[Androzani84]

Androzani84 Watches Gridknight Fight, Part 1

Full disclosure, I have no permission to be doing this here, but I felt I’d keep this thread alive during the breaks between posts with something that’s probably not on the docket to watch, since the only subs for it are in Italian (I myself am watching with hose subs turned off, meaning I had to watch on my computer, hence the low quality of these screenshots.



Like the old Ultra Fight series this miniseries homages, this is filmed entirely on location in a quarry, with no attempt to make the fighters look like giants (meaning that this is one huge quarry), and there’s a guy doing wrestling style announcements that describe everything that happens (in this case, Hiroshi Kamiya, the voice of Juuga in Dynazenon proper).



The fight in this part is between Gridknight and Dynazenon, both played by the suits used for their public appearances. And while Knight pulls off looking good in live action quite well, Dynazenon suffers from the lack of budget to use his various guns (not even the Don’t-Know-The-Name Beam) and the fact that since Tsuburaya have less experience making humanoid toy based mecha costumes than Bandai, his hands are in permanent “karate chop action mode” and he’s stuck weakly swinging them to simulate fighting.

But enough griping, let’s look at something this mini does better than its inspiration.



Specifically, we get the illusion of scale thanks to the presence of Nidaime, who is played by an uncredited actress always filmed at angles her full face can never be seen and the VA from the anime can be dubbed over. And reiterating my point that the narrator won’t shut the hell up, he repeats her rating of the apparent training fight 1 second after she says it (I sadly don’t know enough to say anything other than that it was positive feedback).



And pulling from the modern Ultra Galaxy Fight series, there is a thin plot connecting the episodes, as Alexis Kerib makes his appearance. While I applaud them for giving him the Cyberman mouth to indicate him vocalising, the divide between the rubber head and regular looking cape is very distracting.



Knight rushes in to fight him, leaving Dynazenon just standing there (and that’s actually the last time we see the whole robot in this mini). And someone realised that there needed to be some stakes here, so Knight looks to Nidaime for support.



Coming to the conclusion that Kerib has kidnapped her, Knight engages him in battle… and despite being in his non-action form, Kerib still whoops his ass, ending the first part.



I’d cover the rest, since these are only 3 minutes each, but part three has some spoilers for episodes of Dynazenon not covered here, so I’m doing it in segments. To be continued… when I think of doing the next one.