I don't usually vent my frustrations here, but I always have this feeling that I'm all alone in my home country, because no-one shares my interests irl or online, like, I'm a Godzilla fan, I also love paleontology and tokusatsu. But I never found another Godzilla fan in Serbia or in the Balkans at all, nobody in Serbian threads or forums discuss kaijus or anything, but whenever it's a kaiju movie either they like or hate it, but the in between answer is always common. I don't want to feel like the only one, I know Godzilla fans exist around the world, in The United states, it's native Japan, Southeast Asia like Thailand and the Phillipines also in Western Europe like Germany and the United Kingdom, But Germany has a lot of kaiju fans, but there aren't many in Hungary or my Native Serbia at all. But I'm mainly looking for kaiju fans in the Balkans (which I didn't find any, now the word Balkans is mostly arbitrary because sometimes Romania and Hungary are considered Balkan, but there's an argument that they're not)
The only fandoms I find Serbs interested in are the mainstream ones that *Everyone* is into like that circus show, those ridiculous animatronics, magical ponies, the generic popular stuff tiktok kids are into, like Serbs online are so americanized (ironic since a lot of Serbs don't like the United states yet we're the most americanized people in the Balkans, and that goes for the teen-agers too.)
But I've never meet a Serbian paleontology nerd or a Godzilla fan, there exist Serbian anime fans and people that claim to like Japanese culture but when you try to mention something like Tokusatsu related they look at you like a confused dog. How can you claim to know all of Japanese culture when you choose to ignore something that's also considered important to Japanese culture? Godzilla movies used to be released in Yugoslavia! The original 1954 movie and the other kaiju movies were shown in Yugoslavia! So what gives? Why where they released in the first place if nobody bothered to watch them? But whenever you mention Godzilla to a millennial or gen z serb they only think of the monsterverse or that 1998 film. And the only kaiju Serbs and other Europeans like is King Kong (who's the only common kaiju reference in Europe and Serbian YouTube videos.)
This just goes to show how the Godzilla and dinosaur communities are still considered "weird" and frowned up hypocritically by other secretly ableist fanbases, we're too "autistic" (people use it derogatory on some of us) or "were confusing" and "Godzilla movies are indigestible". The Godzilla franchise still isn't mainstream, it's big & popular in the Pacific but over here in some parts of Europe (excluding western countries like Germany, UK, Spain, Italy and France) nobody cares or even likes it. Why is that? It's because some snobby Europeans have too much high expectations when they watch Japanese kaiju films, and were not "simple", the movies are too 'strange", they can understand Pokemon and MLP or something more "Bizarre" than any kaiju film, but they can't understand one Godzilla film? That's Hypocrisy. The most common thing in European film critics and general watcher. And I thought Godzilla minus one would make people interested. One time it was probably hyped but then forgotten very quickly.
Tokusatsu isn't truly mainstream or popular enough if we can't reach a global audience (and when I mean global I mean every country and I don't mean G7 or the western world that only Americans know.) Like kaijus are overshadowed by western tedious cartoons, boring try-hard horror and many modern lackluster film from hollywood.
Ako je neko ovde fan Godzile, a da je iz balkanskog poluostrva, ili iz bivše Jugoslavije ili samo iz Srbije. Molim te, javi mi se pa da ne ispadnem kao jedini obožavatelj Godzile u Srbiji. Ja bi voleo da te upoznam.
(To my followers, I'm sorry that you had to read that, it's just im sad that kaiju movies aren't being respected like any movie medium in Europe, and it's also difficult to find a Godzilla fan in my native Serbia, I don't usually vent my frustrations here, and I'm sorry that I made you guys upset with this, I don't mean to bring anyone down with me or feel as bummed out as I am.)
