Final Wars: Why all the Hate?

[Tim85]

Gotcha. Sorry, I was pretty tired when I was cruising the board last night.

I understand. This week at work tired me out. Glad we're back to normal.

[Gojira1963]

Honestly I like the film for what it is. Still think as a 50th anniversary film, something else should have been done.... but it's a good fun Godzilla film for me.

I agree with you. It took a while for me to like the film and I can understand both sides of the issue. It really is a different Godzilla movie than what had been done recently. In some ways I see Final Wars as an homage to the Showa series. It really has the spirit of those movies and once I understood that I began to like it a little better.

[TokyoVigilante]

Other then a cast of exclusively Showa monsters and a bunch of random nods to Toho's Fantasy films from that era, Final Wars doesn't have the spirit of those films in the slightest. Godzilla: 2000 and GMK draw from the actual ideas, themes, and tones of that era without just relying on the iconography and classic imagery.

[Mincecraft]

Godzilla: Final Wars is the latest G film, it came out back in 2004. I've seen it four times, and with each time, I enjoy it even more. Every time I look it up, I always find negative reviews. My question to everyone is why? Isn't Final Wars everything we want in a Godzilla movie? It has epic monster scenes, they take up a lot of the screen time, the humans aren't boring, and the music is epic. (It isn't as dramatic as the old film's, but it's still really energetic.) I'm not ashamed to say that Final Wars is my favorite Godzilla film.

So my question to you all is why not a lot of fans like Final Wars.

Well my friend, I'd say you have your answer in 79 pages . But I might as well give my thoughts.

I'm fairly certain that the main issue is that Godzilla has a little less screen time than warranted for an anniversary. Destroy All Monsters had that problem too. Other than that though, I enjoy this movie. Is it a rip-off of American theatre? In some ways, maybe. I dont think that they were trying to rip anything off, just taking inspiration, every film does that. I have seen a comment that compared it to a Michael Bay movie . I wouldnt go that far. And while I have respect for his opinion, I feel that TokyoViglante is looking a little to deep into it. How GMK reflects any social commentary is beyond me . Many other reasons posted here are mainly nitpicking in my opinion. There are many good scenes and decent dialogue. I feel, as many do, that movies nowadays are taken too seriously. Many critical successes in this age are rarely action movies, nor would I expect it.

Overall, this movie is a charming tribute to the Showa Era and a good rap-up to another Godzilla Age.

[darkcancer]

How GMK reflects any social commentary is beyond me .

Check kpa's post on page 2 of the GMK thread here: http://www.tohokingdom.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=4850&start=19 for info on that. On topic, I didn't hate Final Wars, but I also wouldn't call it one of the best. Overall, I did enjoy it, but as everyone else says, it could have used more kaiju footage.

[Mincecraft]

Well, I think I owe someone an apology.

Thank you for that. That makes alot of sense. I guess looking deep into it does bring promise .

[darkcancer]

No problem. The background info helps a lot in understanding/appreciating GMK. But, alas, we are off topic for this thread.

[TheChingzilla]

I wanted to see the military, not some damn mutants frying Ebirah
Better acting
Better story/plot
More monster action
Less human action
Less monsters.
Make Godzilla stay true to his origins
Let Godzillas fights be epic and make the monsters powerful , instead of a 10 second long short clip.

[JVM]

I say all copies of this movie should be burned and sent to Mars.

[Dr. Nishiyama]

Unless I missed something in all those times I watched Final Wars it finally hit me- why doesn't the Gotengo make more use out of its Absolute Zero cannon? It completely vanquished Manda in the beginning so why not use it on the rest of the monsters? Was it destroyed during the opening fight?

Little things like this add into the big things of why I dislike Final Wars. It's the only entry in the entire franchise that I don't like. Even lesser entries like Raids Again, Megalon, and Megaguirus all have something I enjoy, but since Final Wars was the 50th anniversary of Godzilla, there is no excuse for the way the film turned out.

Does anyone know what the higher ups at Toho thought when they saw the dailies or first cut? Did they know they had a massive flop on their hands? Did they realize they should've gone with Kaneko? Were they panicking about how to recoup their losses? I doubt any of the blame could fall on producer Shogo Tomiyama, I've heard he never had the power his predecessor Tomoyuki Tanaka had, so I don't know if it was is decision to hire Kitamura

[Mincecraft]

I say all copies of this movie should be burned and sent to Mars.

A wee bit extreme, wouldn't you say?

[Bentley]

Unless I missed something in all those times I watched Final Wars it finally hit me- why doesn't the Gotengo make more use out of its Absolute Zero cannon? It completely vanquished Manda in the beginning so why not use it on the rest of the monsters? Was it destroyed during the opening fight?

The Gotengo doesn't fight any other monster in the film, so there is that.

[GotengoXGodzilla]

Unless I missed something in all those times I watched Final Wars it finally hit me- why doesn't the Gotengo make more use out of its Absolute Zero cannon? It completely vanquished Manda in the beginning so why not use it on the rest of the monsters? Was it destroyed during the opening fight?

The Gotengo doesn't fight any other monster in the film, so there is that.

Except Gigan, and the Mothership, and had a very clear shot at Keizer Ghidorah at the end.

[Sydney Aradi]

I say all copies of this movie should be burned and sent to Mars.

That is quite extreme of a comment to make. Even though GFW is a bad film, its copies shouldn't be burned. It should be preserved for future generations of filmgoers (same can be said for all films that are depised by critics)

[TheChingzilla]

I say all copies of this movie should be burned and sent to Mars.

An alien would find this, and think there are actual monsters on planet Earth. They send in a team to investigate, a new major event happens, aliens come to our world...

[Gojira1963]

Other then a cast of exclusively Showa monsters and a bunch of random nods to Toho's Fantasy films from that era, Final Wars doesn't have the spirit of those films in the slightest. Godzilla: 2000 and GMK draw from the actual ideas, themes, and tones of that era without just relying on the iconography and classic imagery.

I do see Final Wars as an homage to the Show series. Having Minya was one thing that lead me to see the movie that way. Burying Godzilla in ice at the beginning reminded me of Godzilla Raids Again...and many other things including the design of Godzilla himself. He looked more like an updated Showa design than a Heisei or Millennium design.

I am alright if you don't agree.

I love the movie.

[Grignr]

The film doesn't do Godzilla's 50th Anniversary any justice whatsoever, but I still think it's an enjoyable movie regardless. I mean, seeing Godzilla incinerating Zilla was worth the price of admission alone. :maybe

[GodzillaRangerPrime]

I say all copies of this movie should be burned and sent to Mars.

An alien would find this, and think there are actual monsters on planet Earth. They send in a team to investigate, a new major event happens, aliens come to our world...

and we could then blame GFW for that, if the aliens end up being hostile or full of space disease.

[GodzillaSpawn]

Aside from Godzilla kicking ass, I enjoyed the lead Xilian guy. He's in other Kitamura films and always plays a cool character, so that was a treat for me. So I don't hate the film that much either.

[Bentley]

The Xillian boss is awesome, maybe the only character I like on that film, even if Don Fries is funny because he's so over the top.

Unless I missed something in all those times I watched Final Wars it finally hit me- why doesn't the Gotengo make more use out of its Absolute Zero cannon? It completely vanquished Manda in the beginning so why not use it on the rest of the monsters? Was it destroyed during the opening fight?

The Gotengo doesn't fight any other monster in the film, so there is that.

Except Gigan, and the Mothership, and had a very clear shot at Keizer Ghidorah at the end.

But the machine didn't really face Gigan, it was just trying to free Godzilla before anything else, and the Mothership had a forcefield and then the crew got pwned by teletransportation. If we stick with the plot, there was no real opportunity of using the Absolute Zero canon again.