This is the second season of Ultra Galaxy Mega Monster Battle, and the same crew of space ship Spacependragon continues their adventure. IMDb unfortunately is woefully incomplete in its cataloging of Tsuburaya Production's "Ultra" series, and only the second season of this series is represented here.
This is one of the first series to come out since Tsuburaya production has been bought out by TYO in 2007 (Since then TYO sold all its shares to a Pachinko manufacturer Fields in 2010). The series does not feature Ultraman or any of its siblings. The story revolves around mysterious young man named Rei, and the crews of the space ship Spacependragon. Each episodes features various "kaijyu" or monsters from earlier Ultra series.
Tsuburaya production essentially went bankrupt after the first season of this TV show . They always had problems containing the budget for each of the episodes of their "Ultra" series, but when Ultraman Nexus failed to be a hit in 2004, their finance went into a tailspin.
But I'm not sure if I can put all the blame on Tsuburaya's management for this. Japanese television system seems to work on an arcane budget principle that makes no sense at all to the westerners. Take for instance, TV stations only pay Tsuburaya production 20 - 30000 dollars per episode on the Ultraman series. This is insanely low for any production method let alone special effects laden Ultra series.
When average American TV shows routinely costs over 5 million dollars per episode, this is less than 0.5% of the American TV show's budget. It's no wonder a company would go under with such poor return on their investments. Tsuburaya was reportedly "blowing" their budget by spending a whopping 200 - 300,000 dollars per episodes of the Ultraman series. You can't even shoot a short educational video for school kids for that budget in the United States.
I love the "Ultraman" series that Tsuburaya production makes. It's certainly the finest super hero genre TV series from Japan. This is an off shoot of that series, but very enjoyable to watch. Of course with that little of a budget you can't expect a grand space opera, but the quality of production will impress you if you understand the budget these TV shows are made on.
