KOTM: The Positives

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KOTM: The Positives

Post by JAGzilla »

What the title says, pretty much. I don't think we have a thread intended to discuss the positive aspects of the film yet, aside from one about the monsters specifically.

To start, I've seen a lot of complaints that the action focuses too much on the humans running around, and not enough squarely on the monsters themselves. To a point, I agree, and would've liked more 'traditional' shots that showcase the monster fighting from a distance, allowing us to clearly see what's going on. That said, we have literally dozens of films that already do it that way. That's one of the main interesting reasons to use CGI, isn't it? You can achieve virtually any visual you want. They could have recreated the same style we're used to, minus the suits, but then... why not just use suits and pay a fraction of the price?

Showing the action from the POV of people scurrying desperately around the Titans' feet is something that would be impossible to do convincingly with practical effects, but obviously very possible with CGI. I like that they used the new technology to change things up and give us something new that helps sell the massive size of the kaiju and allows the humans to become directly involved in the action as opposed to ineffectually observing from a hill. It's fresh, it's new*, and it justifies the switch to a new special effects medium. I still want to see plenty of tradition going forward, but I'm glad to see things like this being experimented with.

*Obviously G14 did something similar, but IIRC the focus was much more on Ford running around with the kaiju in the background, while KOTM had the kaiju right there stomping and smashing all around the humans. Some of the time, anyway.

There were plenty of other good uses made of CGI, too. The monsters (Ghidorah especially) were given all kinds of detailed actions that practical effects have never even attempted. Mothra's constant lightshows, Ghidorah regrowing his head, Rodan's aerial acrobatics while chasing down the jets, etc. You could tell there was a conscious effort to utilize the available potential.
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Re: KOTM: The Positives

Post by GuardianGhido »

Pretty much EVERYTHING about the movie was a positive IMO with very few exceptions.

The monster visuals and monster action were ABSOLUTELY TOP NOTCH and blows almost every other Godzilla fight I've seen outta the water in my opinion. The fight choreoography and movement of the monsters is also done well. Instead of standing there/floating around and spamming beams or doing campy Showa style wrestling, they managed a happy medium with it's own twist; well balanced violent fighting at close range and distances with shades from Showa, Millenium and Heisei. Mothra got to do some melee attacks this time around and kept her silk shot, making her far more unique and competent a fighter than her Toho counterparts. Rodan and Ghidora are far more flexible than mere suits with Rodan's aerodynamics and King Ghidorah's wingwalking and twisty neck movements. Godzilla himself also has the definitive fighting style here with a near perfect blend of human like fighting moves, animalistic mauling and atomic breath blasts.

The soundtrack is GLORIOUS in so many ways that I can't even put it into words. Bear McCreary's masterpiece of a sountrack for this movie may just be one of my favorite movie soundtracks of all time. All of the tracks convey exactly what they were meant to convey and just...wow. I really can't say too much more here. The sountrack practically leaves me speechless.

I don't know why so many people dislike the human cast, for me it's really good for a Godzilla movie. I actually liked the Monarch operatives and their interactions. The cast also did a good job playing their characters IMO. What we got to see of Charles Dance and Millie Bobby Brown's performance was wonderful and left me wanting more. Which is good because they'll probably be recurring characters in the Monsterverse. Ken Watanabe's Dr. Serizawa was arguably the best human character in the Monsterverse IMO, I loved everything he said and did. The end of his character arc came a little too soon but it was a satisfying conclusion that provided the most emotional moment in this movie.

I could go on and on and list so many minor things as positives but I'll finish it here saying that practically the whole movie was full of so many positives that if there are any huge negatives, they are overshadowed and outeweighed by magnificence (as one sane, open-minded and most likely unbiased reviewer said).
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Re: KOTM: The Positives

Post by KingKaiju »

Godzilla, Rodan, Ghidorah, and Mothra all look fuuuucking fantastic! Every time they were on screen, it was amazing! None of them talked, and yet each of them had so much character and personality.
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Re: KOTM: The Positives

Post by Hokmuto »

The music. Absolutely great.
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Re: KOTM: The Positives

Post by Vakanai »

I made a long post on this, but I lost internet for a few minutes while trying to post it, and I'm not typing paragraphs again, so bullet points:
1. The four monsters have never looked better, their designs were ridiculously grand.
2. The action scenes were amazing. A little too fast, didn't care for the moments focusing on humans while monsters are throwing down, but largely the fights were amazing.
3. Mothra. She not only looked good, but I thought her powerset was the best it's ever been. Limbs she can use to hit with, webbing in adulthood, stinger. It was a great balance that made sense.
4. That finishing move at the end of the movie. Just damn!
5. Excellent rendition of Go Go Godzilla.
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Re: KOTM: The Positives

Post by Malchik »

This was probably the best portrayal of Ghidorah I've seen to date. I loved him in this film. I wish they didn't bog down the film with bullshit and just made it a Godzilla vs. Ghidorah film.

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Re: KOTM: The Positives

Post by GuardianGhido »

Malchik wrote:This was probably the best portrayal of Ghidorah I've seen to date. I loved him in this film. I wish they didn't bog down the film with bullshit and just made it a Godzilla vs. Ghidorah film.
You call Mothra and Rodan bullshit?!
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Re: KOTM: The Positives

Post by GoWhaleTours »

GuardianGhido wrote:
Malchik wrote:This was probably the best portrayal of Ghidorah I've seen to date. I loved him in this film. I wish they didn't bog down the film with bullshit and just made it a Godzilla vs. Ghidorah film.
You call Mothra and Rodan bullshit?!
It's obvious he means story-wise. The characters themselves aren't bad, the movie just would have been more straightfoward if it focused on Godzilla and Ghidorah.
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Re: KOTM: The Positives

Post by CCMan »

I actually found Mark Russell a very charismatic character. It's interesting to see a sort of traditionally, square-jawed American hero in such an otherwise traditional Kaiju movie. Its very much a second coming of Nick Adams's roles.

I also really liked how much inspiration it took for GMK in regards to various aspects of Mothra and Ghidorah.

Last thing, it makes a lot of sense that a space monster would be immune to the Oxygen Destroyer.

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Re: KOTM: The Positives

Post by Ivo-goji »

I loved that Rodan was a heel in this one. That was an inspired take on his old school characterization.
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Re: KOTM: The Positives

Post by GuardianGhido »

Ivo-goji wrote:I loved that Rodan was a heel in this one. That was an inspired take on his old school characterization.
From what I saw of him he seemed like a loose cannon wildcard that does things his own way until Ghidorah beat him badly enough to submit to his will. Then Godzilla beat King Ghidorah so he bowed to him in both respect for his savior and fear of a stronger titan. Godzilla though will probably not be as domineering (he only needs to keep him in check, not order him to attack anyone) so hopefully we might get to see Rodan act on his own in more than just one aerial battle/massacre against humans later on.

His aggressiveness really gave him personality, he just rushed straight towards Ghidorah and got wrecked, he wrecklessly tried to finish off Mothra and got shanked, then he actually tried to challenge Godzilla in his already wounded state but did the sensible thing for once and backed down after Godzilla glared at him. This comic by Extinct-Doodles sums him up perfectly!
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Re: KOTM: The Positives

Post by Relair »

The positives: almost everything? It was fantastic. Pure classic Godzilla goodness. Replace all the actors with japanese actors and slap a Toho logo at the beginning and it wouldn't have looked out of place one bit compared to showa/heisei stuff. It was absurd and ridiculous and absolutely glorious. The soundtrack was brilliant, gave me chills many times! The monsters were all done justice, they looked as good as I could have ever hoped for and had great personality. The battles were intense and numerous, hell I even liked the human stuff for the most part. It was the kind of classic human fluff Godzilla movies almost always have: scientists and/or military looking at monitors and fretting about what to do, mostly ineffective military combating the monsters sprinkled in with a doomsday weapon that will 'definitely kill them!', a heroic sacrifice, a touching moment or two. The tried and true formula.

Dougherty is a true fan, and the love definitely showed through almost every scene.
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Re: KOTM: The Positives

Post by GuardianGhido »

Relair wrote:The battles were intense and numerous, hell I even liked the human stuff for the most part. It was the kind of classic human fluff Godzilla movies almost always have: scientists and/or military looking at monitors and fretting about what to do, mostly ineffective military combating the monsters sprinkled in with a doomsday weapon that will 'definitely kill them!', a heroic sacrifice, a touching moment or two. The tried and true formula.
THIS! I actually really liked the Monarch people and the stuff they did in this movie, specially actively helping Godzilla. Humans fighting ALONGSIDE Godzilla was absolutely epic! The Godzilla March was once again used for it's original purpose from 1954 as a triumphant theme for the military in the Battle of Boston! (Yes, the Godzilla march was originally a human military march when they started blasting Gojira with everything they had) My favorite human part is the "For Serizawa" moment where the Monarch Air Force, the Argo and the rest of the human military all opened fire on Ghidorah to distract/annoy him and give Godzilla a hand. I LOVED THAT!! It's like the Lion and the Mouse from the senators scene, even if the Mice only throw paper balls at the Lion's opponent, it still provides openings for attacks and messes with the opponent's focus. Every little bit helps! I also kind of liked the evacuation scenes too, especially how Monarch soldiers tried to save people even when Rodan was flying by and when they had to crash an osprey into the Argo. The main Monarch crew really showed a lot of competence in this movie (with a few exceptions like not being able to fix the torpedo launchers)
Last edited by GuardianGhido on Thu Jun 13, 2019 6:31 am, edited 3 times in total.
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Re: KOTM: The Positives

Post by AtomicMorningBreath »

Relair wrote:The positives: almost everything? It was fantastic. Pure classic Godzilla goodness. Replace all the actors with japanese actors and slap a Toho logo at the beginning and it wouldn't have looked out of place one bit compared to showa/heisei stuff. It was absurd and ridiculous and absolutely glorious. The soundtrack was brilliant, gave me chills many times! The monsters were all done justice, they looked as good as I could have ever hoped for and had great personality. The battles were intense and numerous, hell I even liked the human stuff for the most part. It was the kind of classic human fluff Godzilla movies almost always have: scientists and/or military looking at monitors and fretting about what to do, mostly ineffective military combating the monsters sprinkled in with a doomsday weapon that will 'definitely kill them!', a heroic sacrifice, a touching moment or two. The tried and true formula.

Dougherty is a true fan, and the love definitely showed through almost every scene.
Great way to put it! As much as I like G14, KOTM felt a lot more like a Godzilla movie.
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Re: KOTM: The Positives

Post by Tyrant_Lizard_King »

Rodan's emergence scene and none of characters bored me. Outside of that I don't really have anything. I really need to try and see it again. I still haven't been able to form a solid opinion. Oh and Ghidorah regenerating his head like an actual hydra. That's something I've always wanted to see.
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Re: KOTM: The Positives

Post by GuardianGhido »

Since the new topic got locked, I'll post what I was gonna post there in here instead:

One thing I really liked was that they made a heroic Godzilla without making it overly cheesy and still kept the possibility of him attacking humans open. Godzilla as a guardian deity in charge of keeping the balance of the natural order undisturbed is one of my favorite iterations of him. Plus I also love how he's literally King of the monsters and in charge of all the inhabitants of Earth basically. Giving him so much authority and responsibility feels like a really cool take on the radioactive beast we all know and love. Puts the God in Godzilla without making him lovecraftian like Shin or a God of Destruction like Earth. This one's a benevolent king and guardian of nature but he does not tolerate rebellion and will probably kick our butts if we start harming nature to the point where he notices (The Titans heal the earth much faster than we damage it, so our pollution and stuff is beneath his notice for now)
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Re: KOTM: The Positives

Post by Gojira18 »

+ Visual effects were really good
+ 10/10 musical score
+ The monster scenes and action was amazing
+ The updated designs for all 4 classic kaiju were amazing, particularly Ghidorah
+ The characters were much more interesting than in 2014, with actual character arcs
+ Overall solid acting, with Chandler, Watanabe, MBB, and Dance being the highlights
+ Was very entertaining, never got bored with it
+ The new monsters were really cool
+ Loved the personalities given to each monster, mainly Ghidorah
+ Loved all the little Easter eggs and references to previous Godzilla films
+ Loved the ancient rivalry feel between Godzilla and Ghidorah
+ Most of the cinematography, I really liked
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Re: KOTM: The Positives

Post by Dv-218 »

1) The sheer scale of it all. Each time the Titans are on screen they feel as huge, majestic and godly as possible. The movie absolutely nails their nature, and clearly establishes these are not just some random animals. It truly embraces the nature of the kaiju.

2) The designs for the big 4 were perfect, got nothing to say here. Each one of the creatures was updated in a near ideal manner, and their designs felt both recognizeable yet fresh and new.

3) Cinematogrophy. Now, it wasn't perfect and most of the qualms regarding it have already been voiced, but when it does it right god bloody hell does it do it right. The movie produced some of the most memorable and iconic shots I have recently seen in a Godzilla movie- Ghidorah and Godzilla squaring off in Antarctica, Rodan emerging from the volcano, Ghidorah's call, Mothra's emerging and of course, Godzilla's rebirth. Each one of those shots feels absolutely breathtaking to behold.

4) The monster fights, although not always constant, were badass. The scale, the amount of tooth and claw meele clashes, the destruction and the stakes made for very entertaining and rewatchable fighting scenes.

5) Although the writing isn't perfect and certain motivations were unclear, the main character cast as a whole was much more interesting to watch than G14. Most of the humor was either minor or just harmless, and emotion was relatively strong when it was present. Serizawa was definitely a highlight, and his sacrifice coupled with the powerful soundtrack was one of the film's strongest moments.

6) The worldbuilding. This movie truly takes the Monsterverse into it's more grander phase, and the sheer amount of backstory it has is rather impressive. The idea of Titans affecting the world's mythologies during ancient history, and the idea of a long-lost civilization that managed to find a way of coexisting are incredibely intriguing imo.

7) Setpieces. Although the movie suffers from fast and sometimes rushed location jumping, the new location designs themselves were great and really helped to shape up the atmosphere. The sunken ancient city is my favorite.

8) The characterization of each Titan. From Godzilla's regal and powerful but also dangerous presence, Rodan's fiery and aggresive tendencies, Mothra's calm and graceful nature and Ghidorah's sheer demonic villainy, each one of the monsters stood out as a character on his own right.

9) Although they appeared for a short time, the new Titans had some rather cool designs.

10) Finally, the soundtrack- which I honestly can't praise enough. The adapted old themes, the new motifs, the energy and the sheer essence it brings to each scene were a true delight to listen to on the big screen. McCreary for GvK please.

Overall, while it was far from a flawless movie, I found it to be immensily entertaining, rewatchable and a worthy addition to the franchise's catalogue :)
Last edited by Dv-218 on Mon Jul 22, 2019 5:39 am, edited 2 times in total.

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Re: KOTM: The Positives

Post by Gojira18 »

Dv-218 wrote:1) The sheer scale of it all. Each time the Titans are on screen they feel as huge, majestic and godly as possible. The movie absolutely nails their nature, and clearly establishes these are not just some random animals. It truly embraces the nature of the kaiju.

2) The designs for the big 4 were perfect, got nothing to say here. Each one of the creatures was updated in a near ideal manner, and their designs felt both recognizeable yet fresh and new.

3) Cinematogrophy. Now, it wasn't perfect and most of the qualms regarding it have already been voiced, but when it does it right god bloody hell does it do it right. The movie produced some of the most memorable and iconic shots I have recently seen in a Godzilla movie- Ghidorah and Godzilla squaring off in Antarctica, Rodan emerging from the volcano, Ghidorah's call, Mothra's emerging and of course, Godzilla's rebirth. Each one of those shots feels absolutely breathtaking to behold.

4) The monster fights, although not always constant, were badass. The scale, the amount of tooth and claw meele clashes, the destruction and the stakes made for very entertaining and rewatchable fighting scenes.

5) Although the writing isn't perfect and certain motivations were unclear, the main character cast as a whole was much more interesting to watch than G14. Most of the humor was either minor or just harmless, and emotion was relatively strong when it was present. Serizawa was definitely a highlight, and his sacrifice coupled with the powerful soundtrack was one of the film's strongest moments.

6) The worldbuilding. This movie truly takes the Monsterverse into it's more grander phase, and the sheer amount of backstory it has is rather impressive. The idea of Titans affecting the world's mythologies during ancient history, and the idea of a long-lost civilization that managed to find a way of coexisting are incredibely intriguing imo.

7) Setpieces. Atlhough the movie suffers from fast and sometimes rushed location jumping, the new location designs themselves were great and really helped to shape up the atmosphere. The sunken ancient city is my favorite.

8) The characterization of each Titan. From Godzilla's regal and powerful but also dangerous presence, Rodan's fiery and aggresive tendencies, Mothra's calm and graceful nature and Ghidorah's sheer demonic villainy, each one of the monsters stood out as a character on his own right.

9) Although they appeared for a short time, the new Titans had some rather cool designs.

10) Finally, the soundtrack- which I honestly can't praise enough. The adapted old themes, the new motifs, the energy and the sheer essence it brings to each scene were a true delight to listen to on the big screen. McCreary for GvK please.

Overall, while it was far from a flawless movie, I found it to be immensily entertaining, rewatchable and a worthy addition to the franchise's catalogue :)
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Re: KOTM: The Positives

Post by GojiDog »

Most everything has been stated already, so I don't have much to add.

But I will say that my two favorite aspects of the film were the music (Thank you Bear!) and the monsters!
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