Monster Zero x SciFi Japan - Archive Only

It seems the Shadow knows more than just what evil lurks in the hearts of men!

I like to forget the second season of the Filmation cartoon even existed. But the first season was indeed fairly close to the original comic strip, aside from some of the character designs.

The biggest problem I had with the 1980 movie was casting; rather than getting someone who could actually act, they just settled on someone who only looked the part for Flash, and I think that hurt the movie some.

The more recent cartoon series and the live action series on the Sci-Fi Channel changed things too much and therefore suck. Making Flash a teenager who rides a hover board (ripping off Back to the Future Part II right there....) and Ming a straight up lizard man in the cartoon was a severely bad idea, and there are SO many things wrong with the live action series:

1. Making Flash a Soccer star who lives with his mom = horrible decision. Changing him from a Football player to a Soccer player might help appeal to younger viewers slightly and may help syndicate it internationally, but I'd wager that most Americans don't give a damn about Soccer, so him being a Soccer star instead of a Football star would actually make him less popular in his own country.

2. I understand the desire to be PC (*spits on being PC*) and not offend orientals, but making Ming look like an evil CEO who just happens to look like an almost ideal Aryan was a tremendously bad idea. Why not take a page from the last cartoon...sort of....and make Ming part lizard? All they'd have to do is slap some scales on him (just a few at the temples and on his neck and hands), maybe toss in some contact lenses, and alter his skin color in post-production.

I could go on about why the live action series sucks, but I'll stop right there.

Flash was originally a polo player -- a team sport where two teams are mounted on horses and use to hit a 3 1/4 inch to 4 1/2 inch ball into the other team's goal using mallets.

Here's the wiki:


Kidnicky, you seem to be saying villains [in any medium] can not be Asian or Asian-looking -- does that mean villains can only be so called "white" or fictional non-human?

A recent B.P.R.D. (Hellboy spin-off) issue did a play on the whole evil-Chinaman type character when it turned out that the demonic Fu Manchu-esque guy who's been orchestrating some bad stuff (and was nemesis to pulp hero Lobster Johnson back in the day) was in fact a white guy!

I didn't twist what you said around, I was seeking clarification as your words could be misread.

Could you clarify why you think there is something wrong with the Ming the Merciless? Why should the character be changed [or even abandoned]?


Also, a hypothetical question for you. One day a large group of Germans & German-descent American's get together because they are frustrated with Lex Luthor being a villain. This what-if group calls Luthor's constant depiction as a villain embarrassing and xenophobic [as you described the Ming the Merciless] because the vast majority of German & German-descent Americans are not villainous. Would you consider the same sorts changes be made to Lex Luthor necessry that you appear {and admittedly you haven't specified any yet} to be advocating for Ming the Merciless, why or why not?

I'm with King_Ghidorah -- for a great Flash Gordon movie they need to go back to the source, what Alex Raymond did originally.

For a modern movie comparison [in regards to the "feel"/"flavor" of a good new Flash Gordon movie] think Star Wars or Indiana Jones.

Flash Gordon is great because of what it is already, not because of what someone thinks they can make it into.

From AICN:

From Sci Fi Wire: