Ultraman - 11/06

A section of the Mitsui Greenland amusement park is called Ultraman Land where a 50-ft Ultraman looks down protectively at attendees.

The US has Superman; Japan has Ultraman. Superman is a lonely kind of guy. He fights all his battles by himself. Ultraman has a large family and adventures with his ultra brothers, ultra mom and ultra dad. Of course, there are commercial advantages to a big happy product family, but I digress.

Superman has super powers and he can perform all kinds of amazing feats. Ultraman does one thing. He fights monsters. He doesn't have any particular powers except that he is big. He is as tall as Tokyo Tower and weighs 40,000 tons. So, hand-to-hand wrestling is usually effective. Sometimes he has to finish the monsters off with his specium ray. But most of the time he calls on his brothers for help. Superman never asks for help.

The Japanese message is that you can rely on others and work as a team to get things accomplished.

He also commutes from the planet Ultra, so that probably helps the Tokyo commuters feel better.

Ultraman had his heyday in the late 60s (Dave remembers the show!). Superman has had a few comebacks since then. I'll be ready for the Ultra-revival in the states and will figure out how to be involved in marketing ultra-spinoff products.