The Ten Best Godzilla Movies (in my not-so humble opinion)

The best in the continuity free Millenium series. This was the first, and as of yet, only Godzilla film directed by Shusuke Kaneko, the man most famous for making the Gamera franchise somewhat respectable in the 1990s. Godzilla is not only the "bad guy" monster in this, but he is down right evil. Played as a direct sequel to the original 1954 film, and ignoring all the films in between, Godzilla derives his power from the the Japanese and American War dead of WWII who have become angered at the living for "forgetting" their sacrifices. It's a convoluted plot point, but its almost inconsequential to the action in the movie. Mothra and King Ghidorah are reintroduced, with new origins as spirit guardians from ancient Japanese culture, revived to defend the country from Godzilla. This film is also noteworthy for having the first ever fight between Godzilla and cult favorite Baragon, who makes his third film appearence ever.

The last entry in the "Hesei" era films, this one has Godzilla suffering from a slow nuclear meltdown. It is determined early on that if Godzilla reaches a temperture of 1200 degrees, he will become walking nuclear explosion that will wipe out the Eastern hemisphere. Meanwhile, a new type of monster named Destroyer (or Destroyah, as the japanese like to call him) arrives on the scene. A by-product created from the use of the Oxygen Destroyer in the original Godzilla, Destroyer has the ability to destroy oxygen molecules. The new monsters also have the ability to combine with each other to form larger Destroyers, culminating into one massive Destroyer monster at the end. The Japanese government decides that they can use Destroyer to eliminate Godzilla before he goes all meltdown on them, but the destroyers prove to be too unpredictable, and even more dangerous than Godzilla. The Godzilla design is one of the best, as it sports large orange "hot spots" all over it's body. It's worth checking it.

A lot of Godzilla fans (and a few general people) hate this movie, but I love it. Don't get me wrong, I know that this movie is as good as professional wrestling is real, but there is a certain charm to the complete lack of common sense that this film is endowed with. The polluted ocean bays surrounding Japan produce a organism dubbed Hedorah, who feeds on the mankind's industrial waste, and leaves a path of posionous sludge and smog in its wake. Much like Destroyer, Hedorahs can combine with other hedorahs to make larger creatures, forming one gigantic Hedorah at the end of the film. Godzilla doesn't serve much more of a purpose than to fight Hedorah everytime it shows up, doing whatever it takes to stop the monster, even flying (yes, flying!). The film is broken up by little Hedorah cartoons, and bizarre, hallucegentic imagery. Why a monster created from nuclear waste would want to save the world from a monster created from pollution is beyond me, but the film is worth seeing, if only to laugh at how ridiculous it is. It's a little too creepy and demented for smaller kids though.

This is one of the more maligned Hesei era Godzilla flicks. This is mostly due to all the tampering done by scriptwriters to Godzilla's vague origins. Instead of Godzilla being a unknown species of Dinosaur awakened by atomic tests in the South pacific, Godzilla is now an unknown species of dinosaur still living in the south pacific, whom is mutated and twisted by atomic testing into the monster known today. All of this is revealed via a group of time travellers who journey to modern day Japan to ask for help in a mission to stop godzilla from being born. The time travellers secertly have King Ghidorah created in his place (in hesei continuity, none of the enemy monsters previously existed), and use him to blackmail Japan from becoming the most powerful nation in the world, which at the time, was actually happening economically. Luckily for Japan, the place where the dinosaur was sent is a nuclear waste dump in current time, so a godzilla is born anyway, only this time is more powerful, and more destructive. As confusing and ridiculous as this all sounds, I still enjoy this film, and for two reasons, one is the Godzilla design. This is my favorite to date. Measuring in at 100 meters tall, and almost 200 meters long, it was the biggest Godzilla had ever been up to that point. Another reason is the fight between Ghidorah and Godzilla. For my money, this is the best fight these two have ever had. The fight is long, nasty and brutal, and one of them hits the mat at the end of it. It makes my top ten list simply for this high water mark of a fight between these two.

After reintroducing King Ghidorah and Mothra during the hesei series, and finding moderate success, Toho decided that the next characters who needed reviving were Rodan and MechaGodzilla. After studying the technology left by the time travellers in Godzilla vs. King Ghiderah, the U.N. comissions the creation of a cybernetic defense weapon dubbed MechaGodzilla for use in the combat of Godzilla and his pesky monster friends. Meanwhile, scientists scouting islands in the bering sea discover dinosaur eggs being guarded by a flying monster that they dub Rodan. While the two monster fight it out, the scientists manage to flee with one of the eggs in tow. Upon returing to japan, the egg hatches, and it is discovered that the egg is a baby godzillasaurus. When Godzilla and Rodan both arrive in japan again, they realize that this baby Godzilla has pyshic connections with the two monsters, and is used to lure them into a battle with MechaGodzilla. The plot is fairly light, and only exists to move from one monster fight to another. Luckily the monster fights are all fantastic.

For a long time, this was the holy grail of Godzilla movies. Rarely shown on TV (Philly57 here in Philadelphia showed it once, when I was eight, I missed it and they never showed it again!), and unavailable on home video for a long ass time, the only way to see it was to purchase a bootlegged VHS tape dubbed from grainy UHF station broadcast tapes. This is the film that featured almost every Toho owned giant monster. They even manage to be onscreen, altogether at the same time at one point. Set during the end of the millenium, the world has managed to round up all the giant monsters and contain them on one island in the south pacific. Unfortunately, a race of nomadic aliens decides to seize control of the monsters and unleash them on the major cities of the world until mankind submits to becoming slaves. The main reason that this film is held in such regard is for the melee at the end of the film in which King Ghidorah is finally put down by Godzilla and almost a dozen allies.

Mothra might be Godzilla's arch enemy, and Ghidorah may be his strongest, but my favorite is MechaGodzilla. This character switches sides as much as Godzilla does, but can get away with it more, since he is a machine, and not a living creature. He's sort of like an early version of the Terminator, serving whatever cause he is programmed for. Terror of MechaGodzilla was the end of the Showa series, and also the last godzilla film that Inshiro Honda, who started the Godzilla series in 1954, would direct. Oddly enough, MechaGodzilla takes a backseat in this one, along with godzilla, as most of the plot is focused on a new monster dubbed Titanosaurus, a tall, red dinosaurian creature with no special skills beyond being able to grapple with the best of them. Alien invaders take control of Titanosaurus, and send him into the heart of tokyo, along with a new and improved MechaGodzilla. Godzilla shows up, only to take the worst beating of his life at the hands of these two. I enjoy this one so much because half the film is Godzilla fighting these two monsters. Godzilla's first appearance in the film is great in an overly dramatic, superhero sorta way.

After finding a successful formula for reviving the Godzilla franchise with King Kong vs. Godzilla, toho decided to start pitting Godzilla against some of their other in-house monsters. The first would be their second most successful character, Mothra. Godzilla is at his best when he is the villian, and he is such a villian here. A typhoon ravages the South Pacific, washing a new Mothra egg onto the japanese mainland. Sleazy moneymen lay claim to the egg, and refuse to return it when the twin fairies of infant island ask for it back. Meanwhile, Godzilla is awakened, much to the horror of industrial types clearing the beach head. Apparently he was washed ashore, and buried in the awesome amount of silt that was washed in with him during one of the Tsunamis created by the Typhoon. The parties who lobbied with the twin fairies to return Mothra's egg journey to infant island to plead for mothra's help, only to find a once beautiful and mysterious island has been ravaged by the atomic testing in the south pacific, and its inhabitants unwilling to grant them audience with Mothra. After some heavy handed exposition, it its agreed upon that Mothra will fight off Godzilla, even though this will be the last march for her, since she is dying. Mothra arrives just in time to find Godzilla advancing on her egg. The battle between these two is epic. It's considered by many film historians, including Roger Ebert, to be one of the all time great monster movies, and it deserves so.

After a ten year hiatus following 1974's Terror of MechaGodzilla, Toho decided to bring back their once most profitable franchise, only with a more adult return to form, like it was originally intended to be. This film ignores all the previous sequels, and acts as a psuedo-sequel/psuedo-remake of the original 1954 film. After a massive volcanic eruption on the Daikoku islands off the coast of Japan, Godzilla is awakened. The only proof of this is a fishing troller discovered by one lone reporter on holiday, who finds one lone survivor aboard. This reporter thinks he's found the story of a life time, only to be silenced by the Japanese government who fear that news of Godzilla's return after 30 years will ruin japan's burdeoning economy. But when Godzilla destroys a Russian submarine, thus almost setting off fullscale nuclear war between the the US and USSR, the japanese government is forced to reveal Godzilla's return. Not only this, but they find themselves diplomatically isolated when Japan refuses to allow American or Russian military to test nuclear armaments on Godzilla, should he decide to arrive on Japanese soil. This was the first Godzilla film I ever saw, so it holds a special place in my heart of hearts. Some find the political intrigue to be tiresome, since it takes up the first half of the film, with the second half being devoted to Godzilla's attack on Tokyo. I personally find it intriguing, as it is very much set in the cold war era of the 1980s, and makes the human characters and what they have at stake in the film all the more interesting. Godzilla's arrival in Tokyo harbor is greeted with the most massive military assault ever seen in a Godzilla film. An assault which takes Godzilla a whole ten seconds to wipe out. This film was the first in the Hesei series, and also saw the introduction of the "Super X", a flying tank of sorts that would keep returning to combat Godzilla throughout the hesei series. Not only does Godzilla return to his villianous roots, but the film returns to the dark, somber tone of the original as well. Tokyo becomes a red, nightmare city during godzilla's attack, and the score (which is my one of my favorites) is unsettling when it needs to be, and will evoke sympathy for you when it needs to as well.

For me, the original is, has, and will always be the best. This is not only my favorite Godzilla film, but my favorite film period. The scene that stands out the most for me is when a mother holding her two children in a building doorway looks up to see Godzilla's head peering over top the building across the street from them, as he pushes through it. She looks down at her children and says "we're going to be with daddy soon". Simply horrifying. There is no doubt in my mind that this is the best of the atomic age sci-fi films, as it was produced by people who had first hand experience with Atomic weaponry. Godzilla is literally a walking Hiroshima bomb in this film. The devastation following his longer attack on tokyo (he attacks twice) mirrors many photos of Hiroshima and nagasaki. A film that I find holds far more relaveance today than many of the other "classic" monster movies like king Kong and Frankenstein. It's shame that more people haven't seen the original japanese version, and instead have only seen the truncated american cut, with Raymond Burr spliced in. Akira Ikufube's score is haunting, and gives the dark tone of the film all the more punch. Akihiko Hirata plays Dr. Serizawa, a handicapped WWII veteran, and scientist who invents the only means that might stop godzilla, but knows that his invention is so terrible that if he were to use it, word of it would get out, and he could be forced to create a weapon far more powerful than any Atomic bomb. His Dr. Serizawa still remains to be the most interesting human character to ever appear in a Godzilla film.