Sooner than I expected, GAMERA Trilogy COMPLETE! I bought a box set containing all three films so now I have a double of "Gamera 3: Revenge of Irys", but I'm sure f.y.e. will take it, getting a buck or two in return. Both films are fantastic, Kaneko really proving himself here. His work just puts other monster films, like the Mothra trilogy and albeit a few of the Millennium Godzilla films, to shame. The third still just on a whole norther level.

The first in the series, this film is Gamera's rebirth, a task no other director could handle. A lot of the characters who appear in this film will appear in the third and final film. All give wonderful performances, Mr. Osako being are evident comic relief. Watching this film really helps one understand the plot of G3, which is why I guess you should never see a sequel if you haven't since the first film. Gamera looks awesome, still a bit cute, and this film right off the bat shows man's fear and uncertainty of the monster's stance with or against the human race. Hell, this seems to me to be the only "hero" trilogy where the authorities are trying to kill the good guy with even greater effort than the bad guy. Also in this film, we really see Gamera and Asagi's bond, the girl actually sharing the monster's pain. A beautiful aspect to the story. Gyaos looks just sick in this movie and the way the featherless "bird" is portrayed ( as a man-eating, asexual, doomsday bio-weapon) is simply excellent. Only now I do get the ironic plot point and Kuarata Shinya's rantings in G3: The 'Ancients' were a highly advanced race, similar to our own. Soon, also like us, they became a decadent, enviormental and self-destructive race. To counter their own self-annihilation, they created Gyaos to, as Kuarata put it;"reduce it's swollen numbers". These creatures however did their job a little too well, and as a backlash created Gamera. Also, the amulet-stone object allows certain chosen people to mediate with Gamera, which makes him stronger. Still, the Gyaos multiplied to an extent where they completely destroyed the Ancients and so with their food supply gone, they laid eggs. Gamera also went dormant. 12,000 years later, humans have apparently created a similar enviorment to the one the Ancients did, and so Gamera and Gyaos awake again. In the third film, it is revealed some Ancients clearly thought humanity would never stop destroying the earth and created the 'perfected Gyaos', Irys (who's real name technically is the Ryuseicho). This final answer to crush humanity heeds the "Earth spirit" while Gamera the human one. Irys can also "mediate" with humans, although in a more extreme way (by fusing with the selected mediator). Yes, I have a lot of free time to think about these things.

Getting back to the review, despite "Godzilla vs. Destroyah" being the King of the Monster's heisei finale, this film clearly has a bigger budget, the special effects being incredible (don't take it the wrong way, I love that movie. "Godzilla vs. Destroyah" is the saddest G-film ever and one of my personal favorites. ). The action is great no doubt, the air duel looking incredibly cool. Koh Otani serves up some bad-ass music that I for one am thoroughly impressed by. Whereas the latter two films have decent dubbing, this film's is horrible. Definitely watch in Japanese, although the audio quality is only 2.0. Anyways, this film didn't disappoint, that's for sure!

Fifteen years after Gamera sacrificed himself to save mankind, the massive turtle is back! This reboot ignores everything that has gone before, and is set in a world where the Japanese are blissfully unaware of the existence of kaiju, at least until a small island becomes the feeding ground of prehistoric birds called the Gyaos. Not long after, Gamera makes an appearance as well, and unsurprisingly causes panic, the army taking action by firing missiles at the giant reptile, not realising that the turtle is there to protect people from the flesh-eating birds.

I had hoped that, by 1995, Japanese film-makers would have moved on from dodgy miniatures being stomped by men in rubber monster suits, but Gamera: Guardian of the Universe uses many of the same techniques employed by the series during the '60s and '70s, and it's still quite laughable, even if the cinematography is better and the explosions bigger. This film came hot on the heels of Jurassic Park, but you would be forgiven for thinking it came out years earlier, the special effects being quite primitive for the time. Perhaps that's what most kaiju fans want, the old-school look and feel giving them a comforting sense of nostalgia, but I think I would have preferred the film to have moved with the times.

Oh well, at least there's plenty of action in this one (no matter how unconvincing) and no cutesie kids to make the adults look like idiots. Best moments: Gyaos attacking a packed train, and the big bird nesting on top of what remains of the Tokyo Tower.

5.5/10, rounded up to 6 for IMDb.

A vicious trio of giant nasty flesh-eating reptilian birds called the Gyaos awaken and start preying on hapless human beings. It's up to gigantic flying fire-breathing prehistoric turtle Gamera to stop them before it's too late. Director Shusuke Kaneko, working from a smart script by Kaznori Ito, treats the story with commendable seriousness and maintains a constant brisk pace from start to finish. This film further benefits from solid and credible acting from an appealing cast, with especially praiseworthy work by Tsuyoshi Ihara as brave, eager, likable naval officer Yoshinari Yonemori, Shinobu Nakayama as tough, gutsy ornithologist Mayumi Nagamine, Akira Onodera as shrewd agent Naoya Kusangi, Ayako Fujitani as Naoya's cute, sweet psychic teenage daughter Asagi, Hirotaro Honda as sniveling cowardly wretch Mr. Saito, and Hatsunori Hasegawa as the hard-nosed Colonel Satake. Moreover, the first-rate special f/x are often stunning, the guy-in-a-rubber-suit beasts are genuinely gnarly and impressive, the elaborate mondo destructo scenes deliver the pulse-pounding goods, and the exciting monster fight sequences are staged with considerable aplomb. Ko Otani's spirited score really does the rousing trick. Junichi Tozawa's glossy, dynamic cinematography likewise scores a bull's eye. Why, we even got a pertinent ecological message tossed in for good measure. A very neat and immensely entertaining winner.