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abnerkrill · 1 year

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fantastic rebuttal to "writers don't deserve better pay because the stuff they write is terrible/unoriginal", full thread here

(to explain, the "Unknown" under his name is from a add-on bot detector; it usually can assign a percentage likelihood that a user is a human being and not a bot, but I think the blue check system disrupted the add-on so it says "Unknown" underneath his name now.)

[image id under the read more:

May 7, 2023 tweet thread from Tom Vaughan @/storyandplot

With #WGAStrong rightfully in the spotlight this week, I've seen some less-than-sympathetic comments focusing on the lack of originality in our projects. This is a fair criticism of the system, but not the writers. A quick history of how we got here (thread emoji)

The first thing to understand is that Hollywood has NOT run out of new ideas. The studio’s preference for I.P. has nothing to do with regurgitating ideas and everything to do with MARKETING.

The late 60s-70s is generally considered the artistic high of the studio system. Ironically, many contribute this to corporations buying up the studios! The corporations knew they had no idea how to run a movie studio, so... they put creative people in charge.

This is how you got the run of so many great films the studios would never make today. They also took bigger chances on young, promising talent (the first "film school generation" of filmmakers.)

But with the success of JAWS and STAR WARS, the corporations demanded more of those kinds of hits. The creative folks insisted such things were unpredictable, and the business folks said let's make them less so.

(Sidenote: This was also the same time a completely different phenomenon was happening. A/C was becoming the norm for theatres, making summer movie-going much more attractive.)

Over the next decade, more and more MBAs and marketing people gained influence in the studio system. Being business folks, huge hits were not a creative problem as much as a product/marketing problem.

The 80s is when the “high concept” became pre-eminent because it narrowed a sales pitch to one sentence, a trailer, and a poster. This made everyone a marketing agent for a movie because everyone could explain what it was about!

In the 90s, marketing became just as important as the film itself (reflected in their respective budgets) when Hollywood discovered they could profit from fifty years of pre-existing awareness for old TV shows and movies.

This allowed the marketing department to move away from pitching a movie and convincing you to go see it (lower success rate), to simple “audience awareness” and building anticipation. (higher success rate.)

The audience knew what THE FLINSTONES the movie was. They just needed to know the casting and when it opened. No one needed to have the remake of GODZILLA explained to them. They just needed to know when it opened.

The marketing department prefers AWARNESS over SELLING because awareness is something you can throw money at. Selling is harder, and it’s less predictable. This is why franchises are so valuable.

Whenever someone says, “That’s something I can sell!” It’s usually something that can sell itself. What they mean is, "I just have to let people know about this!"

Hollywoods's reliance on property the audience is already familiar with is 100% because... the audience is already familiar with it. It is easier to market the product and this increases its chances of success.

This focus on I.P. has become so pervasive, many, including executives themselves, have forgotten WHY it's valuable. They'll option an unknown comic BECAUSE it's I.P., forgetting that it's unknown and lacks the main asset of I.P.

Writers do love writing on an I.P. that means something to them. Every Star Wars fan who became a filmmaker would love to work in that universe. But we do not love it more than our own original work. We would always rather work on that.

So when you see another remake, or reboot, or adaptation, and think, "Can't they come up with something new?"

Remember, the answer is yes. Yes, we can. And we want to. You can blame the market or the marketing, but either way, the widespread production of truly original content is just not the studio business model we're in right now. #WGAStrong

end ID.]

#wga #wga strike #NOW WITH TRANSCRIPT PEOPLE REBLOG THIS ONE

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astoundingbeyondbelief · 5 months

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Kaiju Week in Review (December 10-16, 2023)

Suit actor Kenpachiro Satsuma, who originated the roles of Gigan and Hedorah and played Godzilla in all of the Heisei films, passed away on Saturday at the age of 76. A serious performer paired with a serious Godzilla, he approached the role with near-religious reverence. Asked to give advice to Godzilla's next actor following the completion of Godzilla vs. Destoroyah, he said, "Be Godzilla. Don't do anything else. Write books about playing Godzilla, talk to reporters about playing Godzilla, but don't do anything else. Just be Godzilla." His second stint as the character, Godzilla vs. Biollante, is my favorite movie of all time, and it's pretty staggering how many of its key people are gone now. Rest in peace.

Monarch: Legacy of Monsters finally brought Godzilla into the present-day storyline—and finally let him enter Japanese waters in the flashbacks to 1955. (The only other time he's done this in the Monsterverse is in the debatably-canon Godzilla: Awakening.) I enjoyed the flashbacks a lot more than the main story this time, as the latter is just piling on the Ominous Pronouncements while withholding details to a degree that seems unrealistic from a Watsonian perspective. Give me a well-acted, doomed love triangle any day.

Comic book sales data is nigh-impossible to find these days, but 2022's Godzilla vs. the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers must have made bank, since it's getting a sequel! Writer Cullen Bunn and colorist Andrew Dalhouse are back, with Baldemar Rivas now handling the art. First issue's coming in April. The logline:

Worlds collide a second time as everyone’s favorite kaiju meets up with Earth’s mightiest warriors once again to take on the most fearsome monsters from both sides of the multiverse, with Rita Repulsa egging them on! This one has it all: SpaceGodzilla! Clawhammer! Tentacreep! But what exactly does Rita intend to do with their collective might, and how have her mysterious new allies, Astronema and the Alliance of Evil, given her added reach across worlds? The Power Rangers are on a mission to find out, but first…all roads lead back to Godzilla!

I recognize some of the proper nouns in there, at least!

Godzilla Minus One added even more North American theaters (from 2,540 to 2,622), but with stiffer competition in the form of Wonka, it fell to fourth with $5 million. That gets it over $30 million here; we'll see how much of a boost it gets from the holidays. The film is piling up accolades from regional critic groups, as well as a nomination at the Critics Choice Awards for Best Foreign Language Film.

I'm also making my way through all the videos Toho put on YouTube when I was desperately dodging spoilers, so look forward to more Minus One gifs and screenshots.

youtube

One more trailer for the Kaiju No. 8 anime, which is, for whatever reason, going to stream worldwide via X/Twitter. (Maybe they saw that users there already upload entire movies and decided to get ahead of the curve?) Don't worry, it'll be on Crunchyroll too.

#kaiju week in review #kenpachiro satsuma #power rangers #kaiju no. 8 #godzilla #godzilla minus one #kaiju #monarch legacy of monsters

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theashpit · 24 hours

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ORGA'S VICTORY.

An alternate end for the movie Godzilla 2000! I personally always wanted to see Orga fully consume and copy godzilla, and was honestly pretty bummed and angry when once again godzilla won. Its just not what i cared about <3

so i decided to give myself a win and use my artist ability to make it end how I WANTED IT TO.

and with this comic i also come baring a small story, (readmore)

Out of the flames the enormous alien monstrosity came, and its hard shell once again began shifting and pulsating. Healing what damage the king of monsters had done, as if it was nothing. So much had been done but so little had worked, and in this moment Godzilla found himself tired…

Just what the beast wanted, a run down tired opponent. Easier to swallow.

Orga; in its hulking horror, came to a halt just before Godzilla. It rumbled out a low roar as it seemed to open its bottom jaw wider than normal. Godzilla responded in kind with a roar, however, what followed was Orga’s upper jaw snapping upward revealing a gaping maw that extended farther than anything anyone onlooking had seen. Only Godzilla however could see the unfolding frills that would become clear to be the alien’s true mouth. Once unfurled, it stretched it across the whole of its mouth. Whatever it was planning did not matter, Godzilla had faced many foes before and this was nothing different.

Charging in, the mighty king had plunged himself into the creature's maw. Orga stretched its jaw around its prey, hooking its barbs into godzilla’s scales, they punctured deep like barbs. Clawing and yanking him deeper and deeper, all the while Orga’s worm-like maw within forced itself over Godzilla’s head. A function he had not considered, and its tight hot flesh made it hard for him to breathe. Orga’s whole being had been put into consuming godzilla, its hands clamped on tight and its arms raised the king up into the air. Deeper and deeper the barbs pulled him down and the throat extended and squeezed its way around his head and neck.

Godzilla’s plates began to glow their signature bright red, this was the moment he was waiting for… deep enough into the gut where the blast would surely kill orga. Charging up his attack, orga continued to devour him. Paying no mind to its attackers plan, as if it itself was already prepared. Godzilla did not stop however and blasted a full powered atomic burst into the creature's gut.

The walls around godzilla sparkled as it hit, but it did not destroy orga. No, instead it had super heated the fleshy walls and created a suffocating heat. Godzilla began to struggle more but Orga had not stopped devouring him. It had gotten to his bigger back spines and negated their difficult shapes by simply using sheer force to snap them off. The king of monsters howled in pain as the alien used all the force in its jaw to break and force godzilla's body down into its gut.

Orga’s body began to grow, changing beyond its prototypical form into something more concrete… something more familiar. Ecstasy filled the alien’s mind and body as it gorged itself on its prey. His power coursing through its skin and morphing it into the ultimate life form. Its stomach let out an angry gurgle as it desperately yearned to have its food. One loud enough anyone around would have surely heard… and once it had. Nothing could stop the beast from inhaling the rest of its meal.

Now broken, Godzilla's back plates slid effortlessly down the worm-like tube that was sending the would-be king of monsters down to his end. The tail was nothing more than a desert, a welcomed effortless slurp downward. And with each passing moment Orga’s body became less and less alien, more familiar… more like a king. The plates everyone so usually recognized grew and shaped Orga’s back, the shell deformed and created a much more reptilian spine.

And with a quick flick of the head, down went the rest of the king. And with it a massive pudge plopped to the ground into orga’s tummy. It churned and whirred as it pressed and pushed godzilla melting him away like nothing. The super heated walls made the digestion quicker than normal, coupled with the added DNA ripping godzilla’s struggling was swiftly stopped as the pudge went limp and sloshy. Bubbling away his flesh, as now everyone bore witness to the new king of monsters.

Orga stood tall, dwarfing most everything. This was the end of days, humanity would have no way to fight back.

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avillanappears · 1 month

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godzilla x kong: the new empire

"For most of human civilization, we believed that life could only exist on the surface of our planet. What else were we wrong about?"

okay, I kind of fell off doing this, but we’re back! the best ever tumblr review series that’s written by avillanappears.tumblr.com! I came in not expecting much, but it turns out I really, really liked it, actually! I’m more pleasantly surprised than anyone, godzilla vs kong rubbed me very much the wrong way. godzilla and kong beating the ever-loving tar out of each other was fun, sure, but I have WORDS for the human stuff. I could fill a whole post with those, probably, but we’re not talking about that! we’re thinking good thoughts, about the one I liked!

it’s definitely a fun adventure film. hollow earth was a much more fleshed out setting this time, I loved the varieties of locales and creatures. giant, flying flamingo fish that shoot electricity? kong crossing a rickety bridge made out of the spine of a monster so massive, that it’s kaiju sized compared to him? this is exactly the sort of thing I wanted to see! it was fascinating seeing kaiju sort of “on their level”, in a whole giant sized ecosystem made for them. we got some of that in the atomic time of monsters by @tyrantisterror, and I think it’s such fertile ground to explore. godzilla’s flirted with the idea before in both its netflix animes, but this is them really committing to it. it makes my worldbuilding and specbio freak heart happy. we even got to see more hellhawks! I love those guys.

lookit that face

okay this is going pretty long, but anyhoo, I liked the character stuff too. kong was as lovable as always, you really feel for the big lug. even though he’s a living god the size of a mountain, there’s a real vulnerability to him. he’s just a sad, lonely guy who wants purpose and belonging.

he and suko had some kind of fast, but still very nice bonding. the human side was fun too, they fixed a lot about what I didn’t like from the last movie. jia had more of an arc going instead of just being “the one kong talks to”, bernie was a lot more enjoyable since they cut out the weird conspiracy theorist stuff, trapper was a fun guy. it was nice just seeing someone who loves monsters and weird nature stuff.

skar king surprised me with how personal of a threat he is, they really let him feel like a horrid, nasty piece of work. he’s more than just a big evil overlord, he’s a bullying control freak who wants everything his way, and it makes his wretchedness more tangible in a way.

shimo didn’t get all that much, but I love shimo. I love her, and I can barely even tell why, there’s just some kind of Vibe to her I resonate with. I think it’s how mythical she feels. the oldest of a line of gods, a great being of ice, controlled by a wicked devil….in fact it all felt very mythic. I appreciate that, I love it when kaiju works play out like weird mythological epics.

probably the most tangible complaint I can think of right now is that the godzilla stuff was pretty underwritten. it honestly felt like he was just….doing video game sidequests or something. like, it didn’t have Impact up until the very end when he finally meets kong and SPOILERS SPOILERS. and it feels a shame to kill scylla and tiamat off this early, I liked those two as unpredictable wildcards. with rodan and the others still mia, and two titans unceremoniously dead, it’s starting to feel like the monsterverse is sorta….flattening itself? now that kongs arc is done, I think we need to get back to a godzilla solo or two, flesh things back out a bit. but that’s for future peter to talk about, today we’re leaving things off on a high note. fun characters, dynamic locales, some great monster brawling, this one was a good’un!

godzilla cast monkeys into hell for their sins

#avillananalysis2024 #godzilla #king kong #godzilla x kong: the new empire #kaiju #long post

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tyrantisterror · 7 months

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Criticizing the police in a superhero story is kind of straightforward, examples exist, but what about the military in a kaiju story? Like, it's one thing to have the monster be immune to weapons but how do you avoid the usual cliches?

I would say most kaiju movies are pretty critical of the military - and so are a lot of Western giant monsters movies, to a lesser extent. The military is almost always impotent at best in a kaiju movie, rarely accomplishing anything more than stalling for time, and often end up making the situation worse. All the military's actions in the original Godzilla, for example, do nothing but make the monster more pissed off, until his final and most horrible rampage is directly provoked by the military's incredibly thorough and diverse attempt to kill him with every weapon they can think of. That is not a flattering portrayal of the military.

In fact, this trope is so common in the kaiju genre that it wasn't until decades after its inception that people tried to go against it - one of the directors of the 90's Godzilla movies talked about how G-Force in those movies was made because he always felt annoyed as a child that the military never accomplished much, and wanted to have them put up a better fight. Yet even then, MechaGodzilla, Moguera, and the various super xs never win - they come close, but Godzilla proves indomitable in the end.

Victories in kaiju movies overwhelmingly hinge on noncombatants and diplomacy - the happy ending comes from a scientist creating an ingenious invention, or fairies convincing their moth goddess to save our ass, or simply allowing Godzilla to swim off into the sunset when he's done defending his territory from the invasive monster of the week.

Some modern American kaiju pastiches find interesting ways to make the military useful while trying to stick to the themes baked into the genre's bones - Godzilla 2014 has a protagonist who, while in the military, specifically works as a bomb disposal expert, i.e. someone who keeps violence from escalating rather than perpetuate. Said character is drawn as a direct reflection of Godzilla himself in the same movie - heroes defined by their desire to stop a violent situation from exploding rather to destroy for the sake of destroying.

Pacific Rim explicitly focuses on a military organization of pilots in giant robots trying to fend off alien invaders using kaiju as weapons - but in the movie's greatest break from reality, said force is woefully underfunded, stripped to just a handful of robots and pilots. While the Jaegers of Pacific Rim have the trappings of some real world miltiary stuff, I think ultimately they don't resemble the military that much in execution, being more akin to, like, a remnant of an army turned into a guerilla resistance force, and really they make more sense when you take them as a metaphor for the few people actively fighting against climate change in our world (which the movie makes pretty clear is basically the theme, more or less - the aliens are specifically seeking our world out because we've fucked up the environment enough to make it favorable to them). And, ultimately, the Jaegers only manage to get their job done thanks to the help of two very brave scientists.

But, in all honestly, I feel no need to do away with the "cliche" of the impotent military in kaiju flicks. Fuck the military. Show them as incompetent, war-mongering, overfunded and undereffective assholes. Fuck 'em. They get their cocks sucked by every other genre with a budget, they can take a few beatings in the kaiju flicks.

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balanceoflightanddark · 11 months

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Restless Souls: the Origins of the Most Evil Godzilla

It's no secret to anyone that Godzilla has run almost the entire morality spectrum in terms of morality in his 60+ career. He's gone from being an allegory for the hydrogen bomb to a destructive force of nature to a defender of the earth and back again, sometimes within the same film. It is to be expected for a series that's been around for so long with various creators having their own interpretations and view of the character, and how societal norms have changed over the years.

In this regard, the version seen in Godzilla, Mothra, and King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All Out Attack (or GMK for short) is...unique.

This particular version of the king of the monsters is widely considered to be the most malevolent he's ever been. Granted, he's no stranger to being a bad guy and causing catastrophic amounts of death and destruction. But this incarnation is especially monstrous. There's a number of times where he almost seems to smile or sneer at the terrified civilians he's killing, whereas most versions are just rage incarnate. Even his design looks wrong, with those milky white blank eyes making him appear more like a ghoulish harbinger of death as opposed to any actual animal.

Well...there's an in-universe reason for why this particular Godzilla is so destructive than normal.

Hirotoshi Isayama: “This animal contains the restless souls of the countless people who perished during the terrible battles that took place during the Pacific conflict.”

Yuri Tachibana: “Their souls? In Godzilla?”

Hirotoshi Isayama: “In Godzilla, the souls of all those people have combined to bring life to the monster. Believe me, I have tried to warn people but they refused to listen. They think I'm mad.”

Yuri Tachibana: “But tell me, why does Godzilla keep attacking Japan? Why does it want to destroy us?”

Hirotoshi Isayama: “Because the Japanese people want to forget what happened... They have deemed it preferable to forget the pain and agony they inflicted on all those people!”

(Copied from Wikizilla)

To sum up, this version of Godzilla is explicitly said to be supernatural in origin. He's effectively the amalgamation of millions of souls that were killed in the Pacific and Chinese theaters that were unable to rest in death possessing the corpse of the original Godzilla that was killed in the first movie. And when you have that much undiluted hate and malice in one giant undead monster, you have a recipe for a particularly malevolent entity.

Interestingly enough, Japanese folklore does tell of a similar entity which might have inspired the creators.

According to Yokai.com, the Gashadokuro is a particularly terrifying yokai. The amalgamation of the souls of fallen soldiers who were denied proper burials, the Gashadokuro is a gigantic skeletal monstrosity formed by the bones and skulls of the deceased and animated by an unearthly hatred for the living that denied them their rest. Nearly unstoppable due to its size and strength, the Gashadokuro was a nightmarish being who's whole existence was to wreck havoc and death upon the world.

Given how spiritual beliefs and legends play in the narrative of GMK, Godzilla does have an uncanny resemblance to the Gashadokuro. Him going out of his way to kill civilians and innocents lines up perfectly with the Gashadokuro's hatred for mortals. Even his design looks less like a living animal and more like a corpse, with dead blank eyes, bony spines, and a bloated stomach full of decomposing gasses. And ultimately, he was almost unstoppable in the film, killing off three monsters awakened to defeat him and the majority of the JSDF. All of which lines up with the legend.

Which is what makes this version of Godzilla so destructive and malevolent. All that rage and hate of the restless dead created this monstrosity who's only purpose was to hurt and kill. Effectively, he's less a living being, and more an unrelenting engine of death and hate.

#godzilla #gojira #kaiju #kaiju movies #gmk #gmk godzilla #gashadokuro #yokai

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atomic-crusader · 6 months

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Godzilla Minus One thoughts (SPOILERS)

TLDW: Godzilla Minus One is easily one of the all time best films in the franchise so far. While it isn't my personal favorite, it absolutely deserves the praise fans and critics seem to be giving it. Outside from some personal nitpicks, I'd say this entry is worthy of standing shoulder-to-shoulder with the best.

10/10

THOUGHTS AND SPOILERS BELOW THE CUT!!! GO SEE IT!!!!!!

Boy does this movies come in swinging! Koichi setting up the main conflict of feeling like he is a coward (he's not, as the movie goes on to point out) and then the whiplash of GODZILLASAURUS

I know its just an unmutated Godzilla but HOLY FUCK the similarities are there and I love the design.

Personal nitpick #1: was hoping the movies would go more in depth with the origin of its Godzilla but the movies isn't really about what Godzilla is but rather what he does and represents to the story. As a result they don't really say what he is other than he is known to Odo Island's folklore. I like that, it gives him a mysterious vibe.

I gasped because I thought he ate a guy be then he yeeted him

Poor Koichi Can't Catch a Break the Movie

Noriko was great. It's clear she isn't used to being looked after and it shows.

Speaking of which, ALL the characters are wonderful. The Reiwa era looks like it is being defined by stronger human characters and stories and I am all here for that!

I'm actually surprised that the trailers (or at least the 2 I watched) didn't show to much Godzilla action. Or at least the final battle.

Godzilla REALLY has it out for folks in this movie. That lack of a clear origin helps actually. His attacks are sudden and brutal. He is REALLY visibly pissed off too.

SPEAKING OF BRUTAL HOLY FUCK!!! For as much damage Godzilla does to everyone, he gets FUCKED UP! Half his face blasted off! It's cool the see his regeneration ability realized in CG

Personal Nitpick #2: I do wish they had made Godzilla a more obviously tragic character. He is just as much a victim of war as he is a symbol of it. Again though, that isn't what this movie is about, and the ending does at least suggest a sequel isn't completely out of the question, so maybe we can still see why Godzilla decided that All Humans Are Bad.

His atomic breath is wild man. Creating mushroom clouds and massive creators is some nightmare fuel shit.

NORIKO NOOOOOOOOO :(

(dont worry she lives)

The plan to kill Godzilla was interesting. Explosive decompression is not really the first thing I would have thought up for a sea monster that brings up deep sea fish but the speed at which it happens is important.

KOICHI NOOOOOO (its okay he ejected)

Personal Nitpick #3:... I don't really like how they defeated Godzilla. I thought it was overkill. Like, yeah I get that Koichi needs to have is moment and all but blowing his head up I thought was a little much. and then he crumbles away? I guess he was frozen? Cool visual though. I imagine it was hell to convince Toho to have Godzilla die that way.

I heard Yamazaki was a big GMK fan, and the last scene really makes it obvious. I wonder if he isn't available for a sequel, Yamazaki would request Kaneko to direct...

Hey Noriko is alive!!!! Hey what's that on her neck? Why does it look like Godzilla's dorsal plate? Oh God Please Let Koichi Be Happy He Has Been Through Too Much.

The overall message of the movie is so goddamn moving, Live. That isn't a request, that's an order, a demand. Live, you should be happy to be alive. You may not think it, but people love you. People can forgive you. You don't deserve to die. Live and fight for the next generation so they don't make our mistakes. It is tough but you and people around you can make it better. You. Will. Live.

#godzilla #toho #kaiju #tokusatsu #godzilla minus one #godzilla minus one spoilers #review

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wits-writing · 2 months

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Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire (Quick Review)

Director: Adam Wingard, Screenplay: Terry Rossio, Simon Barret, and Jeremy Slater

Resurrecting this inactive blog and copy pasting this from over on my Letterboxd because I need to spread the word about this movie as much as possible!

No Spoilers, fwiw:

Well...

This fucking owns!

Easily the best stuff from Godzilla vs Kong was Kong journey to discover more about himself and his connections to the Monsterverse's delightfully bonkers lore around The Hollow Earth. Positioning him as a member of an honorable line of warriors.

The New Empire effectively triples down on that by making Kong this movie's actual protagonist over any of the human characters (who are pretty fun to watch and play their support roles in this plot damn well.) The giant ape's story playing out as a quest for purpose within his new home in the Hollow Earth. One he discovers once he comes across other apes like him living under the tyrannical fist of the Skar King. Kong's challenge becomes figuring out how to get his rival Titan, Godzilla, on his side for the inevitable showdown with this new threat.

It's a highly fantastical tale, made better by the fact that this movie trusts the audience to follow along with it as plays out wordlessly. Only having the human characters directly commentate on it after the important actions have played out.

And all of this would be enough to leave me satisfied, but this movie actually has a fair amount of surprises up its sleeve that none of the marketing gave away.

So I'll just say, if you've been enjoying the Monsterverse up to this point, Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire is more than worth your time!

#godzilla x kong the new empire #godzilla #kong #king kong #kaiju #monster movie #monsterverse #godzilla x kong #wit's writing #movie review #adam wingard

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eternal-gromnommer · 5 months

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Godzilla: Minus One is unfortunately limited in its release and isn't showing anywhere nearby so for the meantime, to fill the nuclear tragedy Godzilla fix I just ended up rewatching Shin Godzilla instead. On a rewatch 7 years on, it's mostly aged well design-wise, though I kind of found the first two forms kind of too goofy-looking with their silly moray-eel faces, so I felt like playing around a bit with the designs to more capture the sense of "forced unnatural evolution".

My biggest issue with the first form (or second if you count the aquatic phase as a separate form) is that it looks too much like Godzilla right away. It's clearly trying to go for a "slowly metamorphosing into the familiar shape" vibe but the dorsal spines kind of make it too obvious. So in this redesigned take the first form doesn't have the spines just yet, and its bulging eyes are swollen shut with fused eyelids to further highlight the aesthetic of an altricial baby-bird like half-formed being. Since it was a deep-sea organism the pale yellow skin has more of a decompressed abyssal fish look, clearly suffering outside its natural element, and as it's crawling on the ground it makes more sense for the front limbs to be developed first, its hind limbs still fused to the tail and the feet being multi-toed fins resembling early Carboniferous tetrapods.

The second (or third) form, thus, goes for a far more horrific and painful transformation than the one we see in the movie. It's here that the iconic Godzilla dorsal spines finally burst from its back in showers of blood and ripped flesh, the spines being exposed vertebrae radiating immense quantities of heat. The release of heat causes veins to bulge from its transluscent skin, so much that the entire body now flushes a bright red. Here, the hind legs finally, though not completely, emerge from the body, but still bound to the torso, and thus the second form walks in a bowlegged manner, struggling under its own weight and hobbled by strips of webbed flesh that still partially bind the legs to each other and to the tail, and at last the eyes open, the eyelids completely ripping away to reveal swollen, bulging eyes, now lidless and unblinking, and with their violent opening, perpetually weeping tears of blood--completing the grotesque image of a tortured monster who didn't want to be born, and suffering unimaginable pain from just existing at all.

#speculative biology #fantasy biology #creature design #godzilla #godzilla minus one #shin godzilla #kaiju #tw gore #tw body horror

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stgroversfire · 5 months

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watched king of the monsters 2019 last night- my first american godzilla film

other than the fact im really sick of seeing stranger things kids in every piece of american media (and dear god, mbb has talent but clearly the direction was ass bc her acting was dogshit in this one), i was still excited to see vera farmiga

and more importantly, the absolute trainwreck of all the human plot pretty much made me hyper attuned to the monster plot, because i was so excited every time the humans left the screen that i was just cheering for anything kaiju. i cried when mothra died for goji and i cried when goji's blast had mothra's wing pattern in it.

overall its amazing how you can completely fumble the human side of a godzilla movie and still make an enjoyable kaiju film anyway- most of my thoughts were just "i have no idea why this plot point is here but it made for a gorgeous visual so im not mad." that movie was PRETTY. and some really iconic frames as well.

#i know that american godzilla films are supposed to be a bit campy #but 90% of the one liners fell super flat #and the one liners were most of the dialogue LOL #i need to watch more godzilla before i get too harsh on this one #but dear god #good thing the kaiju carried it #.text #godzilla #gojira #toho kaiju #toho #kaiju #king of the monsters #mothra #king ghidorah #rodan

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cadmium-free · 4 months

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third film from the list of films recommended by mutuals

Godzilla (1954) recommended by @brisling

I watched this two weeks ago and was gonna post this as a double feature like I did for the first two films, but time has stretched so long between watching it and another from the list that I'm finally just posting it alone. When I was a kid my favourite toy was a little Godzilla robot that was attached to a controller by a long wire. I have a vivid memory of going to a store with my older brother to look at Godzilla toys. It's ridiculous that it's taken me until now to finally watch Godzilla.

This is one of those films that is so culturally relevant, in film and pop culture, that you watch it and end up going! Oh! So many things I've seen before are finally sliding into the proper context. Sometimes you watch an iconic film like that and find out it's awful. But this is a great film: beautifully composed & uses the shadow in a haunting way. It is tragedy and mourning and devastation. It's more level and grounded than you would expect it to be from pop culture. And I think there is something charming and earnest when you see its seams: the models, how much it is just an actor in a costume, the occasional awkward cut. I had a moment watching it where I commented to @neopetsdotcom that I really liked how many scenes depicted Godzilla disrupting everyday life. And then I had to pause and go, oh, right, that's the point. Nuclear disaster and occupation disrupt you when you're just living. It would be senseless violence if it weren't so viciously and hatefully considered. Anyways, maybe now I'll do something evil to myself and watch all the Godzilla movies in chronological order. I need to understand how Godzilla became what it became. It might do something awful to my brain. I think that might be fun. :)

#film #recs #godzilla #not doing this paired with another movie is gonna mess me up in the end because oops i did go with an even 12 movies for this

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astoundingbeyondbelief · 5 months

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Kaiju Week in Review (December 3-9, 2023)

I made a frame from this shot Wikizilla's Image of the Week. No regrets. Monarch: Legacy of Monsters, I love ya. When I was a teenager, explicit queerness was anathema to most big-name franchises. Those dominoes have been slowly falling, often in lower-profile tie-ins first, and to me this is a huge one: 69 years without a queer live-action Godzilla character are over. And Cate's the main protagonist of the show! I'm not under the delusion that media representation will cure all society's ills, but it sure doesn't hurt. Now, the non-Tumblr parts of the fandom are being completely normal about this, right? Right? Whatever, that's why you'll never get rid of me here. Cate had a couple more sweet moments with May in this episode, and Mariko Tamaki wrote episode 7, so don't expect her to stop kissing girls. Hopefully she's learned a valuable lesson about cheating though.

"The Way Out" is also another gift to those of us who have always wanted to see more of the ramifications of a world where Godzilla exists, from underground towns for the super-rich to ruined cities where federal troops shoot looters and harass people experiencing homelessness. And the show continues to find ways to use kaiju to talk about COVID, from Cate and Kentaro's exchange about San Francisco truthers ("It's easier than waking up every day and thinking, at any moment, the same could happen to you") to the blink-of-an-eye speed at which the threat went from on the news to her front door in the flashbacks.

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As I foretold, we got a Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire trailer, an amusing contrast to the weighty Toho flick and Apple show already fore of mind. It's Adam Wingard unbound, that's for sure. The human cast seems pared back, a longstanding Monsterverse problem, and the kaiju fights were far and away the best part of Godzilla vs. Kong, so hopefully this approach will play to his strengths. But that movie also had excellent VFX, and some of the shots in here are rough. There's time to fix them, at least... which probably can't be said of Godzilla's design. I like that he's pink (did some Warner Bros. executive take the wrong message away from Barbie?) and sporting a thagomizer on his tail, but his proportions are uncanny. And I see Kong found the Infinity Gauntlet; good for him.

I am, of course, not done talking about Godzilla Minus One. It added over 200 screens and made $8.3 million in its second weekend in the U.S., a minuscule drop considering that its $11.4 million opening "weekend" spanned five days. Almost a third of all tickets sold this weekend were for Godzilla or Hayao Miyazaki's The Boy and the Heron, remarkable in a market so allergic to foreign imports. That brings its total to $25.3 million (more by the time you read this). With an avalanche of Christmas blockbusters on the way, its grip on premium-format screens is about to slip. Still, I see it hanging around theaters for a while. I have never seen the fandom so united in praise for a film before, and it's making plenty of new fans.

Some of those fans are in high places. Variety leaked that it's on the 20-film shortlist for Best Visual Effects at the Oscars (to be narrowed to five nominees), something I, again, never expected to read about a Toho Godzilla film. Alas, it's locked out of this year's Best International Film category due to the quirky nomination period.

Much has been made of how great the film looks on a $15 million budget. I have two caveats, one in each direction. No one is quite sure where the $15 million figure came from; Yamazaki said at a recent con appearance that he only wished he had that much to play with. (He has yet to divulge the actual budget, just that it was above ¥1 billion.) Now, unions in the Japanese film industry are much weaker than in Hollywood, so a given production budget goes a lot further in Japan. All the same, I doubt that alone explains Minus One looking better than most superhero movies made for twenty times the cost. I'll offer a couple more reasons: Yamazaki has extensive visual effects experience (he's been the VFX supervisor of all but one of the live-action films he's directed), and the film's big effects scenes aren't as busy or lengthy as many of the Hollywood counterparts. I don't know if Disney will ask Yamazaki to direct the next Star Wars movie (that would require there to be a next Star Wars movie), but the studios here should be taking notes.

the sphinx, a blog with a ton of American Godzilla rarities to share, has outdone itself—behold a continuity and dialogue script for the U.S. version of King Kong vs. Godzilla! Included in the download is a detailed comparison with the film. No huge differences, apart from the script giving the secretary added to the U.S. version a name, but a fascinating piece of history all the same.

The Minus One incarnation of Godzilla (MaiGoji?) has joined Godzilla Battle Line, accompanied by [SPOILER]. To be honest, my enthusiasm for this game has been flagging, and I'm not caught up on the strategies developing around these two, so I'll just refer you to Sir Melee's channel as usual. This Godzilla's also doing a collaboration with the Japanese mobile game Fleet of Blue Flame.

Tiffany Grant, Asuka's original voice actress, will narrate the audiobooks for the Neon Genesis Evangelion: ANIMA light novels which explore an Instrumentality-free path for the show. Seven Seas Entertainment published them in English from 2019 to 2021, which, to be honest, was also news to me.

This one's for my fellow library workers: the obscenely popular Who HQ nonfiction series for children is publishing a book about Godzilla next June. I don't know if this will have quite the same impact on today's young Godzilla fans as the Ian Thorne tome had on Gen Xers and Millennials, what with the Internet and all, but it's certain to be more factual. Expect illustrations instead of licensed photos, and not just because of Toho.

I can finally talk more about the Godzilla x Kong: Titan Chasers mobile game without fearing a DMCA. Not that there's much to talk about; it's freemium through and through and I'm not sure I know a single person who's excited for it. Interesting to see some critters from the comics break into another medium, at least. Here's the trailer.

#kaiju week in review #godzilla minus one #monarch legacy of monsters #godzilla x kong the new empire #kaiju #godzilla

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monkey-network · 5 months

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Good Stuff: Best Movies of 2023

This was NOT a great year for blockbusters, huh? This was probably Disney's worst in years, multiple flops including what was meant to be their centennial anniversary film. It looked remarkably by the numbers, but think of the conglomerate's losses... Anyway, this to me was a pretty great year for films. Like 2022, I'm amazed at the variety we got that says more about the shifting tides of people's interest in movies. It was the most times I've been to the theater. We got a big worker's strike over the summer, especially large push back against degenerates trying to push AI to do more than just shitposting. And it was enough for me to know Adam Sandler, Godzilla, and Hayao Miyazaki could get the better of Disney. With this said, let this be a first for Good Stuff and count down my favorites of this year.

12. Renfield

My suspicions were on the money and I'm glad I gave this a shot in the theaters. Cage was the best Dracula I could've asked for in what you might say was an Adult Swim-esque dark comedy. It definitely has that style of gruesomeness and humor given Robert Kirkman and the Writer/Director behind Moral Orel made this. Unfortunately, Ben Schwartz stuck out like a sore thumb even if he fulfills his purpose in this, reminding me of Christopher Mintz-Plasse in KickAss; I feel he or Jason Schwartzman would've been better suited. Plus it can feel all over the place, an identity crisis that you can't even grasp after it finishes. Then again, I just had fun watching and would gladly rewatch for Cage and Hoult who are the highlights of this.

11. Migration

Call it blasphemous, but I enjoyed this more than the Mario movie. It's essentially Rio mixed with National Lampoon's Vacation, with a lovable cast, solid animation, and an eazy breezy road trip story. I've always looked to Illumination for simple enjoyable romps and I got what I expected here. Gave me Amphibia vibes in a way, replace frogs with birds. Everything surrounding the villain is my only real issue, he was an obvious and very nothing bad guy, but it's overall better paced than Super Mario Bros where it felt like you watched an eternity in 3 minutes. Still don't get the air of folk looking down on this for just being serviceable when it's honestly become my favorite Illumination movie next to the first Despicable Me.

10. Killers of the Flower Moon

Sad to say this is the weakest Scorsese movie for me, mainly because it felt like we're following the wrong main character. Lily Gladstone is incredible in this, among the other great performers, but she felt sidelined in favor of DeCaprio and De Niro's perspectives. It's like if in 1995's Casino, we just follow Ginger throughout the moment Sam introduces her. I liked the turmoil Leo's character goes through, but it paled in comparison to Mollie who was more affected by his and Hale's actions. That does not mean it's all bad. This can be a beautiful, dynamic, and ruthless movie that just made me feel bad for watching it; running with the words "harsh reality" throughout the 3 and a half hour runtime.

9. Good Burger 2

I watched Good Burger 1 & 2 this Thanksgiving weekend, and just had a blast. These are the kind of movies that are charmingly stupid but not insultingly so. Kel Mitchell's Ed is emblematic of how much dumb fun this duology is where he's actively comical but not smoothbrained to ruin your time. This I say is like Home Alone 2 where it is just beat for beat the 1st movie with minor developments but that doesn't really matter when it's just as well put together. It never feels like Kenan nor Kel missed a beat and the drama not overstaying its welcome. It is just "Good Burger Again" without it feeling like diminishing returns compared to other rehashing sequels.

8. Leo

Can you believe this got better publicity than Disney's Wish? Even YMS could appreciate this movie, that's how you know Sandler has his recognizable game when you least expect it. But Leo is a surprisingly good comedy that has actually sincere moments. Being Happy Madison's 2nd ever animation, it's like Adam waited to refine the production as opposed to putting a cash grab together like one would expect. It's not all good, especially trying to be a musical, but seeing it once you'd be impressed how much good it does with the risks it takes.

7. Nimona

Like Migration, everything surrounding the villain is the one big issue I have with this, especially when it comes to affecting the film's message. At the same time, she pales in comparison to the dynamic pairing of Ballister Blackheart and the titular shapeshifter. Nimona is my favorite character of 2023, her energy and confidence matched by the struggle she bears existing alone and the facade made to band-aid it. Her and Ballister's journey alone made me glad this got out of development hell, being Blue Sky's final production posthumous. To me it wasn't about being a take that to Disney, it was about the fact a movie like Nimona got to exist as great as it did. Hoping Stevenson is satisfied with their adaptation, because it definitely earned its flowers.

6. Emesis Blue

Offhand, it openly sucks that Letterboxd refuses to let this stay on the site to log, but it can't be overstated how much of a marvel this was. Repurposing not just the characters, but the lore and mechanics of Team Fortress 2 into a feature length horror thriller. The animation's top notch where it can have godly framing that was on par with the known legends of horror film making. SFM animations can be beautiful on their own, shitpost or otherwise, but Emesis Blue goes a step beyond by having a compelling story fitting for the universe on top of, again, every frame being a painting.

5. Shin Kamen Rider

I've never really saw any Tokusatsu shows. Not that I hate the genre, just could never get into it while recognizing the glorious looking chaos found in clips. Knowing Hideaki Anno directed was what got me into seeing this film and it opened my mind quite a bit. This was the legacy film that definitely had Anno's touch in both the action and drama. While the climax can notably drag, you never feel left out of what was essentially the original Kamen Rider's origin story. It doesn't have the complex VFX of stuff like Marvel, but the costumes and fight scenes makes me wish we got more of this in America beyond Power Rangers.

4. TMNT Mutant Mayhem

Advertising before release really didn't make this appear like a promising film. If there's anything I learned from this year though, appearances can be deceiving. Like Nimona was for her movie, the creative choices for this made it the TMNT movie I never knew I wanted. To me this felt akin to the Lego Batman movie where it's not only a good love letter of the franchise for more than its fanservice, but this spin on the characters is able to have a new sincere view of them without overhauling everything about the TMNT. That and it has the greatest needle drops I've had in a long while like how do insert He-Man Fabulous Secret Powers and expect me to hate this?

3. Godzilla Minus One

I call this a great year for films because it marks the first time I got to see a Toho produced Godzilla, with subtitles, in an real movie theater. Needless to say, it felt like I got to enjoy the 1954 film again anew. Not a remake mind you, but the parallels were uncanny and this spins here work just as well, if not more here than with the original in a couple places. Both are still strong movies nonetheless. Minus One is a refurbish that dishes out what people always wanted and uniquely giving a little more while never sacrificing why the OG is that timeless. With it getting more than a limited release, I'm glad this got to be more than a niche celebration of the kaijuu king.

2. Oppenheimer

This film's been meme'd to heaven, hell you could say it got meme'd to success thanks to its dual release with Barbie, but it didn't undermine getting hooked to watching this anyways. This really has become my favorite Nolan film, a compelling biopic that doesn't exactly herald its titular lead in the best light thanks to the paradoxical storytelling. Oppenheimer gives us the largest ensemble I know, and delivers in the most breathtaking moments I never knew I could get. Cillian killed it among the many who made the three hours of people sitting and talking in rooms actually tense and intriguing to thread. Plus it gave us the beauty of Josh Peck being the guy to detonate the test bomb like cherry on top of this cinematic cake.

1. The Holdovers

I remember watching Alexander Payne's Sideways with Paul Giamatti as a high schooler but couldn't appreciate it until rewatching this year. It's one of the best mid-life crisis comedies you could see, still fresh in its easy going presentation and music. The same can be said for this film, made to feel like it came from the late 70s or 80s with the old opening logos that I didn't think you could do in these times. Out the gate, this was the holiday story I was shocked would be as relatable as it was, with the trio of Giamatti, Randolph, and Sessa each having their story that resonated with me strongly. With the right amount of time, Payne offers an remarkably cozy, down to earth movie where from reserved to outgoing, it did a lot for me emotionally. Like Netflix's Klaus, I kinda want this to be a traditional rewatch for the holiday seasons. One that everyone should try at least once, especially if they feel the disillusionment of the season where this might lift their spirits one way or another.

If there's anything to learn from this year, it's that the meta has definitely shifted. Even when the many on my list didn't make billions like the Avatar films, the variety and risks made spoke more than the big dogs like Disney and WB putting out unprofitable blockbusters that ranged from very by the numbers to you don't need to see The Flash to know how god awful it just was. More people are & should branch out beyond the major mainstream names. Not that the big dogs aren't ever gonna make great films in the coming years, but we should appreciate more than the big budget features you can tell are playing it safe. Time can be patient for great cinema, sleeper hits or not, so take advantage while you're young.

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