Monster of the Week- Viras

Gamera movies were scarce in Colorado.  it didn't help that most of them didn't have the name "Gamera" in the title.  I had seen half of War of the Monsters, about 3/4 of Attack of the Monsters and this, Destroy All Planets was the first one I saw all the way through.

it aired at 8:00 on a school night, so I got to stay up to ten to watch it.  I believe I still have the tv guide from that week, close to 30 years ago.

I had no idea it was a Gamera movie, but since our hero makes his first appearance about 2 minutes into the movie I learned quickly.

as this was my third or so Gamera movie, I didn't mind all the stock footage of him fighting Barugon and Gyaos, since most of that was new to me as it was.  now that I'm a bit older, I think it could have been trimmed down to a scene or two instead of 20 minutes of padding.  it works OK though.

here's the face of our villain.  ever seen a space squid?  me either!  since I have a fascination for tentacled monsters such as giant octopi and squid, I loved seen this as the for for Gamera to fight.

this was also one of the smarter alien monsters Gamera fought.  and more vicious, though all of the titanic turtles foes made him bleed at some point.  Viras invaded bodies of Earthlings (I think) and then when he needed them, lopped off their heads!

that was a surprising scene!  he was also able to use his own body as a spear.  Viras came to Earth because their race needed nitrogen to survive, and since our atmosphere is 78% nitrogen it seemed like it would do.

most of these images come from a PD DVD, but this last one is from the R2 Japanese DVD, which looks amazing.  a few years ago I corresponded with Carl Craig, who was the Caucasian boy in the movie.  really nice man.  he recorded a commentary track for this movie at one point, but I've never heard of it being released.  which is too bad, as it's probably unique and cool to listen to.  you can still purchase really cool pictures and such from him here.