Yukijiro Hotaru is a prolific Japanese actor whose career spans several decades, beginning in the 1980s. He is best known internationally for his role as Inspector Tsutomu Osako in the Heisei Gamera trilogy, directed by Shusuke Kaneko: *Gamera: Guardian of the Universe* (1995), *Gamera 2: Attack of Legion* (1996), and *Gamera 3: Revenge of Iris* (1999). For his performance in the first installment of the saga, he won the Best Supporting Actor award at the 1996 Yokohama Film Festival. His career is closely linked to the *tokusatsu* genre, having played the character of Gonza Kurahashi in the long-running *Garo* saga and acted in cult films such as *Zeiram* (1991). He has collaborated with numerous directors, including Takashi Miike, consolidating his reputation as one of the most recognizable faces in Japanese genre cinema, often in supporting roles characterized by a mix of comedy and drama.