TALKBACK #21: Godzilla vs. Spacegodzilla

[lhb412]

Just watched Sony's Blu-Ray, and while the film is bad I'm again reminded of its positives in comparison to other films of the era. The '90s Godzilla films are the beigest of the beige, so it's nice to see a film with a lot of great color and beautiful location footage, and Yuki has more screen presence than pretty much all the other human characters in the Heisei movies put together.

[Hybrid Gojira]

I need to rewatch this movie, but the very thought makes me sleepy. Why is that?

[MekaGojira3k]

[klen7]

It has already begun...
http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2008/ ... /shea-text

[Hybrid Gojira]

I remember when I first saw this movie. I literally started to doze off.

After just rewatching it, somehow I enjoyed far more than ever. Don't get me wrong - the movie has some terrible ideas that literally go nowhere and it's not really a good Godzilla film....but there is just enough for me to like.

The Bad:

Little Godzilla- Just stop. Godzilla doesn't need offspring.

The asteroid scene - Whyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy

The idea that Godzilla can't knock over the tower without Moguera's help - what a dumb idea. Godzilla may have needed Mog to distract SG so he could get close, but it's pretty absurd to me he couldn't push over the tower like he does every other building in the entire Godzilla series.

Project T - Toho must have run out of ideas. The subplot goes nowhere and you could easily cut the entire thing out and not miss a beat...and shorten the film by at least 10-15 minutes. The mafia tie and the rescue of Miki is just....awful.

The love subplot - Koji and Miki are just awkward. "Stop trying to kill Godzilla...and here's my number."

Blood Coagulant - Nope. Nope. Nope. Dumb.

The Score - It's not so much that the score is bad as much as it simply doesn't really fit a Godzilla film. The music is rich and upbeat...sometimes it sounds too "nice" and makes me want to sleep.

Space Godzilla - Toho must have been really lazy, because most of the new kaiju in the Heisei films have terrible roars and many of them are rehashed (Battra is Rodan; Space Godzilla has a reworked Gigan shriek). There is little to no originally to these roars. Space Godzilla looks so menacing and I wanted him to sound different that Gigan.

The Story - There are some bare bones ideas here that could really work, but most of it falls flat. It's a shame, because Space Godzilla could have been truly epic.

Miki - Does she really...do anything in these movies? I mean, if we cut her out, would I suddenly feel like I'm missing something? Maybe that's too harsh, but I really feel like Toho was looking for a way to connect a human to Godzilla...and while they have a few moments that work, I often find myself wondering how necessary it was.

Yuki, after seeing Space Godzilla thump Godzilla on the Island - "I really want to kill Godzilla..but not today. Maybe later, after he's stomped across Japan and killed thousands of people. Maybe I'll do it then. :shrug:"

The Good:

I dig the Godzilla and Space Godzilla suits, especially the design of SG. Moguera is actually kinda cool.

The Matte shots: There are some glorious mattes in this film. Well done, Kawakita.

Yeah, I guess that's really it. I mean, I did enjoy the final fight for what it was.

[Psycho Soldier]

[Dr Kain]

Oh my god, I just watched this movie subtitled for the first time ever and it might actually be worse than Revenge and Megalon.

[MekaGojira3k]

[DannyBeane]

[jellydonut25]

[Shin_Edda_Robo!!!!!]

I think the only thing I truly enjoyed out of this movie is MOGERA, because I'm a sucker for Super Robots.

[MekaGojira3k]

[lhb412]

[Dr Kain]

[MekaGojira3k]

[Shin_Edda_Robo!!!!!]

[Jorzilla]

Has it been pointed out that Spacegodzilla is essentially a re-do of King Ghidorah? Like someone at Toho realized they missed an opportunity to remake Ghidorah the Three Headed monster and decided to just re-hash some interesting points about that film and turn KG into Spacegodzilla?

1) The monsters are very similar, from origin (asteroid) and powers.

2) Miki is kind of like the princess from Ghidorah the Three Headed monster, including electrodes on her head.

3) Both monsters are prophecized by phsychic women.

4) A shadow organization is going after the female.

I'm sure I could brainstorm a whole lot of other items.

[XvGojira]

Based on a discussion/argument elsewhere, I came to the realization that SpaceGodzilla is a somewhat inaccurate name.

So the debate started out with which Godzilla was the strongest. I said Final Wars due to him taking out about the same amount of monsters the Heisei Godzilla did across his series in one movie. He argued that because g-cells survived the stresses of a black hole to become SpaceGodzilla Heisei Godzilla was the strongest. To me that's like saying because some blood or skin cells from one guy survived him getting sucked into a jet turbine and becoming just a chunky mist he was the strongest man in the world. And wouldn't make sense unless g-cells could regenerate into a new Godzilla, but then we'd have tons of Godzillas all over Japan.

Anyway SpaceGodzilla's origin was scrutinized from that. According to the movie G-cells go in a black hole, out a white hole, assimilated crystalline organisms, and exposed to exploding stars. Understanding that the cells can't regenerate themselves, it must have been the crystalline organisms that started regeneration. To me then the resulting monster is less Godzilla and more crystal monster. Like if Orga did absorb Godzilla you wouldn't call that hybrid a new Godzilla. Or if a facehugger was big enough you wouldn't consider the resulting monster a Godzilla based on a xenomorph, but a xenomorph based on Godzilla.

So Spacegodzilla is techincially more of a Crystalline Organism-zilla and less Godzilla of space.

Wanted to get this off my chest and not continue the discussion/argument.

[Benjamin Haines]

Crystalgodzilla would have been a cooler name.

Imagine if those crystal organisms made it to Earth and spread like a disease. Tiny crystal organisms that move through the air like shimmering dust, absorbing cells from human skin, dog fur, insect wings, or any available life form and then assimilating those cells to begin growing into a crystallized copy of the host. There would be horrific crystal clones of all kinds of animals sprouting up everywhere.

[The Great MM]

Just got done watching this earlier. SpaceGoji is among my favorite kaiju and Moggy easily one of my favorite kaiju mechs. Shame the movie kind of sucks.

[Hybrid Gojira]

[lhb412]

I'm not a fan of the thick, cumbersome suit designs of Heisei villains like Spacegodzilla and Destoroyah.

I look at how the Gamera series made such extreme designs as Legion and Iris work so... how do I put this? Elegantly? Spacegodzilla and Destroyah just have this "Add more bits!" approach that I don't care for.

[Gwangi]

I bought the blu-ray a long time ago, if only to have "Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla II". I never bothered to watch this one until recently, and perhaps to see if this has aged better or that age has provided me to take a different approach. Unfortunately no. It is not that I want to dislike a Godzilla movie, but here, there is not much to like.

The scenes where Godzilla is coming ashore on that island are probably my favorite. Otherwise, that is the only positive I can bestow on this movie. Unlike with "Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla II", there was no one particular intriguing or even likeable. Yuki, was the closest to being an interesting character. The T-Project was really not a bad idea, but not properly executed here, and the mafia story arc, just fell flat! Space Godzilla is probably the most uninspired Toho creation of all time. And there was nothing inspiring (or even fun) in watching that final battle, which just seemed to drag on forever!

After years of not watching it, I gave it another shot, and unfortunately, I still feel the same way. For me, this one is still the bottom of the barrel of Godzilla movies.

[lhb412]

^ I think Yuki stands out among all the Heisei characters and it's entirely due to the performance and that he's a clearly defined character, as opposed to a lot of vague characters of the time.

[Rodanex]

I stumbled across a post on another forum that claims Godzilla uses three different spiral heat rays in the heisei films. According to this post, which lists the Japanese wikipedia page as the source for this information, Godzilla uses a Uranium Heat Ray against Mecha-Godzilla, a Nuclear Fusion Heat Ray to destroy SpaceGodzilla and Mogera, and the Infinite Heat Ray on Destroyer.

It also goes on to say [WARNING: bad translation] "By crystal of shoulder space of Godzilla is destroyed, it was shot by inverse absorb the cosmic energy that has nowhere to go, and spiral heat rays were positive cosmic energy. Amount of heat's 900,000 times, destructive force in the launch of three times in as more than a hyper uranium heat ray Space Godzilla and MOGERA boast the power enough to blow up at the same time."

From what I can gather of Google's translation, it seems to be saying Godzilla was able to absorb cosmic energy that was leaking from SpaceGodzilla's shattered shoulder crystals, enabling him to use the Nuclear Fusion Heat Ray. I'd always assumed that all of Godzilla's spiral heat rays in the last three heisei films were just the result of absorbing energy from Rodan. If the above information actually represents the filmmakers' intentions, it actually works as an explanation as to why Godzilla didn't just keep using the red spiral ray all the time after the end of Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla. In other words, he temporarily gained a power boost from Rodan, another temporary power boost from SpaceGodzilla, and then another upgraded heat ray when his body began to melt down. It's always slightly bugged me that Godzilla seemed to have the option of using a more powerful atomic ray, but didn't actually use it until the end of his fight with SpaceGodzilla.

What do you guys think? I'm curious about this Japanese wikipedia page, I haven't been able to find it.