After the release of Godzilla Final Wars, TOHO announced that they were not going to make anymore films featuring Godzilla and Tri-Star let the rights to Godzilla expire in 2003. In August 2009, there were rumors that surfaced about Legendary talking with TOHO to produce a new American Godzilla film in 2012. In March 2010, Legendary Pictures and TOHO confirmed the rumors that Legendary Pictures had acquired the rights to Godzilla with Warner Bros. co-producing and co-financing. Legendary Pictures stated the film would be close to the 1954 film than the 1998 film with its "iguana-like creature". CEO of Legendary Pictures Thomas Tull stated, "Our plans are to produce the Godzilla that we, as fans, would want to see. We intend to do justice to those essential elements that have allowed this character to remain as pop culturally relevant for as long as it has."
Despite missing the 2012 release date, Legendary Pictures showed off a teaser for Godzilla at San-Diego Comic Con 2012. The teaser wasn't leaked until a year later. This was due to Warner Bros. having a strict rule about video recording and photography and it was reported that the convention was heavy on security guards when the trailers were shown. Director Gareth Edwards was disappointed that nobody leaked the trailer so it can be shared to the whole world outside of San Diego Comic Con.
At 2013's San Diego Comic Con, an exhibit dedicated to the film had maquettes of different Godzilla designs and the pictures were leaked. This gave some reassurance to fans that Godzilla was in good hands.
The 2014 Godzilla is 350 feet tall. At the time, he was the biggest Godzilla to date until the 2016 film, Shin Godzilla, out sized the 2014 Godzilla by measuring up to 400 feet tall. The next tallest Godzilla in the upcoming animated film, Godzilla: Monster Planet, will even out size Shin Godzilla.
Japanese actor, Akira Takarada, who was in six Godzilla movies including 1954's Gojira, was signed on to the movie for a cameo appearance. Ultimately, his scene was cut from the final production.
Godzilla is the first movie in the Monsterverse series with plans of 4 movies in total. Kong: Skull Island is the second movie in this series and will follow up with Godzilla: King Of The Monsters in 2019 and Godzilla vs Kong in 2020.
Review:
As the world is surprised by the startling and sudden appearance of giant monsters humanity's only hope is on the alpha predator, Godzilla, to save them.
Like all the other fans, I was part of the hype train when a new Godzilla movie was being made. I remember going to see this movie with high expectations only to feel let down afterwards. After seeing it many times over and over, it's pretty okay for a Godzilla film. As a second attempt for an American Godzilla movie it was a good attempt. Bryan Cranston really out done himself in this movie, but I wish that they wouldn't kill off the best actor 15 MINUTES INTO THE MOVIE! Seriously, he was the only one that had the best performance in this whole movie and he could have carried it all the way through! Once he is gone, you're stuck with Aaron Taylor Johnson, Elizabeth Olsen, and Ken Watanabe who are as boring as watching a pot of water boil. There was no resolve with ATJ's character, Ford Brody, and Bryan Cranston's character, Joe Brody. They could have had a father - son adventure of trying to get back home while trying to settle their differences. It would help appreciate their characters more and tell me why I should care about them.
This version of Godzilla is the best looking Godzilla in my opinion. He looks very realistic in design and how he moves around. He looks like an actual animal when comparing with all of his previous incarnations. I even do see hints of his old designs like his face sometimes look like the 90's Godzilla and his dorsal plates look like the ones from the millenium era. The MUTOs looked very uninspired and look like the Cloverfield monster mixed with the bugs from Starship Troopers. They were suppose to be based on origami yet they don't look like any normal animal that you would see in real life.
The visuals are good only when you get to see it. Most times, it is too dark to see anything and this happens only in night time scenes. I know that there is a fight going on, but it is more like an outline of the monsters fighting each other. The rest you see are smoke and dust forming around them. The only times you do see Godzilla and the MUTOs are either in the day or in those cool moment scenes like Godzilla's dorsal plates glowing when charging up.
It has some awesome moments such as when Godzilla is fully revealed at the airport in Hawaii, Godzilla's atomic breath scene, and the finale where Godzilla kills the female MUTO by shooting his atomic breath into the monster's mouth. I didn't mind the build up to Godzilla's reveal at all. Yet, when you really want to see the first fight between Godzilla and the male MUTO at the airport the movie decides to cut away from that scene to show a boy watching the fight on TV. I was sort of down about that and I was hoping that next time the movie will show the next fight. When round two began the movie cuts away again and you don't get to see any fighting until the movie is close to the end. The movie kept cutting away from what would have been the best parts of the movie and did a little too much. What is worse is that Godzilla does not have that much screen time. It makes the movie seem like it wasn't about Godzilla at all. He was more like an after thought like the director forgot he was making Godzilla and not Cloverfield 2. Many fans will argue, "Well, Godzilla has had much shorter screen time in the older movies, so you shouldn't complain about the screen time." While it is true that the older movies had Godzilla with shorter screen time there is a difference between those movies and this movie. The difference is how Godzilla is presented. Usually, once Godzilla appears he becomes the main focus for most of the movie and the second and third monsters would come in later on. In this, it was the exact opposite. Even Tri-Star's GODZILLA at least concentrated on the monster and nothing else.
Final Verdict:
Godzilla is not the best film, but it shows a lot more improvement over Tri-Star's remake. I only wish that there was more Godzilla and Bryan Cranston, but I guess you could say this one is only taking baby steps.