Ultraman Trigger: New Generation Tiga

Protect the smiles, the light of hope!

Ultraman Trigger: New Generation Tiga, or simply Ultraman Trigger, is the 33rd entry of the Ultra Series, created by Tsuburaya Productions, succeeding Ultraman Z. It celebrates the 25th anniversary of Ultraman Tiga, hence the titular hero's blatant copy of the original Tiga as an alternate retelling of the former series intended for the current generation of audience.

30 million years ago, the world was engulfed in terrifying darkness. But that darkness was sealed deep in space by the Giant of Light. His power spent, the Giant of Light sleeps in the red star, and is forgotten to time…

The Terrestrial Peaceable Union hurries to gather the expert team GUTS-Select, while Kengo Manaka lives peacefully on now-colonized Mars as a botanist. However, his peaceful life suddenly comes to an end one fateful day. The darkness that the ancient civilization sealed away breathes once more! As a monster bears down on the Martian settlement, Kengo's fate leads him to a chance encounter.

A chance encounter with none-other than the sleeping Giant of Light. How will Kengo’s meeting with the Giant of Light influence his destiny and the destiny of Earth? The Giant of Light is reborn after an eternity. His name: Ultraman Trigger!

List of tropes

• Alternate Self:
  • Provided that the show's continuity is separated from Ultraman Tiga (and Ultraman Dyna), the eponymous Ultra is one to Tiga himself aside from sharing the same attributes. Trigger is distinguished from Tiga in that he wields his own personal weapon.
  • The series' version of the Dark Giants (Carmeara, Darrgon, and Hudram) are named differently as stark contrast with the original (Camearra, Darramb, and Hudra). On the other hand, Yuzare also exists in Trigger's world and is much younger compared to her Ultraman Tiga incarnation.
• And the Adventure Continues...: After Kengo leaves GUTS-Select, Ignis moves on to searching for exquisite treasures across the universe.
• Battle in the Rain: Happens in the near-end of the climax of Trigger's first battle with Trigger being pinned down by Carmeara in the midst of a heavy rain on Mars, with the wet and muddy terrain making the battle difficult for Trigger.
• Bittersweet Ending: Trigger defeats Megalothor, Carmeara is redeemed by Kengo before dying. But, Kengo has to leave his friends behind to re-stabilize the Eternity Core and reassures he will return.
• Break Out the Museum Piece: Monsters and aliens from Ultraman Tiga make a return in the series to commemorate its 25th anniversary, such as Gazort and Deban.
• Central Theme: On what ways for one person to put the happiness of others before his own?
• Continuity Nod: The series has many references to Ultraman Tiga, and the first episode establishes this series' connection with the latter through Mitsukuni Shizuma, who happens to have a degree of knowledge about Tiga.
• Destructive Saviour: Kengo as Ultraman Trigger has left behind a path of collateral damage after a battle, this is due to him getting manhandled by other monsters and the Giants of Darkness. And Akito even calls Kengo out for it on two occassions.
• Downer Beginning: The series starts out with Carmeara awakened from her 30 million year petrification and unleashes Golba upon the Mars colony, Kengo gets caught up in the ensuing chaos and is attacked by Carmeara before his merger with Trigger.
• Phantom Thief: The alien treasure hunter, Ignis looks to steal anything he deems exquisite, even go so far as to go inside the Shizuma mansion and even the Nursedessei undetected, in an attempt to kidnap Yuna and even steal the antique Sparklence respectively.
• Shapeshifter Mode Lock: A variant. The GUTS-Sparklence in Kengo's person can interchange between Gun Mode and Sparklence Mode, the latter of which allows him to transform into Ultraman Trigger. The rest of GUTS-Select officers are only limited to Gun Mode.
• Spiritual Successor:
  • To Return of Ultraman, in that the titular Ultra of the show being referred to as the "New Generation Tiga" is similar to how Ultraman Jack was referred to as the "New Ultraman" at the time of his debut to distinguish himself from the original. The parallels between Trigger and Jack is sharing the same height and weight, Finishing Move names as with their predecessors, their respective shows having the same title logo styles. Likewise, both utilize a multiform weapon to further distinguish themselves from the original. It also helps that Trigger coincides with Tiga's 25th anniversary and the 50th anniversary of Return of Ultraman.
  • Arguably to Ultraman Gaia, other than being the third entries of their respective Japanese imperial eras. Given Trigger foregoing a lot of elements from previous New Generation shows in favor of traditional Ultra Series elements, like a narrative set apart from the Land of Light continuity, and Multiform Balance as the heroes' source of power instead of past heroes' powers as well as a traditional fully fledged attack team. The same can be said with how Gaia discards the said Multiform Balance in favor of having two main Ultras. Both series even deal with threats at a planetary scale and a secondary Ultra (Trigger Dark and Agul) along with their hosts starting out as Anti-Heroes before joining forces with the main Ultra.
  • Also, to Ultraman Mebius. In addition to both shows commemorating the franchise's Milestone Celebration, both series take stroll back to a previous continuity from the preceding Japanese Imperial era. The only main difference however, is Mebius takes place in the same universe with the Land of Light Ultras that have previously set foot on Earth, whereas Trigger is an alternate retelling of Ultraman Tiga intended for the current generation of audience, set in an Alternate Universe from the Neo Space Frontier universe (aka., Tiga and Dyna's home world), all while hinting a connection between the two series.
• Title Scream: Much like Ultraman Tiga's opening title. This is the first instance in the Reiwa Era to do a title scream on the opening title of an Ultra Series show, or second if counting the opening of the previous season. However, this is only present in the pilot episode.

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