by lhb412 » Tue Aug 25, 2015 10:36 pm
Higuchi said something recently, and I've been mulling it over. I believe it was on that ABC interview, which I now can't find (the link now takes me to the main page for their Entertainment/Lifestyle section). He said something to the effect of the Godzilla franchise deviating too much from the core concept over the years, acquiring baggage that should be shed. It's a sentiment that's been popular for decades, circulating heavily among Toho itself in the years before the first reboot in '84, and I've always felt it was... well, kind of stupid.
I mean, there's nothing wrong with going back to core concepts. I liked that Godzilla '14 was a '50s style monster-on-the-loose throwback. But the truth of that matter is that during the golden age of the Godzilla series, the period that set the bar for the franchise in terms of popularity and influence, was also the most outrageous and removed from Godzilla '54. The four movies that Honda directed from '62 to '65 are completely bonkers stories that stretch Godzilla way beyond what he was before. King Kong vs. Godzilla is a spoof, Ghidorah is a romantic comedy/splashy spy caper (despite Bond influence it's actually a bit more like Charade or North by Northwest), Monster Zero is a full-on space adventure in the vein of Star Trek and Forbidden Planet!
You could say Mothra vs. Godzilla is traditional in the sense of Godzilla's character (certainly not in Godzilla fighting a mystical god who associates with fairies), but actually it presents the most important pivot in the franchise in making Godzilla more force of nature than villain. Since the '80s it's this version of Godzilla that's been the most common.
The films of the last few decades have, by and large, played it safe, at least when compared to the wild experimentation of the strongest period in the franchise's history.