Shin Godzilla - The General Discussion Thread

[morgoth]

Man you guys spaz out over semantics and superficial issues way too much.

It's been a year+ since Shin Godzilla came, still can't believe it took so long since the Showa era for a legitimately great Godzilla film to come out.

Ehhh...Maybe over-stating the case a little lol.

[Mr_Goji_and_Watch]

Ehhh...Maybe over-stating the case a little lol.

Nothing since Mothra vs Godzilla is legitimately great. Everything is either good to legitimately B-movie grade schlock.

[ToxicLove]

Ehhh...Maybe over-stating the case a little lol.

Nothing since Mothra vs Godzilla is legitimately great. Everything is either good to legitimately B-movie grade schlock.

The gentleman is correct. Nothing wrong with schlock though, it can certainly be fun in appropriate measures.

[MechaGoji Bro7503]

Er- I think we've had some good films after Mothra vs Godzilla. Different opinions I suppose.

[HeiseiGodzilla117]

There's also the part where there's art of Shin's evolutionary cycle, which I believe is also from the artbook, which shows multiple fish with Godzilla-like dorsal plates swimming around the containers of radioactive waste.

Not saying he's a microbial colony, but he sure as hell isn't a marine reptile either.

I don't have the art book, although id like to get it. But that would seem to confirm what I assumed. Shin's a fish. Form 2 looks so fish-like that there aren't many other explanations.

[SpaceG92]

There's also the part where there's art of Shin's evolutionary cycle, which I believe is also from the artbook, which shows multiple fish with Godzilla-like dorsal plates swimming around the containers of radioactive waste.

Not saying he's a microbial colony, but he sure as hell isn't a marine reptile either.

I don't have the art book, although id like to get it. But that would seem to confirm what I assumed. Shin's a fish. Form 2 looks so fish-like that there aren't many other explanations.

REEE! Why don't people take bigger pictures or use an image resize tag. Makes it harder to translate. Pretty sure this was translated at some point - but hey, im bored.

#1: "A large amount of radioactive waste was dumped in the area where marine life exists 60 years ago."

#2: "A morphology of marine organisms, the first form of the amphibian birth is born.
BEFORE ANYONE TAKES THIS OUT OF CONTENT.

mor·phol·o·gy
môrˈfäləjē/Submit
noun
the study of the forms of things, in particular.
BIOLOGY
the branch of biology that deals with the form of living organisms, and with relationships between their structures.
LINGUISTICS
the study of the forms of words.

I swear to god if people take this as another mixtroph i'm handing out a warning.

Essentially what this says is, "The transformation of marine life. This first morph is that of an amphibian."

#3: "It seems like salmon, [it] has both seawater fish and freshwater fish functions."

#4: "The second form aiming at land with amphibian instinct. In order to move up the freshwater Mukawa river, it changed into a form that can breathe [with] lungs.

#5: "From the urban environment such as building[s] blocking movement, the need for [a] bipedal walking [form] arises, transforming into the 3rd form.

#6: "Heat treatment [regulation] in the body does not work well, it transforms into underwater creatures there in the seal to cool the body, re-landed!

Interesting they brought this up, since its often missed by some people. Shin does transform back into his second aquatic/amphibian form after overheating. He maintains his size, color and his newly sprouted arms.

#7: "It strikes with an attack by the US military and it emits a beam and a flame. It can be said it is a transformation(*) to the 5th form."
*Had to translate this line 4 times. It kept giving me "prevert" instead of transformation. Then again, one would assume with context, transform would be the correct word.

#8: "What is the final form? In anticipation, it is said that the possibility of proliferation flight in a small size and a rat formula."
This on keeps getting butchered. From what the 7 translations says, Translation each line seperately does yield a slightly better result that remains the same. This is a summary;

"Although there is a possibility of flight,-"
"Miniaturze and grow to rat formula" (There it is again!)

From the looks of it, there is a possibility of flight or to evolve into something smaller. Hell if I know what rat formula means, maybe a swarm mentality? That would line up with what we know and have seen in fan published media. Then again, this is their native language and i'm just a man with a phone

[MechaGoji Bro7503]

Yeah im sure "rat formula" refers to his 5th form swarming humanity.

[Zarm]

I think it just needs to become the new TK insult.

"Anyone who claims Shin came from a microorganism colony is a dirty, no-good rat formula!"

[SpaceG92]

I think it just needs to become the new TK insult.

"Anyone who claims Shin came from a microorganism colony is a dirty, no-good rat formula!"

I should make it a question to pass for user registration;
"What is a mixotroph?"

Yeah im sure "rat formula" refers to his 5th form swarming humanity.

+1

[HeiseiGodzilla117]

Thanks for the translation, SpaceG! So Shin either starts out as a fish or a tadpole (never forget). Either way... it's pretty fucking weird.

[Inferno Rodan]

Essentially what this says is, "The transformation of marine life. This first morph is that of an amphibian."

Not exactly. Morphology, when used in this context, basically just means the physical characteristics of an animal. Anatomy, in other words. "Morphology of marine organisms" is basically fins, gills, streamlined body shape, etc. Transformation has nothing to do with it.

So a more proper English version of the translation would probably be something along the lines of "The first form of the amphibious lifeform is born, possessing anatomy of marine organisms."

[SpaceG92]

Not exactly. Morphology, when used in this context, basically just means the physical characteristics of an animal. Anatomy, in other words. "Morphology of marine organisms" is basically fins, gills, streamlined body shape, etc. Transformation has nothing to do with it.

So a more proper English version of the translation would probably be something along the lines of "The first form of the amphibious lifeform is born, possessing anatomy of marine organisms."

This is why I always ask for a second opinion, I can (and by cosmic law at some point) I will be wrong. Thanks for the better clarification!

[tbeasley]

Unrelated, but does anyone think the tail is the "core"?. The first form is a tail (with possibly some unseen body beneath it), and it's so large and is the one thing that remains really consistent throughout the movie. It has its own face, and it appears to be the point of reproduction given the the little humanoids that were about to pop out.

I've postulated the tail is somehow the source of his radar abilities, it pops out of the water first like a submarine periscope.

Nerdy rationalizations aside, I think we should keep in mind what Shinji Higuchi said about the tail at G-Fest, how past films always had problems with it because the wirework and whatnot involved always limited the length and movement. Going digital freed them up a lot for Shin and you can tell they put a lot of focus on it just to try something different.

There's also the part where there's art of Shin's evolutionary cycle, which I believe is also from the artbook, which shows multiple fish with Godzilla-like dorsal plates swimming around the containers of radioactive waste.

It's not from the artbook, it's from this one I believe (maybe Jomei or someone else can fill us in).

[Gawdziller1954]

Apologies for the harshness, but it's pissing me off that so many people are regurgitating this info despite it being proven wrong.

If you're gonna get upset by people "regurgitating information" you should probably not do so yourself. Did you actually read the paper in question? There's like 2 sentences where he states that Godzilla is a type of unidentified prehistoric marine reptile based on the fact that the containers of nuclear waste had been torn open by a creature possessing teeth and claws. Because marine reptiles are the only creatures in the ocean that possess teeth, amirite? Nevermind the fact that marine reptiles didn't have claws. The rest of the paper is just completely unrelated rambling about the classification of ichthyosaurs and plesiosaurs, which, might I add, uses incorrect information as its basis. In other words, it doesn't really prove anything beyond that Goro Maki was off his damn rocker and people need to stop using that paper as anything meaningful.

There's also the part where there's art of Shin's evolutionary cycle, which I believe is also from the artbook, which shows multiple fish with Godzilla-like dorsal plates swimming around the containers of radioactive waste.

Not saying he's a microbial colony, but he sure as hell isn't a marine reptile either.

Sorry, but I must say, he has a better argument than yours.

I am not sure if UltramanGoji has read the paper in question, but as a proud owner of the artbook, I can say I have. It's located on pages 330-331. Goro Maki states that Godzilla evolved to live underwater, like a fish, and that Godzilla's evolution is "Beyond human understanding". While Maki DOES use the waste drums as proof of Godzilla being a holdover from the Cretaceous era, it is very likely that Maki saw Godzilla, or at least got a glimpse of the creature with whatever apparatus he used to picture the waste drums Godzilla was feeding off of. he also states that Godzilla has claws with certainty, meaning he probably had evidence for what the creature looked like. As for the evidence based off of the destroyed waste drums, evidence points to Godzilla being a sort of marine reptile as opposed to a fish. The Drums exhibit large bite marks, about 2 foot long, probably the tip of the snout. The bite marks clearly show prominent teeth marks puncturing the drums. The waters off of the Bonin Islands(Which is where Odo island is meant to be close to)are up to 32,000 feet deep and would make an ideal covert dumping area for nuclear waste. No fish in the area gets to that size at that depth, nor does any fish have a jaw shape or teeth that prominent in the world. Also, marine reptiles don't have claws? Really? Maki specifically states that Godzilla is an as-of-yet unidentified sea reptile(Meaning that inbetween the 65,000,000 years that passed since the K-PG extinction, in which large marine reptiles were supposed to have gone extinct, it could have evolved claws), and there are several marine reptiles that had claws in real life both extinct and alive today:
Sea turtles
Nothosaurs
Marine iguanas
Mosasaurs
Dakosaurs/Metriorynchids
As for the rest of the paper, I believe the paper may ave been written during the mid-late 20th century, when such practices where common amongst scientific bodies, and it may be a reference to the hilariously flawed and outdated origin for the 1954 Godzilla(A intermediate between plesiosaurs and Carnivorous dinosaurs, which, by the way, were almost completley unrelated). So no, it doesn't prove that Maki was off his rocker (That's the entire POINT of Maki possibly luring and unleashing Godzilla on Japan, people assumed he was off his rocker and ridiculed him while Japan left his wife to die) and that Shin Godzilla isn't a marine reptile. People SHOULD use that paper as a basis for something meaningful, as it is not only cannon(It appears in the film and the artbook) but it also is the only thing that gives a rather definitive answer to the question, "What exactly IS Shin Godzilla?" By the way, that illustration of the arthrodires possessing Godzilla dorsal plates (Which is NOT from the artbook, i believe it's from "Inside Shin Godzilla") also has a massive pink question mark over it. The passage only ever mentions that whatever fed off the Nuclear waste Drums was "A form of marine life". It is meant to simply be a generic stand in, basically saying, "A prehistoric sea creature ate the waste and got mutated", not that he was actually an ancient species of fish, which there is no actual evidence to support that idea. The fish are too small, and don't have the right headshape OR teeth to inflict the damage to the waste barrels seen in the film. So no, he's not a microorganism, and he's not a fish, but it's very likely that he WAS an evolved marine reptile. My theory is below.

WALL OF TEXT INCOMING

Shin Godzilla's evolution, to quote Goro Maki "Is beyond human understanding". We know very little about his species before he was mutated, other than the fact that he was a giant sea reptile. Based on the evidence that Maki discovered and recorded, I managed to cobble together a theory as to what Shin Godzilla truly is, and how his species evolved. Shin Godzilla, according to Maki, is evolved from prehistoric marine reptiles. There are many species and families of Marine reptiles: Plesiosaurs, which dubiously fit into the reptile family, Mosasaurs, which are related to komodo dragons, snakes, and distantly, crocodiles, Ichthyosaurs, which are a sort of reptile that split off from the main tree and adopted a life into the water to exploit an as-of-yet untouched food source, and Dakosaurs, which are a type of marine crocodile with huge, bulky heads and fins. Maki specifically chooses Ichthyosaurs or Mosasaurs as the possible root for his species. Judging by the fact most ichthyosaurs were extinct by the end of the Mesozoic, I support the idea that Shin Godzilla was a Mosasaur derivative as it is more likely. The reign of the Mosasaurs begins 85 MYA and ended 65 MYA, at the end of the Cretaceous and the end of the Mesozoic.At the Cretaceous period's end, an asteroid hit the earth, which ended the Mesozoic era and the cretaceous period. This impact and resulting disasters killed the dinosaurs and most of the great reptiles on earth. However, a species of large, deep sea mosasaur managed to survive the extinction event. Deep sea animals were spared from the onslaught of the asteroid, as they were so far from the surface it barely affected them. The main problem for sea animals during the KT/PTG extinction was pollution and ash coverage. Since the asteroid hit earth at great speed, it caused many disastrous events for the earth. Among these were Tsunamis. Tsunamis swept massive amounts of animals, plants, chemicals, and soil into the ocean. This works both ways. Since animals are swept out and drowned, they die and eventually sink. however, chemicals and soil are also swept out into he ocean and they pollute the surface. However, the major killing disaster that ended the Mesozoic era was the Soot and ash clouds. Since the asteroid was so large (as big as mount Everest), it swept up tons of soot and ash, which blocked the sun. The plants died, and without food, herbivores died. Carnivores ate the herbivore corpses , and when they ran out, they ate eachother to extinction. Only the most derived type of theropod dinosaurs, the birds (BIRDS ARE DINOSAURS, IT IS PROVEN FACT) survived. Since the surface was now dark and cold, with an abundance of food at the bottoms of the ocean, one of the Mosasaur species evolved over time to live deeper under the water, where food was abundant and pollution was less effective. By the time the Cenozoic era was fully under way, and the ash clouds had cleared, they evolved until they only needed to come up for air very sparingly. Eventually, probably around the Eocene of the Oligocene, The creature evolved a set of gills to fully take advantage of the sea. With this new adaptation, The beasts did not need to come up for air and could stay underwater for as long as they liked, giving them an advantage over the vicious pinnipeds of the time, Like the massive Eel-Whale Basilosaurus. However, supporting a mass of 15-20 meters long is a large feat, so the Godzilla species evolved to help support their mass without eating. Over a short period of time, the Godzilla species evolved to become Mixotrophic, which means that they can extract energy by both eating as well as absorbing energy from an inorganic source, such as nitrogen or radiation. This final species of highly derived mosasaur is the species the Goro Maki named "Godzilla" after discovering them in the 1950's. one of these creatures was in the area of Odo Island, and when the US dumped nuclear waste into the sea there, the creature ate it, eventually becoming the Godzilla that attacked Tokyo in 2016.

[morgoth]

Ehhh...Maybe over-stating the case a little lol.

Nothing since Mothra vs Godzilla is legitimately great. Everything is either good to legitimately B-movie grade schlock.

Come on man Son of Godzilla!

[Jomei]

Shin Godzilla is legitimately great. It just doesn't have the decades of fan reverence to make labeling it so as uncontroversial as is the case with the original and Mothra vs Godzilla. Son of Godzilla is also great, but you get push back from Minya haters when you argue the point.

[Mr_Goji_and_Watch]

Shin Godzilla is legitimately great. It just doesn't have the decades of fan reverence to make labeling it so as uncontroversial as is the case with the original and Mothra vs Godzilla. Son of Godzilla is also great, but you get push back from Minya haters when you argue the point.

Dude minya looks like the Pillsbury boy James Rolfe said it lmao

[Tyrant_Lizard_King]

I should make it a question to pass for user registration;
"What is a mixotroph?"

Any lifeform that can gain energy/sustenance from multiple sources. Might be a little simplified but I believe that's the basics of the term. Many microorganisms are mixotrophs but so are venus flytraps and Godzilla. Godzilla has always been a mixotroph. Well at least since the Heisei era.

[tbeasley]

it may be a reference to the hilariously flawed and outdated origin for the 1954 Godzilla(A intermediate between plesiosaurs and Carnivorous dinosaurs, which, by the way, were almost completley unrelated).

Well to be fair Prof. Yamane was never that specific when attempting to explain the original Godzilla. All he ever says (according to the Criterion subs at least), is that he considers Godzilla a 'rare intermediate organism, a marine reptile becoming a terrestrial animal.'

But I think more than anything Godzilla is supposed to be this weird evolutionary throwback we don't entirely understand. He's like the poster boy for antediluvian monsters.

So no, he's not a microorganism, and he's not a fish, but it's very likely that he WAS an evolved marine reptile.

+1

[eabaker]

WALL OF TEXT INCOMING

Why not add some paragraph breaks for the reader's benefit?