Go-Go-Godzilla: #4 King Kong vs. Godzilla

My intention for this SBP series, especially with the original 50's through 70's era Godzilla is to watch them in their original edit and tongue, with subtitles. Unfortunately sometimes you're just stuck with what you have at hand, and what I have at hand is the Universal-released edit of KKvsG.  I know there are some major differences (7 minutes difference in the edit, the bulk of the score has been changed, scenes shifted, and a weird United Nations News framing sequence) so I will need to loop back on this one after all is said and done.

That all said, KKvsG is the first giant moster movie I can recall seeing. I was a young, young lad (possibly around 5 years old), and recall there being a screening at my local library. I have vague memories of the experience, but also the memories might not be truthful, as I remember it being black and white, which apparently it never was

Name: King Kong vs. Godzilla
Japanese Name: Kingu Kongu tai Gojira
Director: Ishirō Honda
Studio: Toho with Universal International
Year: 1963

The Story:
A cheap-ass United Nations news desk reports on some Chilean troubles and then some issues with Japanese shipping routes. A UN nuclear sub is on its way to help. The newsman reports on rare psychotropic berries that Japanese science crew has discovered on Ferro Island, a berry the local natives are defensive of, as they use its psychotropic effects to placate a giant beast that cohabitates on the island.

A pharmaceutical company is both after the berries, and saving the flogging rating of the nature TV show it sponsors. The executives plan a one-two-punch of going to the island to both get more berries and capture this giant monster on camera.

Meanwhile, back at the "UN newsroom", events transpire on the UN nuclear sub "Seahawk".  Unfortunately the ship gets wedged between shifting ice floes and its engines are destroyed.  The tube full of bad actors are trapped aboard the flooding ship, their deaths all but certain, especially as Godzilla awakens from the very same ice.  Smash cut back to the "UN newsroom" (because all of the footage, including the terror aboard the submarine, was "cut to" footage) to an entirely disaffected reporter, who tells of Godzilla's journey towards mainland Japan, where the army is there to fruitless meet him.

The conceit of cutting back to newsrooms is very annoying, crippling the narrative flow of the film. The reports of Godzilla terrorizing Japan sends the pharmaceutical exec into a rage... he wants his own monster (I guess big pharma people are always assholes).  His TV crew is on their way to Ferro Island, where we cut to the ... oh boy, Japanese actors in brownface playing tribal natives. The natives are unhappy about the visitors, but they curry their favour with a transistor radio playing pseudo-calypso music and cigarettes...even the children want a puff. "It's okay, they're all smoking." And then lightning cracks in the sky, signaling the arrival of their god.

News reports cut into the proceedings, to explain what Godzilla might be, as the creature approaches Hokaido. And then cut back to Ferro Island in the search for the tribal god. An errant gunshot triggers the ire of beast and a rockslide interrupts the hunting party. One of the Japanese men is injured, and the young smoking tribal boy is sent to get red berry juice to soothe him, but he's attacked by a giant octopus going after the berry juice supply.  The ruckus caused trying to fight the octopus rouses King Kong who faces off against the cephalopod, driving it away.  He then tucks into some red berry juice and gets pass-out blotto.  The pharmaceutical men abscond with Kong towing him from the island to Japan on a raft full of dynamite.  The government, though, tells the pharmacy team the creature is considered a menace, and must be returned to Ferro Island.

Meanwhile, Fumiko, a character we've barely met is on a train headed straight for Hokaido where the weather forecast predicts Godzilla will be.  Government officials discuss dropping an atomic bomb on him. The train light attracts Godzilla's attention so it stops and evacuates to waiting buses. Fumiko runs into the woods and then starts splashing in a stream. Somehow her boyfriend Fujita finds her, and the two hide from Godzilla's rampage.

Meanwhile, on the seas, Kong awakens, and is not happy. He's set free and heads towards Japan's mainland, where speculation is the two creatures are old sworn enemies and set for a titanic tussle.  The army dumps dozens of tankers worth of gas along the path Godzilla is taking luring him into pitfall laden with explosives. Godzilla survives. 

Kong attacks Tokyo, chomping on electrical wires. Tokyo is told to evacuate, but it's too late. Kong picks up a skyrail train and becomes transfixed by the screaming Fumiko dangling from it. He then climbs a modestly sized building while the army plans to fire rockets full of red berry juice to rain down on Kong to put him to sleep. Fumiko's brother and Fujita plays rhythmic drums to help lull the beast. Somehow in Kong's passing out process Fumiko is neither crushed nor in a similarly narcotic-induced sleep.

Kong is airlifted by balloon to intercept Godzilla, with the hope the two beasts will kill one another.  They don't. They fall into the ocean and Godzilla fucks of to god(zilla) knows where and Kong swims home. The end?

The Creatures:
Godzilla, explained by a boring white guy from a boring museum, classifies Godzilla as a possible cross between a T-rex and a stegasaurus, between 97 and 120 million years ago.  He thinks Godzilla considers Japan home, but postulates that "as a reptile" he might shy away from electricity.  Boring white guy thinks Godzilla's brain is the size of a marble.  The suit, in colour, looks like the familiar pear-shaped Godzilla form we're most used to.  The tail action on this version of the beast is wonderful.  I'm always surprised by Godzilla's tiny face.  This Godzilla doesn't like the high-tension electrical wires, and avoids them  were previous 'zillas didn't.  The whole purpose of this sudden aversion to electricity is obviously to set up that it's his weakness, and just so happens to be Kong's strength.

King Kong here is a giant ape with ratty, matted fur, heavy breasts, and the derpiest of faces. It's the poorly painted-on eyes.  Kong likes to shred the red. Boring museum guy thinks Kong is a big thinker because he would have a big ape brain.  The costume doesn't look like fur, it's ill fitting, lumpy and wrinkly, and generally looks awful. It looks even worse wet.  Apparently Kong draws strength from electric voltage, which makes no sense, but there you go. 

The Battle: 
Starts with Godzilla having the high ground. Kong throws boulders at godzilla. Godzilla responds with atomic breaths and taunts. Kong's fur is singed and he walks away, scratching his head. Not so titanic, this tussle. Kind of boring, actually

To start round two. Kong gets the higher ground but gives it up so he can get behind Godzilla and grab him by the tail. It doesn't work. Kong chucks more rocks, which a swing of Godzilla's tail sends it right back at him. Kong is hesitant to engage Godzilla's because of his atomic breath, but takes a few shots and gets in there. but he unfortunately brains himself on some rocks.  Kong gets no less than two concussions this fight. To add insult to injury, Godzilla hits him over the head with his tail repeatedly and Kong seems down for the count. But a fortunate twist of thunder and lightning supercharges Kong up which gives him static cling hands that Godzilla doesn't like one bit. Kong jams a tree down Godzilla's throat.  They grapple rolling down a cliffside into the ocean, causing an earthquake that splits the land.  Kong swims home, and Godzilla disappears.  It's pretty weak stuff.

The Humans:
There's two news reporters, one American, and one Japanese, as well as boring museum guy who get as much screen time as any of the original actors. I hate these news guys, passionately.

There's handsome manly Sakurai and total sub Furue who are our guides on Ferro Island, for what it's worth. Sakurai is Fumiko's boyfriend, and her brother, Fujita's best friend. Fujita invented a near-invisible threat that has the strength of a steel cable. This seems important as it's needed to lift Kong by balloon to fight Godzilla (but if you take miniature scaling into account the thread we actually see would be thick cable density in size, so not that remarkable...it's a weird super-science conceit the film asks for).

There's also Mr. Tako (great name), who is an utter man-child, prone to temper tantrums, but somehow very successful. He's the head of the big pharma company and the show producer that Sakurai and Furue work for.

None of these human characters are explored at all in this rendition beyond exceptionally basic beats. They're an unfortunate casualty of trying to re-edit to Americanize the story (and tell, more than show, as if there's something so complicated about this story) as much as possible.

Friend or Foe:
Godzilla could be picking up from Godzilla Rides Again, trapped in ice, but this American rendition seems to pretend like this is the first time we're ever seeing Godzilla, except everyone in Japan knows the creature is Godzilla. 
Kong's story is basically a truncated retelling of King Kong, only giving him a mortal enemy this time, and no meaningful entanglement with Fujita.

The Sounds:
The tribal chanting is very exotic sounding, a pastiche of the original chanting from King Kong.

Kong's roars sound like they're coming out of a Speak'n'Spell.
When he pounds his chest it sounds like banging on sheets of aluminum.

The Message:
Big Pharma sucks?
Apparently director Honda wanted to satirize the Japanese TV industry with this film, but it loses all of its intent in the butchering and insertion of the loathed UN newsdesk reporters.

Rating (out of 5 Z): 
Zz

Go-Go-Godzilla: final thoughts and ranking

 Last year, on Halloween, when I decided to start watching All The Godzillas*, I didn't know that there was both a new Toho Godzilla and Legendary Godzilla feature in the direct path of my stupid boy project. It was genuine good fortune that my viewing experience culminated with the release of Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire. 

I also didn't expect that, just a few weeks prior to GxK, I would be cheering for a crew of Japanese visual effects artists as they held their Godzilla action figures in one hand and their Oscar in the other. Or that the best of all Godzilla films would be that latest Toho production.

As I reflect upon viewing  All The Godzillas*, it's a pretty messy blur of textured suits, destroyed miniatures and radiation blasts. If you were to pick out any pre-2010 Godzilla title and ask me to explain to you the plot, with the exception of the original Gojira I'm not sure that I could.  The Toho films run through so many of the same tropes and iterations of the same creatures, they reuse so many of the same actors in different roles, and their plots are so often labyrinthine or nonsensical or convoluted, and rarely ever with connective tissue from one film to the next, that it's really hard to make one stand out from the whole.  

Rather than a full or rich understanding of story or character, with each of the pre-2010 Toho films I am left with instead an impression, a sense of something that I liked or disliked about it, something that I reacted strongly or negatively to.

As I've said a few times, what I respond to most in Godzilla films is a strong character story. In almost every Godzilla film, Godzilla is not really a character. He is what the film is built around, weather as a force of nature, or as a planetary protector... he may have characteristics, or perhaps even a bit of personality, but he's never the central story character, certainly not like Kong usually is. I don't recall ever feeling a tremendous sense of sympathy or empathy for Godzilla.  Sure, you root for or against the big bastard, but you're never invested in him for his wants and desires, biting nails hoping he achieves his objectives.  And if Godzilla ever stares down a human, it's usually anyone's guess whether their monster is even clocking human facial expressions. Have you ever stared an ant in the eye and felt a genuine connection? There should be nothing remotely human about Godzilla, and he shouldn't care about us as a species at all.

As I wrote up each film for this "Go-Go-Godzilla" series, I assigned each film a ranking (out of 5 Zs). I also would enter my viewing in Letterboxd, assigning the film a ranking out of 5 stars. For the most part these rankings aligned (but not always, sometimes as I write things out my opinions can become more, or less, favourable). But I used these ratings to maintain my rankings list, adding to it with each film watched.

Very quickly the rankings list started to feel more and more arbitrary. By the time I was watching Tokyo S.O.S. do you really think I could earnestly compare it to Godzilla vs Megalon? All I really have to go on is my Z/star ratings as guide to establish tiers and then my general sense memory to sort the films within the tiers.

I mean, it was pretty obvious to me what my favourites were, and very clear what I genuinely did not care for, but everything in-between is the "mushy middle". 

Even with the Z/star rankings as guide, my "sense memory" of certain films wants me to push it higher, or perhaps question it's spot. Like Mothra vs Godzilla was a big win early on after two dudes, but is it really at equal stature or enjoyment to me as Minus One, 2014, or Shin?

Gojira is classic cinema, a massively influential and important film with a deeply resonant message. But its storytelling is disjointed and visually its perhaps not as potent as it was 50/60/70 years ago. But surely it's better than any film with MechaGodzilla, right?

And I feel like I would go to bat for Ebirah, Horror of the Deep any day, and think it should be in my top ten. So why isn't it?

I'm sure if I dared do a rewatch of all these that they would shift all around. I think Minus One, 2014, and Shin would all remain top 5, and that most of the bottom five would stay right there, but everything else could swing in unexpected ways. 

But I don't think Lady Kent would tolerate me doing a full Godzilla rewatch any time soon, and there's a whole lotta other kaiju tourism for me to partake in.

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RANKING
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1. Godzilla Minus One (2023) ****

2. Godzilla (2014) ****

3. Mothra vs Godzilla (1964) ****

4. Shin Godzilla (2016) ****

5. The Return of Godzilla (1984) ***1/2

6. Godzilla: Tokyo S.O.S. (2004) ***1/2

7. Godzilla vs Mechagodzilla (1974) ***1/2

8. Godzilla vs Mechagodzilla II (1993) ***1/2

9. Terror of Mechagodzilla (1975) ***1/2

10. Gojira (1954) ***

11. Ebirah, Horror of the Deep (1966) ***

12. Godzilla vs Kong (2021) ***

13. Godzilla 2000: Millennium (1999) ***

14. Godzilla vs Megaguiras (2000) ***

15. Godzilla vs. Hedorah (1971) ***

16. Godzilla vs Gigan (1972) ***

17. Godzilla vs Megalon (1973) ***

18. Godzilla vs Destroyah (1995) ***

19. Ghidorah the Three Headed Monster (1964) ***

20. Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire (2024) **1/2

21. Godzilla: Final Wars (2004) **1/2

22. Godzilla vs Mothra (1992)**1/2

23. Destroy All Monsters (1968) **½

24. Godzilla, Mothra, King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All-out Attack (2001) **½

25. Godzilla: King of the Monsters (2019)**1/2

26. Godzilla vs Biollante (1989) **1/2

27. Godzilla Raids Again (1955) **1/2

28. Godzilla 1985 (US version 1985) **1/2

29. Godzilla Against Mechagodzilla (2002) **

30. Godzilla vs SpaceGodzilla (1994) **

31. All Monsters Attack (1969) **

32. Invasion of the Astro Monster (1965) **

33. Godzilla vs King Ghidorah (1991) *1/2

34. Godzilla King of the Monsters (1956) *1/2

35. King Kong vs Godzilla (US version 1962) *½

36. Son of Godzilla (1967) *

Did not watch:
Godzilla (1998)
Godzilla Planet of Monsters (2017)
Godzilla City on the Edge of Battle (2018) Godzilla The Planet Eater (2018) 

Go-Go-Godzilla: Millennium Era in review

 

I've written thousands of words about and around Godzilla and, frankly, I'm exhausted. 

I mentioned previously that throughout the Showa and Heisei eras of Godzilla I would routinely fall asleep whilst watching those films. The pleasant surprise of the Millennium era was how engaged I was throughout each and every one of those movies, well, except GMK (Godzilla, Mothra and King Ghidora: Giant Monsters All-out Attack). There I was close to unconsciousness a number of times, but, I never fully fell asleep. (Edit: I did nod off while writing this though). 

The Millennium era hits a point where digital effects have a bigger and bigger impact on the films, and being lower budget films in the early 2000s, you can guess how bad the digital effects can get. And yet, kind of how we accept silly, loose-fitting rubber suits, miniatures-that-are-clearly-miniatures, and camera-tricks- which-aren't-fooling-anyone from previous eras, many of the digital effects have a quaintness to them that don't rub abrasively. Instead, in many instances, they have their own charm. Credit to the Toho team at the time that they conservatively used digital effects much of the time to enhance scenes or sequences, rather than overreach...although surely overreaches did happen, and...moof.

I struggle to say that any of the Millennium Era films were great, and I would have a hard time recommending any of them to anyone who wasn't already interested in watching Godzilla films. My  favourite of the era (and there will be a full ranking update at the bottom of this) is a sequel film within the Era and probably not the easiest film to enter into coldly. 

Once again I find myself at odds with the G-fan concensus. GMK, touted as one of the highest watermarks of Godzilla films, is my second least favourite of the era.  Just as I didn't take to Godzilla vs. Biollante as G-Fans had in the Heisei era...I get what they're reacting to in those films, they just don't work for me. Once again, my appreciation lies in the storytelling, which is still pretty shaky throughout the Millennium era, but there is a palpable evolution, and seemingly a larger desire to invest in characters than in the previous era. As well the ambitiousness of the suits, the effect, the miniatures from film-to-film also intrigue me. But I would rather have a better composed shot, a more artistically lit scene, a more thoughtfully edited Godzilla fight sequence than the bog standard side-scrolling wide shot or that 3/4 tilt from on high which is so pervasive.  

There also seemed to be more effort to put the human characters into the midst of the fight (especially with Mechagodzilla in the fray).  Having the humans be active and meaningful participants makes the third-act brawl much more engaging. This also includes a lot more scenes of human characters navigating the mid- of post-fight wreckage, which I loved every time.

My favourite aspect of Godzilla is using sense of scale, getting that human POV of these titanic monsters, and we get a tremendous amount of those in the Millennium Era compared to the previous Eras, which had limited ability to truly blend live action and real locations with miniatures and suitmation.

I'm now heading into the final stretch with the three Warner Bros. Monsterverse films (leading into the fourth coming out at the end of March), and the two Reiwa Era live action films. Almost all of these I've seen already (save for Shin Godzilla), but I'm excited to watch them because I know what I'm in for. 

While I've been doing this series, I've watched the Monsterverse-related TV show (Monarch: Legacy of Monsters) and I've seen Godzilla Minus One as well, and also watched the first episode of the seemingly charming Netflix anime series Godzilla Singular Point which I think I'll get back to. I'm still skipping the '98 Godzilla as well as the three Netflix anime movies, but never say never.  I'm also flirting with doing a Gamera series of recaps, kind of the official competition to the Godzilla juggernaut in the Kaiju field.  I'm also thinking about the four Mothra solo films, since I clearly reacted well to that creature in this series. We shall see.

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RANKINGS

Millennium Era:

1. Godzilla: Tokyo S.O.S
2. Godzilla 2000: Millennium
3. Godzilla vs Megaguiras
4. Godzilla: Final Wars
5. Godzilla, Mothra, and King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All-Out Attack
6. Godzilla Against Mechagodzilla

All of the films (so far)

1. The Return of Godzilla
2. Godzilla: Tokyo S.O.S.
3. Godzilla vs Mothra (1964)
4. Gojira
5. Godzilla vs Mechagodzilla (1974)
6. Ebirah, Horror of the Deep
7. Godzilla vs Mechagodzilla II
8. Terror of Mechagodzilla
9. Godzilla 2000: Millennium
10. Godzilla vs Megaguiras
11. Godzilla vs Destroyah
12. Godzilla vs Mothra (1992)
13. Godzilla vs. Hedorah
14. Godzilla vs Gigan
15. Godzilla vs Megalon
16. Godzilla: Final Wars
17. Destroy All Monsters
18. Godzilla vs Biollante
19. Godzilla, Mothra, King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All-out Attack
20. Godzilla Against Mechagodzilla
21. Godzilla vs SpaceGodzilla
22. All Monsters Attack
23. Ghidorah the Three Headed Monster
24. Godzilla vs King Ghidorah
25. Invasion of the Astro Monster
26. Godzilla Raids Again
27. Godzilla 1985
28. Son of Godzilla
29. Godzilla King of the Monsters (1956)
30. King Kong vs Godzilla (US version 1962)

Go-Go-Godzilla: Heisei Era in review

I come out of the Heisei Era of Godzilla (1984 - 1995) wondering if I even like Godzilla at all anymore. I mean, I must otherwise I wouldn't be putting in this kind of time and energy into watching every damn last one of them. But I'm trying to remember if there's a single Godzilla film that I didn't fall asleep to while watching, at least since maybe the first two from the Showa era, and I can't think of one.  If I need to go to naptown, it looks like Godzilla is the guy to take me there.

The Heisei spans 7 films over an 11 year period, as opposed to the Showa era which spanned 15 films over a 21 year period. All things told, both eras were dispensing films at almost the same rate. Toho, once they get the machine up and running, can seemingly just crank these things out. The last 5 films of the Heisei era all came out in a 5 year span (the last 12 Showa era films came out in a 13 year span). But that kind of speed does show in the quality of storytelling.

The first four of the Heisei era films are not readily available to stream, rent or buy. I saw a copy of Godzilla vs Biollante on Blu-Ray at a video store a few weeks ago, and it was selling for over $200. I wound up finding free streams in Japanese with subtitles on the Internet Archive. The video quality was ok, but the sound quality was terrible...all I can say is it's good that there was subtitles. I did wind up acquiring the latter three Heisei films on DVD, since distribution rights were acquired by TriStar in America. Godzilla vs Mechagodzilla came in a sealed 7-movie set with all the Millennium Era Godzilla films (so I'm set for the next phase) while Godzilla vs SpaceGodzilla and Godzilla vs Destroyah came on a single, double sided disk which I found at a used store.  These three were all dubbed, which is not my preference at all. I did watch most of Godzilla vs Mechagodzilla with the Internet Archive subtitled version on my phone just to compare the dub vs the sub, and they weren't exact, but they weren't too egregiously different either, not like the heavily edited American versions of the Showa Era G-films.

After I watch a Godzilla film -- or rather, after I start watching a Godzilla film, fall asleep through half of it, get confused and frustrated by the ending, then re-watch another day, and do my silly and wholly unnecessary play-by-play write-up -- I hop over to youtube and watch Big Action Bill's amazing "history of" videos which go deep into the pre-production background, details on the suits used for the production, info on the director and performers and writers and music...just really well researched and essential compendiums for pop culture tourists like myself who are only going to spend a limited amount of time and investment in a property before they move onto something else.

Through Big Action Bill's videos, it sort of confirms the chaotic nature of these films behind the scenes. Scripts seem pretty rushed in coming together, often just cobbled from the dregs of past disposed-of story ideas and monster concepts. Where a lot of time and energy are put into building miniature cities and the suits, the actual filming of these movies seems very much a "get the shot, move on" concept. 

There's a marked improvement in both miniature construction and suit construction in 9 years between Terror of Mechagodzilla and The Return of Godzilla, but the production values seem comparable between the two eras. Depending on the director , you might get some absolutely gorgeous shots, with impeccable lighting that really trick the eye in a delightful way, or you might just get puppets on strings swirling around on what's clearly a badly lit set, and  sometimes both even within the same film... there's no consistency.

After 22 films, they still haven't figured out how to do a flying creature well. Whether it's men in big rubber suits hoisted in the air by cables, or static mini-puppets bashing into each other, they all look unconvincingly awful.  Every time they introduce a new monster with wings I have to groan, because the monster fights with flying creatures are the absolute worst. 

Big Action Bill also pointed out that in Japanese cinema it's common for extraneous or tertiary characters to pop in to deliver exposition or do an action beat or take up space that one of the main characters would otherwise take in a North American film. Most Godzilla films in both the Showa and Heisei era sink because there are too many characters, and the "main" characters of the film are really non-entities with no development to speak of. That Toho recycles their actors from film to film in different roles only confuses things even more. I found myself asking myself "Are we supposed to know that guy?"  

The Heisei era had a few recurring characters, including government and military personnel, who, if they had a name, I never really cottoned to it, because they are so minor and inconsequential despite being in (nearly?) every movie. Then there was Miki the Psychic Girl who appears in 6 of the 7 films, but has no distinct character arc and no defining personality to speak of. She's a consistent presence but has so very little to do. She's supposed to have this strong connection with Godzilla, but it amounts to almost nothing but an exposition dump every time.

The first two Heisei films, The Return of Godzilla and Godzilla vs Biollante, felt ...elevated somewhat from their Showa Era predecessors, but following that it felt like the Heisei era was really reverting back to Showa-era goofiness to varying effect. Godzilla vs Destroyah does effectively return a bit of actual horror and tension with Godzilla's impending meltdown set to destroy the world, but really inept scripting and storytelling rob the film of much of its dramatic and emotional impact.

I went into the Heisei era really excited, hoping to see better stories, better characters, tighter continuity, and, well, I got one of those three, the one that matters least. I come out of the Heisei era feeling pretty drained on the property, and let down overall.  Many fans, I've been hearing, consider the Heisei era to be be the best of big G, which has me even more worried as I head into the Millennium era. 

One big change needs to happen in this process of watching all the Godzillas is a further adaptation of the template I'm using to recap them... especially the "recapping" part. It started with the Double Oh series for James Bond and then was almost a necessity with our A Toast to HallmarKent series, but recapping a movie beat by beat, or even in broad strokes, has become one of my least favourite things, primarily because Godzilla films are so anti-structure and, frankly, poorly written, event-focused stories.  So recapping all the sort of stream-of-consciousness flow to these movies is kind of maddening, because they don't make much sense and trying to capture every absurd swerve is a fools errand. I'm that fool, but I can no longer be.  Heck, maybe we'll find the Millennium era finally finds some narrative drive to their movies....

At least I know, post-Millennium, getting into the Monsterverse and Reiwa era, that there's some actual great stuff happening there to look forward to.  

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Rankings:

Heisei Era

1. The Return of Godzilla
2. Godzilla vs Mechagodzilla II
3. Godzilla vs Destroyah
4. Godzilla vs Mothra
5. Godzilla vs Biollante
6. Godzilla vs SpaceGodzilla
7. Godzilla vs King Ghidorah
8. Godzilla 1985

All the films (so far):

1. The Return of Godzilla
2. Godzilla vs Mothra (1964)
3. Gojira
4. Godzilla vs Mechagodzilla (1974)
5. Ebirah, Horror of the Deep
6. Godzilla vs Mechagodzilla II
7. Terror of Mechagodzilla
8. Godzilla vs Destroyah
9. Godzilla vs Mothra (1992)
10. Godzilla vs. Hedorah
11. Godzilla vs Gigan
12. Godzilla vs Megalon
13. Destroy All Monsters
14. Godzilla vs Biollante
15. Godzilla vs SpaceGodzilla
16. All Monsters Attack
17. Ghidorah the Three Headed Monster
18. Godzilla vs King Ghidorah
19. Invasion of the Astro Monster
20. Godzilla Raids Again
21. Godzilla 1985
22. Son of Godzilla
23. Godzilla King of the Monsters (1956)
24. King Kong vs Godzilla (US version 1962)

Go-Go-Godzilla: The Showa Era in review

As I start writing this, I've just finished gorging myself on all 15 of the Showa-Era Godzilla films plus the godawful American re-edit of the original Gojira (and not getting to see the original Japanese edit of King Kong vs. Godzilla, having had to suffer through the English dub and reedit instead).  I crammed these 16 films into 25 days, however 12 of these 16 I binged within the same week. That's a seriously intense amount of Godzilla. This is the kind of shit I get up to when Lady Kent goes away.

What have I learned about both Godzilla -- and myself -- that I didn't know before?

First, I had always assumed I had seen plenty of Godzilla on Sunday morning TV, but turns out very little of this was familiar to me. I'm sure I had watched some of these over the years, but to be honest, without ever having steeped myself into the lore before, I really couldn't tell one from the other.

What you realize in binge watching Godzilla is there's not nearly as much Godzilla in each movie as you think there would be. I remember when the Gareth Edwards Godzilla came out in 2014 that there were a lot of detractors saying "not enough Godzilla". But when you go back to the original first wave of Toho features, there is truly not that much Godzilla in them.

I recall in my younger years that whatever Godzilla movies I had watched, I had this very same reaction: not enough Godzilla. I think I always intended to seek out the ones that did have more, I just never got around to learning that there really weren't any.  What I feel as an adult is that the best Godzilla movies have human characters you like, and, better yet, care about.  Even the best of those, though, don't ever seem to figure out what to do in the third act when the kaiju battle is taking place. The human story tends to be a two-act structure as set-up for a men-in-rubber-suits wrestling match.

It's amazing to learn that the first film spawned a much lesser-than sequel, and then the third film was actually the Kong crossover. The fourth and fifth were yet again more crossovers with Mothra and Rodan, although the trend became to spotlight a new kaiju rather than Godzilla for a while.

A surprising number of these movies revolve around space aliens trying to take over Earth, too many in fact.  The films are often convoluted, taking wild twists and turns to always wind up in the same place of a monster battle. In their own way, they're formulaic like Hallmark movies, and much like Hallmark movies, these Toho films use the same stable of actors in different combinations as different characters.  It's part of its charm, to be sure, but it also exposes the underlying cheapness to it all.

With the exception of the original, it's not until Godzilla vs Hedorah that it feels like the franchise attempts to be cinematic again. It does take some WILD experimentation in that movie to drag Toho kicking and screaming into the 70's era of filmmaking but it does get there. The final 5 movies of this era are probably its most watchable.  It's also so very stylish. The clothes, the hair, the cars. The men all look sexy, the women all look cute, the earth tones and fall colours are to die for. 

The series contains only a very small sense of continuity from one film to the next, but usually by two films removed it has forgotten its past. By Destroy All Monsters we've reached the turn of the century, and then three films later, with Godzilla vs. Megalon we're back in the 1970s.  In Destroy All Monsters, King Ghidorah is clearly killed, but he's back again in Godzilla vs. Gigan (its very possible this is a timeline thing but I don't care to delve that deeply. The lore just isn't that strong, nor intentional).

The series clearly makes a shift from turning Godzilla from heel to face. By the time of Invasion of the Astro-Monster, he's at worst chaotic neutral. By All Monsters Attack children are idolizing him.  It neuters a very intimidating, very scary cinematic creation, and honestly, outside of Hedorah, there's no creature that's been as scary as Godzilla himself.

The Godzilla costume goes through a real journey through the 20-ish years of the Showa Era...from thick and bulky in the original film, to loose and wrinkly in the 60s films, to a stabilized look throughout the 70's.  The suits of the 70's start looking better and better, except for Anguiras, who always looks goofy and awkward. 

I don't think I realized just how silly so much of Godzilla was, and the silly business of Godzilla is some of my least favourite business. I hated Godzilla dancing in Astro-Monster, and I hate the Mothra conversation with Godzilla and Rodan in Ghidorah.  By the 70's they had learned how to use camp effectively so the silly business in Gigan or Megalon I find easier to swallow...for the most part.  Frankly, the kaiju battles are just silly anyway, so adding intentionally silly shit to them seems like a hat on a hat filled with whip cream.  The drive of course was to appeal to children. Turning Godzilla hero was about appealing to kids, and so the films became more and more tailored for that.  I definitely don't mind entertainment for children...I enjoy it often, but it has to be smart, and treat the kids like they're smart, and not pander. Pandering Godzilla is not great.

I fell asleep through a great many of these movies. I don't know if it was the films or just being overworked, lacking sleep, having too much to do while Lady Kent was away...or if it's that the films are...well, kind of repetitive and boring. Even though most of them are between 80 and 90 minutes, a lot of them seem overlong or padded, especially without interesting characters to drive them.

There were clear standout films for me, and then there were the rest. I'm almost tempted to say I don't even like Godzilla movies after all this, but that's a half-truth. I'm excited to step into the Heisi era and see what influence the 80's and 90's boom in action and sci-fi production had on the series, as well as the dramatic advances in special effects.  But if the story structures wind up the same, I'm not sure if it'll make any difference.  I got really bored with tiny tanks and planes firing their arsenals on Godzilla, and likewise, with the exception of the latter Showa-era films, I found the Kaiju battles pretty tepid, goofy or ludicrous.  

I think there's a trigger in one's brain for falling in love with "suitmation", and what surprises me the most is I don't seem to have that trigger. There are kaiju fans out there who live to see men in rubber wrestle on top of miniature trees or buildings, but I don't think I'm one of those guys (as much as I appreciate the craft of miniatures and suits).  Maybe with later-era art design and filming techniques I'll find some passion for it, but throughout much of Showa era, I just wanted a good human story and for the monster fights to be over quickly.

Ranking Showa Era Godzilla
16. King Kong vs. Godzilla (US Version) - maddeningly bad
15. Godzilla: King of the Monsters (US Version) - less maddeningly bad, but still maddeningly bad
14. Son of Godzilla - pandering kiddie crap
13. Godzilla Raids Again - just boring
12. Invasion of the Astro-Monster - surprisingly boring
11. Ghidorah the Three-Headed Monster - the start of anthropomorphism, boo
10. All Monsters Attack - a pretty good short drama merged with a bad Godzilla clipshow 
9. Destroy All Monsters - what most consider a high point took me four attempts to get through
8. Godzilla vs. Megalon - silly, but good silly
7. Godzilla vs. Gigan - good silly, just less silly, but still good
6. Godzilla vs. Hedorah - a valiant attempt to shake up the franchise, a very, very weird movie
5. Terror of Mechagodzilla - much needed feminine energy.
4. Ebirah, Horror of the Deep -  a great adventure with great characters, and the best final fight pre-70s
3. Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla - a film just loaded to the gills with everything you want
2. Gojira - the original is the most potent of any of them
1. Godzilla vs. Mothra - the "Goldfinger" of the franchise, setting the template for what it's to become

In my rankings the top three are kind of interchangeable...any of them could take top spot. The next three (4-6) are equally interchangeable in my ranking, as I changed the order of them many times. 7&8 are quite solidly in place as enjoyable, good-looking entertainment, where as 9 through 14 are the stereotypical Showa era films that I just don't care about. The final two are the American versions of Toho films, edited with new footage to pander to the American audience, and they really, really suck. A lot. 

Kaiju Top 5
There are a LOT of giant monsters introduced in these 16 films. I don't feel like looking them all up, and most of them looked like hot rubber garbage, so here are my favourites:

Special Mention: Gigan. I want to love Gigan, the daddest of dad-bod kaiju, with big metal hooks for hands, and a cybernetic cyclopian eye, and a weird metal beak. But he has a buzz saw in his belly and I just can't get over that.

5. Hedorah. It's like The Blob, but made of toxic sludge, and it flies instead of seeps and creeps.
4. Megalon. A beetle-thing with big jagged handless metal arms. I love its weird metal mandibles.
3. Ebirah. A giant lobster beast, but what a fantastic looking giant lobster beast
2. Godzilla. Because of course. I mean, I hate the suit through the bulk of the Showa era, but the original film looks great and the 70's films get to the Godzilla know and like.
1. Mothra (moth form). I didn't like Mothra as a kid, but something about her just works for me as an adult. I don't really care for her larval form, but I love her beautiful, colourful, furry moth self.

--- 

Next up, the Heisei Era, starting with The Return of Godzilla (or the U.S. version, Godzilla 1985).
But before that, just a straight up review of Godzilla Minus One, a theatrical experience that, no lie, may have accelerated my hearing loss.

Go-Go-Godzilla #33: Godzilla vs Kong

Director: Adam Wingard
Year: 2021
Length: 113 minutes

The Gist:
I guess because of the understanding of how the Titans communicate and sense each others' presences, Monarch is protecting Kong on Skull Island within a gigantic dome from alpha Titan Godzilla. Kong isn't stupid though, and he knows his fortress is actually a prison. Dr. Ilene Andrews is Monarch's chief Kong-ologist, and her deaf adopted daughter, Jia, seems to have a special bond with Kong. She's taught him some sign language, but they keep that between them.

Walter Simmons is the megalomaniac head of Apex Cybernetics, a very powerful tech organization. He recruits ex-Monarch researcher and Hollow Earth theorist Dr. Nathan Lind after telling him he's created a  vehicle for safe entry into the centre of the planet but what they need is a Titan to lead them to the gateway.

Using his connections they manage to get to Skull Island and convince Ilene that this mission is a good idea. On the way to the gateway, Godzilla attacks a drugged, dazed, and seemingly depressed Kong. Kong fights valiantly, enough to ward Godzilla off, but it's no victory. To continue on the path they've chose would risk another attack. But tracking Godzilla, they discover a gateway, and airlift Kong there.

They make passage into middle earth where they discover Kong's home territory, seemingly abandoned, but just laced with stones full of a new form of energy.  Unknown to Doctors Andrews and Lind, this is what Walter Simmons was really after. Apex Cybernetics created a giant remote controlled Mecha-Godzilla that uses a hybrid cybernetic mind link between a human host and one of Ghidora's skulls from the previous film to control it, but it needs the raw power of the Hollow Earth to power it.

Godzilla knows that Kong has found a hotbed of power and, from Hong Kong big G revs up his atomic blast and opens up a hole right to Kong's homestead (that's 6000+ KM for reference). Armed with a super-charged axe, Kong makes his way to the surface to battle Godzilla (basically hopping up the tunnel Godzilla just bore into the Earth...all 6000+ KM), and once again finds he's just not a match. Godzilla nearly kills him.

Meanwhile, Simmons is out to prove man is the Apex Predator once more and sets MechaGodzilla out into the wild. It's a brawl, and Godzilla's about to lose, but Nathan uses the HEAV as a defibrillator and revives Kong. Jia explains to resurrected Kong that Godzilla doesn't have to be his enemy, and that he needs help. Kong steps in, and the two decimate Mecha-G in a pretty nice tag-team (Godzilla charging Kong's axe with his atomic breath was just aces). They reach an uneasy truce, an understanding of cohabitation, and go their separate ways.

Oh yeah, Mark and Madison Russell from the last film are in this as well. Madison is obsessed with a Titan-focussed conspiracy podcast run by Bernie Hayes, who works for Apex Cybernetics. Along with Madison's friend Josh, they manage to meet up with Bernie and go on a fruitless and meaningless adventure which culminates in them dumping a flask of whiskey on a computer to give Mecha-Godzilla a moment's pause, which is just enough to make a difference it the big finale.

Godzilla, Friend or Foe:
He's the same Godzilla as previous, a massive force of nature, but we get the sense that he's not *just* a force of nature. That he can think a bit too, and even socialize with others.

The Samesies:
Just like the previous Godzilla eras, the continuity here ain't so tight between the films, especially when you add Monarch: Legacy of Monsters to the mix, it's not easy to fit all the pieces together of what humanity knows about the habits and behaviours of the Titans and Hollow Earth, and when they knew about it.  I'm sure it's all fudge-able, in the same way one has to fudge Star Wars continuity to make it make sense, but it's not all there on the screen.

Like many Godzilla films past, the technology available to mankind has gotten really advanced. There's some heavy investment into "super science" and research infrastructure, even way beyond the previous film. King of the Monsters toes the sci-fi waters, where GvK just jumps right in. It's pretty unapologetic about it, too, which I like a lot.  

Mechagodzilla having a connection to Ghidorah is right out of the Heisei era Godzilla vs Mechagodzilla II, as is the idea of Ghidorah taking over the robot from its human controllers.

Like King Kong vs Godzilla, there's lore introduced here that suggests the two beasts have an ancient rivalry. This film goes into it a lot more than the 60's film did, though. 

The Differences:

The Hollow Earth was teased in the previous film and even visited via an underwater portal (which I guess explains why there wasn't all the topsy-turvey-ness others have reported. The reason they don't go back to that gateway is, well, because they blew it up with a nuke.  Anyway, the visit to the Hollow Earth here is very adventuresome and exploratory. It's vibrantly realized and I really dug this sequence.

The HEAV (Hollow Earth Aerial Vehicle?) is not too far off from the Super-X hovering tanks of Toho films past, although these are strictly transportation meant to accommodate the flippidy-doo journey into Hollow Earth. I like the Tron-like light trails it leaves behind in its wake.

I haven't been re-watching Kong films, but doesn't Kong usually have something of a connection with young women? I think this is the first time he's really had a relationship with a child, and maybe the first time he's shown an aptitude for communicating with sign language.

This is the first Godzilla movie to feature a podcaster, and dive into conspiracy theories as they apply to the Monsterverse. Of course, this is the annoying thing where we know more than Bernie does.

Anyone worth caring about?
Oh, so much more to care about than in the previous film. Rebecca Hall as Ilene and Alexander Skarsgard as Nathan are both immediately and infinitely more appealing and likeable than Vera Farmiga and Kyle Chandler. Chandler is still in this film but really tossed into the background, where he should be. Hall, Skarsgard, and Kaylee Hottle (Jia), as well as the Apex and Monarch crews, are all basically team Kong, while Millie Bobbie Brown (returning as Madison), Brian Tyree Henry as Bernie, and Julian Denison as Josh are the largely useless and purposeless team Godzilla but quite likeable. I'm happy to see some of this crew are back in one of two "Empire" movies this March of 2024 in Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire (see also Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire).

But, really, the best character in the film is Kong. He's so expressive. He's a big, homesick, lonely boy, with such soulful eyes, and every moment he has with Jia made me just a little, teensy bit weepy.

The Message:
Uh, it's possible to make peace with even your longest-standing enemy? *ahem*

Rating (out of 5 Zs): ZZZ
This isn't a super-smart movie, and it's sense of scale goes all out-of-whack, but boy does it know how to have fun. If there's a big difference between this and King of the Monsters it is exactly that point. The characters in this film are going on a big old ride and despite the peril they may be in, the performers seem to be having fun. It's contagious. 

The Kong v Godzilla fights are very well orchestrated with a LOT of fun little nuances you could never accomplish in suitmation. That's not a dig on the fun of suitmation, but just part of the comparison. CGI frees the filmmakers up to create more expressive creatures, and have more nuanced fights. Not sure the physics always work out in its favour but who cares!? Big dumb fun is supposed to be exactly that.

I just wish Skarsgaard was playing Tarzan in this.

Sleepytime Factor:
I did have a brief little headbob of a nod during the Ghidorah-head discovery or one of the team Godzilla scenes, but I never went right out.

Go-Go-Godzilla #34: Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire

Director: Adam Wingard
Year: 2024
Length: 115 minutes

The Gist:
Kong is living his new life in the Hollow Earth. He has a treaty with Godzilla. Godzilla gets the surface world, Kong gets the underground. Monarch watches all. To what end is never really established. They're under pressure from external governments to destroy the Titans rather than just watch them. But Monarch know's we've been knocked down a peg on the food chain.

Kong is battered after fight with a pack of Hollow Earth ... wolf-ish-things. He has a toothache and returns to the surface so Monarch can take care of it. He seems to understand they're there to help him. Trapper (Dan Stevens) is the free-spirited "vet" that takes care of it.

Meanwhile, Jia (Kaylee Hottle), the sole survivor of the Iwi tribe of Skull Island is having a hard time adjusting to day-to-day life at the Monarch schools (it annoys me that we get hints of this Monarch-centric world but there's no exploration of it) but she's also receiving visions and falling into fugue states. She worries about her mental health.  Her adoptive mother, Dr. Ilene Andrews (Rebecca Hall), worries too, only to discover that the pattern Jia draws in her fugue states resembles the seismic readings she's been getting from Hollow Earth.  She goes to Titan conspiracy podcaster Bernie Hayes (Brian Tyree Henry) for help because the rest of Monarch just shrugs it off as coincidence.  His condition for helping is a trip to Hollow Earth.

So when he discovers that both the image Jia is drawing and the seismic readings are a distress call from Hollow Earth, a small team (consisting of Ilene, Trapper, Jia, Bernie and their redshirt pilot) go to investigate.

Meanwhile Kong has encountered other giant apes for the first time and they attack him. But he is Kong and they are not. The larger ones flee, but the child ape Kong hangs onto, and forces the child (a pesky little runt) to take him to the rest of the apes.

As Kong encounters what remains of the society he is descended from, a community of apes enslaved by the Scar King as they search for an escape to the surface (doesn't seem that hard, mind) the humans (less their redshift) discover a whole other tribe of Hollow Earth Iwi. They tell of the war the Skar King led against Godzilla, and his desire to rule the surface. Jia is the prophesied last of Skull Island who will come and awaken Mothra, who will help Godzilla in defeating this threat against the planet.

Kong fights the Skar King, and his slave masters, and the giant ice-breathing lizard he has power over. Kong loses and flees only with his life. His hand is mangled, but Monarch has, conveniently, a power glove from an abandoned mech suit ready for Kong to help him both heal and fight better.

Meanwhile, Godzilla, barely in the picture, has absorbed the nuclear radiation of a French power station, and has gone up against the dragon Tiamat and stolen its home in the antarctic where the solar radiation is most strongest.

Kong goes to the surface and with Mothra's intervention, enlists Godzilla into helping defeat the Skar King. Middle Earth fight. Our heroic trio prevails. Godzilla returns to his nest in the Colosseum in Rome for a catnap, Kong has the family he's been searching for, and I guess the humans are going to just leave the Iwi in peace and never speak of it again (Bernie's been taking video this whole time, but Trapper gives him a warning of sharing it...there's not even a concluding moment of Bernie destroying his recordings or anything.).

Godzilla, Friend or Foe:
Friend

The Samesies:

Like the Godzilla films of old, there's a human story here that matters less and less and less as the story goes on, and, frankly, doesn't really matter a whole lot to begin with. But that's also typical of Godzilla films. The human story is often time-biding padding until we get to the monster fights.  

The difference here from old Godzilla is, well, the samesies as Godzilla vs Kong, where the film's main character is Kong, and we do spend a lot of time with.  We follow Kong around as he traverses the Hollow Earth and its dangers. Like the previous Kong movies in this Monsterverse series, he is such a soulful character and it's hard not to be emotionally invested in him.

Godzilla films have, a number of times now, given Godzilla a junior version for him to adopt into his life. For the first time, Kong is the recipient of a junior giant ape to dote over... or to grab by the leg and swing around like a cudgel(!).  If you thought from the trailer that this little doe-eyed red-furred ape would be a totes dorbs aww-meme generator, Wingard instead makes him a little shitheel scamp that betrays Kong a number of times over. But we learn the kid is traumatized from the environment he grew up in, and Kong showing him a kindness or two does eventually sway the brat.

In my watchings of the Godzillas these past few months, Mothra has emerged as perhaps my favourite kaiju, if not necessarily the creature herself, but for all the trappings around her. Her native worshippers, the fariy twin Shobijin, the glorious Masura song they sing, the way they set up Mothra as protector of the Earth only for her to basically be defeated by almost any threat and explode into stardust... but to have larval offspring also called Mothra. There's a whole twisted world to her that I really enjoy.  And by dovetailing Kong's native tribe, the Iwi, into Mothra's, it's a blending I like. But pageantry around Mothra this time is not up to standards. There's no song, nor larvae (that was already done in King of the Monsters, so I get it), and Mothra doesn't explode for a change. So, some losses, but a win.

It's not a net positive, but the surface fights between the Titans, in various cities, feels much like the Toho Godzilla films, where the world feels constructed for the purpose of being torn down. It doesn't feel like the real world even with the occasional composited shot of people fleeing. We're such a long way now from Gareth Edwards' mastery of feeling the awe of monsters fighting overhead. But the brawls do feel like the CGI version of the suitmation fights.  They're a lot more elaborate in their physicality and camera angles, the the sensation is just the same.

The Differences:
It's weird to say, but Hollow Earth as an environment, is just setting. It's no longer treated with much majesty and as such it loses so much of its "wow" factor. We got a lot of "wow" factor out of GvK and even Monarch:Legacy of Monsters but we don't get much of that here. Bernie has a few bulging eye moments but that's about it.  In observing this film largely through Kong as our POV character, we lose the sense of scale. Likewise, leaving the surface for much of the film, there's no structures in Hollow Earth for us to get scale comparisons to.

The Legendary Monsterverse has spent four films and a 10-episode TV series building up Monarch, only for it to be relegated very much into the background of this story. I guess they're just leaving any intrigue around the organization, or the politics of its existence to the TV show, should it return. Which is a shame because it's really what this Monsterverse is built around, and it should be our guide through this. I don't dislike that Wingard and the writing team have fleshed Kong out over two movies the way they have...these two pictures really do fit nicely together as a duology. But the title of these films isn't Kong: Homecoming and Kong: No Way Home, but Godzilla vs/x Kong, and the other half of that title has such little presence and purpose other than force of nature.  In a way it's fitting as we often only get a 15 minutes of Godzilla in any given film, but when we do the focus is squarely on the King, and here, he's a sideshow.

Anyone worth caring about?
Ilene and Jia are the two essential holdovers from the prior film. It's a good choice. Rebecca Hall has such a way of drawing the audience into her performance. She's able to trigger a sympathetic nerve like few other actors can, without ever being cloying about it. Part of that comes from her relationship with Jia. Having a deaf daughter means the communication is largely silent and expression conveys so much more. And Kaylee Hottle, for these two films comprising the bulk of her acting career, has been great in both of them. An absolutely endearing performer who is able to convey depths with just expression.

This film is so deep into quiet communication... Ilene and Jia, the telepathic Iwa people, the apes, Jia and Kong, Kong and Godzilla, Mothra and everyone. It's all very quietly emotive, which is what makes the dialogue so hard to digest. Like Trapper isn't really *that* annoying a character, except everyone else is saying so much without saying anything that his ballyhoo cries are just... a lot. And then there's Bernie.

I've loved or liked every Brian Tyree Henry performance I've seen. Except this one. Bernie is a conspiracy nut who is pretty much correct about most of what he's gone nutty over, but he's a caricature in these two films. He doesn't seem like a real person. And as "comic relief" in this film in particular, almost every jokey line falls incredibly flat. Plus, his character, beyond the initial discovery of the call for help, is useless.  Much like the previous film, Bernie contributes one thing, then just takes up oxygen in the film.  And it drove me nuts that Bernie, an established podcaster, kept going on and on about his blog.

The Message:
erm...home is where the heart is? I dunno. It's not that kind of movie.

Rating (out of 5 Zs): ZZz
I would say I enjoyed this as much as I enjoyed GvK and yet, the more I think about it, the less impressed I get.  I'm not deep in the weeds on it, but I'm annoyed that I can't seem to reconcile the Hollow Earth of King of the Monsters, GvK, Monarch:LoM and this film.  That may be on me, but I don't think so. I just don't think the writers/producers care enough about continuity/consistency. 

The diminished role of both Godzilla and Monarch are definitely detractors for me, but, and I need to be clear, I love the ape stuff. Absolutely love it. Is it what I wanted to see out a a Kaiju movie? Not really. Or at all. We already have a Planet of the Apes movie coming out this year from the same studio. Why did we need another one, just plus-sized?

If these Legendary Monsterverse films do continue, the next time better be space aliens, Gigan and Megalon, with Godzilla in front, recruiting Kong on the back-side.

I did want to call out that I really enjoyed the Godzilla/Kong fights in Egypt. But they couldn't have worked the pyramids into Titan lore somehow? Through the Iwi at least? Sigh.

Sleepytime Factor:
None actually. I had a pretty good time.