more on ultraman 1966 us dvd release

[Dr Kain]

[August]

That's "if" and that "if" is a lie. TPC has spent ridiculous amounts of money trying to break into the US market, including producing two shows with caucasian actors, which amounted to nothing. Here's a general breakdown of their efforts to break into the US market:

Since they sold ULTRA Q and ULTRAMAN to the US, TPC has offered all of its shows for licensing a trade shows for the last 30+ years. No one really bites. ULTRA Q never saw the light of day because of television stations demanding color programming by the mid-1960s. In those days, TPC had an agent in Los Angeles, Bernard Shulman -- the same Bernard Shulman who brokered the deal with Toho for GODZILLA RAIDS AGAIN in 1955. He ran ads in Variety offering the series as TPC's US rep in the 1960s and early 1980s, until he retired.

In 1975, Noboru Tsuburaya established Tsuburaya-Hawaii Inc. to bring the Ultra Series to the US. Why Hawaii? Because there was a huge boom in Toku Hero shows from the runaway success of KIKAIDA. From Hawaii, they would take the series to the West Coast and beyond.

TPC spent his own money to dub ULTRA SEVEN and get it on the local NBC affiliate at the time, KHON-TV 4. Noboru also produced elaborate live ULTRA SEVEN shows at the Waikiki Shell and also imported merchandizing. The show failed to take away the audience weened on KIKAIDA, to justify investing more to adapt other entries in the Ultra Series into English. Tsuburaya-Hawaii closed up shop by 1977.

Several years later, Turner Broadcasting Services bought the Hawaiian version of ULTRA SEVEN in 1985 (approximately); but the series was apparently shelved because, reportedly, someone at TBS was not pleased with the English production. New post-production on the series was farmed out to Cinar in Canada, and ironically, the resulting dub was considered awful, and the series was shelved until 1993. ULTRA SEVEN didn't do much to encourage anything beyond simplying running a show Turner had forgotten they had.

In the 1990s, TPC set up Ultracom Inc. in LA, and again, they couldn't give the shows away. Literally. Ultracom Inc. was able to sell ULTRAMAN: TOWARDS THE FUTURE, which wasn't able to generate much interest -- even with a merchandizing campaign behind it. They arranged the production of ULTRAMAN: THE ULTIMATE HERO -- and even during the initial POWER RANGERS craze, there was not a single taker in the US. Syndicators and Network Buyers weren't interested.

Ultracom even put together a LEGENDS OF ULTRAMAN package, featuring episodes of ULTRAMAN through ULTRAMAN 80, but no one was interested. In the mid-1990s, TPC offered the Sci-Fi Channel the chance to run the original ULTRAMAN, gratis, just to get the series on the air -- and they were turned down. It seemed as though no one wanted ULTRAMAN, although DIC bought and Sabanized GRIDMAN. In the wake of JURASSIC PARK they managed to sell DINOSAUR TASK FORCE: KOSEIDON and DINOSAUR CATCHERS: BORNFREE, but the US versions never saw the light of day.

But what about Ultraman? Part of the problem was that TPC would not allow their shows to be Sabanized, the Japanese actors could not be cut out and replaced with US footage, and all the effects scenes had to stay;which may have scared off potential buyers. But, I'm glad they stuck to their guns -- otherwise we'd be lamenting that right now.

After the passing of Noboru Tsuburaya, whose mission was to spread Ultraman throughout the world (especially North America), TPC decided that they would pack up their US offices and try reviving the franchise in Japan. The result was ULTRAMAN TIGA, which spawned a new series of shows. But, they were still more than happy to sell their properties to buyers in the US. Unfortunately, after the failure of 4Kids' version of ULTRAMAN TIGA, TPC didn't think that anyone in the States was interested in anything beyond the first series (although they did license the TIGA & DYNA and GAIA films to Image Entertainment), and TIGA's failure did indeed keep other distributors away.

TPC recently opened a new US office, to help broker their catalogue in the US and other associated objectives, but with the whole Chaiyo ordeal flaring up, only time will tell what's going to happen next...

[RobD]

Awesome post August. Very informative. Thanks!

[August]

Thanks; that means a lot. In re-reading it, I did some editing to clarify the details -- it just seems that outside of United Artists Television, not too many television distribution companies have been interested in the Ultraman franchise. I guess they have no confidence in a giant scuba-suited superhero fighting giant foam and latex monsters... that sounds weird.

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[Dr Kain]

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[Gigan71]

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[August]

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