Eiji Tsuburaya

I believe two years ago at a Serling Fest event, we were having some beverages and I shared that the news had broken that GFAN, which we had both been readers of for years and years, had announced this was the final year.

And so one of the projects I was working on recently was I got an article in the final edition of GFAN talking about the connections between Twilight Zone and And Kaiju, because I'm really interested in the overlap of the Venn diagrams, right? Like where does Twilight Zone and Kaiju, where does superheroes and science fiction all intersect? So that piece is sort of about Rod Serling and Eiji Tsuburaya's 66 Tokusatsu show that was based on the Twilight Zone.

It's called Ultra Q.

So that piece came out.

So what's up with Baragon? I mean, where does he come from? What's the story on him? Like, where does he? So, you know,

Tsuburaya, the special effects director, was at the top of his game in what this is called the Kaiju Eiga.

And the art of suit acting, giant monsters in suits, it's called tokusatsu.

So they're at the top of their game, and it's very popular in Japan and across the world.

Um, but yeah, the three shredders, you had the Orochi scene, you know, the Mysterians, you had Moguera.

So, um, uh, and, and those are all Toho and, you know, you have Tsuburaya and his, his guys, um, who are pros, uh, but, um, uh, When you compare the ox and the spider to those, they definitely leave a lot wanting.

The spider is pretty clumsy.

It's not Kumonga or anything like that.

Um, and I, I, but I, I think, um, you know, Dye really didn't have a, a proper big special effects department at the time, like, you know, Toho did.

So I, I think these creatures are kind of them, like, you know, they're, they're doing the learning curve of, of kind of getting there.

I don't know that they, they, they, uh, ever quite topped, you know, Tsuburaya's stuff.

Yeah, the

He engineered an entire genre by combining a prehistoric reptile design with the raw power of nuclear fallout.

The special effects team, led by Eiji Tsuburaya, pioneered Suitmation, where a stunt performer in a full-bodied suit interacted with miniature sets to bring Godzilla to life.

Honda's script was deliberately political.

He used the monster as an allegory for unchecked technological ambition.

And Jun Fukuda was originally supposed to do this movie, but he was also reassigned to a different movie.

Exterior shots were filmed at the Bank of Japan headquarters and the National Diet Library, which were two locations very central in the Anpo protest's Honda and Subaru intentionally dialed back the effects in order to focus on the narrative.

Subaru used dry ice, rotoscoping, superimposed fog, and a rubber costume to accomplish the vapor effects.

So we'll talk about how that went over.

Several music cues from this film would be reused in Ultra Q and Ultraman, which the composer of this film, Kunio Miyauchi, also worked on Ultra Q and Ultraman.

There it was.

The trailer for The Human Vapor.

All right, cast and crew, this was directed by, you guessed it, Ishiro Honda, written by Takashi Kimura, with story by John Meredith Lucas, music by Kunio Miyauchi, effects by Eiji Tsuburaya, and starring Yoshio Tsuchiya, Keru Yashigusa, Tatsuya Mihashi, and Keiko Sata.

But this is a movie that was directed by Ishiro Honda.

This has effects by Eiji Tsuburaya, effects including things like, you know, the suitimation.

This is a pioneering film for the man in suit method of giant monster movies.

An incredible score by Akira Fukube.

All of them might be podcast-worthy, Jimmy.

Now, kaiju lovers, the special effects were directed by Supro veteran Kazuo Sagawa, who was a student of Eiji Tsuburaya dating back to 1959.

He was a cameraman and cinematographer on many Supro productions in the 1960s until he became a special effects supervisor in 1971 on Return of Ultraman, with a long career spanning many Ultra Series and even a few stints for Toei with Battle Fever J, 1979, and Denshi Sentai Denziman, 1980.

The last project he worked on was 2001's Ultraman Cosmos The First Contact.

Well, Andrew, you ready for some cast and crew? Sure.

All right, well, this was directed by Jun Fukuda, written by our old friend Shinichi Sekizawa, effects by Eiji Tsuburaya, music by Shigeru Ikino, and starring Koji Tsuruta, Yumi Shirakawa, Yoshio Tsuchiya, and Tadeo Nakamaru.

And the plot summary is more or less as follows.

After a murder at a haunted cave attraction, reporter Kirioka and the police follow the clues to a military-themed cabaret with ties to a smuggling operation run by Onishi.

That incident made Japanese society feel the invisible hand of nuclear power.

Ishiro Honda was already a seasoned director when he teamed with Eiji Tsuburaya to create Godzilla in 1954.

He framed the monster as a mutated creature awakened by test site radiation, not just for spectacle, but as a warning.

The film premiered in Nagoya on October 27th and quickly became Japan's biggest box office hit.

So I really wanted to like this show, but it's, you know, it's not Toei.

And it's not Tsuburaya.

It's its own thing, and that's not a bad thing.

The effects are great, but the story is just, it doesn't move very quickly.