It is time for The Ultraman Episode 31: The Woman Fighter From Ultra!
The episode opens on planet U40 once again, the planet of Ultra! Amia is there talking to Ultra King (they keep calling him different names so I’m sticking with that one) about how she wants to go visit her brother, Ultraman Joneus. Ultra King knows the real reason she wants to go is because she is smitten with Hikari and wants to see him, too, so he declines. Amia runs off to cry in her room and look at a hologram of Hikari. Elec shows up and asks her if she was crying over Hikari again so I guess this is a well known behavior of hers! He says she can’t go because she’d need to take over a body and the only way she can do that is with an Ultra Flasher, but she can’t get one because she’s too young. So Amia does the responsible thing and steals one and then flies off to Earth.
However, on an asteroid, a strange squid creature watches her leave with evil in its eyes. Or maybe just flashing lights. It could go either way.
On Earth, Amia (as a bright globe of light) scares the crap out of a lot of 17-18 year old girls, looking for which one to take over. Eventually she settles on one at a hospital. Hikari and Mutsumi are investigating the lights the next day. He goes into the hospital while Mutsumi stays in the ship to check for rays, and he meets the girl, Kyoko, who can’t walk due to an accident when she was young.. There’s something very familiar about her and he can’t quite put his finger on it, as if it were a dream. It’s because she looks like Amia with different colored hair, reader. Amia/Kyoko hopes that Hikari will remember her, but he doesn’t so she lays on the bed and cries once more. This is a theme with her, huh?
Back at the base, the captain is castigating Mutsumi for not figuring out what the glowing light was, which is a dick move since he just sits there smoking half the time. She’s disappointed too because she wants to know what it was as well. Marume mentions that Hikari seems different since the visit to the hospital so they wonder what is up with him. He’s on the roof, asking Ultraman if he knows why Kyoko seems so familiar when Pig interrupts, saying that it is clearly love at first sight with Kyoko. Hikari wants to know how Pig knows her name and it is because she’s over on a hill, standing and waiting for him!
Hikari runs to her and they have fun frolicking in the woods, enjoying whatever miracle that allowed her to walk. It feels familiar to Hikari and he doesn’t know why, because he doesn’t remember doing the same thing with Amia on U40. Their fun is interrupted when the squid monster rises up from the woods and breathes fire at them. Kyoko is hurt and the monster flies away.
In the hospital later, the doctors say Kyoko has burns but is otherwise ok. Still, they don’t know how to treat her to make her better. Hikari does, or at least Joneus does, and has his host hold Kyoko’s hand so he can use his energy to heal her. This drains him a bit, which is unfortunately as the squid monster Garbados, which was created by the Badel to kill Ultras, attacks once more! Hikari changes into Ultraman to fight with the Science Defense Squad but can he defeat the monster in his depleted state? Will Amia wake up? Will the two ever be together? How does Joneus feel about Hikari wanting to get with his sister?
Well, we get answers to most of those questions in this strange episode. I never got behind Amia and Hikari getting together as I am a Hikari/Mutsumi shipper. They spent a brief time on U40 hanging out and they act like they had been lovers for years. Maybe it was meant to be? So this is just more of that. It gets even weirder when Hikari is frolicking around with a teenager that he doesn’t even know! At least if it was Amia in her own body it would make sense, but romance while someone is hijacking a body is not cool, man. I know those were different times but that shouldn’t be a hard concept to comprehend!
The monster design is simple but works. Giant, red, evil squid that breathes fire and and pincers? Sometimes that is all you need to make a great monster. You don’t need to staple different things onto it like boob claws on a dragon. Plus it’s always nice to fight a monster type that doesn’t really work well in live action.
No new Ultra Powers but we get a female ultra change so that was cool. Wouldn’t mind seeing more of Amia kicking ass instead of pining over Hikari but I’ll take what I can get.
That’s all for this installment. See you next time for the next installment, Ultra Fans!
