#battle hawk

[omercifulheaves]

Battle Hawk Art by Ken Ishikawa

[shinjinrui]

[selketshaula]

バトルホーク・楯ユリカ by Shironeko Chimotarō (白ねこチモ太郎)

[tokumon]

Dokuro Kama aka Dokuro Gama from Battle Hawk

[vyntic]

Man-at-Arms & Battle Hawk

Image by Wes

[himitsusentaiblog]

What are some notable tokusatsu shows that aren't part of a franchise (like Super Sentai, Kamen Rider, Metal Hero, or Ultraman)? Shows like Kyoudai Ken Bycrosser? It's interesting to see different takes on the formula with shows not bound by series conventions.

It’s cool that you mentioned Bycrosser because the same team that worked on that did another show the year before called Nebula Mask Machine Man.

Machine Man is an alien from another solar system who has come to Earth as part of a research project visiting all of the planets orbiting Sol.  He disguises himself as a mild mannered human named Nick and gets involved with a danger prone newspaper photographer.  He decides to stay on Earth after encountering an evil organization called Tentacle lead by the wicked Professor K who seems motivated by a hatred of children.

The show draws heavy inspiration from Superman, with Nick even donning a pair of glasses to hide his identity and acting like a klutz to deflect suspicion.  Well, that is if Superman had a talking baseball robot as a sidekick and a transforming, multi-purpose vehicle.

It’s a cool mixture of American Superheroics and the tropes of Japanese tokusatsu.

A more recent example is 1996′s Choukou Senshi Changerion.

This was something of an experimental series for Toei being produced outside of their then running Super Sentai and Metal Hero series as a way to test producing a show entirely shot on video when their others were using 16mm film stock. 

The basic plot involves inter-dimensional invaders known as the DarkZide attempting to preserve themselves with stolen human life energy.  To fight this threat, a scientist has come up with a suit that can battle the invaders.  However, thanks to an accident, the suit ends up bound to the body of a slacker Private Detective who is about the world’s worst choice for a hero.

It’s a fun show but sadly, it never really caught on and had it’s planned 52 episode run truncated to 39.

There are some other great shows I can mention but won’t go into the same detail on like 1975′s Akumaizer 3 about 3 demons fighting their fellows to protect humanity.

Also from 1975 is Space Ironmen Kyodain!  This one features two robot heroes who can transform into vehicles and programmed with the personalities of a pair of kidnapped brothers fighting an evil space Empire bent on the conquest of Earth.

Going further afield in the 1970s you find Go Nagai’s pair of tokusatsu oddities; Star of Pro-Wrestling Azteckaiser and Battle Hawk.

The first series premiered in 1976 and is about an evil organization trying to take over the world of Japanese Pro-Wrestling with monstrous wrestlers while being opposed by the heroic Azteckaiser.

This one merges traditional tokusatsu action with animation when the wrestling matches verge into the ridiculous and impossible to replicate in live action.

The second was a bit jankier with three grandchildren of a martial artist using magical tomahawk powers granted to him by Native Americans to battle and evil gang of Assassins.

Oh and then there’s Toho’s 1976 series Enban Senso Bankid though this one might have been their attempt to create a team hero show much like 1975′s Himisu Sentai Goranger.

There are so many of these non-franchise Tokusatsu shows, especially in the weird, wild creative explosion that was the 1970s.  I’ve said it before but it bears repeating, the 70s were the boom time for TV Tokusatsu and everyone tried their hands at it.  This doesn’t even scratch the surface of what was out there and either trying to do its own thing or copying the formula created by another company in an attempt to cash in on a trend.

Thanks for the Question!

[tokupedia]

Obscure Tokusatsu costume ideas for Halloween 2017: Ladies Night edition

Coeus Cerberus aka Hyper Force Black

One of the newest additions to the Power Rangers Franchise, Vesper is now the official first female Black Ranger in Power Rangers history.  A closer examination of her costume reveals that, fittingly as a Ranger commissioned for the upcoming 25th anniversary of PR, elements of her suit harken back to past seasons. 

The helmet itself is classic Mighty Morphin/Wild Force in look with a cerberus motif, she has a half and half asymmetrical grey/black design on her torso which is a callback to SPD, Operation Overdrive protective shoulder padding and a silver diamond on both of the boots. 

Finally, the rest of the suit is a connection to its status as a successor to Time Force by having the Time Force bodysuit be the central core of the costume. Wrist cuffs, belt with the Time force buckle and the tight form fitting single piece suit.

2000 NTT Gatchaman Jun the Swan

While I could do the live action toku version from the 2013 movie, I need to do something obscure and this is one costume Jun wore that happens to be a personal favorite of mine due to its modern aesthetics while staying true to its roots. Instead of cutesy “girly” pink mixed with white, the colors are changed to a reddish pink with black and white. The skirt of the old suit, whose only purpose was for lonely perverts to pause for a glimpse of panty shots, has been ditched in favor of a protective body suit with black pants and pink armored boots. Because when you are realistically dealing with terrorists, flashing them while they are shooting at you with high caliber guns will only get you killed.

One thing I mentioned about Gatchaman was that Tatsuo Yoshida was inspired by US superheroes in comics, and this suit definitely invokes 90s Cassie Cain Batgirl. Case in point, a modern utility belt with pouches so she can store her many various explosives or her yo-yo weapon. A neat detail is that the hand part of the glove that deploys her yo-yo weapon is black in color and has her G-Brace on it (guessing it was so the animators could know where it went when drawing her). Jun also becomes a blonde in hero form, mostly to hide her secret identity as she has natural brown hair or black hair in her recent iterations.

Toei Spider-Girl/Woman

Now I know this isn’t a real thing, but its a given that there would be one if Supaidaman was brought into the modern-era. So I thought I’d pitch the idea. Just take design elements of any female web-head and mix them with elements of the toku version of Spider-Man in creative ways!

Ninja Cap-Tan

From Akibaranger, this fictional series is in reality an anime magical girl parody of the live action toku show Ninja Captor, which was erroneously once considered an entry in the Super Sentai series (long story, but involved a screw up by a magazine). It was also an excuse to get the wonderful Mitsuko Horie to sing for us on the show, doing a parody of Ninja Captor’s opening theme. 

Unlike what it is parodying, the girls of the series are themed on sweets rather than the elements of nature (in hindsight this could be seen as prophetic given the existence of Kirakira PreCure a la Mode). If you really want something from Super Sentai that nobody has done as a costume and is really really obscure and KAWAII, I recommend this. 

Watch Akibaranger Season Tsuu episode 4 to get good shots of the characters at the end to analyze the costumes and also use Ninja Captor as a reference if you need to since they are almost the same thing in design.

Female ‘66 Ultraman (Matt Frank design)

Credit to the great comic artist Matt Frank for this one! Matt envisioned what would have happened if Ultraman fused with Fuji instead of Hayata. Female curves aside, the biggest change is the head, which is a nice mix of classic Ultraman, Nexus and Ace.

Yaiba

In the main Garo series, one of the biggest letdowns is there are no female Makai Knights. However, in the expanded universe, there is at least one.....sort of. It involves a bizarre thing about having a female-like form, but is in reality worn by a man who can shift his gender at will and is a villain, like Berg Katze did in the old Gatchaman show. Yaiba is known as the The Scorching Heat Knight and wields a scythe!  You can turn this villain armor into a force for good!

In addition, since Final Fantasy XIV and Monster Hunter XX introduced the armors as possible equip gear for both genders, any Makai Knight can be genderbent now!

Fire-3

The only female of the Rescue Fire Team, Ritsuka is a no-nonsense, take charge kinda gal who loves animals and acts cool. You could either make her civilian work uniform or make her hero outfit. Or if you really want to be creative, you could make a Fire-3 X form by using Fire-1 X as a reference and mix the two or do your own take to create a power up version of Fire-3!

Camearra (Purified)

A female Ultra who served as an antagonist in the Ultraman Tiga Summer Movie. She was evil, but what if Tiga could have got through to her and saved her? This presents an interesting costume idea of a Dark Ultra becoming purified and becoming heroic. 

First thing, her body suit would be a traditional silver instead of dark grey, yellow eyes instead of the evil orange, maybe some blue or red to accent the gold and less demonic looking features on the head. Maybe some angel wings on the crest of the head or just a different shape would do the trick! 

Queen Hawk (Battle Hawk)

This is an old Showa era costume, but it can be improved upon. You can rework it to be more like the manga version as a single body suit or make it more armor like. You can also make the cape another color like a more classic red or white and red. Whatever you decide, you will become a fearsome, monster slaying female warrior who has two axes tethered by a chain as a weapon!

[gonagaiworld]

Battle Hawk (1976).