There’s always been a part of the Utraman franchise which I find compelling across many different series: its ability to weigh matters on both a very large cosmic scale, and a very small personal scale at the same time. I discussed this concept a lot when recapping Ultraman Decker a couple years ago (surprising how time flies…) because the setting of that series was deliberately isolated on a smaller scale. The Earth was cut off from the rest of the universe from the start of the show, but we still saw hints of it, the remnants of wars beyond the Earth and the consequences of those battles within our little part of space.
Ultraman Arc does not begin with an alien barrier erected around the planet. Despite that, the first half of the show continually dropped its own hints about the universe beyond the geographical limits of Hoshimoto City. There was Arc himself, the mystery of his arrival and the eruption of Kaiju attacks which seemed to follow. There were aliens like Numata, Fio and even the robotic vessel Givas, all from their own alien worlds – some of which we don’t even have a name for. The focus of these earlier episodes may have been on Yuma Hize and his friends, but the conflict of each episode often relied on their discovery of, and interactions with these unknown entities from outside the comfortable familiarity of their city.

This isn’t a new concept for Ultraman, it’s been the fundamental principle of the franchise ever since its inception in 1966. I wasn’t surprised to see these lingering mysteries take the spotlight of Arc as the second half of the show began. Instead, what shocked me the most was seeing an intergalactic civil war for the fate of an entire solar system drop out of the sky onto our main characters.
Okay, that might be too much at once. Let me explain.
…No, that’s still too much. Let me sum up.
Episode 14 begins almost exactly where we left off last week, as Shu receives new information from his supervisor, named Nibuya. I didn’t expect the Director for the Space Division of the GDF to show up playing with a soccer ball, but again that’s the least shocking swerve from this episode. Anyways, the audience and Shu both get some more insight into the “Onyx” which was mentioned in the previous episode. It’s some sort of energy source – powerful enough that Givas was searching for it as a “new moon” to bring back home – and seems to be hidden in a huge forested region outside of the city.
Before Shu gets a chance to relate this information to the rest of SKIP, he and Yuma are attacked by a mysterious, glowing tesseract. Luckily, Arc’s power whisks the duo to safety, reemerging in a…. Movie theater?

Speaking of previous Ultraman shows, last year’s Ultraman Blazar used a unique twist on the typical Ultraman-Human host dynamic. Even though Blazar and Captain Gento Hiruma were bound together, they couldn’t talk or communicate explicitly in other ways. This year, we know that Arc can communicate with Yuma, and even speak to him in certain circumstances in earlier episodes. Now we get a reason for why that communication has been so sparse – it requires an immense amount of energy from Arc.
Things must be really dire if Arc is willingly burning that amount of energy for such an elaborate exposition sequence!
Side note, I really loved that Arc chose this movie theater as the setting for his conversation with Yuma. Arc knows it’s an important place to him, with lots of warm memories attached to it. In other words, it’s a comfortable place, and I think he chose it because he wanted to soften the blow of the heavy news he was now forced to deliver. He could’ve just dumped everything onto Yuma standing on any street corner, but he took the time and effort to bring him to this theater because he cares about Yuma’s feelings. It’s a clear sign that Arc genuinely cares about him as a partner… maybe even as a friend?
Similarly, Arc uses a charmingly animated vignette to tell his story, explaining how his planet and others were threatened by a dying star… which sounds strangely familiar, right? I also think it’s ironic that Givas showed up on Earth seeking a “moon” with which to bring life to their planet, and now we have a sun which brings death to Arc’s homeworld.
The scientists and leaders of Arc’s home had a solution for this disaster however. It’s just too bad that Earth stood in the path of a wormhole designed to siphon the deadly energy away from their sun. Arc was sent to prevent the planet’s destruction, despite the orders of the scientist who was trying to save his solar system – at the cost of billions of lives elsewhere in the universe.
Even though Arc averted the total annihilation of Earth, he still regrets the outcome of that battle sixteen years ago. It wasn’t because he lost his own power in the process of sealing the wormhole created by Ze Su and defeating Monogelos, which was sent to stop him in turn. But he was unable to save Yuma’s parents, and the loss of only two human beings – beings he had no knowledge or connection to before that day – was enough of a tragedy to break his heart every day in the sixteen years afterwards.
All of this scene happens while Yuma and Arc are both sitting awkwardly in dinky little stadium chairs in an empty screening room, and I still cried my eyes out hearing the regret in his voice.

More trouble has arrived on Earth however. This mysterious figure of “Ze Su”, who originally ordered Earth’s destruction, hasn’t been deterred by Arc defeating his Kaiju or sealing the wormhole gate. This time, they’ve sent a different agent named Sweed to find the location of the seal and release it for good. Unlike the Kaiju she commands, Sweed herself appears on Earth as a human. But she carries just as much menace as a huge Kaiju, especially when she seems to effortlessly capture the location of the sealed wormhole directly out of Arc’s mind.
Seriously, it’s incredible how her little smirk of “I’ve found you!” in the theater carries such silent threats of violence. Her performance is downright chilling.

Yuma and Arc break out of her control and transform to fight, but it already seems to be too late. The Kaiju Zadime shrugs off all their attacks, then escapes from the battle through its own wormhole, buying Sweed enough time to get to the newly-uncovered “Onyx”. This scene also shows a shocking amount of emotion from Arc himself, with clear frustration and even anger at how quickly things have spiraled out of control. Even worse, this one-two punch of draining his energy to talk to Yuma, then immediately being ambushed by Sweed and her Kaiju, have exhausted all of their strength. The episode concludes with a seeming worst-case scenario – Sweed is only a heartbeat from releasing the seal of Earth’s apocalypse, and Arc and Yuma both are out cold, unable to transform to stop her at this moment.
What a cliffhanger for this week!
I saw many comments over the weekend comparing this episode to Shin Ultraman, and the similarities are undeniable. Like Ultraman in that movie, Arc is a bit of a rogue agent, and arrives on Earth to protect human lives which are otherwise insignificant in the wider scale of intergalactic conflicts. However, Arc himself is already quite human in his compassion and consideration of human perspectives in this episode. I was struck by his emotional reactions to these events which clearly demonstrated how much he cares about the Earth, and especially his erstwhile partner, Yuma.
It isn’t often we see such a dramatic pivot in Ultraman shows like this, suddenly revealing a huge cosmic conflict between other worlds and civilizations. That aspect, more than anything else, reminded me of The Ultraman, along with its dynamic between Ultraman Joneus and his partner, Choichiro Hikari. Some of my favorite parts in that series came from this imaginative, space opera-esque backdrop in its second half.
Similarly, I hope we get to see more alien characters and perspectives on this huge conflict as Arc moves into its second half… assuming the Earth will survive the events of next week in the first place. Until then, stay tuned right here to Ultraman Connection!