Greetings intrepidarians!

If you watched the 2001 film ‘Godzilla Mothra King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All Out Attack’ then you probably think it was a thrilling film with few flaws. If so, I’m glad you enjoyed it! I  did too!

However, for such an awesome film it had its problems. I noticed several which I will now go into:

• We needed more explanation for the guardian monsters guarding sacred relics. In the film we see Mothra and Baragon kill people who disrespect life (the dog) and old statues. I get that they are doing this as guardians but there could have been an explanation given by the old man to confirm this so we get an insight into the guardians’ nature. While this point is minor it still would have driven home the connection that these monsters had to Japanese deities.

• Godzilla is too devil-like. For a monster usually portrayed as good or as a force of nature this was a departure from the norm. He is portrayed as a truly malevolent being intentionally causing destruction on the world he tramples. We have not seen this since Spacegodzilla. Although he does intentionally kill humans at the mountain and the bay area we could have seen more of an insight into his nature. He still felt at times like just a huge wandering animal. This could have been corrected by showing more scenes like the one in Godzilla vs King Ghidorah where Shindo and Godzilla are actually face to face staring at one another for about a minute. Anything such as eye contact would have established a stronger connection with Godzilla as an actual willing villain. Why couldn’t we get more of an explanation/expounding of this?

• Both Mothra and King Ghidorah are portrayed very weakly. The battle scene between the three is short and Godzilla manages to topple both at once. The main problem with that is that we could gotten more memorable scenes instead of a Godzilla squash-fest. Instead of Godzilla eradicating Mothra and knocking out Ghidorah with a single blast we could have gotten cool scenes where Mothra and Ghidorah perform aerial attacks or hit him with everything they had for a few minutes until Godzilla could get offense in.

• Baragon was killed too early. This point is far more obvious. I understand that Baragon wasn’t deemed as important as Mothra or Ghidorah since he wasn’t included in the title. However, he deserved a little more screen time and better placement (It kinda shows when the military commander describes all the monsters in the city battle. He mentions Baragon, who who was just killed. Why? Why give a description to the troops when Godzilla wiped him out and he won’t be reappearing??) They could have announced Baragon as a precursor monster. He could have been the first warning before the guardians are awakened. Not to mention, he could have had an underground battle with Goji that could have lasted longer, made memorable kaiju moments and presented a more sensible threat to Godzilla before the other kaiju arrived.

• This film lacked explanation of Godzilla’s supernatural backstory. This is the biggest flaw I see in this film; in the prison cell the old prophet mentions that Japan’s dead from WWII are possessing Godzilla and using him for revenge. Other than this claim there is no follow-up or reference to it from any of the other characters. I like the idea of Godzilla being animated by a supernatural phenomenon but when that phenomenon is not further explained or touched upon then it has no bearing on the plot. This could have further distinguished this film from the dozens of other films where Godzilla is purely a product of the atom. One simple way to have corroborated this backstory was to show tormented spirits float away at Godzilla’s ‘death.’ This one act would have corroborated what the old man said.

Voila, my review!

I hope you enjoyed this post! Let me know your thoughts in the comments section below. Till next time!