Playing around with UltraSeven recently and between that and Z having the ability to appear in a human-sized base form in addition to Gamma Future's shrinking ability left me wondering: how many other Ultras can fight and interact on a human level?

I'm pretty sure all Ultra have that ability. But I definitly know that Tiga,Dyna,Gaia,Agul and Nexus have it.

Tiga for sure had an episode about it. :rock:

Seriously I remember watching it as a kid and was surprised that Tiga can go human size.

Before 2009 I was wanting Ultraman to have more hunan fight scenes, but thanks to New Generation it proved why Kaiju battles are an art and I just can't praise them enough for improving the fight scenes year after year.

https://media.discordapp.net/attachm...760&height=427

Ultraman R/B Episode 17: What the heck did I just watch? I'm not saying I didn't enjoy it - bizarre, off the wall episodes are often some of the most memorable - but "Aliens throwing a halloween party only to freak when the Ultras show up and also Saki is there and is totally an alien" is a new one. And I do like how we're getting more focus on Asahi and Saki, especially the former, after it felt like she spent a long time in the background through the show's first arc. Katsu and Isa are barely in this one, other than searching for vibes! I like Dada, he's got a cool design, Pigmon is weird but kinda cute I guess, hamster-dance just reminds me of Rabbit Conductor from ToQGer, all very weird but enjoyable stuff.

Then Saki announces the world is gonna get blown up to kill this incoming monster. That is not what I expected! What a place to put that bombshell! What a way to relate Asahi's innocent expression of how to connect with people from earlier to emphasize's Saki's fundamental awkwardness with the human condition. What a way to intreupt the dog show the Minamis are always watching!

Good episode.

https://media.discordapp.net/attachm...760&height=427
Ultraman R/B Episode 18: How do we react to the horrific news last episode? A breather where we have an alien news crew trying to save their ratings, and a focus on Ushio and his love for his family. And I loved every minute. Wonderful comedy episode, if incredibly bizarre.

Ultraman R/B Episode 19: King Joe is here! Isami remembers he took that coding course in college once! And we find out (some of) Tsuru's deal! This is another good one. "Monster takes person hostage" is something we've done before in this very season, but since the stakes are entirely different (plus it's King Joe!), I'm willing to roll with it. Add to that the reveal of Mitsurugi's past, and this is a good one!

R/B Episode 20: So yesterday, it was D&D night, and once again we tried diplomacy only for it to fail and they ended up fighting us anyway despite the common enemy. I bring this us because it's exactly Katsu's situation. He wants to try to talk it out with Tsuru, figure out some way through to her, but Isami just wants to skip the middleman and get her out the way, while Tsuru herself seems... a little more off the deep end than last episode implied? Idk, maybe it's something about morphing into Thunder-Robot-Dragon, but she seemed a lot more blood-thirsty this time round than in previous episodes, where she didn't *like* the brothers, but this time she had it in for them. I'm sure all will be explained.

https://media.discordapp.net/attachm...760&height=427

Asahi is better at art than I am.

https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-_xEb00rZg...ltraman-RB.jpg

I've been avoiding talking about it because I didn't want to steal Akiba's thunder, and I ESPECIALLY didn't want to spoil them; but I've also been watching R/B -- in fact, I finished it last night and watched the movie and Ultra Galaxy Fight today. And BOY did I have a good time!

It's not exactly my favourite Ultra of what I've seen, but compared to what I'd heard about it being meh or middle of the road I loved so much of what it did. The first half of the series decided to be a meta-textual commentary on older fans' views on and reactions to Ultraman and arguably the Masked Hero genre as a whole, which. Love. A little earlier on in this thread some of you all described Katsumi and Isami as "Ultramen who don't care about Ultraman", and that so perfectly describes what I love about it. I'm not sure I need to describe what's so great about Aizen obsessively collecting Gai look-a-likes to become a warped screwed up version of Orb because of his half-remembered memories of his favourite Ultraman being cool and awesome and amazing; if you get it, you get it, and it's a great time. And then the season decides it wants to get serious at the halfway point! And despite such a sudden turn, it does it in such a way that it feels totally natural and cohesive and how the show was all along!

And how it achieves that is because... despite that new emphasis on a more higher-stakes story with legitimate emotion and feeling to it, R/B at its core is an emotional story about a dysfunctional family wrapped in comedy. The first fight in its entirety is joke after joke and gag after gag; Aizen gives Kuroto Dan a run for his money; whacky family hijinks are always present... and it all works. It just. All works. It never feels like it's going too far even when it's completely off the rails or that it's being too pandering or whatever; all the comedy just feels like a natural part of the show and a legitimate storytelling element, because... how else would you tell a story about the Makotos? Isami's an obsessive hair-trigger scientist who dives into danger at the drop of a hat; Asahi's a hyperactive schoolgirl who smiles at any and every situation; U-tan's the funniest dad with the worst fashion sense running a clothes store; and Katsumi's the only sane one of the bunch practically having to run the place. It's a wonderfully dysfunctional family that thrives on comedy, allowing them to both be entertaining and give way to some lovingly wonderful depth.

Not saying too much more to not spoil too much for Akiba (in short though: loved Asahi and Tsuru's relationship; the last few episodes adds a certain element that just makes everything better; the movie was great and episode 18 was nothing short of comedic masterpiece), but suffice it to say this was an Ultraman season that went out of its way to entertain me and surpass its expectations. I'd go as far as to say that it's my favourite Family Toku so far, and I'm so glad I took out the time to watch it.

Seeing so much high praise for R/B makes me so happy I'm just going to self-indulgently quote my review of it from way back in the show's own thread:

I think I actually agree with all of this more now than when I wrote it. I've mentioned this in this thread before, but R/B is a wonderful series that's basically a personal sleeper hit for me. I wasn't instantly, madly in love with it the way I was with Geed or X, but over time, it's sorta ended up on that same level for me.