultraman Leo, her time at Toho with Terror of Mechagodzilla, as well as a stint at Toei including guesting on Goranger and (almost) leading in The Kagestar. It was a fantastic experience for us, and hopefully this recording is a good overview and is a suitable consolation for anyone who also wanted to go and couldn’t make it to the convention this year.

Special thanks to Chris Marti for help with editing this episode!

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In this episode, Kevin sits down for an interview with the team behind Error 4444, an exciting new home video label that’s specializing in Asian genre film. We talk about the company’s origins, licensing philosophy, first few releases, and even tease some of their future plans. Their first Blu-ray release was stellar, and their second (which ships soon) looks promising as well, so if you’re a fan of Asian horror cinema, they’re definitely a brand to check out!

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Show notes:

Follow Error 4444 on Facebook/Twitter/Instagram

Buy Anatomia Extinction

Buy Funky Forest and Warped Forest

A comparison between the original and remastered Centipede Horror and Red Spell Spells Red prints:

On this episode, Kevin is joined by Alex (Control All Monsters, 13AM Games, Seismic Toys), Connor (Easter’s Kaiju Kompendium), and Mike (Vintage Henshin) to discuss the latest entry in the Ultraman franchise, Ultraman Trigger: New Generation Tiga. Does the show make us Smile Smile, or did it turn us into Giants of Darkness? Give this a listen and find out, if you’ve got the GUTS for it.

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On this episode, Kevin is joined by artist John Bellotti Jr of Robo 7 to discuss recent developments of the convention scene from the Artist Alley perspective. Topics include what it was like to be on the ground floor for the Covid-19 omicron variant at AnimeNYC, the seller experience at a virtual convention, and G-Fest’s recent policy change regarding fanart.

Warning: Part of the episode has John recounting the early days of the pandemic in New York City, which gets a bit grim, so be prepared.

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Grüß Gott!

In this episode, I’m joined by Henning Strauß (not “Straub”!) to discuss the history of kaiju (and also of other tokusatsu, anime, and manga) in Germany, along with how the development of fandom there has in some ways similar or different to the US and other countries.

Germany has a vibrant otaku community that puts the US to shame in some regards, so it’s always neat to see what can be learned from our fellow Japanophiles around the globe.

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Notes:

Title Frankensteinification:

More name swaps:

Heidi, Girl of the Alps, whose crew included Hayao Miyazaki, Isao Takahata, and Yoshiyuki Tomino:

Operation Mystery (“S.R.I. und die unheimlichen Fälle”) is kind of like a police procedural show, I guess.

Surprisingly Winspector was one of the rare titles on tokusatsu titles on TV! It was even novelized (so was Saban’s Masked Rider).

German dubs are the only way to watch some Taiwanese edits. For example The Iron Superman is on Tubi in its German dub subtitled in English.

Shogun Warriors and Micronauts in German:

We didn’t mention it in the podcast, but Germany also got a proper release of Takeshi’s Castle (or, at least much less mangled than the US release). Here’s one of the episodes where Ultraman shows up:

Many manga anthologies in the early 2000s, including Banzai, which was the first foreign edition of Shonen Jump. Manga Power led the charge in the late 90s.

Numerous shows have original German opening themes, but Sailor Moon and Dragon Ball‘s banging Eurobeat tunes are my personal faves:

Those irritating FSK ratings on every home video release:

The German equivalent of MST3k: Die Schlechtesten Filme aller Zeiten (or SchleFaZ for short). They even got cameos in the Sharknado franchise!

Recommended reading (auf Deutsch):

Fan magazines:

• 1988-1989: 9 issues of “Godzilla Family”
• 1989-1998: 10 issues of “Godzilla Fanzine”
• 1996-2018: 41 issues of “Pranke” (continuation of “Godzilla Family”)
• 2006: 1 issue of “Asian Cinemagic”

Kaiju-con in Uelzen (not to be confused with German Kaiju Con, which was supposed to start in Hamburg last year, but got derailed by pandemic):

A documentary on kaiju fan culture:

Gazorra: The Beast from the Depths of the Earth, Jörg Buttgereit’s short from 1984.

Kongula: Affengigant des Grauens (2003)

The Gualagon audio drama:

The anthology novel German Kaiju:

No Budget Nerd’s YouTube channel:

For as many titles that the US has gotten but Germany hasn’t, the grass is always greener on the other side. Here’re some titles available in Germany but not the US, in case you’re up for some importation:

• Anolis’s excellent transfers of Toho’s tokusatsu films
• Terror Beneath the Sea subtitled
• Necronomicon, Armicron in Outlaw Power (only available on VHS stateside)
• Physical releases for Gantz: O, the Godzilla anime trilogy, Samurai Flamenco, Tomie Unlimited
• The Next Generation Patlabor, Bloody Chainsaw Girl, Ninja War Torakage, Tokyo Ghoul S, Hentai Kamen, Ajin, Space Firebird 2772
• Manga: Q, DNA^2, Katsura & Toriyama Short Stories, Billy Bat, most of Gou Tanabe’s HP Lovecraft adaptations, Killing Bites

Check out Henning’s audio commentaries (in German) for Frankenstein’s Kung-fu Monster and Gamera vs Barugon and articles (in English) in G-Fan!

After a long hiatus, it’s time for another episode of the Maser Patrol podcast. This time, we take a look at a show with a valuable life lesson:

That’s right, this time around Josh and Kevin discuss the sweet Swan Songs of the Valkyries in the Senki Zesshō Symphogear franchise. It’s largely a synopsis of the five seasons, but hopefully our enthusiasm (and a little bit of the historical context) gives a sense of why it’s a program absolutely worth checking out.

Warnings: Many spoilers. Also, the editing for this podcast might not be all that tight due to Audacity problems (but it’s Maser Patrol, so of course it’s a couple hours long anyway).

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Show notes:

• Buy Season 1 here
• Buy Season 2 here
• Watch on Crunchyroll
• The indispensable Symphogear wiki
• The Shooting the Moon fansite

Marketing

• How Symphogear is marketed in Japan:

• How Symphogear is marketed in the US:

• How Symphogear probably should be marketed:

• But what Symphogear is really about:

Sample clips:

• The marketing leading up to season 1 all implied that Kanade would be a main character, and not, say, someone who would die halfway into the first episode:

Talking about the show:

• Hibiki Tachibana in a nutshell:

• The Noise designs are very much like Tohl Narita’s Ultraman monsters:

• Even more psuedo-Ultraman: The Nephilim was modeled after Zetton, while Hibiki turns into a red-and-silver giant at one point.

• Yumi’s self-awareness:

• Ignite module vs Kill la Kill god robe:

The mobile game

• Symphogear XD Unlimited mobile game opening:

XDU Collaborations that’d be of interest:

• SSSS.Gridman

• Godzilla

• ULTRAMAN

• Nanoha Detonation

• Attack on Titan

• the Gamera trilogy

• Nendoroids mentioned:

Hopefully that all sheds some light on why the franchise has such a devout fanbase, and why “watch Symphogear” has become a meme associated with rabid, proselytizing otaku. But seriously, if you’re even a bit curious, it’s worth checking out.

I was on Kaiju Transmissions last month for a post-Halloween show to talk about some of Ryuhei Kitamura’s early action/horror output, including:

• Down to Hell
• Versus
• Alive
• Aragami
• Longinus

He’s a favorite director of mine, so it was great to geek out over.

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Expect something else Versus-related shortly!

Hi all, Kevin here. The blog has gone sadly neglected for the past few months, for which I apologize; the stressful current state of world events has certainly taken its toll.

However, I have not been completely off the radar! Here are a few activities you might have missed:

Ultra Q the Movie:

https://mcdn.podbean.com/mf/download/tn75er/qmovie.mp3

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Japan Sinks 2020:

https://mcdn.podbean.com/mf/download/c6gejk/japansinks2020.mp3

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On that note, I’ll wish everyone a safe continued existence during these unusual times. We’ll return to normalcy at some point, and Maser Patrol will get back into doing some proper write-ups again as well.