Godzilla: Planet of the Monsters - Anime

Godzilla: Planet of the Monsters is one of the most disappointing things to come out of the entire Godzilla franchise. After almost 65 years of Godzilla, it was truly only a matter of time until Godzilla foraged into the world of anime and this is what we got. Okay, maybe I'm being a bit too harsh on the movie, but I cannot help but feel incredibly let down. From a lot of angles, this could have been a surefire success. An excellent narrative setup with an exploration of Godzilla we've never seen before with even crazier science fiction elements could have been really fascinating, but what we got was just some standard science fiction movie schlock that could have been written without Godzilla. I've seen many a reviewer talk about the trilogy and discuss how it's just like any other anime, especially with the lead characters. Well, as someone who is not a big fan of anime, all I can really say is this movie doesn't do much for me in general. It doesn't make me want to explore anime anymore than I already have, I don't find much of the movie very intriguing, and if I was being introduced to Godzilla through these movies, not only would I be frustrated knowing how simply mediocre the movies are, but I'd be even more frustrated with knowing how good a lot of the other movies in the franchise are. In general, this movie is best summarized as sheer missed opportunity across the board.

At the end of the 20th century, monsters began to ravage the Earth. Kamacarus in New York, Orga in Izmir, Dagahra in Sydney, the attacks were numerous. But everything changed when Godzilla appeared, nearly wiped out the human race and forced the remaining humans to an exile among the stars. With water, food and morale at an all time low, humanity's survivors, helmed by Captain Haruo Sakaki return to Earth in hopes of reclaiming their home from the monster, only to find their home is not the one they left 20,000 years earlier.

Alright, let's get some positives out of the way starting with the story. Most of the massive backstory is explained in detail with the tie in book, Godzilla: Monster Apocalypse.  It's kind of lame that I'm recommeding to reading a book, but I'm working with what I got here. And hey, if you don't want to read, watch WikiZilla's video on the book. It's a quick and thorough dive into the first bit of lore surrounding this universe's history. Anyway, why am I shouting out the book? Well, it gives a lot of context and background to highlight just how dire this world is. When monsters began attacking the world with Kamacarus, the situation was already really dire and it only got worse and worse with every subsequent year, reaching its absolute worst from when Godzilla arrived and on. This is a fantastic story and a story concept. We only get to see the basic history in the movie with the opening 10 minutes, but what we see in the movie up until humanity's journey back to Earth reflects this story greatly. We as humans lost, and we lost bad. And in our desperation for a future we came back to the Earth to face Godzilla again in hopes maybe SOMETHING changed. And the story in the movie is really great too, honestly. It moves at a really solid pace and covers a lot of story beats I find to be 100% necessary. We get to see the desperation of humanity, the happiness of the return, and the fear once Godzilla is reintroduced. The story and tone presented showing just how desperate the situation has truly become is incredibly well done. It's not handled with the light of a fun taking back the Earth movie, no. In fact, it can get kind of depressing if you aren't ready for it. It's effective at giving a feeling of genuine despair.

And since you knew it was coming: yes. Godzilla is a MASSIVE positive of this movie. Despite not being in the movie very much, his presence is really felt. And that's just Godzilla Filius, because after all, this is the first time in history there have been two living, fully grown Godzillas in the same movie! Godzilla Filius and his entire concept are pretty interesting, being the spawn of Godzilla and the size of the original, he's still a huge threat. And once he's destroyed, we get an absolutely incredible double take with the emergence of the true Godzilla; the staggeringly tall and terrifying Godzilla Earth. Godzilla Earth is only in the VERY end of the movie, but he is just so awesome. Armed with two awesome power ups, the super oscillatory wave (basically atomic breath but sound based), and this absolutely massive tail swipe shock wave type weapon, it's clear that this is the rightful ruler and King of this new Earth. The only issue about Godzilla in this series is honestly the fact he's a plant based organism, which too me is stretching the origin of the monster a bit much, but it allowed for Filius and one of the best twists in the entire franchise, so I guess I'll take it. The only issue with Godzilla I have in this movie though is that he's not in it very much. If you have complaints about Godzilla's screentime in Legendary's Godzilla, I HIGHLY encourage you watch this one with a stopwatch and see how much he's really in it. You will be shocked, truly. And that leads us into the main issue of the movie.

Oh my God, these characters are just awful. The main issue here is the character of Captain Haruo Sakaki, voiced by Mamoru Miyano. Now, I will say this: NO. Miyano does not put on a bad performance. In fact, I think given the material, I think he did a fine job. The problem, and in no way is this his fault, is that Haruo is a terrible character. He's always yelling and utterly selfish, acting like he's the only one who is allowed to kill Godzilla. Like, buddy, I get it. Godzilla killed your parents and I know that sucks. But by the time you left the planet, GODZILLA AND ALL THE OTHER MONSTER ATTACKS LEFT SOMETHING LIKE 700,000,000 PEOPLE ALIVE! That's a lot of people whose parents got killed from the EXACT same situation, man! You have NO reason to take this situation so personally, because you are not the only person affected by this, and he 100% acts like he is, and he is unlikable and selfish and just WAY too angry all the time. Again, I have read many people say he's just a standard anime protagonist, but I'm not a huge anime fan, so I really would not know about that. As for the other characters, no one else is even remotely interesting. They're all just stock boring characters who add nothing to the story and they just make a slow movie go by even slower. The biggest problem however is DEFINITELY Haruo, so I just had to get my emotions out right off the bat.

Bottom line, Planet of the Monsters is just disappointing. An excellent setup is thrown to the side for a movie that is purely generic. What would have been really interesting to watch is honestly the story told in the book, Godzilla: Monster Apocalypse. We get a really cool Godzilla with some minimal screentime that in my opinion is used effectively, but none of that matters when the movie is boring to watch because the characters are bad. Bottom line, the movie is just kind of a waste.

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And yet it only gets worse. Tomorrow we're reviewing the second film of the trilogy, Godzilla: City on the Edge of Battle, and straight up, it's a stinker. Tomorrow's not gonna be a fun day, because I don't think I'm exactly going to rip into it, but I am not happy with the movie.