 We're always complaining that the new American Godzilla movies suck and I was prepared to say the same thing about the new Japanese Godzilla, but I can't because it was good Okay, I saw the new Godzilla movie last night the new Japanese Godzilla movie and I was going in preparing to hate it I think it was stupid But you know what I liked it Here's the first thing that I didn't expect about this new Godzilla movie It's a complete reboot. It's a hard reboot. They're starting over completely from scratch with the name Godzilla and the idea of Godzilla and Starting over and usually I don't like that kind of thing because I think it's unnecessary, but at the same time If it's done right if it's done thoughtfully Then that sort of thing can work and it worked this time When they've quote-unquote relaunched the Godzilla franchises in the past like in 1985 It wasn't a hard reboot They they picked it up as if it were a sequel to the first Godzilla movie from 1956 and it ended up being a dumb premise and then the 1999 American Godzilla movie which was a hard reboot Wasn't Godzilla at all and then the most recent American Godzilla film from just last year Had a lot of good elements, but again, they were doing it as if it were The sequel to the original in 1956 movie because they did have callbacks to If I recall they did have callbacks to to Godzilla's first appearance as if he had appeared before am I remembering that right? Anyway, as I said in my review of that one and there's a link here Although the movie was ultimately a failure and it didn't have enough Godzilla in it. They started correctly Especially when it came to Godzilla's origin. He's basically a God He's not a mutant dinosaur So to this new Godzilla it has all the elements that you expect from a Godzilla movie He comes up out of the ocean The Japanese government and the military don't know what to do They ultimately launch military attacks on him and then rogue scientists find a solution and The majority of the movie is scenes of people Sitting and standing in conference rooms having conversations about what to do and usually that gets boring and It's such a cliche in these Godzilla movies, but this time they did it Different it was directed differently and it worked. It was very dry And there weren't long scenes of people having entire conversations All the conversations were very quick cuts Each person would say one sentence or maybe a part of a sentence and would cut to the next one And it would get through it and move on to the next and there was no music There was no music at all. It was there was a silence other than the dialogue Again very dry. It reminded me of the Andromeda strain or maybe all the president's men Dry is the only way I can describe it journalistic almost and and it worked. I didn't get bored Godzilla itself the original Godzilla film from the 50s was an allegory and a warning about Nuclear weapons and the misuse of nuclear power and the effect on the environment and the US bombing Japan with nuclear weapons So the people who wrote this took that idea into the present day and The US nuclear bombing of Japan was a very present thing with the Japanese military unable to Defeat Godzilla the United States was making Unilateral decisions and not asking anyone permission and the Japanese government was very upset about that and And ultimately the US made the decision to nuke Tokyo and the Japanese were like, no We we don't want that so they So the writers of this new film I think did a very good job of bringing the same problems from the 1950s into the present day and This new Godzilla was very strange He he looks different. He has a different origin He behaves different. He's completely unsympathetic. This is not Godzilla the savior of the universe Friend all children at all. He has new powers And I accepted them it this is the most realistic Godzilla I've ever seen and by realistic. I mean He was CGI. He was a hundred percent CGI and they didn't make any attempt to hide that Which was the right decision. It's like they they made the decision. Okay, it's gonna be CGI We're not going to pretend to make it look a hundred percent real and I found that refreshing But it was the most realistic in the sense of Its origin How it behaved How the Japanese government and military responded to it. There weren't any of these phony Lightning radar dishes on top of tanks that they always have when When the helicopters and the tanks were were just shoveling ammunition onto Godzilla they were concentrating on his face Trying to take out its eyes and his mouth. So it was standing there In the middle of Tokyo with destruction all around it and its its face and head completely hidden behind clouds of smoke and explosions And I was nodding saying this looks good. This looks good. I believe it I'm accepting it. There was never a moment when some scientists came up with some ridiculous idea That I just didn't accept The way the Japanese defeated him and this mirrors the original 1956 film the Japanese have a decisive victory against Godzilla this time And again, that was refreshing and the way they did it was really interesting So as much as I was prepared to dislike this I was surprised that I didn't dislike it and that I actually did like parts of it a lot So this new rethinking I was trying to say rethinking and reimagining at the same time Godzilla the rethinking so This new reimagining and reworking of Godzilla I think works It's very different. It's very new And when this kind of thing is done right, it's okay in my book And this one was done right so New Godzilla thumbs up