With the sheer amount of Godzilla films and the rotating rogues’ gallery of killer kaiju the King of the Monsters fought over the years, it can be a bit difficult to tell Mothra from Minya and Godzilla from Godzooky for the uninitiated. Fear not, my intrepid monster maniacs, because I’m here to the rescue with a brief history of the greatest gorilla-whale to ever walk the earth. From the Showa series to the Millenium era, we’ll cover everything you need to know about everyone’s favorite kaiju in less time than it takes to decide what you’ll be ordering for lunch. If it were me, by the way, I’d go with the turkey pesto sandwich. You’ve earned it.
Of course, this is just the tip of the Godzilla Week iceberg. We’re going to have plenty more killer kaiju content coming your way. Want to dive deeper into Godzilla lore? Read Witney Seibold’s excellent Godzilla Goodness series in which he breaks down each and every film for you.
Legendary and Warner Bros.’ Godzilla stomps its way into theaters on May 16th. What’s your favorite Godzilla film? Let us know in the comments below or tell me on Twitter.
What about 1998 which gave us this awesome song/music video? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J415RH4DdLo
Mothra vs. Godzilla (a.k.a. Godzilla vs. the Thing) – which is probably obvious from my work on Daikaiju Attack. (Though I’m leaving out the original Godzilla/Gojira, just to be fair.) MvG has the best combination of story and SFX, and came out during the apex of Toho’s kaiju work.
Godzilla looks like it might actually be great (this time around), but when do we get a Gamera movie?
The classic Gamera films just came out on blu ray, in 2 inexpensive sets. And the Heisei series is on budget blu, too. If you haven’t seen the Heisei Gamera Trilogy, you’re in for a treat!
If you stick around after the credits, Nick Fury comes out to recruit Godzilla and Gamera for the Kaijuvengers Initiative.
Before anyone asks: there is no 1998 Godzilla film, only Zuul.
Nothing I can say could top this…
Actually, Toho brought the 1998 Godzilla into its own canon and renamed Zilla. His only appearance was in Final Wars — and he gets blown up in less than a minute by Godzilla.
That’s a lot of fish!