Hello and welcome, Ultraman Connection readers! It’s that time of year again! If you’ve been following us already, you probably know that we dedicate ourselves to bringing you the latest Ultraman news, events and insight across the franchise. Now with the debut of the new series, Ultraman Omega, we’ll break down each episode every week, talk about some key points of the show, and eagerly gush over our favorite Giants of Light punching the snot out of kaiju and aliens in new and exciting ways.
That’s no exaggeration either, the first two minutes of this week’s premiere featured one of the most impressive setpieces I can remember from recent series. There’s no exposition, or dialogue given to the audience to explain what these terrifying bug aliens are, what kind of huge weapons platform they’re infesting, or why Ultraman Omega was fighting so desperately to try and destroy it. All I know personally is that it looked really cool.
Omega doesn’t emerge from the battle unscathed, despite landing what seems like a serious blow into the mysterious satellite’s core. He’s hit by a retaliating blast of energy, and falls from space to the earth’s surface as a bright meteor.
This cold open brings us to the other hero introduced this week, who most certainly would have been the main protagonist and Ultraman hero himself in any other series within the franchise.
Just like the previous scene, we don’t get explicit exposition about Kosei Hoshimi or his background. I appreciated that we can infer a lot from the audience’s perspective regardless, watching him going around on a normal day – normal, that is, until an alien literally breaks into his apartment and steals his lunch. “Apartment” might be a stretch though, Kosei appears to be living out of the same warehouse where he works. We see his various knick-knacks and more personal home furnishings scattered among shelves of inventory boxes, control switches, and workplace safety posters.
In other words, he seems to have landed on some hard times, and is probably doing his best to make ends meet in his life, with little room for his own goals or passions. This also leaves little room to accommodate an amnesiac alien following him around, but Omega’s arrival is just the thing to shake him out of his ordinary life into something bigger.
Kosei at first gets dragged into circumstances by simple inconvenience, after Omega literally runs off with his phone. However, the pair quickly find themselves in the middle of the disastrous aftermath of an unexpected Kaiju attack within the city. The citizens don’t even have the word for the giant creature that attacked, this appears to be a world that has no rumors or legends of “Kaiju”, and everyone is completely taken by shock and disbelief.
It’s important to note that neither Kosei or Omega had any real reason to stay at this point. Kosei had his phone back, he could have walked back home and forgotten about the strange events of the day. Omega doesn’t seem to have anywhere else to go. However, both of them stick around, drawn by a mutual impulse to do something to help. The result of their actions here informs the audience about their characters better than any explicit description in a biography – or my article here – could summarize.
Kosei, as he describes himself, just can’t bear to leave people behind who need help. He only thinks for a second, then takes it on himself to help a lost girl find her mom, and then goes out to help them again after the Kaiju, named Graim, attacks the city a short time later. I mentioned that he would be the main Ultraman hero in a different show, and that’s the perfect reason to illustrate my claim. Goodness knows the number of times I have joked about Ultraman protagonists getting themselves killed in Kaiju attacks by trying to rescue someone, only to be revived by receiving the power to fight as Ultraman. It’s almost a prerequisite for the job!
But Kosei notably does not die, and is not the character who has the power to fight as Ultraman. That would be Omega’s job, although up to this point he didn’t know that, much less remember his own name. After wandering around in Kosei’s apartment, observing these strange aliens called “humans”, and wondering vaguely why he doesn’t seem to be able to fly, Omega finally realizes both his identity and his mission at the end of the episode.
That realization didn’t come out of the blue, his memory was first jogged by recognizing something familiar on this planet, something he connected with and understood better than his own name. It was Kosei’s kindness and his courage which inspired Omega, his willingness to put himself in danger to save others – even to try and save Omega, despite the fact that he just ransacked his apartment earlier that day!
It’s been a long time since we’ve had an alien Ultraman hero who simply was… himself, with no human host. (I think the last one who fits that description was Gai Kurenai, Ultraman Orb, almost a decade ago! Wow, I feel old now.) But you could make the argument that Omega isn’t the protagonist of the show. At the very least, he’s not the only protagonist, and Kosei’s heroism surely will continue to play a major role in the show, even if he lacks the power to transform into Ultraman himself.
This dynamic between these two characters is fascinating and quite original for the franchise. It’s a unique take on one of the oldest themes of Ultraman though, going all the way back to the original 1966 series. When Shin Hayata and Ultraman first met in a disastrous cosmic accident, neither one knew anything about the other. In that first meeting however, both recognized their mutual desire for peace, and wanted to fight to protect the planet in whatever way they could. Omega and Kosei aren’t as literally joined together, but they share that same unchanging desire to protect others, even if they don’t have the words to describe it yet.
But that’s okay, because actions always speak louder than words.
I have no idea where the show will go forward from here. On the other hand, I am confident that both of our heroes will have plenty of opportunities to show that heroic spirit in their actions as the threats against the Earth begin to ramp up. Until then, stay tuned right here at Ultraman Connection!
