TV REVIEW COMPARISON: Gridman the Hyper Agent (TBS, 1993) and Superhuman Samurai Syber-Squad (ABC, 1994)

I’ve been a big fan of the Ultraman franchise since I was a kid. A tokusatsu hero created by Tsurubaya Productions in the 1960s, Ultraman is a member of a race of svelte silver-skinned alien giants that defend Earth from villainous kaiju with the help of their human alter-ego’s friends and allies. It’s the broadest way to describe the multiple storylines of the series, and it’s always a new Ultraman that comes to Earth to save the say. Imagine when I turned the TV on one Saturday morning to find a new Ultraman fighting to save the world…in Cyberspace?
Superhuman Samurai Syber-Squad was aired during the ABC Saturday Morning entertainment block in the early 1990s and blew my mind. Its hero that too closely resembled Ultraman to be a coincidence. It turns out the show it was based on, Gridman the Hyper Agent, is related to the Ultraman franchise. NOTE: We’re reviewing the Japanese original and the American syndicated version.

TEAM GRIDMAN: (L-R) Gridman, his human alter ego Naoto, brainy girl Yuki, and goofball Teppei.

The Premise: Naoto (Masaya Obi), Yuki (Jun Hattori), and Teppei (Takeshi Sudo) are computer-savvy Japanese kids that built their own from store-bought parts…