Danger After Dark: Karate-Robo Zaborgar [Review]

Karate-Robo Zaborgar is this Sunday’s closing film of the Danger After Dark film festival, and is the newest film by Noboru Iguchi; director of such films as Mutant Girl Squad and Robo-geisha. The film, which is an adaptation of an old Tokusatsu series Denjin Zaborger from the 70s, is the story of a man and his transforming robot motorcycle on a quest to avenge his scientist father’s death.

Really, what more do you need?

The film is told in 2 acts or “episodes” essentially, with the first act featuring Yutaka Daimon in his prime. He is a master martial artist fighting an evil organization with his trusty robot sidekick Zaborgar. While avenging his father, he is also busy keeping the evil organization Sigma from using the DNA of prominent leaders to create a giant killing Mecha.

That is until he falls in love with one of the enemy’s female cyborg assassins.

The second act takes a very interesting direction and shows us that our actions indeed have consequences, even for a secret police Japanese operative that rides a robot around. While I enjoyed the first act I really loved the unexpected ride of the second act of the film, and found the overall story to be a great family friendly departure for Iguchi.

While most directors would have updated the aging subject matter and modernized the character designs, Iguchi instead takes the path less traveled. He bathes in the camp and cheese giving the fans of the show exactly what they want. While you can indeed tell this is probably one of the biggest budgeted films from the Sushi-Typhoon brand, it somehow still manages to have the same attitude and twisted sense of humor we have come to expect from the studio.

Karate-Robo Zaborgar definitely displays the hallmark of a great Danger After Dark selection and is my favorite of this year’s line up and with that I give it a 4 out of 5 stars, if you liked Robo-geisha you should probably check this one out.

You can get tickets here!