Previously on Fanboyism Extraordinaire:
I really love Godzilla, you guys.
This shouldn’t come as a shock since my contract does stipulate that I mention him in at least half of my articles, but Godzilla occupies a really important place in my heart; not only have I been aware of Godzilla since before I even knew what Japan was, but it was also the very first pop culture franchise that I could appreciate on a meaningful level beyond giant robot is cool, makes things go boom.
Point is, while other kids were playing UNO or whatever it was that young people did back in the 90’s, I was thinking, studying, breathing and pondering about Godzilla. Yes, I know two of those are synonyms, shut up. In fact, some of my earliest memories on the internet involve researching Godzilla movies and reading essays about the gray behemoth, which still blows my mind to this day since I am pretty sure I couldn’t speak English back then.
Ever since Godzilla, King of the Monsters! became a… massive hit back in 1956, Godzilla has been the world’s biggest and, let’s face it, only Superstar. That famous dub to the 1954 classic Gojira is certainly infamous for removing some of the most interesting aspects of the film in favor of Raymond Burr’s enrapturing gaze, but it cannot be denied that it was instrumental in making Godzilla the global icon he is today.
Of course, the cheesy English dubs the franchise is mostly known for couldn’t sate the Western audiences thirst for Monster on Monster action forever, which is why the idea of producing a Godzilla film in America gained traction during the late 80’s/early 90’s, something that Toho couldn’t be more on board with, because apparently cultural appropriation is fine so long as you pay for it.
Conventional wisdom says that just because you can doesn’t mean you should, ‘can’ being the active word here; a lot has been said about the 1998 American Godzilla movie starring Ferris Bueller, and we as a society should really talk more often about the unproduced film featuring a Godzilla design by Stan “I made the goddamn Terminator” Winston, but history has proven that, either because of their inability to understand foreign cultures or their inability to understand foreign cultures, American companies just can’t get Godzilla right.
Enter the Legendary Godzilla.
Twenty years ago in 2014, Legendary Pictures, the film production company behind Batman Begins and Pacific Rim, decided that they were the ones that would finally make Godzilla Justice. The results were mixed to say the least, but it gave me an excuse to use the words ‘Batman’ and ‘Godzilla’ in the same paragraph and isn’t what this site is all about?
Directed by Gareth Edwards, who would later go onto gain worldwide recognition for resurrecting Peter Cushing, Godzilla 2014 introduced the titular Kaiju to a whole new generation of older fans who hadn’t seen a Godzilla film since Godzilla Final Wars, and maybe a handful of children.
Like most things based on my childhood memories however, opinions on the film were divided; for some it was not what they expected from a Godzilla movie, and yet for others it was exactly what they wanted from a Godzilla movie, which only goes to show you that movie audiences are a fickle mistress and you should never, ever listen to them.
Still, the movie made back its budget with a cool 50 million to spare, which is a decent amount of money, but it’s not a stupid amount of money, which was a problem because, ever since the MCU taught Hollywood that you can make obscene amounts of profit by simply making 20+ movies revolving around Robert Downey Jr., everyone and their dog has been trying to make their own cinematic universe, and what is more cinematic and universal than Godzilla?
Because there’s nothing more human than following along with an ill-advised idea, Legendary Pictures and WB Entertainment plodded along with their plan and released Kong: Skull Island, a movie that was largely forgotten even though it featured Mace Windu as its main villain, and then got to work on the follow up to Gareth Edwards film, Godzilla King of the Monsters.
Clearly bent on making this sequel a success, the studios took the lessons they learned from Gareth Edwards’ Godzilla to heart in order to make a better movie that would satisfy both critics and audiences alike.
Just kidding.
Since Hollywood Producers operate on the same logic as a five-year-old, they took everything Gareth Edwards did and went for the exact opposite, because that’s how smart decision-making works. Step one on this bold new approach was to hire Mike Dougherty, main writer of Superman Returns, to write and direct King of the Monsters.
Now before you ask, no, this article is not a hit piece on Mike Dougherty, I am saving my editorial powers for bigger, more critical targets. If anything, I have nothing but respect for Dougherty’s love of the franchise; from entire sequences lifted directly from movies like Godzilla Final Wars and Godzilla vs. Destoroyah, to straight up reusing a plot point from Godzilla 1984 and thinking I wouldn’t notice, KOTM reads like a two hour long Godzilla Fanfiction I would have written back when I was 14 and therefore dumb.
Hell, he even brought back my favorite obscure Godzilla attack, the Atomic Pulse!
The point of this article, because yes, there is a point, and yes, it did took me two whole pages to get to it, is how radically different the approach of these two men, who are clearly huge fans of Godzilla, is; while Gareth Edwards’ filmmaking style is the diametrical opposite of things often associated with Godzilla, such as “campiness” and “color”, the entire structure of his movie, from the opening credits to the very last shot, is a clear homage to the Showa era series.
Mike Dougherty’s style is far less nuanced and far more neon blue, but his movie contains so many nods and references to the entire history of Godzilla, things that 90% of the audience wouldn’t even notice, that I am surprised he didn’t just straight up plastered cardboard cut outs of classic Toho actors on top of everyone’s faces.
While this change in direction was clearly made with the best money-making intentions, there is still something to be said about authorial intent and fan interpretation, especially when those fans are filmmakers.
But that is way too complicated a topic, so instead I am going with an infinitely dumber explanation: there are actually two types of Godzilla fans, the Godzilla Chads and the Ghidorah Virgins.
It sounds stupid, because it is, but I mean it.
There are fans who are genuinely invested in the symbolism of the series, fans who study the allegorical aspects of the movies because they see Godzilla not as a simple movie monster like the shark from Jaws or Jack Nicholson, but as a representation of the faults in our society, and in turn, ourselves.
Then there is the other side of the coin, those who grew up with the cheesy dubs that dumbed down the source material like only the English language can, fans whose love for the iconography of the series is genuine, but they are mainly into it for the spectacle of the monsters themselves.
I don’t believe there’s something inherently wrong with either type of fan, I mean, Godzilla gave meaning to my life in a way that should have probably worried my parents, but that doesn’t mean I look down on the people who use the term Monster Porn unironically. Heck, James Rolfe belongs squarely to that second camp, and he is arguably the best person on the internet.
Point is, fandoms being divided is nothing new, just ask anyone who even slightly smells of anime, but you rarely see this divide being taken to such an extreme: Gareth Edwards clearly understood that the key to making a Kaiju film is to use the Monster as a framework to tell a human story; as counter-intuitive as it sounds, the point of Kaiju movies is never the Monster, but rather how the existence of the Monster affects the world around him.
Mike Dougherty is clearly more interested in making the Die Hard of Godzilla movies, because again, sentences like that are the entire purpose of this site, but while the fanboy in me, also known as just me, wholeheartedly believes that a movie is only as good as the amount of Giant Monsters in it, Dougherty’s style does have one unfortunate drawback; it is nigh impossible to tell how big the Kaiju are.
You may call me crazy, delusional, or even Antonio Banderas, but one of the most important things when it comes to Monster movies is scale; it is not enough for monsters to look big, they have to FEEL big, otherwise it won’t matter if you have 200 million dollars’ worth of CGI or 20 pounds of liquid latex and a free afternoon, no one is going to believe that your giant monster is taller than Jim from The Office.
How do you make a monster feel big then, besides telling him that he is loved and that he matters?
Same way we faked the Moon landing: cinematography.
From the Greek words kinema and gràphein meaning ‘movement’ and ‘to write’ respectively, because I, too, know how to use Wikipedia, Cinematography is the art of pointing at things with a camera but like, in a fancy way.
Movie goers often overlook this even though it is the entire point of cinema, mostly because when it’s done well you are not supposed to be aware of it; cinematography is not about showing things to the audience, but to make them feel something through a visual medium.
This can be a point of contempt among fans of KOTM, which I’ve been told do exist, because the cinematography of Mike Dougherty is genuinely impressive; the man has an eye for spectacle that makes Michael Bay look like, well, Michael Bay, but while he is quite talented at crafting set pieces that make Hurricane season look quaint, his movie still fails to convey that sense of scale as effectively as Gareth Edwards’ film did.
Just compare Godzilla’s first appearance in Godzilla 2014…
…with his first appearance in KOTM.
The point of both shots is not to show how big Godzilla is, ladies, but to make YOU feel small. Mike Dougherty’s take certainly makes for a good visual, but his way of emphasizing the Kaiju in almost every scene they’re in shatters any illusion of scale.
Case in point, here’s the single worst shot in the entire film:
Why is this shot so offensive to my refined tastes you ask?
As a general rule, when it comes to giant monsters you should never, ever do this; when you frame a character this way, with a close up from the chest up, you put the audience on the same level as the subject of the shot, much like if they were having a conversation.
This framing method is excellent if you intend to deliver exposition or want for the audience to get into the same head space of a specific character, you are essentially “inserting” them into the scene, which is great if you’re Michael Caine in a Christopher Nolan movie, but not so much when you’re the King of the Goddamn Monsters.
The reason why I dislike that particular shot so much is because the moment you frame a monster that way, something KOTM does a number of times, I can no longer perceive it as a giant creature. This is not a matter of visuals or realism, we could spend all day talking about the merits of using CGI over practical effects, but my ideal date aside, knowing how to frame a giant being can be the difference between Pacific Rim…
…and Pacific Rim Uprising.
I know this is a petty thing to complain about, which incidentally was the original name for this site, but you have to understand, while Mike Dougherty is very talented, the way he frames the Kaiju, while clearly meant to make them look imposing, actually has the opposite effect.
Take the climactic battle of the movie for example; after a lengthy struggle, all around bad boy King Ghidorah gains the upper hand, grabs Godzilla with its hind/only legs, flies up into the stratosphere and drops him like a radioactive sack of potatoes.
The reason why I want to focus on this particular scene is because, had I not re-watched this movie before writing this very article, I would have completely forgotten this was a thing that happened; you would think a giant dinosaur raining down from the sky would leave an impression, let alone Godzilla, but that’s how forgettable the action scenes in KOTM can be.
Don’t take me wrong, they are generally well executed, but because they are not framed properly a lot of these “cool” moments become noise on the screen, which is a shame because the fight between Rodan and the Monarch Fighter Jets is one of the best action sequences I’ve seen in recent memory.
I mean sure, KOTM might have the most epic scale battles in movie history, but Monster fights are not cool because they are big, they are cool because we are small, and if you don’t properly convey that sense of scale then no amount of special effects will make your Monster Four-way battle memorable.
All of this really goes back to the cinematography; creating the illusion of giant creatures is not difficult, but there’s a craft to it, and If you can pull it off then you don’t even need a huge set piece, you could literally just cram two giant monsters inside a train station and it would still be the sickest thing ever.
Gareth Edwards cinematography is nothing short of a master class on how to use scale to build up tension, but unfortunately that tension doesn’t always pays off, and the muddled look of the film does work against it in its busier scenes. Mike Dougherty has the opposite problem, his movie is distinctive and visually appealing, but it has no clue how to build up tension, which zaps the air out of most of its biggest set pieces.
This is not an indictment on them as filmmakers, they both tried their darnedest to make the best movies they possibly could using nothing more than their ingenuity, gumption and 300 million dollars, but be as it may they both fell short and ended up making the exact same critical mistake:
Neither of them really made a Godzilla movie.
I know that’s a brave and controversial statement to make, but the best thing about being my own editor is that no one can stop me, so just humor me for a moment: can you take a look at this gif I casually stole from twitter and tell me what is wrong with it?
It is hard for me to put into words just how much I dislike this scene. But I will try, damn it.
It’s not that it looks bad, I do get why people would think this scene is ‘awesome’ and ‘bodacious’ and other words kids use. No, my problem with this scene is not visual, but etymological; while both Gareth Edwards’ Godzilla and KOTM put almost as much effort into paying homage to the classic films as I put into making horrifying image edits for these articles, both films misrepresent Godzilla on a fundamental level.
How? By portraying him as a Super Hero.
I am sure someone will point out, because apparently I write these things in front of a live audience, that in the Showa movies Godzilla WAS a hero, but that is only half-truth; while he certainly took on a more heroic role as the movies went on, the essence of his character never changed: Godzilla has never truly been on the side of humanity.
He fought monsters that threatened the world, that much is true, but he never stopped being one of them, or rather, he never stopped being a Kaiju, a distinction we cannot afford to overlook. Tell me, have you ever considered what the word Kaiju actually means?
If you answered ‘Monster’ then congratulations, you’re wrong.
While it is very easy for us westerners to label anything that doesn’t resembles Harrison Ford in any shape or form as a ‘monster’, Japan has an entire spectrum of words for such a purpose. There is Bakemono, which is the closer there is to ‘monster’, but then there’s also Kaibutsu which means ‘strange animal’, and Kaijin which means ‘strange human.’
The word Kaiju can be translated as ‘strange beast’, which I am sure all Merriam-webster fans out there will point out it’s a reasonable translation for Monster, but Kaiju is a word reserved for creatures that oppose natural order, those whose very existence defies our understanding of the world, so while you can say that all Kaiju are monsters, not all monsters are Kaiju.
I know this can be a bit confusing but think about it this way: Mighty Joe Young is a Kaibutsu because, even though he is a giant creature, he still has the physiology of a normal Gorilla; Clifford the Dog is a Kaiju because, while he is a dog, he is also red.
The point of this poorly thought out analogy is that Kaiju’s are not just monsters, they are creatures whose very existence should be impossible: a being of the size and weight of Rodan shouldn’t be able to fly at supersonic speeds, but he does; I cannot prove there’s a movie called Gamera The Brave, but there is; Mothra shouldn’t be that cute, but she is.
In contrast, the Legendary movies may try to frame their Monsters as Gods with all the subtlety of, well, Godzilla, but they always make sure to rationalize these impossible creatures as animals, creatures that humans can understand and even kill.
But Godzilla is not an animal.
And he’s not just a monster either.
He’s a Kaiju.
He’s THE Kaiju.
Have you ever wondered why Godzilla is invincible?
It’s not just because of his incredible powers, but because he’s beyond our comprehension.
He’s an abomination born out of humanity’s mistakes; he is a thing that shouldn’t be.
But he is, and he knows that.
Yet in spite of everything, he lives. He fights.
Not for of a noble cause, not to protect others, not for justice and certainly not for us.
He fights because fighting is the only thing he knows.
Godzilla will never know peace, because we made him that way.
And thus, we cannot destroy him. We just don’t have the right.
That is why his portrayal in the Legendary movies doesn’t work.
Because Godzilla is not a savior, nor is he a force of nature meant to restore order, he is the opposite of that; a perversion of nature. He can’t be a hero because heroes are symbols of the best in all of us, and Godzilla’s very existence is a reminder of humanity at its very worst.
And he will never let us forget.
We cannot co-exist with him, but we cannot destroy him either.
We can only do as he does, and fight. Not against him, not against each other, but against our very nature, so that we can be better and never allow Godzilla to be again.
I admit that me being passionate about this topic has certainly colored my opinion of both Gareth Edwards’ Godzilla and KOTM, but you have to understand, if Godzilla was nothing more than a monster that fights other monsters, if he stood for nothing more than mindless destruction, then he would not have endured for as long as he has.
He would not be the King of the Monsters.
Final thoughts
It is no secret that the Legendary Godzilla movies have not been as successful as WB and Legendary hoped. I mean, they do enough money to cover their budget and maybe buy a couple of S.H. Monster Arts, but this is Godzilla we’re talking about.
Godzilla.
The world’s greatest cinematic icon, period.
Godzilla is more famous than most countries, there is no reason for these movies not to make obscene amounts of money, but they don’t and I know why.
Because as much effort goes into these things, they never truly got what makes Godzilla Godzilla, why he rules while others drool. Why no other movie monster has captured our imagination like he did, and I find this very disheartening because
Because I love Godzilla.
And I’m not saying that just because he’s looking over my shoulder as I write this.
Both Edwards and Dougherty are men who love this franchise dearly, their movies are clearly works of passion, but they are ultimately movies made for an audience that seeks entertainment above all, an audience for which Godzilla is nothing more than a source of spectacle, and that’s what they deliver, albeit in different ways.
I cannot say that either movie is bad, though I do prefer Edwards’ take, and I am certain that the perfect American Kaiju film lies somewhere in between these two, but I don’t think Hollywood will ever understand that people are not drawn to Godzilla because he’s the strongest of all the Monsters.
People are drawn to him because he is our Monster.
Fanboyism Extraordinaire 
“Godzilla: Master of His Domain”
-This has been the most obvious Seinfeld joke ever.
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