Ultraman Gaia (character)

"Some people say that the Earth is a living being named Gaia..." "Gaia?" "What do you think of 'Ultraman Gaia' for the giant's name? Gaia's a cool name, right?"

- Gamu Takayama and Atsuko Sasaki, His Name is Gaia

is the third Ultra being of Tsuburaya Productions' First Heisei Wave, created by after the 15-year long hiatus of the Ultraman franchise. He is the successor of Ultraman Tiga and Ultraman Dyna in the first Heisei-wave of the Ultra Series revival. His first primary form was Version 1, and he is incapable of form-changing like the previous two Heisei Ultramen. Later, he gained both Version 2 and Supreme Version from Ultraman Agul's light.

Battle Against Root of Destruction Part 1
"Ultraman! The Earth is in danger! I need to be like you! I need your power! Please, give it to me!"

- Gamu Takayama to Ultraman Gaia, Seize the Light!

During some virtual reality experiments (performed with the secret purpose of discovering the will of the Earth,) science protege Gamu Takayama briefly encounters the mysterious glowing red giant, Ultraman Gaia, at the end of a tunnel of light. When the Root of Destruction begins its first wave of attacks on Earth, XIG is too new to be effective. Time stops and he falls through another light tunnel, where he encounters Gaia again. Because Gamu is so passionately concerned with the fate of Earth and humanity, Gaia generously gives Gamu his light, and he is thus able to transform into the Ultraman when necessary. The first monster, C.O.V (Cosmic Organism Vanguard), was destroyed. Subsequently, more Root of Destruction-generated monsters attack, and Earth monsters are also mysteriously roused, so Gaia is kept pretty busy. Gamu joins XIG as a technical adviser, and later creates the Esplender to store the light that is the essence of Gaia.

Gamu then meets the mysterious Hiroya Fujimiya, the dark, angsty youth who possesses the light of Ultraman Agul. Fujimiya was responsible for developing the CRISIS computer array and its dire predictions, whom after many recalculations, learned is that the only way to save the Earth from Root of Destruction is to eliminate humans from the equation. He quits the Alchemy Stars and goes off by himself, only accompanied by Professor Kyoko Inamori, to find the will of the Earth, only to discover Agul.

Agul and Gaia both fought against Root of Destruction and occasionally help each other out, although Agul makes it clear their alliances are based on his duty to the Earth and his own ambitions, not out of friendship or gratitude. Fujimiya grows more agitated and reckless, and has less and less regard for his fellow humans in his desperate mission to save the Earth. He pushes himself to the point of endangering his own health, and became feverish and irresponsible. When bullied in a bar, he declares that humans need to be purged from Earth.

Gaia and Agul have a major clash and both are badly injured. Incredible energy is released during the fight, which opens up a giant wormhole. An immense serpent named Zoruim partially emerges to invade Earth. It turns out that Zoruim was anticipating this clash, and was able to influence CRISIS's computations. Gamu explains to Fujimiya that Crisis was sabotaged all along, and its analysis is fundamentally flawed. Fujimiya realizes that everything he believes in is based on this flaw, and becomes dejected, losing faith in himself, and that "there is nothing left for him to protect". He gives the injured Gamu the light that is the essence of Agul so that he can use it to defeat Zoruim. Fujimiya walked away, seemingly killed by a blast from Zoruim.

To insure his sacrifice wasn't in vain, Gamu accepted Agul's light into his Esplender, and afterwards turned into a new and improved Ultraman Gaia: Gaia V2. The new form headed for Zoruim and used his Quantum Stream, but it did little than annoy him. Shortly after Gaia turned into Ultraman Gaia Supreme, he went inside Zoruim's mouth, and used the Photon Stream to blow the monster's skull to pieces. The worm zone closed just seconds after.

While getting used to his upgraded powers, Meemos (who was actually CRISIS) invaded XIG's computer and managed to destroy all vaccines shot at it. However, when Atsuko's and Georgie's video game controller seemingly saved the day, Crisis then traveled to Geo Base, where it invaded the storage containing the pieces of Apatee and Algyuros. After melding the pieces together, he morphed into Imitation Ultraman Gaia. However, he misjudged that Ultraman Gaia's power never stops growing, so in the beam match, the imitation was quickly defeated and revealed its true face: Meemos, a combination of Apatee and Algyuros from the past. Gaia quickly engaged in combat, but was soon losing the due to Meemos' metal boomerangs. Meemos threw a fork at Gaia's neck that pinned him to the ground while his four active boomerangs lashed his hands and feet. But thanks to XIG's assault, Gaia was soon freed and transformed into Supreme Version. A short beating later, Gaia used the Photon Stream to blast Meemos' body out of existence.

Ultraman Tiga, Ultraman Dyna & Ultraman Gaia: Battle In Hyper Space
In a world where Ultraman was a TV show, a young boy named Tsutomu, is failing in school due to his addiction to Ultraman. One night, while watching an Ultraman Gaia episode, he gets teleported into a hyperspace where he sees a girl and behind her a scene of mass destruction. He later sees that same girl, named Lisa, in his class. Later on, he finds a mysterious glowing ball (also from the dream) that tells him it can make any wish come true. The one thing Tsutomu wants more than anything else is to meet Gamu Takayama, Ultraman Gaia's human counterpart. After his wish is granted, Gamu actually appears, but a bully takes the ball and makes the second wish; for a kaiju, Satanbizo, to fight Gamu. After Gamu transforms into Ultraman Gaia, he finds he is losing power quickly, but manages to defeat the kaiju regardless. Afterwards, reverting into Gamu, he is chased by kids through the neighborhood until he finally manages to elude them by hiding in a toy shop. Once inside though, Tsutomu and his friends find Gamu and Tsutomu explains to Gamu just how he was brought to their world. Tsutomu tries hiding Gamu in an abandoned hanger, and during this time, Gamu sees that Tsutomu has a present for Lisa, a book called "Gulliver's Travels", which was a favorite of Gamu's as a child. While scanning the ball for the answers, not only do the police find him, but Gamu suddenly finds himself back in his own world, and accidentally takes the book with him. He is soon able to recall the events and checks the data he scanned from the ball, and gets a vision telling him that Tsutomu's world will soon be destroyed.

Unfortunately, during the whole ordeal, Tsutomu loses the ball, and the bully finds the wishing ball and wishes for a giant kaiju to appear. This wish created the kaiju King of Mons who immediately started destroying their suburban Tokyo neighborhood. Gamu becomes determined to open a gateway between the two universes to stop the kaiju and save the world Tsutomu lives in. Gamu is soon able to find his way there with the aid of a new mecha, the Aventure, and transforms into Gaia to battle the giant kaiju. Soon, Gaia was in a deadly battle against the kaiju. With Gaia having the upper hand, King of Mons spawned two more kaiju; Bajiris and Scylla. Tsutomu, knowing that Gaia is in trouble, tries to wish for help only to be sent flying into the air by one of the kaiju's stray beams. Just as all seems lost he is rescued by Ultraman Tiga and Ultraman Dyna, who have come into the battle to help Gaia. The three Ultramen battled the kaiju. Tiga and Dyna destroy King of Mon's spawns. Gaia, now in Supreme mode, manages to obliterate King of Mons with a highly powerful laser blast and saves the day. Gaia then turns back into Gamu and reveals Lisa's secret to Tsutomu: She is the human-interface of the ball. Even though Lisa will disappear forever, she urges Tsutomu to wish for the ball to vanish forever, repairing all of the damage that had been caused by it to that world. Before returning to his world, Gamu returns Tsutomu's book to him and tells him "Thanks to this book, we were able to meet again.

Battle Against Root of Destruction part 2
Later in the series, GUARD tries to be more proactive about defeating the monsters that are attacking the Earth. They try to destroy dormant monster Tigris by sending a bomb into the ground, a plan that backfires horribly. They create an artificial wormhole to destroy the home planet of monsters C.O.V. and Pazuzu, also with disastrous consequences.

The K.H.S.T. uses this opportunity to send C.O.V. and a Pazuzu through the wormhole, and they become more powerful as a result. What becomes evident to Gamu is that monsters like Tigris, MIZUNOENORYUH, Shazack, and Izaku, are creatures of the Earth like humans are, and perhaps it is not so fair to eradicate them when their only instinct is to survive. As for creatures sent by the K.H.S.T., they are not inherently evil. When they are sent to Earth their first instinct is simply to survive in an alien environment. Thus, Gamu / Gaia questions his morals and human motives.

Agul eventually returns later, and he and Gaia set their differences aside to fight the common enemy. When Gamu's life is threatened by robotic monster Σ-Zuiguru, Fujimiya pleads with the Earth itself to fight one more time' and he is granted the power of Agul again, as Version 2. Version 2 appears to have greater power than Version 1, as he was able to withstand Sigma Zuigul's second attack with little difficulty. Gaia and Agul finally join forces to defeat Super C.O.V. and Super Pazuzu.

The final assault on Earth forces begins with the arrival of Blitz-Blots, a black and white avian monster who has the ability to absorb and fire back Ultra energy weapons with the red object on his chest. He systematically destroys GUARD. bases, and roughs up Agul V2 in the process. Blitz-Blots destroys a base that resembles the original Science Patrol headquarters. Tigris II emerges to fight Blitz-Blots and XIG, GUARD, monster, and Gaia must fight side by side to defeat Blitz-Blots. Ironically, part of this motley alliance includes the GUARD commander who killed the original Tigris, as part of an anti-monster vendetta.

Later, the giant creature Mokian is sent to Earth. He is a living monopole, a monster with enough magnetic power to pull apart the Earth's crust and end civilization. It is revealed by the Death God that the Root of Destruction feels humans are a threat to the universe and must be eradicated. To destroy Mokian and save Gaia, Ishimuro of XIG sacrifices the Aerial Base by ramming it into the giant monster, although miraculously, no one dies in the process. In a last effort before the final plan, Shinigami comes to the Earth in the form of Zebub, an owl-like monster. When Agul tries to fight, he ends up getting his leg cut open with his spear. Gaia (after Gamu had revealed his identity to XIG) soon comes in to heal Agul and let him change back and after a brutal fight Zebub dies and with that the final attack began.

Final Battle Against Zogu The Root of Destruction
The Root of Destruction finally reveals herself in the form of Zogu, a giant, white angel. She kills the Kizer Dobishis that the Ultramen are fighting, and replenishes Gaia and Agul's power, only to completely overpower the two and make their Life Gauges expire. The two Ultramen turn back into Gamu and Fujimiya, which is telecast by the two KCB cameramen, despite Reiko's protests to turn off the camera. The battle is broadcasted across the entire world. They survive, but can no longer transform into Gaia and Agul.

At this point, all of Earth's monsters start emerging again all around the world to protect Earth from the Dobishis and Kizer Dobishis.

Everyone is brought back and united to participate together in the final battle against Zogu. Gaia, Agul, XIG, the Earth monsters, the Alchemy Stars, the KCB TV crew, and even Gamu's parents show up to encourage him. Gamu hatches a final scheme, in which the Alchemy Stars network is used to assist the last of the XIG fighters (some are flying normal military planes that have been modified by the Alchemy Stars) to channel energy from the Earth monsters to give Gamu and Fujimiya the ability to transform back into Gaia and Agul.

Boosted with this huge supply of energy, Gaia and Agul wipe the Earth clean of the hordes of Dobishi. However, as Gaia finishes off the Dobishi, Zogu reappears. She strikes down Gaia and Agul, but they fiercely counterattack. After being briefly staggered by the counterattack, Zogu morphs from her angel form into a colossal dragon like monster.

Gaia and Agul then worked together as a team and they destroy Zogu with their strongest attack, formed by combining their energy beams. Zogu is vanquished and people come out into the open to cheers for their heroes.

Ultraman Gaia: Gaia Again
Having lost the ability to transform into Gaia and Agul after their battles against Zogu, Gamu and Fujimiya return to their normal lives. But then, the underwater civilization seeked humanity's help, and thus, they restored Gaia's light to Gamu, allowing him to become Gaia once again to battle the remnant of the Root of Destruction, Gakuzom. He was joined by Fujimiya, who had also regained his powers from the same source. After the battle, Gamu and Fujimiya parted ways as they continued their normal lives.

Great Decisive Battle! The Super 8 Ultra Brothers
An alternate version of Ultraman Gaia and Gamu Takayama appear in a world where Ultraman was nothing but a tv show.

Dark Spark War
Prior to the Ultraman Ginga series, Ultraman Gaia participated in the Dark Spark War but this time he fought not only alongside with the Ultraman Agul but, with the other Ultras and their allies against the evil side. In the war, Ultraman faced Zetton while in their midst battle, Dark Lugiel appeared and turned every Ultra alongside their allies, monsters and aliens into Spark Dolls with Gamu still as his human host. Just as the war was about to end, an unknown warrior appeared and faced Dark Lugiel but like the others he was also turned into a Spark Doll but he was kept within his Spark Device and fell alongside the other Spark Dolls to Earth.

Your Future
After Ginga defeated Lugiel, Gaia is presumed to have returned to his original form and returned home in the form of a ball of light along with Agul and the other Spark Dolls.

Ultraman Ginga S Movie Showdown! The 10 Ultra Warriors!
"Hikaru, Shou, this is your Earth. So you must protect it."

- Ultraman Gaia

Gaia was among the Heisei Ultras imprisoned by Etelgar and Arina in the Evil Mirror. After being freed, he regroups with Ultraman Tiga and Ultraman Dyna, facing the chimeric monster Five King that manifested from the combined form of their traumas against past monsters (in Gaia's case, Gan Q and C.O.V). Gaia turned into his Supreme Version while Tiga changed into Power Type and Dyna changed into Miracle Type. Eventually, the three managed to defeat the ferocious monster with their combined attacks of Tiga's Delacium Light Stream, Dyna's Revolium Wave Attack Type & Gaia's Photon Stream.

Stats

 * Home world: Planet Earth (Gaia universe)
 * Height: micro ~ 50 m
 * Weight: 42,000 t
 * Activity time: Undefined (Gaia's color timer only begins to flash when damaged to a certain extent.)
 * Flight speed: Mach 20, Mach 22 (V2), Mach 25 (SV)
 * Running speed: Mach 5, Mach 6 (V2), Mach 7.5 (SV)
 * Underwater speed: Mach 2, Mach 3.2 (V2), Mach 5 (SV)
 * Ground latent speed: Mach 2, Mach 3 (V2), Mach 6 (SV)
 * Jumping distance: 1,200 m, 1,800 m (V2), 2500 m (SV)
 * Grip strength: 50,000 t (equivalent to 50 kg, for a human), 70,000 t (V2), 120,000 t (SV)

Body Features

 * Gaia Head: Referring to the gold markings on Gaia's head, they gather light energy or mana from the Earth to power him, they are also required for the Photon Stream and similar beams fired from the head.
 * Gaia Eyes: His eyes can detect hidden enemies, even those that are invisible or hiding behind objects, can also see vast distances.
 * Life Gauge: The proper term for Gaia's color timer, he has no set time limit to how long he can be active. Instead it serves to show how much energy he has left, his energy is used up both by attacking and receiving blows.
 * Gaia Breaster (ガイアブレスター): The gold (Later gold and black) bands around his life gauge, they are pieces of armor and sturdiest part of his body, being almost indestructible. Upon gaining V2 they gain a black lines in between them and in supreme version they spread to his shoulders.
 * Gaia Body: The red ultra's body can withstand low temperatures and survive in the vacuum of space. He is also resistant to laser beams and fire.
 * Arms: Concentrates the energy for most of Gaia's ray attacks, such the Photon Edge and Purification Ray
 * Feet: Able to generate anti-gravitational energy for flight. When landing, the energy discharge causes small eruptions underneath Gaia's feet.
 * Size Change: Gaia can become Human & gigantic size.

Transformation
The Esplender: Gamu raises the Esplender to the sky, it then activates and bathes Gamu in a beam of red light before Gamu transforms into Ultraman Gaia. After Gamu receives Agul's light, sometimes red and blue light appears around him.

New Century Ultraman Legend
Pending

PD Ultraman Battle Collection 64
Pending

Great Decisive Battle! The Super 8 Ultra Brothers
Gaia has a counterpart from another universe who was born from human feelings instead of Earth energies.

Toy Release Information

 * Main Article: Ultraman Gaia/Merchandise

Ultraman Gaia was first released as a ATBC-PVC material soft vinyl Figure by Bandai in 1998. Both V2 and Supreme Version (except V1, who were released as an EX version, also Gaia's Fake Counterpart is also released as UHEX) were also re-released as Ultra Hero Series 2004 and 2009 versions. An UH-a, Action Hero Series (V2 only) , Kyomoto Collection, & an Ultra-Act version (V2 is standard, and Supreme version is a Tamashii Exclusive) of the figure is also released. His transformation Device is released by Bandai.

Trivia

 * Ultraman Gaia is the second ultra to fight another Ultra, the first being Ultraman Tiga against Evil Tiga.
 * Ultraman Gaia is the first Ultra to fire his beam with his horizontal arm behind his vertical one, instead of in front.
 * Ultraman Gaia and Agul are perhaps the most unique of Ultras in the entire series. The two are not aliens to the Earth and instead of running on sunlight or having the three minute rule, they are powered by the Light Energies of the Earth and Sea (some call it Mana) and seem to be metaphysical in nature. Their lack of a time limit is not seen again until Nexus.
 * Like Agul, Gaia's power is always increasing, meaning his attacks are always stronger than the last time he used them. Agul's Version 2 is the result of the Agul force reforming after Fujimiya gave his power to Gamu, so it is possible that Gaia may have acquired an altogether different Version 2 had he not acquired Agul's power.
 * Ultraman Gaia is the second Ultra shown fighting a monster before merging with his host or taking a human form, the first being Ultraman Great.
 * Gaia's signature attack Photon Edge is the second signature attack not to be formed by hands, the first was Ultraman Leo's Leo Kick.
 * In the movie New Century Ultraman Legend, Gaia's and Agul's grunts were reused from Ultraman Zearth's grunts
 * Gaia's name comes from the Gaia hypothesis, named after the primordial Greek deity whose name means "Earth", it states the totality of the Earth constitutes a complex organism.
 * Gaia is one of few Ultras that was rarely defeated. His only loss was to Angel Zogu towards the end of the series.
 * Gaia V2 is seen by many as an incomplete merger, due to Gamu being given Agul's light. Most others explain this away as Gaia only receiving the light and powers of Agul, but not his mind, which remained with Fujimiya.
 * Gaia's color timer sound is a higher pitched, and modified version of Tiga's Color Timer.