Patlabor Ep. 4: Go to Demon Mountain!

Three friends sing as they backpack their way through a forest, but one of them stops when he spots a bunch of trees knocked down in some sort of rampage. They then hear a strange sound and wonder if it’s a bear, but one of them says a bear doesn’t sound like that. They think a monster is approaching them, but it turns out to just be a Crabman construction labor that falls down. They then hear a strange growling and run away when they spot glowing eyes in the shadows. The men call the police and report seeing a monster, but the operator doesn’t believe them. She suggests calling the Self Defense Force, but a senior officer says they can’t do that because this is their jurisdiction, so he hands the case over to SV2. Goto gets the call about a mysterious giant monster, and Shinobu says she’s glad that Division 1 isn’t on call for the entire week. She thinks it’s a false alarm, but also a good opportunity for sightseeing. Goto tells everyone to prepare to mobilize and hesitates at first to say that it’s about a giant creature. Asuma excitedly thinks it might be a monster, but Kanuka dismisses it as just being a labor. Shinshi adds that there have been cases of labors in costumes, and Noa asks if it can fly. Asuma notes that no labor can yet move like an animal, but Kanuka adds that animals of that size are extinct. Noa wonders if it’s an elephant, and Ota just wants to kill it and identify it afterwards. In the forest, the hikers take the police to the location of the monster sighting, but the Crabman is gone. The officer doesn’t believe them until spotting the shadowy monster. They try to crawl away, but the monster smashes their car before jumping back into the trees. Division 2 arrives and deploys the Ingrams, and an officer tells Goto that there really is something in the forest. The officer tells Goto to capture the monster alive because city officials believe a monster could boost tourism. Ota asks for orders, and Goto asks if they can just have the monster stuffed in the worst case. Noa talks to Hiromi about the manual makes no mention of monsters, and Asuma comments that an Ingram would have a speed disadvantage against a live animal. Asuma asks Kanuka what they should do, and Kanuka answers that they’ll have to play it by ear. A man rings a bell in the watchtower that the monster is approaching.

The police interview a man whose coops were smashed up by the monster, causing his birds to escape. Kanuka thinks that the monster is a carnivore, and Asuma wonders if it came out of the mountains for food. Unit 2 knocks over trees as it stumbles through the forest, and when Kanuka tells Ota to move more efficiently, he shouts back that monsters aren’t concerned with efficiency. Goto has everyone set up along a spot in the road where all the forest trails meet, and he hopes something happens before nightfall. Kanuka tells Ota to check the sonograph data because he’s wasting too much time, and he draws his gun as soon as he detects a heat signature. Kanuka tells him to wait because it’s a labor, and he begins shooting randomly into the trees, wasting all his bullets. He asks for a new clip, but Kanuka yells at him that they don’t have one. Goto hears the gunshots, and Asuma comments that Ota probably didn’t even hit anything after firing all six shots. Kanuka calls Goto and tells him that she’s dealing with a bonus target as the monster heads his way. Asuma and Noa head into the forest, and Ota apprehends a Bulldog by disabling it with his baton. Kanuka tells him to leave that to her and instead go backup Noa. The monster jumps out of the forest and uses Unit 1’s head as a springboard to jump back into the trees. Noa Is angered and gives chase to the monster as night falls.  The monster finally reaches the road, and Goto has Shinshi and Hiromi activate the spotlights on the carriers, which forces the monster back into the forest. Noa runs toward the monster, but it escapes into the trees and then jumps out behind her. She manages to grab its claw with her hands and flip it behind her. She then shocks the monster with her baton, and Ota appears with a tree to beat the monster. He argues with Noa about beating up the monster and wrestles her to the ground. Afterward, Goto explains that the monster was created by a medical lab in the mountains. It escaped, so they tried to capture it with the Crabman and failed. Noa asks if they’re going to kill the monster, and Kanuka wonders what it was anyway. Everyone disagrees, saying it was a cat, giant rat, bear, grendal and a black panda.