First Exposure to Gamera?

For the discussion of any Gamera related movies, comics, video games, etc.
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Angilasman
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Re: First Exposure to Gamera?

Post by Angilasman »

It was Gamera GOTU on some premium cable channel (Showtime?) in either '98 or '99 when I was around 10 years old.

Kinda ruined the classic ones for me, because I saw those in '00 - '01 when I discovered the Sandy Frank tapes at a local rental place - and by then the more sophisticated GOTU was pretty much my favorite movie so I snobbishly dismissed the old ones. I wish I had seen them when I was younger.

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StreamOfKaijuness
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Re: First Exposure to Gamera?

Post by StreamOfKaijuness »

Gigantis wrote: Fri May 21, 2021 5:59 am This is probably true for.. majority of people here lol but i honestly wouldn't have known who Gamera was without Godzilla.
Same here. I became a Godzilla fan as a kid when the first Hollywood adaptation was released in 1998, and I first learned the name Gamera when I read the comedic "Disclaimer" section on the website Barry's Temple of Godzilla:

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The first Gamera movie that I saw was Gamera: Guardian of the Universe when I rented ADV's VHS from Blockbuster Video in either 1998 or 1999. I thought it rocked but I didn't see the sequels until I bought ADV's DVD releases from Amazon in 2004.

Major sssspielberg! wrote: Fri May 21, 2021 5:56 am Ok, after reading about Gamera I was with my mom at the mall and saw one of the old DVD sets. I can't find any pictures or references on the web now, but I want to say it was Mill Creek, around 2005 or 6. They dropped the Gamera series in two halves, one was Gammera up to Guiron, sans Gyaos, which appeared on the sister set. They were cheap, only about 5 or 10 bucks a pop.
Anyways, the DVD boxes themselves smelled really weird. But Gamera grew on me pretty quick.
Were these the DVD sets that you owned?

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A company called Diamond Entertainment released those sets. Digital Monster Island reviewed them back in the day: I bought those sets in 2005 too at FYE, shortly after I had gotten Alpha Video's Gammera the Invincible DVD, which I subsequently sold. I hadn't seen any of the Showa Gamera films before then. I actually still have those sets stored away in my closet!

I first watched Gamera the Brave unsubtitled on YouTube a year or two after it was released in Japan.

I didn't see Super Monster Gamera until Shout Factory's 2011 DVD release.

Terasawa wrote: Fri May 21, 2021 2:14 pm
JAGzilla wrote: Fri May 21, 2021 9:19 am I know SciFi was regularly airing '70s Godzilla films around that same time, and I caught parts of Gigan and Hedorah, among others.
I know this is off topic but it's also a good time to plug my catalog of the complete broadcast schedule of all kaiju/tokusatsu films on the Sci-Fi Channel (as best as I've been able to determine).
That's an awesome guide! December 23, 2000 was when I saw Godzilla vs. Hedorah for the first time on the SciFi Channel. I recorded it on one tape and then I recorded King Kong vs. Godzilla on another tape, as I still didn't own that movie either. I don't really remember Destroy All Monsters airing before them on that day but I probably just wasn't concerned with it because I already had ADV's VHS release at that point.

It blows my mind to realize that I could have seen not only Hedorah but also King Kong Escapes on the SciFi Channel in the late '90s if I had been more vigilant about checking the TV Guide. I was fixated on video stores for finding movies in those years. I remember learning that KKE existed from reading The Official Godzilla Compendium but I had no idea whenever it aired on TV and I didn't see it until Universal's DVD release in late 2005.
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Re: First Exposure to Gamera?

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StreamOfKaijuness wrote: Sat May 22, 2021 7:05 am It blows my mind to realize that I could have seen not only Hedorah but also King Kong Escapes on the SciFi Channel in the late '90s if I had been more vigilant about checking the TV Guide. I was fixated on video stores for finding movies in those years. I remember learning that KKE existed from reading The Official Godzilla Compendium but I had no idea whenever it aired on TV and I didn't see it until Universal's DVD release in late 2005.
KKE was my white whale. I kept missing it on Sci-Fi (I even had the tape in the VCR to record overnight but somehow it didn't record) and had to wait until 2004, when I finally picked up a bootleg from the comic shop near me. I also found out much later that I'd missed it on AMC, which was my favorite cable channel at the time.

Obviously I'm glad to have seen it and now own it, but, looking back, I still feel some of that disappointment and frustration.
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Major sssspielberg!
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Re: First Exposure to Gamera?

Post by Major sssspielberg! »

StreamOfKaijuness wrote: Sat May 22, 2021 7:05 am [quote=Gigantis
Were these the DVD sets that you owned?

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A company called Diamond Entertainment released those sets. Digital Monster Island reviewed them back in the day: I bought those sets in 2005 too at FYE, shortly after I had gotten Alpha Video's Gammera the Invincible DVD, which I subsequently sold. I hadn't seen any of the Showa Gamera films before then. I actually still have those sets stored away in my closet!
Holy shit, what a blast from the past! Those are the ones. FYE is also where I grabbed mine. Pretty crazy how far Gamera has come, from "digitally restored" to actually restored. Also, the first time I saw The Street Fighter was the Diamond DVD! Thanks for digging those reviews up!
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Re: First Exposure to Gamera?

Post by tbeasley »

I saw most of the Showa films via this from FYE -
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(Gamera, Barugon, Gyaos, Viras and Jiger w/ Warning from Space, Giant Gila Monster, Gappa and Yongary)

Guiron via this strange thing from a Dollar Store -
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(This might've been my first Showa Gamera, and what an introduction)

And Super Monster via Elvira and Amazon here -
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(Not a bad way to view Super Monster, honestly)

I didn't see Zigra until Shout! Factory.

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Re: First Exposure to Gamera?

Post by JAGzilla »

Hey, I have that Monster Mash Double Feature disk, too. That was also where I first saw Guiron.
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Re: First Exposure to Gamera?

Post by G-Matt »

My first Gamera movie was GOTU. More specifically, the infamous UK dub on VHS.
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StreamOfKaijuness
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Re: First Exposure to Gamera?

Post by StreamOfKaijuness »

Terasawa wrote: Sat May 22, 2021 7:42 am KKE was my white whale. I kept missing it on Sci-Fi (I even had the tape in the VCR to record overnight but somehow it didn't record) and had to wait until 2004, when I finally picked up a bootleg from the comic shop near me. I also found out much later that I'd missed it on AMC, which was my favorite cable channel at the time.

Obviously I'm glad to have seen it and now own it, but, looking back, I still feel some of that disappointment and frustration.
AMC was how I first saw Frankenstein Conquers the World in 2004. I remember that they would also often play the Saperstein bundle of Godzilla movies in those years, in the same poor quality as Classic Media's 2002 DVDs.

Major sssspielberg! wrote: Sat May 22, 2021 7:48 am Holy shit, what a blast from the past! Those are the ones. FYE is also where I grabbed mine. Pretty crazy how far Gamera has come, from "digitally restored" to actually restored. Also, the first time I saw The Street Fighter was the Diamond DVD! Thanks for digging those reviews up!
The dismal treatment of the Showa Gamera films on North American DVD in the 2000s definitely made me appreciate Shout Factory's 2010-2011 DVDs that much more.

Mill Creek's 2014 BRD releases were a welcome HD upgrade at a budget price, with eight movies across two discs for less than $30 in total, but Arrow Video really gave each of the Gamera films definitive home media presentations.
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Re: First Exposure to Gamera?

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Terasawa wrote: Fri May 21, 2021 2:14 pm
JAGzilla wrote: Fri May 21, 2021 9:19 am I know SciFi was regularly airing '70s Godzilla films around that same time, and I caught parts of Gigan and Hedorah, among others.
I know this is off topic but it's also a good time to plug my catalog of the complete broadcast schedule of all kaiju/tokusatsu films on the Sci-Fi Channel (as best as I've been able to determine).
That is a great resource, thank you. I do remember when Sci-fi first launched, so those early Gamera airings in October of 1992 were right around that time, however I think it took a couple of years at least before most cable carriers nationwide got it. Whenever a new channel premiered I remember the campaign always to "call your local provider and request availability". The only times I ever requested my parents to do that was for Sci-Fi and Cartoon Network. Anyway, I remember sci-fi came to our area either 1/1/93 or 94, because they always had the Outer Limits marathon over New years. 90's sci-fi channel was pretty awesome, Unfortunately I "cut the cord" back in 2009 I haven't watched any content from either one.
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Re: First Exposure to Gamera?

Post by edgaguirus »

I think I saw one of the Showa films on tv. It may have been vs Zigra or Jiger, but I don't know.
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Re: First Exposure to Gamera?

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I honestly didn't know it was Gamera at the time, or that Gamera existed as a separate franchise. See, I caught the tail end of Guardian of the Universe late on night on Scifi Channel back around...somewhere during 99-02 or 03 I think? I caught it shortly before that scene where they announced Gyaos only had like one DNA pair or whatever genetics suggested it was artificially/genetically engineered. Because I missed the beginning and all, I missed or easily forgot the title of the movie and the monster (Gamera) afterwards. I wanted to find it after that, because the parts I had seen of it that night were so good and amazing, of course, but it wouldn't be until several years later online I think that I'd ID this film and kaiju, and even longer for me to see it again. I'd eventually find this again on a DVD collection at Wal-Mart in a bin marked for good gifts for Father's Day, and I scooped it up for myself. It was a multi-disc set that included several of the Showa era Gamera stuff, the Heisei trilogy, and for some reason Gappa. I'd later get the Mill Creek Heisei trilogy off of Amazon, and now I've got all the films with the Arrow set. But my first experience was one confused late night viewing of the last half-ish of GotU and wondering what this movie was so I could find a way to see it again.
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Re: First Exposure to Gamera?

Post by Kaltes-Herzeleid »

I believe my first exposure was Youtube videos and watching all manner of Godzilla and kaiju related material. Mostly crossover stuff. Piqued my curiosity. On a retro channel I did see bits of the original not realizing it was the MST3K (vomits) version and being confused as to why there was an annoying guy and two robots talking over the movie I wanted to see unimpeded. Ended up switching it off in irritation.

Christmas of 2009 I'd first see Gamera Guardian of the Universe and, ironically, didn't think much of it at the time. Some years later I'd buy the trilogy on Blu-Ray and fall head over heels for those movies and the character, and the rest, as they say, is history.
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Re: First Exposure to Gamera?

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These are from the early 90s and were my only source of Showa Gamera all the way up until around 2005 or so. My parents could never find the VHS for the original Gamera and I didn't get to see it until Alpha Video's horrendous releases. Viras and Jiger (known to me as Monster X growing up and always hunting for it at the video stores) were extremely hard to find. Likewise, I didn't see Viras until Alpha Video's release of Destroy All Planets and a release of Gamera vs. Monster X was released with Gappa as a bonus feature. Up until then, I only knew of these two films because of the stock footage from Gamera vs. Guiron (though, I never knew what Viras looked like until I dove into the net on site's like Rodan's Roost) and my dad telling me about Monster X, mainly the part of Jiger impregnating Gamera and kids going inside of him... Boy, I was let down when I finally saw this one.

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Finally, I didn't see Super Monster until G-Fest 2004 when it was shown on the convention's hotel channel. This was also my first exposure to Daimajin and Guilala as well. I didn't see it again until the Mill Creek DVDs released in 2011.

I saw the Heisei trilogy when they first reached stateside, starting with GOTU on VHS in the late 90s and the sequels on DVD sometime later when they were first released.


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Re: First Exposure to Gamera?

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My very first Gamera film was one of the videos MM posted above, the Celebrity "Gamera vs Gaos" tape, although in my case is was labeled as part of the Creature Features line, not Just For Kids. I saw it around 1987ish, and it was one of my first exposures to a kaiju film not made by Toho. I saw Gamera and Gamera va Barugon soon after the same way, followed a year or so later by Gamera vs Guiron and Gamera vs Zigra.

Those Gamera tapes had such appealing, colorful box art and I really loved collecting them. Next to the New World Gigan and Mechagodzilla releases, they're some of my favorite old VHS tapes.

As for the other films, I had to use a bootleg site for the remaining Showa entries. I saw Gamera Supermonster next in mid 1993, followed by Gamera vs Jiger at the end of the year and finally Gamera vs Viras in mid 1994. I saw the Kankeo trilogy about 2-5 months after each was released via a laserdisc boot (in the first movies case) or theater boots (the other two).

I've owned Gamera the Brave since the Media Blasters DVD came out, but I don't believe I've watched it all the way through.
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Re: First Exposure to Gamera?

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Found G:GOTU at my Local Hollywood Video. It was an awesome find for me, because at my store, they had a little section with all the kaiju DVDs. Naturally, I never really made it out of that section. But one day,after I had watched all the Godzilla films over and over again so many times, and at this point owned most of them, I was curious to see if there were any other kaiju films lurking elswhere. Perhaps they had been misplaced, I thought. Lo and behold, I was right! I came across G:GOTU and rented it. Watched it twice that night with my friend before going to sleep. Awesome experience.

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Re: First Exposure to Gamera?

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Circa 1995-1997, I was watching an episode of an animal documentary series (it may have been "Audubon's Animal Adventures") on the Disney Channel. This episode was about turtles. It used a clip from the first Gamera film, mostly to illustrate how inaccurate a depiction of a turtle Gamera is. I thought it was bizarre to see a turtle in an old giant monster movie at the time. I think I was eating a McDonalds Cheeseburger (I don't like cheese on my burgers generally BTW), which enhanced my feeling of being weirded out.

Around 2001-2002, I read a book of film lists at my local library. It had info and filmographies on (among many other subjects) Godzilla, Mothra, Rodan, and Gamera. That's where I put two and two together and realized who Gamera was.

So, yeah, kind of a strange way to learn about Gamera. But there you go.
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Re: First Exposure to Gamera?

Post by GodzillaXGomoraFight »

At a young age I was pretty aware of Gamera's existence from family and from the web. Perusing through Monster Bios on this sight, Barry's Temple, Rodan's Roost, etc introduced me to how the monsters looked like.

My first expsorue to the films was the Showa film Gamera vs. Gyaos on the DVD collection someone posted in the previous page that included The Magic Serpent. I liked it but definitely preferred Godzilla. The next movie I saw was Guardian of The Universe on Showtime or Stars when I was in high school. Loved the fight in the movie; however, I still wasn't hooked in Gamera.

I saw some of the other Showa movies through MST3K, which allowed me to see my favorite Gamera film, Gamera vs. Barugon. Finally, I watched all of the films a few years back on a binge through the old Blu Ray collection. I am still not hooked, however, I have been meaning to rewatch the Heisei trilogy again.
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Re: First Exposure to Gamera?

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Cinemassacre's Top 10 Giant Monsters video.

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Re: First Exposure to Gamera?

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Oh man must have been early or middle 90s for me. Rental store had numerous Godzilla movies, Gappa, Yongarry, The X From Outer Space and Gamera. I'm like 90 percent sure my first Godzilla was Hedorah and about the same with Barugon being my first Gamera movie. So a lot of the new imagery in that stuck with me for years before I saw it again. Gamera striking the dam, the quicksand and venom scene, Barugon hatching then knocking over that tower with his tongue. Gamera freezing then punching Barugon in the snout along with Barugon getting shot with his own rainbow and bleeding all over. Heisei Gamera was VHS late 90s and being like 'holy cow this is a different Gamera!'

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Re: First Exposure to Gamera?

Post by darthzilla99 »

It was the mid to late 90s, but my first exposure was I saw a sandy Frank VHS Gamera vs Zigra at a video rental that wasn't Hollywood video or Blockbuster. My mom rented it for me and I enjoyed it since I had already been a Godzilla fan. They also had the Gurion VHS so I rented it the following week. Seeing the Sandy Frank advertisement for the other Gamera vhs, I kept my eye out for them. Eventually Hollywood video got Godzilla vs. Biollante and Gamera Guardians of the universe in. Years later I got Legion and Irys on dvd from the internet. It wasn't until the mid 2000s with the public domain DVDs that I was able to see the other showa gamera movies.
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Anguirus and Godzilla being friends in the Showa series is cannon. Deal with it.

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