#godzilla reboot

[zeldasminion]

Will Toho's World of Godzilla be the start of another reboot? Or will it be in the same universe as Shin Godzilla?

[the-desolated-quill]

Godzilla (2014 reboot) - MonsterVerse blog

(SPOILER WARNING: The following is an in-depth critical analysis. if you haven’t seen this movie yet, you may want to before reading this review)

Yep. It appears we have yet another shared universe. This one revolving around giant monsters blowing shit up and beating the crap out of each other, and is set to continue with the release of Kong: Skull Island tomorrow here in the UK. So let’s take a look at the genesis of Warner Bros. and Legendary Pictures’ MonsterVerse. Godzilla. The 2014 reboot of Toho’s Godzilla franchise.

I suppose I should point out that before this I had never seen a Godzilla movie before. nor any other big monster movie (Kaiju movies I believe they’re called). Of course I knew who Godzilla was and the cultural impact he’s made, but I never felt a pressing need to watch a Godzilla movie. I guess the genre just never really appealed to me. I only saw this movie in the cinema because it was a friend’s birthday at the time and he wanted to see it. And do you know what? I’m glad I saw it. I thought this was a solid movie and I liked it a lot more than I thought I would.

The movie is about so much more than giant monsters knocking the shit out of each other. A surprising amount of effort has actually gone into the world and its lore. Godzilla and the MUTOs (Massive Unidentified Terrestrial Organisms) are ancient creatures that feed off of radiation from the Earth’s core only to be drawn to the surface when humans start experimenting with nuclear power. We learn that the nuclear bomb tests from the 1950s were actually attempts to kill Godzilla and that a secret organisation called Monarch is set up to monitor, study and contain these creatures.

The main theme of Godzilla is that of nature’s domination over man and our fierce denial of that. While Monarch are not villains in any way, they do display the arrogant belief that they have power over these creatures and can contain them only to learn very quickly that nothing can stop these things. No matter what we do, we cannot control nature and our attempts to do so only make things worse. At one point in the film, the army try to use a nuke to kill the monster only for the plan to go tits up and the MUTOs taking the nuke back to their nest... in the middle of San Francisco. So then the army have to send another team to disarm the nuke before it detonates and kills everybody in the blast radius. The movie is less about the humans fighting the monsters and more about the humans clearing up their own mess while the monsters fight it out. It’s spelled out very clearly throughout the movie that there’s nothing we can do to stop these monsters. All we can do is back away, let them fight and if and when Godzilla wins, hope that he fucks off and leaves us alone.

Considering that this is the first time he’s ever directed a big budget blockbuster, Gareth Edwards does an extremely impressive job (especially when you consider the intense amount of pressure and stress he was under during the film’s production). The film is absolutely gorgeous to look at. My favourite scene has to be the HALO jump where the soldiers airdrop into San Francisco. I mean you can sort of glimpse it on the movie poster above. It looks like they’re descending through the nine circles of Hell. But what I especially love is the sense of scale. Edwards really relishes showing off just how massive these monsters are and how tiny and inconsequential we are in comparison. It’s the kind of movie that makes you realise just how insignificant we really are and reminds you that we’re all going to die. But as nihilistic as the film can sometimes be, there are also moments of dark humour that bleed through on occasion. For example when the female MUTO is rampaging through Las Vegas whilst Elvis Presley’s ‘You’re The Devil In Disguise’ is playing in the background. Or the bit where the news advises citizens not to take their cars when fleeing major cities only to then cut to a road that’s jam packed with cars and people fleeing in all directions. It’s moments like that that add some humanity to the film, which I really appreciated.

Let’s talk about the monsters themselves. First of all I love how they behave like actual animals. The way they move and interact with each other, it all feels believable. And they don’t care about us. We’re like ants compared to them. The MUTOs aren’t destroying buildings because they’re hellbent on killing  us. They’re just doing what all animals instinctively want to do. Find food, reproduce, and defend their young from predators. Godzilla is the same. He fights the MUTOs not because he’s trying to defend humanity. It’s because he’s the alpha predator and the MUTOs are his prey. (On a side note, I love how they establish Godzilla’s relationship with the MUTOs. At the beginning of the film we see these MUTO pods inside the skeleton of another Godzilla, implying that they’re parasitic, feeding off of the radiation of other monsters. I have to applaud how well thought out and well constructed this ecosystem is).

The MUTOs look really cool (apparently they were designed around a staple remover). They’re sort of giant insectoids and are incredibly threatening. The noises they make are enough to make your heart rate go up. That’s another thing Gareth Edwards is good at. He’s so good at building tension and suspense. There are scenes where the humans are trapped somewhere and you can see and hear the MUTO moving around and you’re not sure what its going to do. It’s incredibly frightening at points.

And then there’s Godzilla himself. I LOVE him! The design is really cool, the roar is mind blowing and, again, he just feels like a real animal. Now some people have complained that there’s not enough Godzilla in the film (there’s a YouTube video that shows all of Godzilla’s scenes and it’s only ten minutes long). I suppose it all comes down to personal taste, but honestly I was fine with the amount of Godzilla we got in the film. (Remember we barely saw the shark or the Xenomorph in Jaws and Alien respectively). Godzilla doesn’t show up until about an hour into the movie and Edwards does an excellent job building up his reveal. From there the film keeps showing you brief glimpses of fights, teasing and tantalising the audience until the final act where we finally get the big monster smackdown. I personally think the film showed just the right amount of Godzilla to keep us in suspense. Edwards is very careful not to overuse Godzilla, making sure every encounter is memorable and powerful. Too much and I honestly think it would have become boring. I’d much prefer a few memorable scenes with Godzilla rather than a saturation of monster fights that start to blur together after a while. Quality over quantity.

I reckon people wouldn’t have minded so much about the amount of Godzilla if the human characters were interesting. Sadly that’s by far the weakest part off the movie. Don’t get me wrong. They’re not poorly written or under-developed. They seem likeable enough. They’re just not very compelling or memorable to the point where I can’t even remember their names. I’d say Bryan Cranston gives the strongest performance. He loses his wife at the beginning of the film when the nuclear power station he works at gets destroyed, and he becomes obsessed with finding out what happened. Out of all of them, he seems to be the most interesting character and there are some good moments with him. The scene where he watches his wife die of radiation sickness did choke me up a bit and I’d say I cared about his character the most. Which is why it’s a real kick to the bollocks when he’s callously and rather cruelly killed off by the MUTO. At which point, we’re then forced to follow his son, played by Aaron Taylor-Johnson. While he’s not a bad character, he is incredibly bland. Sure I was happy that he was reunited with his wife and child at the end, but he’s just not as good a lead as Bryan Cranston was. Given the choice, I’d much rather Taylor-Johnson’s character was killed off and Cranston’s character remained the focus because his character is just more appealing to me.

While the main characters are kind of bland and forgettable, it’s the monsters, direction and truly fascinating lore where Godzilla excels. I’m definitely curious as to where they go from here and whether this MonsterVerse they’re planning will have any potential going forward.

[str8upreview]

Godzilla vs. Kong Trailer: What's going on?

Godzilla vs. Kong Trailer: What’s going on?

I just checked out the Godzilla Vs. Kong trailer and it promises to deliver on an epic showdown between Godzilla, King of Monsters and Kong, King of the Apes aka The Eighth Wonder of the World. However, while it definitely hyped me up for the last installment in the Godzilla reboot franchise, I am left with a lot of questions by its end. Synopsis: The scene starts out with a lengthy discussion…

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[belt-and-braces]

So, I finally got round to watching the Godzilla reboot, last night.

The human side of the film was complete crap, but I expected as much, especially with the military. It's rarely done right in films such as creature features and the rest, and besides: this is a giant monster vs giant monster movie. I'm not watching it for the humans, I want to see some epic monster fights!

Which is what happened. True, the fights would have been better if it was during the day time, or maybe even have one fight during the day, but it wasn't as dark as a lot of people are claiming, the fights weren't short or choppy, in my opinion: and Godzilla's atomic breath use was fucking fantastic. That said, I'm happy with how he only used it 3 times: and suffered side-effects, e.g lethargy and whatnot. You can't really expect any creature to be able to use such a devastating attack, repeatedly and without tiring, etc. Godzilla shouldn't be able to, well, enter godmode. Whee, spamming attacks! 

That all said, the only human characters that had some depth to them, and were interesting: was the father. Everyone else was 2D, boring, irritating to a small extent, and could easily pass as background noise. The apparent focus on children was annoying, but it could have been worse, e.g several drawn-out 'save the children!2!' crises.

In short, I would watch it again, and I would be able to ignore the human-half of the story. I didn't pay too much attention to them, the first time round; again, I had expected the usual Hollywood 'didn't do the research' scenario.

In my experience, Hollywood's military are either incredibly incompetent, 'hurrr, how hold gun', or the exact opposite: they are organised, thorough, and quick to react every time a giant monster threatens NYC. Godzilla!military was the former.. and I didn't mind. It's a film about giant radioactive monsters, in the first place. I can believe the monsters, in that universe; the military being a pack of poorly-trained fuckers didn't bother me or ruin the movie, unless I focus on their half of the story for too long.

[fullmetalasgardian]

Godzilla is my spirit animal

[stargazersilver]

So my dad calls Godzilla "Gonzales."

[mohartproductions]

Godzilla (2014) Non-Spoiler Review

皆さん、こんにちは、ここにトロイ。さて、ゴジラ... Okay, sorry, I was going to do a Japanese into as a homage but I'm worried I might offend someone... anyway... Godzilla, everyone's favorite city destroying, atomic breath-breathing monster has returned to the big screen on his 60th year anniversry at last... And Man was it underwhelming... what?! Well okay, maybe not "Underwhelming" I mean it's not bad, far from it actually; there's plenty of brilliance to this film and I must give props to the cast and crew for their commitment and all the effort they put in this movie. (ストーリー)The Story After losing his wife in a nuclear incident 15 years prior, scientist, Joe Brody (Bryan Cranston) and his son Ford (Aaron Taylor Johnson) investigate a government cover up in their former home in Japan, they are then taken into custody where at the abandend plant where they are examining the source of all the disasters, a Muto: A giant parasitic monster that inevitably risen from the plant after feeding off from the radiation and contracted EMP abilities. With this new threat now active, and while the U.S. Government prepare for a nuclear assult, Dr. Ishiro Serizawa (Ken Wantanabe) believes that there is but one other creature that can end this new catasrophe... Godzilla. Godzilla has new returned to earth the the struggle is on as the two monsters clash. We'll I must say... It has it's twists, minor cop outs included. Especially at the last 20 minutes there's a cop out... then a cop out of that cop out, then a cop out of the cop out from the earlier cop out... then a cop out, of a cop out, of a cop out coping out that cop out... Don't worry it's not like that other movie that involves a giant iguana... but yeah hiccups aside it actually does pull off some pretty good drama and action. Infact for what it is it actually comes of as almost like a Superhero movie in one way... we'll get to that. (キャラクター) The Characters First let's get to know the actor who'm practly everyone knows and loves best, Bryan Cranston as Joe Brody. As usual, Bryan pulls of an excellent performance as he can go from percky and colorful to dark and honest, and while not as dark as with his performance as Walter White, he knows how to pull off a serious and even heart-felt performance for this character. Then we have Aaron Taylor Johnson as Ford Brody, Joe's son. Again another realistically dark and emotional act for this film, a character who also has a family of his own; his wife Elly, played by Elizabeth Olson (Not either one of the Olson twins BTW) and his son... He's cute. And he must risk his life for the good of the many; we'll see why he's the real main character of the story as it progresses. Ken Wantanabe as Dr. Ishiro Serizawa was okay... nothing grand but hey there's gotta be some Japaneze roots to this film I guess... that doesn't sound racist does it?! Well the stuff revolving around him is... Well the way he brought up Godzilla in this movie seems, again more like a cop-out; yeah let's just say that if your expecting a sequel to the first movie then... sorry but whatever purpose this character has here suggests otherwise... Still I at least thought he did solid with what he was given. In fact think of him as the Ramond Bur of this movie as apposed to Ramond Bur of the original... when it was edited in America for american audiences, Ironic aint it?! And of course let's not forget the reason why we all came to see this movie in the first place, Godzilla. Godzilla (Gojira) was absolutely amazing in this movie, he looked big, he felt big, he sounded big; he truly does live up to his title as King of The Monsters, especially with his fight with the Mutos... when they were happening in the movie! See, thing is, and trying to avoid spoilers with this but... Godzilla ain't exactly in the movie for that long really. I mean don't get me wrong, the movie isn't really about the monster, it's about the people, that's one of the things that make Godzilla movies it, they're also about the humans!

Besides it's almost paralell to how little Batman we saw in Tim Burton's Batman movie... which brings up the superhero aspect of the story. By the end of the movie, dispite the cassualties he's caused, Godzilla feels very much like a superhero to some degree. Infact while one can consider this the Batman Begins to Batman and Robin, you can also say that This is Man of Steel done right... Yeah the monster that reaks havoc on modern man is actually a much better Superman than Superman was in Man of steel... So wait is Godzilla Batman or Superman... or is he Wolverine? I don't know whatever floats your boat I guess. (効果) The Effects Their good... that's all I gotta say, the cgi, props, and cinematography for this movie for the most part was pretty good. Again Godzilla looked and felt real, and his roar was truly defines his as the King of Monsters, we also got the design for the other monster, The Muto. I actually like the design of the Muto, it just seems so alien that you can't decide whether it's a parasite that evolved evolved into Gigantism as a resut of feeding from the radiation, or infact if it's just another form of reptile... also it's not a government creation, so yeah as far as this movie's rules on biology is conserned, this is it's own species... sorta (Again The Bomb Allegory). the musical score by Alexander Desplat (Harry Potter and Rise of The Guardians) was also very nostalgic, sure he's no Akira Ifukube, and while I wanted to hear a modern take on Godzilla's iconic theme I was rather glad with the direction he took, composing his own score that was very much a homage to classical movies while still giving it a modern feel. (決勝) Final Over all, Godzilla does have what it takes to live up to the legend, thou it's not flawless and there are things worth critiquing on, The film makes up for it's hiccups with it's outstanding cast, good effects, and even a fairly memorable soundtrack. Gareth Edwards is definitaly a good director as he stands now, along the way he may even be right up there with Steven Speilberg, Peter Jackson, and Christopher Nolan, and I for one hope to this story continue along the way. Who knows, maybe we might... might even get a chance to see Rodan return to the big screen, think of it as a Kaiju equevalent to setting up the Avengers... make it happen! So, that's... Story: 7.5 Characters: 8 Effects and Score: 8 And with that, I am going to give Godzilla... Movie: 7/10

[superweebtime]

A couple friends (Tucker and Tony) and I have a really long-winded discussion about the new Godzilla movie. The first 18 or so minutes are spoiler-free and everything after that is riddled with Godzilla spoilers. I hope you all enjoy, and maybe if this goes over well, we can do this again for other movies!