The post full of Ultraman, part the second.

State of mind: bouncy
Current soundtrack: Heisei High - Ultraman Nexus - Eiyuu (doa)

So, one finally gets to watch the Mebius and Ultra Brothers movie. (I also did Cicakman this hols, but...Cicakman deserves a separate post.) About time, too, as it came out late last year. A big shout-out to Seij, who pointed me in the right direction to getting it. Now how do I burn it off...?

Ultraman Mebius & Ultraman Brothers

The Rabid Fangirl Review

Once upon a time on the moon there was a big old scary monster...

GYAAAAH! Whose idea was it to use the 'A-type' Ultraman mask!?

Onceuponatimeonthemoon, there was a big old scary monster called Ukillersaurus out to defeat four of the Ultra Brothers — Ultraman, Seven, Jack and Ace. The monster was controlled by the bigger, scarier Yapool, who kicked puppies, shot wee ducklings and was just generally pissy for fun. To make sure the Yapool wouldn't harm any more people and kick any more puppies, the four Ultra Brothers used the Final Cross Shield (which was more of a tetrahedron) and imprisoned the Yapool and his scary monster off the coast of Kobe. For even though they knew that the use of the Cross Shield would take away their powers as giant superheroes, they were confident that humans would be able to defend themselves from evil on their own.

Apparently in this reality, there was no such thing as Dubya Bush.

Ultra SQUASH!!!

Now let's fast forward to the present day 20 years later (yes, that was all backstory). It appears ALL FOUR liked Kobe so darn much they all settled down there, did the whole normal human thing again and lived very happy, peaceful lives. Inspired by this battle, a rookie decided that he would go to Earth and figure out what drew the brothers to it. His name...was Mebius.

(c/wise from top left: Hayata/UM the air traffic control chief, Moroboshi/Seven the farmer, Hokuto/Ace the chef and Goh/Jack the go-kart circuit manager.)

In the human guise of Hibino Mirai, Mebius has been defending the grand old Earth for six months. He is sent out to Kobe on a recon mission, because some pretty scientist thinks Something Is Up. (and Something Is, as is usually the case.)

(l-r) Hirokawa the marine centre dude, Hibino Mirai @ the Human Puppy and Shinguuji Aya the Pretty Scientist.

Pretty Scientist has a little brother called Takato, and he has his OWN subplot about bumping into a monster once and losing all courage, love of Ultraman and dream of joining the human defence force. Mirai uses all his puppypowers on him (and believe me, these are Puppy Powers indeed) but it takes some serious work to convince him that even the Ultra Brothers had big foes whom they were scared of, but if they stuck together and fought then they could win over anything, so on and so forth. This is actually something that the other brothers mention to the rookie when he meets their human forms for the first time, but it works, and Mirai promises that if Takato bears up and holds on, Mebius will give him the V-sign when he next appears.

Mirai TRIES to use Puppypowers, but Takato's apparently more of a cat kinda guy.

Before long, Ultra Big Brother Zoffy sends a message that SOMETHING is going to blow up pretty soon, which is explaining all the disturbances in the ocean. Despite the target being the uber-evil, puppy-kicking Yapool, who would sooner thump than thank anyone who tried to resurrect him, the slightly-less-evil Nackle, Guts and Temperor aliens are planning to...you guessed it, resurrect U-K and whip some Ultra butt.

The wild, woolly, and rather ELDERLY Nackle Seijin.

So Temperor Seijin goes out into the field, destroys some buildings, attempts to engage Mebius...and gets pwned. Those who have seen Temperor's fight in Taro should probably not be TOO surprised - more so if you read UM manga. *coughgekidencoughlosercough* However, this enables Zarab to gain Mebius' 'battle data', and by kidnapping the lovely Aya and changing himself into a clone of her, he plies Mirai with...The Poison Coffee of EEEVIL!!!

Note to self: Green milk does NOT give your coffee healthy intestinal cultures.

Needless to say Mirai DRINKS this PCoEEEVIL, which incapacitates him while Zarab goes off and happily turns into fake Mebius, smashing some buildings, wreaking havoc and scaring the shit out of a train full of cameo stars. When Mirai does manage to pull his poor stomach together long enough to transform, he is pissed beyond all belief. Rightfully so, too. I mean, YOU'd be pissed if a potential love interest fed you PCoEEEVIL, transformed into a rather obvious fake version of you and went around smashing buildings.

Yes, that is Fakebius - no, he is not flipping Mebius off.

So pissy!Mebius and snarky!Fakebius fight, and Fakebius is defeated in due course. Unfortunately, being pissy is not a luxury Ultras can afford, as Guts Seijin takes Mebius by surprise and claps him in a crystal cross suspended mid-air. To save him, the Ultra Brothers transform despite the risk of death AND the supposed impossibility of it in the current day. They proceed to pwn the Guts and the Nackle. All this goes down in front of young Takato, who in truly Ultra fashion regains his courage his pomp and splendour.

One question remains — if they can't transform, and they don't want to transform, and Hayata was all we-must-not-transform-ever, why does he still have the Beta Capsule with him??

Of course, this was all part of another, bigger plan, and when Mebius is finally freed, Guts and Nackle go for the other four brothers and take our rookie out. This time, however, Mirai regains his strength when he sees Takato brave the hordes of screaming people, falling rubble and batshit giant aliens to save his dog, Alto - who, by the way, was involved in the traumatic incidents mentioned some paragraphs above.

Yes, I forgot to mention there was ANOTHER puppy involved besides Mirai.

With HIS mojo back on track, Mebius rises once more, guts the Guts, knackers the Nackle and frees the others. Mebius is not only the human puppy, he has Gary Sue tendencies, too. Unfortunately, this all comes a mite too late, as the Ultra Bros' energy has all been drained out, converted to negative energy and used to negate whatever seals remain on U-Killersaurus and the Yapool. The shield breaks, the monster reappears, the Nackle gloats and...the Nackle gets offed.

But come on, you expected this, didn't you?

U-Killerzaurus has not only come BACK, but has become even larger. There ensues a mighty fight in which there are plenty of flying tentacles (you in the back there, get that thought out of your head!), Zoffy and Taro arrive to restore the Bros' energy and help kick ass, and Aya is found, mostly unharmed. Too bad she's been jammed into the crystal embedded in U-K's head.

The unfashionably, unfashionably late duo. Hey brother, this is not Malaysia, this is JAPAN!

Caught between the potential love interest and the Ultimate Eeevil, Mebius is at a loss. The Six Ultra Brothers join forces and transferring their energy into Mebius, create a new, uber-powerful being: Ultraman Mebius Infinity.

Little did anyone know that even the human puppy went through a teen angst phase, where he went half-black, had a tongue piercing and listened to nothing but the Ultran version of Evanescence and My Chemical Romance.

Mebius Infinity, with seven times the bashing power of your ordinary Ultra Brother, saves Aya, makes short work of the giant U-Killerzaurus (because there are only 15 more minutes left to the movie), separates into the 6 Bros and normal!Mebius and fulfils his promise to Takato. Everything is now peachy keen again, Mirai gets to pontificate heartwarmingly for one scene, and he joins up with the rest of Crew GUYS and goes home. The end.

Hearts and flowers and YAY! :D

My verdict? 4 stars out of five! It was great to see the Bros back in action, and get a bit of a glimpse into how they are as characters. Mirai/Mebius was a right puppy, and there were a lot of cameos that I quite enjoyed. But the best part comes in the end credits, where...well, I still want y'all to go get the movie, so you'll not be hearing about if from me. Now if only we could figure out WHY Tsuburaya used the wrinkled old A-type mask...*is not letting up on this* Overall, it's a good, fluffy movie that any Ultra fan should enjoy. :3

I'm sorry, I just...feel very warm and fuzzy...