AGON, Arise! The ‘Lost’ ’60s Daikaiju Eiga Found — And, Revisiting the 1990s Comics Crash
By srbissette on February 24th, 2009Posted In: News
Tremble, mere mortals, at the terrifying power of — AGON, THE ATOMIC DRAGON!
Thanks to my good amigo Joe Citro steering me to the website,
I’ve just enjoyed one of the ‘lost’ 1960s Japanese daikaiju eiga gems I’ve heard rumors of for decades, but never ever thought I’d see with my own eyes.
I just received my first mail-order harvest from Rare DVD World, but I confess to satisfying my need to experience Agon before diving into the TV movies I ordered.
Well, truth to tell, Agon (original title: 幻の大怪獣アゴン / Maboroshi no Daikaijū Agon / Giant Phantom Monster Agon) is a TV movie, and a far rarer item than almost any other in the Rare DVD World catalogue.
Vet giant monster movie fans will sit through — well, anything, really. There’s a few holy grails left for braindead diehards like moi, and one of mine was an obscure made in 1964, broadcast in January 1968 four-episode rarity from Nippon Denpa Eiga (Japanese Radio Pictures) entitled Agon.
What’s the allure of a black-and-white TV failure?
Well, gee, that’s hard to explain, unless you’re among the infected — uh, initiated. I’d heard whispers over the years from the really serious Gojira/Godzilla fanatics that Toho, parent studio of the Big ‘G’, had legally squashed an early ’60s, pre-Ultraman TV monster series because it was too damned close to Gojira in its monster design. This alone made Agon enticing; but the rumor that Toho relented after a few years because it turned out Agon’s creator — series co-director and special effects supervisor Fuminori Ohashi — had been among special effects maestro Eiji Tsuburaya’s seminal effects crew who constructed the first Gojira/Godzilla monster suit back in 1954 only made it more attractive.
A TV monster by one of Gojira’s rubber suit creators? That, I gotta see!
At last, I have. It’s a quick fix — four 20+ minute episodes, in Japanese language sans subtitles (and not the theatrical cut-down version, which was reportedly released by Toho in the mid-1990s, according to some sources) — and it proved as appetizing and satisfying as a slider (those teeny square White Castle burgers of yore), and just about as nutritious. However, Agon didn’t give me a bout of the runs.
Agon is a black-and-white cheapie, tinted a pleasing sepia tone throughout, indicative of the state-of-the-art of Japanese TV sf effects prior to Eiji Tsuburaya’s launch of Ultraman in 1966. Agon is interesting as an artifact; Ohashi’s monster and effects transcend anything in earlier Japanese sf television, but it’s also worth noting that Eiji Tsuburaya had flirted earlier with a made-for-TV monster movie: according to many sources, the 1958 Daikaijû Baran (released in the US in 1962 as Varan the Unbelievable) was originally to be a Japan/US TV movie coproduction, but Toho was left holding the bag and ultimately completed the feature for theatrical release. Tsuburaya’s Baran/Varan is superior in design and execution to Agon, but since it ultimately wasn’t broadcast but instead released theatrically, Agon holds the honor as the first Japanese made-for-TV monster movie to be produced (but not broadcast — read on).
Agon and the miniatures he stomps through are closer to those in the Korean Gojira imitator Taekoesu Yonggary / Yongary, Monster of the Deep (1967) than the made-for-TV monsters and effects of Ultraman.
[Above and right: Korea's Yonggary/Yongary, 1967]
That’s a fair comparison, but I hasten to add that Fuminori Ohashi’s Agon boasts a better monster suit than that manufactured in Korea for Yonggary. Anatomically, Ohashi clearly knew his stuff: the detailing of the scaly skin textures is nicely done, as good as anything Toho and Tsuburaya had overseen, and Ohashi’s effects sequences like to dwell at one innovation: a swelling throat bladder effect that lends a bit more semblence of life to the rubber saurian.
That said, Agon’s body design is unlike any Toho monster of that era, but the head design is awfully close to Gojira in many ways. Alas, his glassy pop-eyes aren’t as lifelike as those of Tsuburaya’s giant reptiles, and Agon’s jawline cuts so absurdly far back into his skull area that he too often looks like the patently phony rubber dragon he is — but that is, of course, part of the beguiling charm of the damned thing. Once he starts breathing fire (in a fashion anticipating Daiei Studios’s soon-to-surface Daikaijû Gamera / Gammera the Invincible, 1965/66), well, you can see why Toho jumped on this puppy.
So, Agon was apparently made in 1964 — the year Toho released what I still consider the peak of the 1960s Eiji Tsuburaya monster movies, Mosura tai Gojira / Godzilla vs. the Thing / Godzilla vs. Mothra. If that is true, he indeed holds a key position in the evolution of ’60s daikaiju eiga, predating Gamera, Ultraman, South Korea’s Yonggary and even Nikkatsu’s Daikyojû Gappa / Monster from the Prehistoric Planet / Gappa the Triphibian Monster and Shochiku’s Uchu daikaijû Girara / The X from Outer Space (both 1967). If Agon was indeed produced in 1964 (and it sure looks and feels like it), he beat all of Toho’s imitators out of the production completion gate.
But not the broadcast gate.
Alas, Agon must have looked positiviely archaic when it finally was telecast in 1968 in the wake of Tsuburaya’s colorful Ultraman and that show’s weekly procession of imaginative monsters — not to mention all the Gojira imitators noted above. Thus, Ohashi’s status as the first to imitate Toho’s monsters has been derailed by the four-year delay between production and eventual broadcast.
Admittedly, it’s not exactly stealing thunder, but part of the pleasure of excavating an oddball gem like Agon is determining its proper place in the daikaiju eiga pantheon.
Fuminori Ohashi also directed the final two episodes of Agon — Norio Mine directed the first two, though I assume Ohashi also directed the effects sequences in those — collaborating with cinematographer Takeo Kawarazaki and art director Koichi Torizuka to galvanize the professional look of the production. My favorite component, though, is undoubtably Wataru Saito’s wonky musical score: it’s genuinely akimbo and unusual, eschewing any attempt to emulate the majesty or marches of the Toho wellsprings to instead bleep, wonk and tweak something closer to the Italian sf movie scores of the era.
Agon was officially released on DVD out of the blue in Japan four years ago.
If you’re a braindead diehard daikaiju eiga fan, that is.
Oh, baby, that’s me all over…
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Given what’s happening in the Direct Sales market right now, and given that co-instructor Robyn Chapman and I will be covering this ground in class today at the Center for Cartoon Studies (with guest speaker and vet retailer Bill Townsend, who’s driving all the way from Electric City Comics in Schnectady, NY to join us today), it seemed timely to share once again this timeline of the mid-1990s Direct Sales market implosion.
I posted this a couple of years ago, and welcomed input. I’ve incorporated the suggested corrections and revisions, and offer this anew as an overview of what happened in the 1990s to ultimately drive self-publishers (like myself) out of the industry, and allow you to draw your own correlations to the present market implosion prompted not by a bubble, but by the collapse of the US and world economy at a time when (thanks to the following 1990s events) there remains only one major distributor standing. A monopoly suffering amid a genuine economic disaster may mean the end of the Direct Sales market as we’ve known it — or offer fertile soil for long-necessary alternatives and competitors to grow.
Time — and action — will tell.
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The 1990s Comics Crash! A Time Line…
1989:
January:
Billionaire, chairman of MacAndrews & Forbes and notorious Wall Street junkbond king Ronald O. Perelman buys Marvel Entertainment Group.
[Note: billionaire rival Carl C. Icahn fought Perelman’s reign throughout, repeatedly trying to acquire Marvel and/or organize shareholder revolts until he succeeded in June, 1997.]
1991:
Marvel Entertainment stock shares go public, yielding Perelman a $36 million cash dividend.
1993:
* March 1993:
Marvel’s “first junk bonds issued” (Comic Wars, pg. 242), yielding $288 million for Perelman; a second “tranche of junk bonds” yield $145 million in October 1993, a third set net $121 million in February 1994 (Ibid., pp. 241-243).
* Perelman’s restructuring of Marvel includes acquisition of Toy Biz (controlling shareholder: Isaac ‘Ike’ Perlmutter) via “shares-for-licensing rights deal” that makes Toy Biz a subsidiary of Marvel; Marvel also purchases Malibu Comics Entertainment Inc. (b&w indy launched 1986, combined with Aircel acquisition) for $15 million, primarily to acquire their innovative computer coloring operations, as well as the trading card companies Fleer and SkyBox, Italian sticker manufacturer Panini, more.
* Marvel Entertainment stock reaches highest value since going public.
[Note: Kitchen Sink Press, founded in 1969, “merges” with Tundra Publishing, moves offices from Wisconsin to Northampton, MA., with Tundra founder Kevin Eastman reportedly holding majority share of 51%.]
1994:
“Pearl Harbor”
Marvel Comics pulls out of all Direct Market distribution to purchase NJ-based Heroes World Distribution, thus instituting/owning its own exclusive Direct Market distributor.
[Note: Success of the feature film adaptation of James O’Barr’s THE CROW -- earning $50 million in theatrical release alone -- creates a windfall for Kitchen Sink sales of CROW comics, graphic novels, merchandizing, exceeding all expectations.
* May 1994, Los Angeles-based investment banker group Ocean Capital Corporation acquire Kitchen Sink Press]
1995:
DISTRIBUTOR WARS!
* DC Comics, Image Comics, Dark Horse Comics and others sign exclusive distribution contracts with Diamond Distribution, the Direct Market’s largest distributor.
* DC Comics, Image Comics and Dark Horse Comics report drops in sales “as much as 15%” after signing with Diamond, though the three Diamond major exclusive publishers combined still constitute about 75 percent of the market, sans Marvel.
* Kitchen Sink Press and self-publisher James A. Owen are the only publishers to sign a similar exclusive with Capital City Distribution. Initially, this boosts KSP sales, but this boost doesn’t last into 1996.
* Marvel Entertainment suffers major losses, stocks value begin freefall.
1996:
THE IMPLOSION
Spring 1996:
Final Diamond Comics and Capital City Distribution trade shows. Capital City co-founders John Davis and Milton Griepp appeal to retail community; reportedly, Capital’s 1996 revenue was already half of 1995’s revenue.
July 26, 1996:
Capital City Distribution — the second largest Direct Market distributor — sells its assets to Diamond Comics to avoid bankruptcy. This provides Capital with a means of paying the approx. $7.4 million due to suppliers over a two-year period of incremental payments.
* The Direct Market shrank by at least 50% in the wake of the events of 1996. According to Capital City co-founder John Davis (subsequently employed by Diamond), “about half of the approximately 4500 retailers in business during 1996 dealt only with Diamond in the wake of the ‘distributor wars’…”
* Marvel Entertainment suffers further losses and stock collapse — from $13.25 early in ‘96 to $4.50 per share and less — down 85 percent from their high in 1993.
* Marvel fans launch a “reader rebellion,” boycotting Marvel product for almost a full year. Note that Marvel’s market share had slid throughout their ill-fated exclusivity upset: “from around 70 percent of American sales [in 1990-92] to 35 percent in 1995, then 25 percent to 1996” (Comic Wars, pg. 71).
[Note: Kitchen Sink Press returns to Diamond, suffering many lost orders, revenues, etc. in the transition. Labor Day 1996 opening of THE CROW movie sequel THE CROW: CITY OF ANGELS enjoys $9 million opening weekend boxoffice, then fades; Kitchen Sink merchandizing fails, a fiscal disaster for KSP on heels of Capital City’s demise and delayed payments.]
1997-98:
AFTERMATH
January, 1997:
Marvel Comics files for Chapter 11 corporate bankruptcy
February, 1997:
Marvel and Malibu (former indy publisher purchased by Marvel) sign exclusivity contract with Diamond as its sole distributor to the Direct Market.
June, 1997:
Ronald O. Perelman departs ownership of Marvel Entertainment Group; it is estimated that “Perelman’s net gain from eight years of running Marvel could be put at $280 million — plus the tax advantages for his wider empire” (Comic Wars, pg. 243).
Rival billionaire and corporate-raider Carl C. Icahn, purchasing Marvel bonds thorughout the 1996 company crisis, becomes Marvel’s chairman June 1997, appoints former Marvel executive Joseph Calamari the new CEO of Marvel.
[Note: Due to Marvel’s bankruptcy filing, prospective Kitchen Sink investors withdraw, deciding the comics business as a whole is too risky. Kevin Eastman and others had already departed KSP’s board; Denis Kitchen is fired by board of directors; Kitchen Sink closes shop later in 1997.]
1998:
Marvel Comics emerges from corporate Chapter 11 bankruptcy, after a period of time during which it was “for sale.”
October 1998:
Marvel Entertainment is restructered by bankruptcy court order with Toy Biz partners Isaac ‘Ike’ Perlmutter and Avi Arad in charge. Perlmutter and Arad placed Peter Cuneo, “a turnaround specialist, at the helm” as CEO, who restored Marvel’s fortunes via the aggressive licensing of Marvel characters and concepts to movies, TV, videogame and toy manufacturers, reversing the Perelman management strategies of 1989-1997 (Fortune, June 27, 2005, pg. 194). Carl Icahn departs “with a relatively paltry $3.5 million” (Comic Wars, pg. 252); Marvel stock ceases to exist, replaced by Toy Biz shares, which start at $7 per share. Note Icahn continued to fight, but soon abandoned the struggle.
[Note: By 2005, Marvel Enterprises was producing its own films with great initial success, launched by 1997 breakthrough of Aircel/Malibu acquisition Men in Black.]
Sources: The Comics Journal, various issues, 1993-97; COMIC WARS by Dan Raviv (2002, Broadway Books, NY); Fortune, June 27, 2005, pg. 194.
Thanks for posting this Steve!
I’m still playing catch-up with comics in general, so reading this post about the 1990s comics crash was both informative and a real eye opener to me.
A great article about the current situation regarding the Direct Sales market by C.H.U.D. Movie News website’s chief editor, Devin Faraci, follows (if interested):
http://chud.com/articles/articles/18160/1/THE-DEVIN039S-ADVOCATE-THE-NEW-DEPRESSION-MAY-BE-THE-BEST-THING-THAT-EVER-HAPPENED-TO-COMICS/Page1.html
EXCELLENT link and editorial by Devin — thanks!
Devin writes, “The continued life of the superhero comic almost feels like a conspiracy. The direct market, in collaboration with the Big Two publishers, Marvel and DC, has pandered to the core constituency of superhero comics, essentially alienating everybody else. Almost feels like a conspiracy, but I think it’s simply the fact that the Big Two are among the worst run businesses in the country; instead of using the core, weekly consumers as a base upon which to rely while growing their business, they have turned to milking that base for every penny possible, which turns off those on the outskirts of the base – shrinking that base yearly. Each company’s attempts to reach out to new readers feels more half-assed than the last, and Vertigo seems to be the only attempt that has borne any fruit… a decade ago. Meanwhile, the Big Two has remained resistant to any changes in their decades old business model; Marvel is JUST NOW starting to sell comics on iTunes, despite it being dead obvious that the internet was the next frontier for comics years ago. And don’t get me started on the way DC dragged its feet on the trade paperback front forever.
Besides pursuing business plans that has pushed away their readership over the years, the Big Two have poisoned the well for the medium of comics, keeping it from transcending its status as geekbait. It feels like every time a comic comes along that stands outside the superhero genre and tells a unique, enjoyable story through the merging of words and pictures and gets some mainstream appreciation, one of the Big Two pull off a stunt that gets media attention and reminds everybody that comic books actually mean men in tights pandering to the kind of people you hope don’t sit next to you on the bus….”
I’m hoping this prompts more discussion, too — bring it on, folks.
Freakin fantastic timeline Steve. You are the man to go to when the big picture needs to be dissected and brought to a clear presentation. You should try your hand at teaching or something like that.
Hey, Steve, more kaiju madness!
http://augustragone.blogspot.com/2009/02/great-hairy-beast.html
Thanks for this time-line. It offers some handy data, but it falls far short as an explanation of those times and the implosion of the mid-1990s. One needs to explain the speculation bubble which led to the creation of Image which led to the bursting of the bubble and Marvel purchasing Heroes World, which led to the distributor wars and Diamond’s monopoly. Still, in just keeping with the topics addressed in this time-line, here is some additional or more specific or contradictory data that I culled from the long paper (prompted by another subject all together) I sent you a month or so ago while incorporating your data:
MacAndrews and Forbes sold 40% of Marvel to the public in the summer of 1991, raising $74 million for debt reduction and owner dividends.
Kitchen Sink Press technically swallowed Tundra on April 1, 1993, but it was Denis Kitchen that moved to Northampton, Massachusetts to try and run the operation professionally and profitably.
Something like 1,100 retail comics stores closed in January 1994, kicking off a six-year downturn.
In May 1994 Denis Kitchen and Kevin Eastman sold control of Kitchen Sink Press to Los Angeles-based Ocean Capital Corp. They got Will Eisner to join them on the nine member board.
In December, 1994 Marvel bought Heroes World Distribution, the third largest direct-market distributor. There were about nine other distributors in the business, but the preponderance of the business was in the hands of two companies, Diamond Comic Distributors, and Capital City Distributing. A reasonable guestimate had Diamond with control of about 45% of the distribution of new comics, and Capital City with a 40% market share. The remaining 15% was split between eight (?) small distributors, including Heroes World. No one in the industry was satisfied with the 1994 performance levels, but the executives running Marvel simply could not admit to their bosses that they had screwed up the industry with the loss of their major commercial talent, incessant cover price increases, and a flood of mediocre products. As an alternative to their own failures they had concocted the ludicrous theory that their comics would be selling just fine if it were not for the incompetence, and the perceived antipathy, of the distributors. This had become the primary justification for their purchase of Heroes World, with tentative plans to make it their sole distributor.
In January 1995 Marvel Comics announced at a meeting of the International Association of Direct Distributors that it had purchased Heroes World Distribution and that they were considering changes in their distribution. Direct Market comics distributors faced the prospect of their overall sales volume being reduced by 35%-40% (Marvel’s market share), while their operating costs remained constant. In a business where even a single point of discount or volume could translate into huge differences in earnings, these massive losses in sales volume would simply not be sustainable. Steve Geppi, owner of Diamond Comic Distributors responded to this threat to the survival of his business by entering into negotiations to become the exclusive distributor for all the other comics publishers. Geppi’s only viable competition in this quest was Capital City Distributing, as only Diamond and Capital had the warehouses and other infrastructure in place at the time to distribute comics nationwide. While Geppi was begging all the comics publishers to switch all of their distribution business exclusively over to his company, John Davis and Milton Griepp of Capital City were making the same pleas on the part of their organization.
In March 1995 Chuck Rozanski, of Mile High Comics, Inc., pointed out to Marvel President Terry Stewart (the man who four years earlier had refused to deal with the creators that went on to form Image Comics) that Heroes World was a very small company that did not have the infrastructure, or the managerial experience, to handle the number of comics Marvel shipped each month. Stewart responded to these concerns by saying in effect “Ivan (Ivan Snyder -President of Heroes World) has assured me that they can handle the volume, and I am putting my faith in him…” On the following day Marvel Comics (inadvertantly?) announced that they would begin distributing comics to comics shops exclusively through its own distributor, Heroes World Distribution. A little later in the month Marvel also bought SkyBox for about $150 million.
At the beginning of April 1995 Marvel Comics representatives embarked on a 19 city tour to inform and convince comics retailers of their distribution terms and the rightfulness of their actions. On April 13 Canadian distributor Andromeda Distributing Ltd. Filed for bankruptcy. On April 19, at the third Pro/Con the panel “How the Changes in the Industry Affect Creators” was conducted with Image Executive Director Larry Marder, Dark Horse Editor Bob Schreck, Marvel Group Editor Bobbie Chase, and DC Group Editor Archie Goodwin. Marder and Schreck were trying to be as candid as possible, and basically intimated that they would have no idea what the future held for their companies until after DC announced its rumored deal with Diamond Comic Distributors. Euphemistically comparing it to a game of musical chairs, Schreck noted, “The music is still going, and we don’t know how many seats there will be or who the players will be in the next four to six months.” On April 28 DC announced their exclusive distribution agreement with Diamond. There was a specific pernicious clause that prohibited anyone reselling DC comics that they have purchased from Diamond to another comics retailer. This clause effectively slammed shut the door on any potential alternative to Diamond ever arising. Capital City Distributing started pursuing exclusive arrangements with a number of other publishing companies, with Image and Dark Horse being the big fish they had to land.
On July 21 1995 Image and Dark Horse were announced as having been signed exclusive to Diamond Comic Distributors. Shortly afterward Chuck Rozanski of Mile High Comics, Inc. had a one-hour discussion in downtown Washington, D.C. about Diamond Comic Distributors with the head of the United States Department of Justice Anti-Trust Enforcement Division. His primary reason for meeting with them was to get an idea of his litigation options if Diamond chose to use Steve Geppi’s recent purchase of AnotherUniverse.com to go into direct competition with his own internet company. After they discussed that situation, Rozanski was surprised to be quizzed, in turn, by the Federal Anti-Trust people as regards his opinions about potential negative implications of the Diamond exclusive contracts with DC, Image, Valiant/Acclaim, and Dark Horse. Rozanski honestly felt that it was not in the best interests of anyone in the comics world to alter that situation. No matter how much he might have disagreed with some of the things Diamond and/or Steve Geppi appeared to be doing, there was no way that he was going to do anything to weaken the only viable comics distributor left in the business. Instead, Rozanski stressed to the DOJ that the comics industry was so fragile at that point in time that the Diamond exclusive agreements were really quite necessary to provide Diamond with a large enough stream of revenue to continue operating. Rozanski also stated that he saw no benefit to breaking up Diamond, nor did he see where eliminating the exclusive agreements would work for the public good.
Shortly afterward Capital City Distributing announced exclusive arrangements with Kitchen Sink Press and Viz Comics.
There were something like 6,100 and 6,500 comics retail shops in August 1995. About a third of the shops had disappeared in the previous two years.
By October 1995 Capital City Distributing had shut down 18 of its 20 regional service centers.
In January 1996 the International Association of Direct Distributors was winding down its activities as most of its members were gone and the ones remaining were fundamentally different than they were a year earlier.
Sales of comics and cards had seen 50% declines in consumer demand over the previous few years.
On December 11, 1996 Marvel Comics filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.
On February 7, 1997 Diamond Comic Distributors announced it would again be distributing Marvel Comics.
In April 1997 Marvel Comics folded Heroes World and returned its sales to Diamond Comic Distributors. This made Diamond a monopoly and its exclusive contracts would ensure it remained one. Somewhere between half and two-thirds of the Direct Market had been obliterated in the space of just three years.
After 30 years, Kitchen Sink Press finally succumbed to falling sales and ceased publication in December 1998. All of the company’s rights to the works of Will Eisner reverted back to their creator. Eisner then made Denis Kitchen his literary agent, and thus was formed the Kitchen & Hansen Agency. Zot! Book Four, collecting issues 28-36 of Scott McCloud’s first series, the so-called “Earth Stories,” which was supposed to be published by Kitchen Sink Press, didn’t make it out in time. The rights to the Zot! material could and would be extracted in the wake of KSP’s demise, but it would take some time and energy.
Thanks, Mark — the time line wasn’t meant to be anything more than an outline. It was, in fact, prepared to accompany a three hour conversation in class in CCS this week with guest retailer Bill Townsend, who had plenty of insights into the business from the retail POV. Very educational, to say the least!
Bill just celebrated his shop Electric City Comics’ 27th Anniversary, and he really knows the industry inside and out.
If you’re going to dig up graves, you “Ol’ Gravedgger”, (I think that was your EC comic character). You better mention “Obysessus” and the world’s greatest unicyclist, the one and only Dave Booz.