Legendary's Godzilla 2 & beyond - News & Rumors
- Thread starter Kai "the spy"
- Start date
Filming started today, and a plot synopsis was also released:
"The new story follows the heroic efforts of the crypto-zoological agency Monarch as its members face off against a battery of god-sized monsters, including the mighty Godzilla, who collides with Mothra, Rodan, and his ultimate nemesis, the three-headed King Ghidorah. When these ancient super-species—thought to be mere myths—rise again, they all vie for supremacy, leaving humanity’s very existence hanging in the balance."
As far as I recall, this is the first time it's been confirmed that the three other kaiju are in the movie. There have been teases, and most fans have assumed they would appear, but no official announcement before now.
"The new story follows the heroic efforts of the crypto-zoological agency Monarch as its members face off against a battery of god-sized monsters, including the mighty Godzilla, who collides with Mothra, Rodan, and his ultimate nemesis, the three-headed King Ghidorah. When these ancient super-species—thought to be mere myths—rise again, they all vie for supremacy, leaving humanity’s very existence hanging in the balance."
As far as I recall, this is the first time it's been confirmed that the three other kaiju are in the movie. There have been teases, and most fans have assumed they would appear, but no official announcement before now.
Damn, that sounds massive (pun intended). 
Godzilla, Mothra, Rodan and King Ghidorah in one movie! Hopefully it will be as epic as it sounds!
Hmm... I'd expect that the American film will treat Mothra and King Ghidorah rather differently than they're handled in Japan. As for Mothra, she's always portrayed as a heroic kaiju who's essentially a god, worshipped by the natives of Infant Island and accompanied by two fairy-like heralds who speak for her. Since Americans aren't so much into animism or polytheism, I expect Legendary Mothra will be just one more giant ancient animal. (Also, she's a her. English dubs tend to use "he" or "it" for Mothra, despite the whole recurring egg-laying theme.) I hope at least they don't make Mothra villainous.
As for King Ghidorah, it's usually been portrayed as a monster from space, and this description makes it sound like another ancient Terrestrial species. Although there have been various versions of KG. The original was a space monster used as a weapon by alien invaders. The Heisei KG was radioactively mutated from a breed of small genetically engineered pets from the future, so it was essentially of Earth origin (although the novelization of the movie said the pets were engineered from the remains of the original alien KG). And Godzilla, Mothra, King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All-Out Attack reimagined KG as one of the three ancient Yamato Monsters that defended Japan, along with Mothra and Baragon, the only time KG was ever cast in a heroic role (because the original plan was to use a more obscure kaiju named Varan, but the execs insisted on a more famous one).
A lot of the kaiju movies portray the monsters as neutral, just dangerous to anything that gets in their path. There aren't that many unambiguously "good" kaiju. The list would basically include Mothra, King Kong, Frankenstein/Sanda, Minilla, and his Heisei counterpart Baby Godzilla aka Little Godzilla aka Godzilla Junior. Godzilla, Rodan, and Anguirus were "good" in the later '60s and '70s, but were aggressive kaiju in their early appearances.
In the first kaiju battle, Godzilla/Anguirus in Godzilla Raids Again, there was no good guy or bad guy, just two dangerous giant animals fighting and wreaking havoc for humanity. A lot of the Heisei and Millennium movies treat Godzilla as the lesser of two evils against a worse monster. GMK treated Godzilla as actively set on Japan's destruction (though arguably not "evil," since he was avenging the victims of Imperial Japan's aggression), and while the three Yamato Monsters defended the land, they were indifferent to the people upon it. Indeed, the early scenes of that movie are like a horror movie, as the Yamato Monsters punish juvenile delinquents who are disrespectful to ancient idols and such.
The '90s Gamera trilogy, from a different studio, reinterpreted Gamera as a genetically engineered Atlantean kaiju created to preserve the ecological balance -- much like Legendary Godzilla's role, really. But that Gamera was not necessarily protective of individual human lives, and actually wrought a lot of havoc on humans in the course of fighting other monsters -- unlike the original version of Gamera, who, after initially being a run-of-the-mill dangerous-animal kaiju in the first couple of films, became a benevolent "friend to all children" in the rest of the original series.
Hopefully Godzilla 2 learns lessons from the first movie and Kong Skull Island. I liked Godzilla (2014), but it needed more Godzilla action. I haven't seen Kong Skull Island yet, but I understand the human parts weren't great. So, if Godzilla 2 can have more action then Godzilla (2014) but more character then Kong, it should do pretty well. I'm a bit worried about the director, I like his other work but going from Trick R Treat (a very good halloween anthology) to Godzilla is a bit step. Still, as long as he actually shows Godzilla doing things and the script is decent the movie will probably be better then the first one (even though, again, I liked the first one, it had very obvious flaws).
I liked Kong actually.
I was surprised that the humans weren't all asshole's
I was surprised that the humans weren't all asshole's
There was a novelization? In English?
I don't know if anyone is keeping up with the videos of the Monarch timeline, but the hints revealed so far are interesting. In 1991, a quarantine is established around a volcano on Isle de Mona (Rodan?). In 2009, a cocoon is found in a temple in China (obviously, Mothra). Lastly, in 2016, a three-headed "devil" is discovered beneath the Antarctic ice (King Ghidorah). Apparently this is all a tease for the Kong: Skull Island blu-ray coming out on July 18. The complete timeline will be a special feature in the set.
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They could introduce a pair of twin heralds of Mothra without making them tiny. It could be sort of like the role of Asagi in the Heisei-era Gamera trilogy, a normal human teenager who became spiritually bonded with Gamera and became essentially his "priestess," and his anchor connecting him to humanity (so that he became more destructive and negligent of human casualties when their bond was broken). That was basically an attempt to do a less cheesy equivalent to the "Gamera is the friend to all children" idea from the original series. Or, heck, they could go the Gamera the Brave (or Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla II) route and have a pair of twin girls who find and nurture Mothra's egg so that the infant Mothra imprints on them when it hatches.
In any event, I'd love for them to work Mothra's Song into the movie, even if just using the melody as Mothra's theme.
