Ultraman Powered Production History

Where can I start with Ultraman: The Ultimate Hero. Well, I can start off by saying that Ultraman: The Ultimate Hero may be the greatest production history trainwreck to ever grace Tokusatsu. I can say it’s the most poorly handled Ultra show in the entire series. I can say it’s a project that suffered from a series of incidents that makes one question why did they continue to try to make the show. It stopped Tsuburaya’s idea of producing shows in foreign environments up to this day; unless you count dubs of the shows made in Japan and brought to other countries. It most likely killed Gridman Sigma and a planned Hong Kong Ultra show. I think we all can see the effects of Ultraman: The Ultimate Hero/Ultraman Powered to this day, however before we can dive into the effects of Ultraman Powered… we must start with its story.

In 1993, Tsuburaya Productions have recently struck success with their international release of Ultraman: Towards The Future. Ultraman: Towards The Future, better known as Ultraman Great, was the first time the Ultra Series had hit broadcast television with a new show in over 12 years. Almost instantly hitting cult classic status, Ultraman Great was the first major success the company had seen since The★Ultraman in 1979. It was amazing for Tsuburaya. The company had been on the verge of falling into complete irrelevance and bankruptcy for all of the 1980s and now they finally had the window for a comeback. While it wasn’t their biggest window, it was enough for them to promptly begin moving through.

The first step of this come back was an attempt to regain a foothold in Japanese television. This attempt would be the creation of a new Tokusatsu production, called Gridman The Hyper Agent alongside Takara (Now known as Takara Tomy). Gridman would air on Tokyo Broadcasting System in 1993 and would use new digital effect software to produce heavily advance special effects for the time and tell the story of a digital superhero i.e the titular Gridman. While Gridman would begin airing, across the globe another new show produced by Tsuburaya would begin to take form. The show we would come to know as Ultraman: The Ultimate Hero a.k.a Ultraman Powered.

Seeing where America was the place Ultraman Great first found success and was still fresh in people’s mind, Tsuburaya wanted to hit the American market while the iron was hot and make it big. Within in early 1992 creators on the Japanese side began to work on concepts for this new series. Miike Toshiro, Mahiro Maeda, and Shinji Higuchi were called in to begin developing concept art and design the monsters and technology of Powered, members of the yet to be established Gonzo Studios (Most likely brought in by Mahiro Maeda) were also called in to assist with design work, designers like Steve Wang were brought in to give opinions and pitches for the design of the new Ultra, and screenplays had started to be written by Ito Kazunori and Hiroshi Yamaguchi. While they worked, the executives at Tsuburaya began to brave the international waters to find a partner to help them make an American show. Tsuburaya’s ambitions haven’t been as high as this for a long time.

It is on the other side of the Pacific the problems would lie, all throughout the product. While the Japanese side of production was hard at work trying to make the best feeling and looking show for America, Tsuburaya found their business partner. Major Havoc Studios. So, what is Major Havoc Studios? Who made up Major Havoc Studios? Where did Major Havoc Studios come from? Well the answer for all of these questions is almost one hundred percent, an “I don’t know”. Major Havoc Studios from what I’ve been able to gather was a small production/film studio made sometime shortly before Ultraman: The Ultimate Hero came into existence. The studio also seemed to have been comprised of or had a sizable number of Japanese Americans attached to it. There is no specific date when it came into existence or other works they contributed on outside of Ultraman: The Ultimate Hero. There is a chance that Ultraman Powered was their first major production. As far as I know, it was a studio of nobodies with nothing to back it up and it was perhaps one of the worst business partners Tsuburaya could’ve chosen to take on the product. That point will be restated and made abundantly clear as we go deeper into the project.

Even before the series was given the green light, issues regarding communication began. All throughout negotiations between Major Havoc and Tsuburaya, there was strife and contention. Whether it was Tsuburaya questioning which resources were truly necessary for the shows production or Major Havoc’s consistent push to raise the budget even higher than it already was, or the general problems that come with communicating across the ocean at the time, there were issues all over. Tsuburaya wasn’t experienced in making shows in American and Major Havoc wanted to contribute as little as they possibly could in funding the project. After a few months of debate, the two studios finally came to an agreement on the budget (which despite King Wilder’s insistence, was higher than Ultraman: Towards The Future, by another 12,000,000 minimum), a set year and a half for production, and a set agreement of conditions that had to be met. It’s important to know for the future of this post, every single thing that happened along the production was out of Tsuburaya’s pocket and out of Tsuburaya’s control. Major Havoc seemingly did not contribute financially to Ultraman Powered, in fact, there seems to be great cases of budget mismanagement while working on the show too. Executives from Major Havoc even used funds and income that was supposed to be for Ultraman Powered, to go on vacation locations such as Hawaii and Last Vegas. And these were the people in charge of the production and all decisions regarding the show. People that were more concerned with having fun with their money, than putting it into their work.

To begin, we might as well talk about the men and women who would be creating the show. The directors, editors, writers, and all other important production staff members needed to make the show function. Them, like Major Havoc in itself, were seemingly a bunch of nobodies. People with extremely little experience to no experience in the field. Some members of the production staff have even admitted to it being their first official job in the field. Those who did have experience worked on products like Cannibal Woman of The Avocado Jungle of Death, Night Game, Bikini Carwash Company 2, Slave Girls From Beyond Infinity, Trolls, Underworld, Robot Apocalypse, Sorority House Massacre 2, and countless other B-grade horror movies, exploitation films, and countless other schlock. It was a mix of people with no experience or the wildest kind of experience and both sides had no standing ground in the genre/type of show they were working on. The most accredited people on the staff at the time of production were the two cinematographers, one of which worked on Terminator 2: Judgement Day. Outside of those two, no one else had anything to write home about.

Due to how shorthanded Major Havoc was, many people had to play multiple roles in the production. People could be sharing duties as an editor, director, actor, and writer all at the same time. People and resources were thrown about all over and despite Tsuburaya’s funding, the budget was still slim. The chaos didn’t end there. Things also always seemed to be done on a rather short time frame and work always seemed to have to be done at a rapid pace. Suit filming was done in four weeks flat, scripts were rewritten from the JP source material in seven to ten days at most, and who they could get to work on what days were always confused. Many members of the crew had to do an array of odd jobs to help production go down smoother. Whether it was having to drive the props around to where they needed to be filmed or working as a security guard and keeping on eye on the warehouse overnight because they couldn’t afford to hire one. Some people even used Major Havoc’s office as a place of residence during production. A consistent feeling of “We don’t have a clear idea what we are doing” laid over the production.

Things felt like they were being constantly rushed, resources may or may not have been properly used, and the people were scattered. This, of course, led to some interesting hiccups in production. Two of the more infamous hiccups are one where the set builders joking said they would build the buildings that would be used in giant monster fights out of cardboard to play up the camp angle. However, when the joke reached the people over at Tsuburaya Productions, they did not know it was a joke. Immediately, they sent over experienced model builders to construct sets for them to use. Due to time and budget constraints they couldn’t stay over for long or construct too many sets. This joke caused the show to be held back even more and took away from the already meager budget. So with these new sets, you would think they would use them as much and as often as possible. They used them to some extent, yet most of the filming continued to take place in random outdoor settings and in a parking lot because Major Havoc’s limited studio space made it hard to film.

One of the most famous incidents that displays poor communication, poor timing, and how scattered the production was, is one that I like to refer to as “Red King of The Highway”. In which the staff had to deal with the sudden need to transport their other Red King suit. You see, usually to transport the suits and other assorted props the production staff had a large truck to bring what they needed from point A to point B. What happened that day was that the production staff had already brought everything they thought they needed to the filming site, but later that day the people at the storage warehouse got a call saying they needed the second Red King suit. Due to the limited time frame they had to work under, they couldn’t bring the truck all the way back to the warehouse and back. So to transport the Red King suit, they had to stuff it in the back of a Honda Civic and drive it somewhere around four miles down the highway. THAT IS THE STORY I USED TO SAY! But according to Lynette Eklund, who actually worked on the show and who actually drove this Red King to the shoot that day in her own car, she never took it on the highway. She did, however, take the suit to a 7/11 on the way to the shoot and had to awkwardly park with it sticking out still as she grabbed some stuff they needed on set that day. Eventually, it made its way there and the suit would then proceed to be thrown down a cliff.

All sorts of chaos happened during the production of Powered. They made specialized defense force cars they deemed too ugly to use so they just proceeded to rent jeeps for the rest of the show. The studio space was limited and the storage space was poor. Some constructed sets would greatly attract heat making it hard to film in them for long periods of time. The only real thing going for this production was how close by everything was to each other. Including the costume workshop.

Now perhaps the suits are the most infamous aspect of Ultraman: The Ultimate Hero. I feel like most Ultra fans have heard that the suits were fragile. However, the issues go deeper than that. Let us start with the Ultraman Powered suit in itself. The suit was made by industry professionals who worked on films like Batman Returns, Predator 2, Star Trek 6, and Edward Scissorhands to name a few. Their intent was to make a skintight suit, one that would be sleek and cool and appeal to people looking for sharper aesthetic. The suit would be made out of a thin layer of rubber foam, followed by a dense layer of skintight latex, with over an inch and a half of rubber foam over it, and finally clay for additional detail work. It was then given an attachable mask made out of fiberglass and had exposed wiring in it.

They succeeded in their goal of making a sharp, skintight, modern suit. Though this suit would have multiple issues. It was hard to move around in, cut off blood circulation, was hard to breathe in, got hot extremely quickly, and let us not forget was still very fragile. All 13 Ultraman Powered suits were built like this. There was also the potential dangers of having a mask made out of fiberglass with exposed wiring in it. There was the chance the wiring could burn the suit actors face or set fire to the mask. The Powered suit had to be given tubes and a special vest filled with ice to allow the suit actor to breathe easier, lower the risk of heat stroke, and pad out the suit. In some shots, you can see the tubes push against the suit because it was so tight.

It wasn’t the Powered suit alone that had issues. Take for example the Dada suit, which was too tight around the legs and prevented the suit actor from freely moving around and cut off blood circulation. The head of the Dada suit was also too heavy and brought strain the suit actors shoulders and caused further balance issues. There were rumors that they had to put the suit actor in the Dada suit on a swivel to simulate movement. The Red King suits were filled with mechanisms that made it rather heavy and caused strain on the wearer similar to Dada’s head. The suits were also painted with aluminum paint, which is known for being rather flammable. Putting suits such as Pestar, Zambolar, and Powered at risk during scenes that called for more pyrotechnics. Poor movement and being surrounded by fire while wearing a flammable suit is not a good mix. These suits also attracted heat rapidly and now allow to remind you, most of the show was filmed outside or in a parking lot in the L.A heat.

Thankfully, all of the filming for these suit shots were done on a rather quick time scale and all under four weeks. So the suit actors weren’t at risk for too long. The fights were also done in a slow, careful manner not just because of the dangers of the suits and their fragility, but to meet with American TV censorship laws and how much danger and action they could put into a live action show of this manner. Nothing too graphic or violent was to be used if it wanted to meet an for all ages content rating. So no slicing and dicing of kaijus, no permanent injuries, no strong punches, kicks, or so on were allowed. Light grappling and pushing were pushed forward. This also meant that the scripts which already had gone through rewrites had to be changed once more to help stay within the rating.

Things were done in constant crunch time, resources were low and scattered, Major Havoc rarely ever footed the bill, management was all over the place, the suits were dangerous, and the show was being filmed in a parking lot. You may wonder “where is Tsuburaya in all of this?”, well, they couldn’t really get involved in the show’s production. Due to the contract for the show, Tsuburaya couldn’t have a large hand in the production of the show outside of some small help such as the previously mentioned set construction. They could check and make sure things seemed to be on the right track, but they couldn’t get on the set themselves and get into the mix.

This came as a disappointment to both the workers at Tsuburaya that helped plan out Ultraman: The Ultimate Hero and the American production cast. The American staff did go on to say how they wish that Tsuburaya could’ve assisted with the show’s production more than they had. They felt that Tsuburaya’s input and experience would’ve made the process go along much smoother.

However, in the end, it got finished. It got finished and since it got finished we must ask why it was not brought to air. The answer is rather simple; it was too expensive. To air the show in America they had to pay royalties for every single actor that appeared no matter how minor of a role they played. That was viewed as too pricey for Tsuburaya and they backed out; preferring to air the show in Asia where they only had to pay the main cast for their contributions.

This is where we get to the biggest short term effect on Tsupro by Ultraman Powered and that is the cost of the show. In addition to footing the budget for the show by themselves, Tsuburaya also got dumped with all other fees for Ultraman: The Ultimate Hero. Union fees, debt gathered by the show, paying the actors, paying the crew that was under the employment of Major Havoc; all of which had to be covered by Tsupro. Tsuburaya was also having to pay for producing Gridman as well as having the cover the attempt for mass marketing of Powered at the same time. Ultraman Powered, similar to Great, was planned to have a whole entire toyline (that was already in production in Asia) and also had a video game. That videogame being Ultraman Powered, for the 3DO made by Bandai. The toyline in Asia did not gain great success, the toyline never reached America, and the game when released was not a big success. Powered, effectively bled Tsupro of its cash.

Due to this many things were canceled, such as Gridman Sigma (however it did get to live on in the form of a short series in a TV-Kun back in 1994) and the planned Hong Kong Ultra series and productions were halted. The Powered gamble blew up in Tsupro’s face. From there we all know the direction the company took and how they tried to make up for losses and bring back Ultra once more through Ultraman Neos.  

So, where does Ultraman Powered stand now? Well, in Tsuburaya’s eyes it another installment of their Ultra series. Powered was one of the first new Ultras Japan had seen in over a decade and gained a surprisingly sizable fanbase. He was popular enough to put on merch, throw into stage shows, and even have direct to video content. Heck, he thankfully even got a whole new suit when he got to Japan. Powered had a blu-ray release of his series in recent years that have seemed to sell rather nicely. He is fondly remembered as an Ultra for a generation and one that helped Tsuburaya regain a foothold and face in Japanese television. Despite the short term losses of his show Powered ended up helping.

However, one may find themselves wondering what would’ve happened if Powered was a success. Would there be a Powered season 2? Would there be Gridman Sigma? Would the Hong Kong Ultra series be success and Tsuburaya would’ve continued to make shows for completely new foreign environments? Would Ultraman Tiga exist? How long would it have been until Tsuburaya Productions fully returned to Japan to make new Ultra Shows? Who is to say? I personally feel that if Powered succeeded in the way Tsuburaya hoped, the future of the series would have been changed forever. But then again, who is to say?

While I may not be the biggest fan of his show, I love the Ultra in himself and his host Kai. I hope to see them return to the series one day. I also hope that everyone remembers the story of Ultraman Powered’s production, for there isn’t one quite like it in all of Tokusatsu.

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Sources

• https://vantagepointinterviews.com/2018/08/03/remembering-ultraman-the-ultimate-hero-producer-julie-avola-on-bringing-japans-greatest-hero-stateside/
• https://vantagepointinterviews.com/2018/08/03/making-godzilla-and-ultraman-bruce-fuller-on-recreating-japans-greatest-sci-fi-icons/
• https://vantagepointinterviews.com/2018/07/01/how-to-make-ultraman-kevin-hudson-on-his-experience-creating-ultraman-the-ultimate-hero/
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• https://dic.nicovideo.jp/a/%E3%82%A6%E3%83%AB%E3%83%88%E3%83%A9%E3%83%9E%E3%83%B3%E3%83%91%E3%83%AF%E3%83%BC%E3%83%89
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