Johnny (Masaaki Kaji) and Caroline (Hiroko Saito) are annoying Japanese schoolchildren straight out of GODZILLA flick central casting. Johnny has that round, moon face that suggests too many dumplings and a role as the teenager Sammo Hung in a made-for-TV bio-pic while Caroline sports white knee-highs, pigtails, and a denim jumper over a Holly Hobbie blouse, securing a place for her in the hearts and minds of freaky Japanese schoolgirl fetish fans everywhere.

While visiting the hi-tech lab of Uncle Charlie, the kids and chaperone Catherine (Reiko Tokunaga) take refuge from an earthquake in capsules that shield them from the falling debris, not to mention the danger of that big cardboard "computer" catching fire from the blinking lightbulbs jammed into it.

The good news is they survive the earthquake. The bad news is they wake up several thousand years into the future on... wait for it... a planet ruled by apes! (You were expecting something else from a flick called TIME OF THE APES?)

What follows is one of the most entertaining "so bad it's great" gems I've seen in years. All the cliche POTA subplots can be found in abundance... the area the apes are afraid to venture into; Pepe, the helpful ape child (played Kazue Takita), who looks like a kid in an Ewok mask; Godo, the obligatory "wildman" (Tetsuya Ushio) who might as well come from a tribe called "The Beatniks" with his turtleneck sweater and wild beard; in-fighting within the ape community; and, oh, so much more.

Unlike "official" APES entries, TIME OF THE APES steers clear of any "messages" like racial harmony, technology gone awry or man's inhumanity to man for most of its 98 minute running time. That changes during a revealing encounter between our "naked ape" humans and Police Chief Gebar (Baku Hatakeyama), which is pronounced "Gay Bar" throughout the flick. Thanks to some footage provided by a buttinsky of a UFO and the good-natured wisdom of the sartorially resplendent Commander (Wataru Omae), our heroes are given the opportunity to live a life that basically translates to "separate but equal" status. Until, of course, an encounter with a supercomputer that explains (sorta) how apes came to rule and gives our intrepid time-travelers a chance to travel even further into the future or live life on another planet. Some choices.

What the computer does not explain is: how the apes came into possession of leftover uniforms from a civil war re-enactment society; why the Commander wears a costume that can only be described as Dolemite Meets Colonel Sanders; what the origin of the CB antenna, um, I mean "laser whip" is; how – if it's a few thousand years in the future – the apes are driving a fine selection of 1960s/70s muscle cars; or, if Uncle Charlie's smoking around the "highly sensitive" computer equipment had anything to do with thrusting our heroes into the future.

With all the junk that's clogging up the 600 cable channels we get, I find it hard to believe somebody wasn't willing to air the 26 episodes that make up the entire Japanese TV series from which this flick was edited together. I guarantee it would immediately become my favorite show on television!