Monster Zero x SciFi Japan - Archive Only

If the rest of the trilogy has been this good, I've have thought more highly of it. Flawed as this installment is, it does generate some excitement on the strength of its thematic convictions and emphasis on action over worldbuilding. I also appreciated the Lovecraftian take on Ghidorah (though I'm not in love with his design or "fight" with Godzilla). But it does still have its ponderous moments, its weak dialogue, its dull Godzilla, and its less-than-stellar 3D anime style. I'd give this installment a 6.5 out of 10 and the trilogy overall a grudging 6.

I do have to give THE PLANET EATER credit, though: it finally delivered the anti-civilization message I've anticipated from this franchise for a while. I'm not anti-civ, mind you, but given the Godzilla series' general skepticism of technology, the expression of such a message did seem inevitable.

My take is going off of half-memories of the previous two installments, and it's probably too late at night for me to attempt this sort of analysis, so feel free to correct me on any of these points. What's worth noting is that the Houtua, IIRC, don't fit the bill of a (traditional) civilization: they lack agriculture and live a sort of hunter-gatherer lifestyle, with the only obvious hierarchy being in their worship of Mothra. They don't seem very nomadic, but Godzilla and his corruption of the planet almost certainly restrict the Houtua's movements. They also have religion and ritual, which is sometimes more characteristic of sedentary/civilized peoples than of nomadic or hunter-gatherer types, but this will fall outside of my focus for now.

Haruo's sacrifice achieves two things: it rejects not only the technology that gives rise to monsters, but civilization itself. The Bilusaludo epitomize one of civilization's potential outcomes: they have (almost?) achieved the technological singularity and can merge with Mechagodzilla City, but they lose their humanity as a result. It's a prime example of people enslaving themselves to technology and thereby dooming themselves. On the other hand, the Exif perfected their sciences to the point where nihilism became mathematically justifiable. Perhaps Haruo sees this in their and humanity's examples: if every form of civilization leads to ecological disaster and human extinction, then civilized people must abandon their former ways and live akin to the Houtua--closer to and more respectful of nature. By destroying the Vulture and Yuko's nanomental-consumed body along with himself, Haruo tries to prevent Martin from repeating history and the catastrophic mistakes of human "progress."

In that light, it's interesting that the Houtua children, at the end, sacrifice their fears to what looks like an effigy of the Vulture--the last hope for the old civilization's reestablishment, but also the Houtua's "Wrathful Lord" who purifies them of curses.

^interesting take (also glad this thread gets multiple pages since if any of the anime trilogy is worthy of commenting this one is, but many may be burned out from prior disappointment). I never thought about how the franchise has been leaning towards anti-civilization and technology for a while now as opposed to just anti-nuclear, anti-pollution, or anti-artificial-life. It’s a good way of tying all the races approaches to life in on this.

While I gave this a 7/10 I think I give the series as a whole a 5/10. It’s just too much of a wasted opportunity to have the reluctant to ever allow an anime Toho, to produce one that’s so devoid of monsters, action or any of the excitement that the anime genre is capable of producing. While I felt this last film did the most with what it had to work with and produced an inspired and compelling take on the franchise and some deep concepts without boring the audience to sleep, without it the first 2 felt like a waste, the second in particular.

While I’m obviously no director and it may not be my place to say, if I could alter these films to make them something I’d recommend, I’d delete large chunks of the first movie up until the final battle and intersperse dramatic battles from the novelizations as flashbacks ala The Godfather 2, perhaps to make you more connected with some of the characters who were there or the world but mainly to make it more fun to watch than some poorly animated repetitive scenes of servos:

I’d do the same with much of the second film including its novelization tie in during flashback scenes for galugu and the bilasaludo with mechagodzilla and Gigan or the houta for battra, gorath or Mothra:
Also instead of repeating the same strategy used on Filius either have it fail early on or replace it entirely with this (just animated at full studio quality):

Finally this may be a bit of a nitpick but for Planet Eater, show a little bit of the backstory on the alien races from their home world instead of doing so much telling. Renji Oku isn’t doing a novel for these so instead we get 2 rewrites of the trilogy: https://wikizilla.org/wiki/Godzilla:_Pl ... velization) . That’s fine, it’s just surprising we saw more backstory on the nebula space hunter m aliens in the shoestring-budget, stock-film laden Godzilla vs Gigan, than we’ve seen for any of the aliens in this. Make those changes and I’d probably rate the trilogy as a whole an 8/10 or a 9/10.

The Godzilla franchise tends to criticize particular technologies rather than civilization, though the seeds of an anti-civ take were planted by at least the time of GODZILLA VS. MOTHRA (with Battra destroying the ancients and their weather control device). I don't see that approach as a good or bad thing per se, just a matter of emphasis. But G2014 pretty much conceives of ecological balance as the present status quo plus Godzilla, and I've been eager to see a challenge to that perspective ever since, even if I end up disagreeing with both views. I hadn't expected the anime trilogy to make the attempt, though, which makes THE PLANET EATER more interesting to me than Parts 1 and 2.

I found Planet Eater the most thematically interesting of the trilogy, but the most boring to watch. Haruo does nothing for the first 80 minutes while people state their philosophical views at him. I'm not saying he should have been running around mindlessly blasting everything, since that would have been boring too, but he doesn't even debate or struggle against what's happening until the final 10 minutes. He just...floats, first figuratively, and then literally. And that was the problem with the whole movie; it was a lot of inactive floating. Every character except Metphies shows a frustrating lack of drive in this final movie. Everyone else spends all their time commenting on the fallout of movie 2, commenting on what Godzilla and Ghidorah are doing (which mostly involved staying still, changing temperature, and more literal floating), or just standing around and dying. Nobody does anything.

The only part I enjoyed was the denouement, probably because it was the only time Haruo was thinking, deciding, and acting. It was a final flourish that conveyed the idea that, "A monster is only a monster when it's hated" in a compelling and moving way, and was far more effective than an hour of Metphies droning on.

As I have been saying, this has not been the most engaging series, however, I was very much satisfied with "Planet Eater". A bummer (but ultimately necessary) ending for sure, and of course, the end credits segment leaves us with questions. Is Toho going to continue down the line in a couple of years, with Mothra as the protagonist?

I had no problem with this interpretation of Ghidrah (just as I had no problems with this version of Godzilla). Could we have seen better monster battle action throughout this series? You bet! But for this last battle between G and spaghetti Ghidrah, not only did I think it was refreshingly different, but rather fascinating as well.

I am not going to repeat what others have said about this movie and the series in general, because many of you have said it much better than I could ever write. I am just curious in 10 years from now, how many of us will see this? Will we have the same feeling - love it or hate it? Will some have mellowed out with time and perhaps think that it was not so bad after all? Or vice-versa, perhaps it was overvalued during this period? God willing, I hope I am around in 10 years to see these results.

^ i know i have warmed up to Final Wars over the years, so maybe the same thing will happen here... but in the case of FW it had to do with appreciating the technical execution of the suits, etc. With the anime series, the technical failures are what frustrate me the most. The animation looks cheap and stiff and does little to take advantage of the medium until Ghidorah shows up. Despite Ghidorah succeeding, there are times when 90s Flash animation is smoother, you could tell this same story with dolls.

Fair points. It might also be worth pointing out that, in a way, the Houtua are destined to (re)produce a monster of their own, Mothra. but she seems not to be a destructive force in the vein of Godzilla, Mechagodzilla or Ghidorah, and doesn't strictly require humans for her rebirth or summoning anyway, IIRC. So yes, the Houtua, while closer to nature than their predecessors, still retain elements of civilization, and that's why I don't go full John Zerzan at 2 A.M. on a message board.

So...I finally watched this on Friday Night..I guess it's not just my thing. i heavily defended the first film, because IMHO, it wasn't that bad. But for me personally each installment has gotten worse, with #3 being definitely the lowest of the 3. I still think there is great potential for an animated Godzilla Series, so I hope Toho doesn't take any negativity in audience reaction as this is something not to be done ever again, they just need to do something more traditional.

Well I enjoyed it after the slog of the first one. This is probably my favorite incarnation of Ghidorah.

I appreciate that; thank you. Now that we've had the discussion, I still think the trilogy is skeptical of civilization itself, but the ending's ambiguity leaves room for questioning. We're not inclined to see Mothra as a threat to humans, but that comes as much from franchise tradition as her role in the story of the trilogy. Plus, we see her primarily through the eyes of the protagonists. It also seems whenever humans and aliens worship monsters--Mothra, Ghidorah, Mechagodzilla (not in a religious sense, perhaps, but in a similar vein)--in 66.6% of cases, it works out poorly for the worshipers and their civilizations. We don't know if or how Mothra and the Houtua might prove different, but comparisons to the Exif and Bilusaludo are downplayed quite a bit, as I recall.

It's a lot to sift through casually like this. For all this intellectual meat to consume, I wish the trilogy were more watchable so I could have an even more detailed discussion. I just can't see myself sitting through Part 1 again, even if Parts 2 and 3 deliver some goods. I hope the next anime project (if there is one) comes from Madhouse, Studio Trigger or another good studio like them. At a minimum, I need to see a better script and more creative use of the animation medium. If you're not bound to rubber suits, do the right thing--make Godzilla fly again.

Well, have to say, this ws an interesting experiment, of how would Godzilla would look as an anime.

Personally, I wont say I was dissapointed, after knowing that Gen Urobuchi was behind the script, I kinda knew were this was going, still hoped to see some kaiju vs kaiju action, but nonetheless, maybe I'm alone on this, but for me the trilogy wasn't a total dissapointment, there were some interesting ideas.

I heva ethe impressio thta alot of people though this would be more like a classic Godzilla movie, with alot of monster fights, rather than a philosopical movie about revenge, and got really dissapointed, even angry.

I guess next time Toho could come with another anime, but this time, could be a good idea to be more about monster battles, of course, with an interesting story, even if its just a short animated series.

I finally got around to watching this last night. Eh. Pretty much what everyone else has said. Lots of neat ideas and implications that are rarely properly explored and are delivered in the most uninspired and lifeless presentation imaginable. This trilogy could have been absolutely amazing if only the execution had been better.

Been reading some reviews, as far as I've read, I think at the end, people just wanted a Godzilla fight.

Well, hope to see more Godzilla anime, maybe something more traditional, would love a Godzilla anime with Jet Jaguar on it.