Godzilla Binge! One Newbie Stomps Her Way Into the World of the Monster-Movie Icon

Everybody has a cultural blind spot. Maybe you don’t know your X-wing from your C-3PO, or the difference between a hologram deck and a transporter beam. Me, I’ve never seen any of the 30-plus films starring a certain city-smooshing, fire-burping reptile. So in preparation for the latest big-screen version of Godzilla (in theaters May16), I decided to immerse myself in over nine hours’ worth of the Godzilla canon — from old Japanese movies to American cartoons to music videos — carefully curated by my editors. Like the many frazzled scientists in this franchise, I observed and took notes, recording my body’s response to 554 minutes of sustained Godzilla exposure. Results varied.

00:00–1:36

Gojira (1954) 
First up is 1954’s Gojira, the original black-and-white kaiju (monster) film from Toho Co. Ltd. After a fantastic opening score, I see a certainProfessor Yamane — who is either a zoologist or paleontologist — suggesting that recent nuclear detonations have dislodged a radioactive creature. Seeing as it’s been able to survive all the atomic activity, and possibly dates back to the Cretaceous Period, the professor doesn’t want it harmed. Classic zoologist/paleontologist behavior!

Soon, Godzilla begins his destructive waltz through Tokyo. I’m surprised by how impressed I am with his physicality. Given the production values of the era, I expected a toy dinosaur stepping on Popsicle-stick houses, but the black-and-white palette disguises his features, making him more shadowy and sinister. Sure, when he opens his mouth to breathe smoke, his head looks like the nozzle of a fog machine, and his proportions vary from scene to scene, but he’s still intimidating, even today.

Less impressive are the humans. They come up with a plan to build an electric, barbed-wire fence around the coast of Japan. But Godzilla, needless to say, makes quick work of the fence. Radio broadcasters refuse to abandon their post, and instead keep taking pictures. (It’s reassuring to know that if Instagram existed in 1954, Godzilla would have been as excessively documented as sunsets and lunches.)

In the end, he is defeated with a weapon called an Oxygen Destroyer, which literally destroys oxygen molecules. Personally, I would have workshopped the name a little first, but the point is not lost: The scientist’s agony in deploying the powerful Oxygen Destroyer is obviously a response to the then-fairly-recent traumas of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Overall, a smart film at a civil length.

2:00–3:30

Destroy All Monsters (1968)
Next, I dive into Monsters, the ninth film in the original Godzilla series, which features an all-star roster of Toho’s mutant kaiju. It’s set way in the future — 1999, to be exact — when evidently the mod ’60slook was supposed to make a huge comeback, and all of the Earth’s monsters have been collected and confined to an island called … Monsterland. Forty-five years after the Oxygen Destroyer, and the Japanese government still hasn’t gotten any better at branding.

A voiceover tells us the monsters are treated well in captivity, and have plenty of fish to eat, and … hold on, who cares? I’m forming my first objection to Godzilla-as-metaphor. I thought his existence was punishment for playing God with atomic power, and now it’s a commentary on the treatment of zoo animals? Pick a lane!

But this concern won’t keep me up at night. It doesn’t even keep me up during the movie — I am so bored that I fall asleep.Destroy All Monsters may be a fan favorite, but I humbly submit that this movie is total garbage. I like a good getting-the-band-back-together story as much as the next person, but when Godzilla, Anguirus, Baragon, Mothra, etc., unite to fight the Kilaaks (a feminine alien race that threatens humanity), I had to mute most of the second half because their screeches and roars were migraine-inducing. (Also: Are the Kilaaks a backlash against the era’s feminist movement? One more reason to hate it.)

The monsters’ brawl perplexes me, because it’s more adorable than frightening, with Godzilla pulling on the three-headed King Ghidorah’s leg like a cartoon child clutching a comically large balloon. It seems some of the monsters emerge as the heroes here — I think I saw Godzilla waving to the humans at the end.

3:30–5:13

The Return of Godzilla (1984)
Next, another Toho joint that’s supposed to serve as a direct sequel to the original. The American edit features Raymond Burr — who was also inserted into the original for American audiences, making this a reunion of people who never worked together in the first place — but I’m watching Return's Japanese version, which is Perry Mason-less.

I’m cranky — perhaps from my lack of protein, or maybe because I’m getting bored of watching movies that refuse to embrace the production technology of the times! Alien came out six years before this movie, and featured axenomorph — created by the late H.R. Giger — that was terrifying. So why does Godzilla look like a grounded parade float?

5:13–7:33

Godzilla (1998)
I notice this much-hyped American blockbuster adaptation conveniently blames France for the lizard mutation. So let me get this straight: First, Godzilla was a commentary on the atomic bomb, and then a statement against feminism, and now it’s another way of saying the French are jerks? Bien sûr! At least this movie, directed by the apocalypse-loving Roland Emmerich (Independence Day), brings some star power with Matthew Broderick and Jean Reno.

Broderick channels Ferris Bueller as scientist Nick Tatopoulos, all wide-eyed and “Who, me?” when he’s picked up by the Army, whereupon he starts trying to convince everyone that Godzilla has come to New York to nest.His aspiring-reporter love interest, played by Maria Pitillo (a poor man’s Heather Graham), hoodwinks him by sneaking his confidential research into her broadcast.So far, I’ve isolated two themes ominpresent in the series, no matter which country is producing it: The media is run by a bunch of schnooks, and Godzilla gives good photo — like so many before him, Dr. Tatopoulos can’t stop snapping pics.

It’s not just the French who have to endure croissant-related stereotypes; the New York characters fumble with heavy, outer-borough accents and pre-9/11 emergency responses, like “Whaddya mean there’s a lizard in the tunnel? It’s rush hour!” I cheat and fast-forward through a 20-minute taxi ride that ends with the cab speeding out of Godzilla’s mouth.

Truthfully, I don’t want these people to survive. Apparently, nobody else did, either: The movie was a critical flop, emerging from the decade only slightly less hated than Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo.

7:33–7:35

Bambi Meets Godzilla (1969)
In need of a breather, I turn to animator Marv Newland’s sublime short, which was occasionally shown in theaters before the 1985 movie, and appeared on some VHS versions. At this point, I’m convinced that one minute and 32 seconds is the ideal run time for all things Godzilla-related, which is how long it takes for the opening credits to end and — well, watch for yourself. The effect is slightly spoiled by knowing the run time, but Newland’s cleverly bloated acknowledgments are still hilarious.

7:35–7:58

Godzilla: The Animated Series (1978)
"The Firebird"
A Hanna-Barbera/Toho co-production, this kaiju-for-kidz series ran for three years. I was assigned to watch the premiere episode, and while doing so, I discovered that Godzilla is everybody’s buddy again. In the movies I’ve seen, he’s bounced between Public Enemy No. 1 and public servant and back again.

Plus, his origin story keeps changing, like he can’t keep it straight, and it’s giving me whiplash:He’s a byproduct of nuclear activity, a creature dislodged from his natural habitat by nuclear activity, a monster created by man, a living nuclear weapon that feeds on radioactive waste, a pal, and a confidante. What’s your motivation, Godzilla?

Here, he saves a boat from a rogue wave with the “help” of Godzooky — a mini-gojira and the much-loathed Scrappy-Doo to Godzilla’s Scooby. I would have preferred it if he pulled a mask off the Firebird in the end to reveal that it was Mr. Wickles all along.

7:58–8:01

Blue Öyster Cult, “Godzilla” (1977)
Having loomed large in pop culture for two decades by this point, Godzilla finally got his own classic-rock hit, and his onstage likeness is not much worse than what I’ve seen on film. Do we think BOC frontman Buck Dharma can really speak Japanese? And I’m getting a double entendre vibe from the lyric “Go, go, Godzilla”?

8:01–8:15

Mystery Science Theater 3000 (1988)
Godzilla vs. Megalon
It’s been eight hours. I’m lonely. Nobody will watch any Godzilla movies with me, because conventional wisdom suggests that they stink. Or maybe that’s how I prefaced the invitation? Anyway, I find this interlude satisfying because I crave the company of irreverent pranksters who will watch excerpts from 1973’s Godzilla vs. Megalon and make remarks like “Whenever they test nuclear bombs, it’s the monsters who suffer.”

8:15–9:45

Godzilla Against Mechagodzilla (2002)
God help me — I might get in the monster’s corner for this one. “Humans are ruining the Earth, destroying ecosystems by the dozen,” says a scientist named Yahura in the 26th installment of this franchise. Yeah, eff ‘em! Godzilla’s going green.

In the first movie, the issue was nuclear weapons, but rather than risk seeming dated with out-of-favor concerns, the franchise’s new crop of self-flagellating scientists (the scientists are always self-flagellating, except in the American version, natch) lecture us on the environment.

To combat the new incarnation of the monster, Yahura builds a biomechanical Godzilla from the remains of the 1954 skeleton, but that patently irritating roar (seriously, it’s copyrighted) triggers the clone’s memories of the earlier demise and he goes H.A.M. on Tokyo (and stunt-casted baseball player Hideki Matsui, whose nickname is “Godzilla”). Eventually, though, the robot Godzilla swings the new Godzilla around the city by the tail, which is strangely satisfying after so many hours spent watching the monster toss trains and truck beds like toys from a baby’s pram.

I go to bed, my head ringing and my heart full of salt and fury. Suffice it to say, this condensed oeuvre didn’t make a convert out of me. But it has taught me some important lessons: 1) Sometimes the original idea is the best one (Gojira remains my favorite of the bunch). 2) A little Godzilla goes a long way — there’s a palpable lack of suspense when the monster emerges too quickly and destroys everything. And 3) Godzilla’s not always bad. He’s complicated. Everybody’s an antihero these days. Even the monsters.