Okay, so, I am a ''huge'' fan of the Ultraman Series produced by Tsuburaya Productions from 1966 onwards. The fast-paced monster action and awesome battles have always captivated me.
There is one Ultra that I will always consider my favourite, and that is Father of Ultra, the supreme commander of the Space Garrison, and one of the strongest Ultras by far! I always watch the episodes he's in, just to witness his amazing power once more.
It was then that I noticed that an Ultra-Act figure of Father of Ultra had gone on sale on eBay, and so I decided to buy it. I already had a big collection of Godzilla, Gamera and Ultraman figures, so I thought that he wouldn't look out of place amongst them. I ordered the figure, and it was delivered really fast, arriving the next morning. I unboxed the figure, ready to add it to my collection in the display case, when I noticed several things that were wrong with it.
Firstly, Father of Ultra's head was his dead head, with his living head still kept in the packaging, whereas normally it should be the other way around. I swapped the two heads out, then looked for his personalised Brother's Mantle. It was wine red instead of bright red. Feeling confused, I continued to search through the box, and I found a disk! It was labelled: ''FATHER OF ULTRA 0001''. Upon closer inspection, this disk was a DVD.
I thought ''"Oh boy! A disk of classic Ultraman Episodes to watch with my new figure!"''
But I was wrong.
Oh, so very wrong.
Upon loading up the disk, I came across a menu with three characters on it, Taro, Zoffy and to my surprise, Agul! I was confused at this point, since Ultraman Agul is a Heisei Ultra, whereas Zoffy and Taro are both from the Showa era. I picked Taro, and an episode of Ultraman Taro began, the opening credits running normally.
When the episode began, Taro was sitting in a burning field with rocks everywhere. This continued for around two minutes, until he got up. He started walking for five minutes straight. I got even more scared as this happened.
Eventually, Taro came across Father of Ultra, standing with his back to the camera. I started to panic. What might Father of Ultra be doing? Was he responsible for the destruction of the land? Taro called out to Father of Ultra, and Father of Ultra spun around to face him.
The Camera faded to black.
When the camera returned, Taro had been thrown on his back, Father of Ultra looming above. He summoned his Ultra Array and used it on Taro, rupturing his eyes. A line of text flashed on the screen.
"sO mAnY pEoPlE lOvE mE. I dO nOt cArE fOr tHeM."
I tried to scream, but I couldn't. Why would Father of Ultra do this to his own son?
The menu returned, but Taro was different. His colours were greyscale, and his face was missing its eyes. He had a neutral expression on his face, and both his horns were broken. Hesitantly, I selected Zoffy.
Another episode began with Zoffy and Father of Ultra talking. I couldn't make out what was being said, as the audio quality was non-existent. Father of Ultra said something that Zoffy didn't like, and the two got into a fight. Zoffy was repeatedly punched in the face, until his face was bruised. One of his eyes went dark, and he was bleeding from the mouth. Father of Ultra stood upright, and fired his Father Shot at Zoffy, destroying his lower body and leaving the esteemed Ultra writhing in pain on the ground.
"yOu nEvEr mEaNt aNyThInG tO mE. aCcEpT it.
I was booted back to the menu again, and this time, Zoffy's eyes were both dark, and the bottom half of his torso was missing. I started to cry. Why was Father of Ultra doing this? I had no choice. Not a single part of my body besides my fingers could move. With a heavy heart, I selected Agul.
Another episode began, this time with Agul and Father of Ultra fighting. Agul was strong, and fired off a multitude of beams at Father of Ultra, but all of them missed. Afterwards, the Camera cut to what looked like a beach, with Agul lying on the ground. He got up, looked around, and to my shock, looked at the camera. His body language indicated that he was frightened about something. He turned to look off into the distance, and started to run along the beach. For a while, he looked almost relieved, peaceful, in fact. He flew through the air, close to the ground for what felt like an hour.
Eventually, the sand started to turn red, and the bloody heads of various Ultras littered the ground. Agul looked terrified, and so did I. Yet another piece of text rolled across the screen as he erratically tried to fly faster and faster:
gO oN. rUn. yOu pAtHeTiC wAsTe oF mAtTeR. yOu wIlL uLtImAtElY fAiL.
hAhAhA
All of a Sudden, Father of Ultra appeared in front of Agul. His eyes were black and bleeding, and his cape was torn and bloody. Agul once again tried to fight Father of Ultra, punching and kicking him over and over again, but the demonic Ultra simply took the blows as if they never happened! Father of Ultra then slammed Agul into the ground, and tore out his colour timer, leaving the Ultra close to death. Finally, Father of Ultra slammed his hand against Agul's neck, and ripped off his head, blood going everywhere accompanied by the grinding of flesh and the snapping of countless bones.
With Agul more than dead, the menu reappeared. There was a new option. All of Agul's face was a bloody mess, and his eyes were missing. His head hung limp, blood spurting from his ruined neck. The fourth option showed Mother of Ultra, Father of Ultra's beloved wife. I had no choice but to choose the option.
The episode began with Mother of Ultra locked in a room, crying. She looked as if she had been this way for hours. Wind rippled the curtains which hung alongside an open window, and chains held the Ultrawoman in place. At once, a pair of black eyes opened in the darkness, and a pair of horns could faintly be seen. Mother of Ultra bolted around in shock, as Father of Ultra tore out of the darkness like something which could only have crawled from the very depths of hell itself. One final line of text appeared on the bottom of the screen, amidst a harsh, pained female scream, followed by sobbing and coughing.
I nEvEr lOvEd yOu. yOu cAn gO aNd bUrN lIkE aLl tHe oThErS. nOw, lEt mE sAtIsFy mY hUnGeR...
Mother of Ultra screamed in terror again, and the sounds of flesh being chewed could be heard.
The footage reappeared, except all five Ultras were in a scene together. Mother of Ultra looked as if she had been skinned alive, and lay on the ground, slowly writhing in pain as her struggles grew ever weaker. Zoffy was in a corner of the room, blood gushing from the end of his mangled torso, with a shocked expression on his face. Taro's eyes were bleeding through stitches, and his horns had been torn off, blood pouring from their stumps. Agul's head was missing, his lifeless corpse tossed into the center of the room. And, as for Father of Ultra, he was standing there, with his right foot on top of Agul's spine. Taro's horns were hung around his neck, and he held Agul's head in his right hand. He was wearing Mother of Ultra's hands like gloves, and had various organs (most likely the abdominal organs of Zoffy and the brain of Agul) impaled on his horns, skewered like some perverse barbecue dish. He began to speak, and in that moment, I howled with a sound that probably woke my neighbours. I didn't care.
"oH I hAvE dOnE it
tHeY'rE aLl dEaD
hAhAhA
dO yOu wAnT tO jOiN mE?"
"NO! PLEASE, NO!" I screamed in response.
"wHy
iT wOn'T hUrT
tOo bAd
i'M cOmInG fOr yOu"
The DVD froze. I could hear sparks coming out of the back of my television, and so (mercifully) I got up to try and turn the television off. I heard a noise, similar to someone breathing behind me. and so I turned around. Something appeared in front of me that made my blood run cold, and I screamed at the top of my lungs.
There, standing right in front of me, was the Ultra Act Father of Ultra figure. Blood was running down from its eyes, and it had a terrible, vicious smile. I screamed in horror, and I ran out of the room as fast as I could. But, at the top of the stairs, a misplaced dowel rod lay. I slipped on it, and fell down the stairs, fracturing my ribcage and my left femur.
As I lay there, bruised and broken, I fell into a series of nightmares that I couldn't escape. It went on for days.
It's been three weeks since I saw that god-forsaken disk. I'm slowly recovering, but I'll still never forget those terrible horns and those dark, dead eyes.