Part 2: Godzilla's Anime Trilogy - Attack On Titan On PCP - Transcript Version

 

By Joe Gibson

 

The following is the second part of the transcript of a recent video on Plan9Crunch’s YouTube page that you can watch here: Godzilla's Anime Trilogy: Attack On Titan On PCP

Previously, we covered the first film in the trilogy, describing its similarities to the first few arcs of Attack On Titan (which you can find here: Plan 9 Crunch: All About Cult Films: Godzilla’s Anime Trilogy: Attack On Titan On PCP, Part One),. This entire project will spoil AOT and the anime trilogy quite heavily. Make sure to watch those first or proceed with the utmost caution and discretion. At the end of the first film, after they kill the average size Godzilla Filius, an absurdly large specimen called Godzilla Earth showed up.

 

All in all, this moment of false confidence from Haruo constitutes the first couple episodes of Eren’s first battle in Trost in terms of challenging his confidence leading his comrades into battle. But whereas those episodes used that opportunity to flesh out Armin, Mikasa and Jean Kirstein, Haruo gets rescued by one of the humanoids that watching them earlier, a young girl with buglike antennae, and we will focus again on his perspective as he finally starts to have an arc in Godzilla: City On The Edge Of Battle, but right now I’m going to call it–

 

GODZILLA: Cigarettes On The Edge Of Battle

Okay, we are now reaching the section of this essay where I have to go beyond the first film, and that also means spoiling more parts of Attack On Titan. If you are so inclined to proceed, I would encourage you to find this trilogy and AOT whether in print or animation. The trilogy is on Netflix, and Hulu has Attack on Titan. Okay so in Attack on Titan, something very interesting happens in the Battle of Trost, and this is a spoiler for the first season but in the marketing of every subsequent one: Eren somehow becomes a 16 meter tall intelligent Titan. In order to destroy that which he hates, Eren literally becomes it. I’m going to be a lot lighter on the AOT spoilers from here on out, because I want you all to watch it, but when, at the end of the season, Armin tells Eren that in order to defeat monsters, they have to let go out of their humanity, that is built into the stakes of the show. That statement from Armin comes back in every major plot point after, and that is the question City On The Edge Of Battle tries to explore through its 100 minute runtime: is it worth it to defeat your enemy if the cost is your humanity?

 

Okay so you already know two of the titles by which to refer to this film. Well let’s add a third. The direct translation is GODZILLA: Battle Mobile Proliferation City.

 

Okay so the film opens with the central committee offering a bit of foreshadowing on the Aratrum. Meant as an “oh crap” moment, they ascertain that anything on the scale of the 300 meter Godzilla Earth could destroy their mothership by shooting its beam into the sky at them. There will be no payoff for that in this film, and it won't even be Godzilla that destroys the ship, but the purpose of the scene is clear. Plot twist that jeopardizes the perceived safety of their enclosure that the characters are reacting to with reasonable fear.

 

This is the “the damage at Stohess district reveals there are Titans inside of the walls” moment, in other words. And I want to take a brief moment to again talk about how the action adventure show handles foreshadowing for plot twists as opposed to the melodramatic philosophy lecture.

 

I told you Eren is a Titan. Well, a couple episodes before the reveal, you see actual evidence of this. When he gets injured, his head steams to heal, a trait unique to Titans. It is a very subtle thing but lays the groundwork for the first major plot twist of the show. To solve its mysteries, you have to take note of what cuisine and technology our heroes have and what our villains have. Some plot points are as obvious as Metphies’ manipulations, but we see those characters acting in ways that the reveal contextualizes not, as this trilogy did, one of our first scenes of Metphies being him and a Bilusaludo member both casually admitting to each other that they both tried to take over the Earth before and are manipulating things to take the coalition back there.

 

Again, the point of this essay is not how AOT is the only way to tell this story. Different approaches work. NBC's Grimm has a surprising amount of plot points and arcs in common with AOT, but it plays those out in its own unique way. This trilogy just oozes of pretension when the runtime gives us more quiet moments to solve its mysteries, and they are easier.

 

Alright I should clarify the point I made a few paragraphs ago about how the chain of command should have prevented Haruo from taking control even though you can chart a chain linking Leland then Metphies then Haruo. For one thing, Yuko is directly Haruo's superior on this mission and has to give him a power suit later, but she wasn't the one to free him. That was Metphies against the orders of Leland who was still alive at that point. And then he is risking not only his company's materials and soldiers but other companies, and Belu-be, Galu-gu and Martin have all been able to move more freely on this mission than Haruo and at least have comparable power to Metphies when he was advising Leland earlier. Though they are friendly with Haruo, as I pointed out, the film was more concerned with showing the technological means of transmission for his message reaching all of them and less so about his charisma to convince them. After his speech, I guess I have to take for granted that he can convince them to go on the same mission that just killed Leland, but the film didn't show us why they would go along with it. They just do and for some reason don't take any of the available outs to discredit him that they have. The reason I bring this up is again that scene about the Aratrum that opens this movie.

 

Even though their literal captain is giving them the order to stay in Earth's orbit under risk of Godzilla beam, they have different privileges, responsibilities and expertise in their sectors so they argue because it is a matter of operational security. Since it concerns probabilities of landing team survival, the Exif delegate gets a say. Since it concerns physical vessels, the Bilusaludo have a say. And it's just really interesting that the conversion that should have been happening about Haruo's death march is happening based on a hypothetical about Godzilla's beam being capable of reaching their altitude.

 

The title card uses the imagery of replicating nanometal twisting to form the title, and the movie will utilize the nanometal in a way that ties into my PCP analysis so just keep that in mind.

 

Haruo wakes up, his maladies treated and skin covered in a fine powder. Now, this powder over his skin, some very sacred scales, is actually going to effectively grant him immunity from some of the other physical ailments that will lead to reduced respiration, reduced blood pressure and coma in the other characters. And why I find that important to note here is that it is an angelic dust granting Haruo immunity, an immunity that will amount to invulnerability that empowers him to use violence and anger to singlehandedly reverse the status quo. The whole PCP aspect of this is technically ‘Begging The Question’ in order to actually have a platform to talk about the storytelling of the trilogy, but you must admit this is the most apt comparison so far.

 

It takes only like 10 minutes for Haruo to reunite with the crew from the last film, and it does so in a way that removes so much of the tension that could have been there. We see a Houtua girl tending to Haruo’s wounds, and another identical one attacks Yuko, Adam, Marco and Belu-be, but the film makes it pretty clear almost immediately that they are two separate people, never allowing us as the audience to worry what she might do to Haruo if she is that hostile to the other humans. At the same time, after the Houtua people take our human survivors into custody, we almost immediately see that Martin is there, and he confirms that Metphies is not there (but says so in a way that implies he is still alive), and Belu-be and Galu-gu reunite. Not only are we confirming so soon that every main character survived, but we are literally just biding time until the Bilusaludo realize what the Houtua use for their arrowheads.

 

I do not want to be impossible to please. Yuko is finally being treated as a main character, even a leader among her group at the beginning of the film, and this film will show us friction in this coalition as the Bilusaludo have their own goals independent of the humans. Haruo is allowed to show more than one emotion, and this is the beginning of an arc he will have though it is against the way he was characterized. He genuinely believed that Godzilla robbed all of the attributes that made them human, but when he defeats them again, he is fine. Sorry I’m complaining again. This Haruo is a lot more pleasant to watch even if it took literal angel dust to get here.

 

 

Martin puts together that the people with antennae living in tunnels in the ground evolved from bugs, and the Bilusaludo expose their technologically based racism against the Houtua, all while the people still ultimately look to Haruo and accept it when he decides to go fight Godzilla again. Specifically, the old Haruo returns when he gets angry about the Bilusaludo casually talking about slaughtering the Houtua, and a flashback to Metphies reminds Haruo he should be angry at Godzilla.

 

A question I have to ask myself in this process is “how often can I just keep pointing to the same narrative confusion, the same detachment and violent tendencies from characters, sometimes the exact same dialogue, as unique talking points for this PCP comparison?” Well, the rage transfers from Haruo to Yuko for a good bit of this movie while she gets jealous about the attention and care Haruo seems to have for the twin Houtua girls Maina and Miana, the angry one and kind one respectively. This means that PCP-induced rage is an aspect of the trilogy, not just Haruo.

 

Martin’s exposition teaches us that the Houtua communicate psychically when the twins channel the Mothra egg’s power and that the Houtua, though seemingly primitive, have a rich culture. He has even also learned that Godzilla Filius was a subspecies and that the entire surface is mimicking Godzilla. Logic be damned, Martin will always be right because he is a mechanism in this story. I find the approach taken with Hange more suitable: someone who obsessively spearheads the search for truth because of the odd kind of person they are not for what the story can make them say.

 

At some point, I need to mention that during the initial landing of this Earth advance team, they had to drop some bombs to land, and the Houtua understood this to be terrorism on their home. Haruo earnestly tries to explain otherwise, and I think that is the actual reason his character needed to be more even tempered in these scenes. It’s the prequel Anakin Skywalker effect. A smart and empathetic woman like Padme is not going to fall for the emotionally stunted, genocidal fascist like Anakin unless he is really, really nice to her. Even so, our heroes suffer no consequences, and neither Houtua nor human/Bilusaludo blood is spilt. Now, obviously the lesson here is to be more like the Houtua, but this is a very shallow exploration of these actions in such a talky show. You may not have seen AOT, but you’ve probably seen Kong Skull Island, which used the Vietnam War as the lens through which to analyze the journey to Skull Island instead of colonialism, and the bombs they drop at the beginning are the first tangible effect of the violence that the film interrogates and punishes as its theme.

 

Now, Marco does confront Haruo about wanting to fight Godzilla again, but that conflict is pushed aside to favor the aforementioned resentment of the twins from Yuko, and that leads to worm-type Servum using their tentacles to pull her legs apart and then trying to ambush her. Since the filmmakers refused to give Yuko characterization in the previous film and are now borrowing objectifying imagery in having her be preyed upon when Haruo was not when he was in this area earlier…it puts a bad taste in my mouth. Even this escapade, Yuko’s biggest moment so far only exists so that we can see Galu-gu realize that the Houtua’s arrowheads are made of nanometal, and then Metphies does a Deus ex machina to save the characters from some flying type Servum. 

 

Earlier, we saw Haruo question himself again and cry out for Metphies, which shows the hold this Exif has over him. I actually cannot complain too much about this. I think the very simple and subtle way of showing that Haruo’s sense of self-worth and justice ties back to Metphies does the legwork of the foreshadowing here. As you will find out whenever I get around to reviewing Gamera Rebirth, I really appreciate foreshadowing that subtly reveals character dynamics through their relationships to each other. I guess that means Seshita does too. As you’ll see though, liking Metphies and Haruo a lot more in this movie is not going to affect my overall assessment of this film’s conflict and themes.

 

The argument aboard the Aratrum between the committee members representing the Bilusaludo and Exif sets the tone for the rest of the film. The Bilusaludo look to technology, and the Exif use their mysterious God to make decisions. When Metphies tells Haruo of the committee’s plan to leave the solar system, Belu-be and Galu-gu come up next to them, and Haruo is framed between the two delegations. After the Bilusaludo tell Haruo they can win using the nanometal, he addresses the survivors of their mission. Once again, Marco speaks out of turn, and Haruo invites Belu-be and Galu-gu to explain the nanometal. Haruo’s moment of asking the remaining men if they want to stay but not blaming if they do not is something Erwin did in Attack on Titan, but Haruo steeps it with his thoughts on living in the ship, which can best be described by how Eren regarded living in the walls, living like cattle.

 

Now, are we meant to assume that seeing Leland’s sacrifice and being influenced by Belu-be as well as Metphies has led Haruo to mature, or should we assume that this dialogue and plot point was the starting point and Haruo was the easiest for the narrative to make say these words? I am clearly arguing for the latter perspective, but if you believe the former, we can have that debate at a later time.

 

The scene of the surviving cadets choosing to join Erwin’s Scout regiment was a very emotionally impactful scene because while we always knew our main trio was going to stay, the characterization of Jean throughout the last dozen episodes leads to a very difficult decision to stay and fight and avenge the people he has lost. There’s not really a moment like that here. Haruo was always going to stay and fight, Yuko was always to stay with Haruo, and Metphies needs to manipulate Haruo, with the Bilusaludo spearheading this part of the mission. Martin was always going to keep studying the planet’s curiosities, and Marco…was always going to leave because the story was never interested in exploring dissidence in Haruo's leadership outside of bastardizing the Bilusaludo in this film and the Exif in the next.

 

Martin, as the primary tool for exposition, explains monster factors in changing the florafauna and that Earth seemingly has restructured to serve Godzilla’s needs as if it chose him. Haruo already viewed his mission as taking the Earth back from Godzilla, and this justifies his perspective on that, inflating the self-importance of this mission. He defensively declares that they will have to take the Earth back. This also plants the seed for Haruo that humans should liberate Earth from this state and not accept that kind of control over the Earth coming from anyone other than them. You should keep this in mind when the characters then stumble on a city made entirely from the nanometal in Mechagodzilla’s carcass that spreads and consumes a few Servum. The Houtua twins warn Haruo that Mechagodzilla City is poison, but, since they use nanometal in their tools and technology, we can understand this warning to be of the same caliber as “hey be careful if you walk into an oil refinery, and just make sure to be safe around the product.” 

 

 

The nanometal’s AI explicitly serves the directive of fighting Godzilla, and the nanometal has reproduced Mechagodzilla’s production plant at a larger scale. And a Giant Mechagodzilla is on the poster, lording over even Godzilla so you would be forgiven for thinking that the nanometal will form a giant Mechagodzilla. The characters just handwave that aside immediately and end up augmenting the power suits into flying Vulture Mechs. For what it is worth, Metphies is the final person to speak against rebuilding Mechagodzilla, but Galu-gu this whole time was talking of other projects. The city itself becomes the very specific terrain needed for Haruo’s Godzilla Defeat strategy, and, though I think the film is only kind of aware of it, there is a very clear parallel between Haruo and the nanometal AI. 

 

Both operate mainly under the goal of defeating Godzilla, and both push aside ideas like Mechagodzilla to favor one singular ideal strategy. Consequently, unless we are drawing these similarities to their logical conclusion, the Bilusaludo created AI should have made another Mechagodzilla. That would have made more sense. The idea is supposed to be that the Bilusaludo will try to tempt Haruo into merging with the nanometal and becoming a monster by showing that the nanometal will be the only way to defeat Godzilla and the only conscious agent that cares as much about doing that as Haruo does, but already he is a synergy with the nanometal that Galu-gu, passionate creator of Mechagodzilla, isn’t.

 

As the movie develops, more and more Bilusaludo allow themselves to join with the nanometal, and this shapes the vague ‘destroy Godzilla directive’ into a more well-defined misanthropic worldview of submission. If you are familiar with Attack on Titan, you might know what comparison this naturally brings, and it is a pretty spoilery one. So I will put this in simple terms. Of the intelligent Titans, one is near omnipotent, however it comes with a certain mindset, almost a hive mind of all of the holders of this power. The arc in question is also the one that broke down Eren’s philosophy, making him question if his mission truly was the best one. And so for that to happen to Haruo now when the nanometal is on his same page makes more sense if they started with AOT and then extrapolated outward.

 

Metphies asks the Bilusaludo for the ability to repair his religious artifact, and Yuko practices flying in a Vulture. The former will diverge from the Bilusaludo’s intentions, and the latter will actually embrace them. First, however, Yuko reassures Haruo after he voices his insecurities, though it does not exactly work. Right after the film first alludes to it, Martin explains that the Houtua’s treatment and scales has made those treated with it functionally allergic to Mechagodzilla City, and so Haruo, who is suffering those symptoms, leaves the City briefly to ask advice from Metphies. Metphies spoonfeeds Haruo the author’s assessment of the nanometal as monstrous and parasitic, and then whispers the name “Ghidorah” into Haruo’s ear as the name of the Exif world’s monster. Now, when this scene was in the trailers, because of the art style and the way the camera pulls back, a lot of people thought Metphies was kissing Haruo. In the very next scene, Yuko kisses Haruo after his ego is sufficiently inflated to declare that they need to defeat Godzilla, will defeat Godzilla and that he will show Yuko what being on Earth was like. Checking back in on the PCP symptoms, yes that is the sense of invulnerability but also the allergy to the nanonmetal could be interpreted as nausea and dizziness depending on how you view Haruo clutching his chest and stomach. This is only the second Godzilla film to include two main characters kissing, and the first was Invasion of Astro-Monster. It’d be really funny if the next film jumped to a different milestone and featured the first sex scene in the franchise with just one of these characters and not both, but there’s no way that can happen right?

 

So Godzilla wakes up an hour into this movie. And when he finally starts moving, a single step takes over 7 seconds. That might contextualize what I mean about lethargy being a major motif on his end. 

 

Anyway, Adam informs Haruo that the City is eating some Bilusaludians, and all of the humans in the room instantly think this is too far even though it is a volunteer thing. Yuko, who overhears only part of this, wanders in and defends the practice. Having Haruo and Martin, the POV character and exposition machine respectively, both oppose it kind of poisons the well and takes out the suspense. Haruo is not even considering joining the nanometal now even though it flows so easily from his wants, and the way you write a suspenseful climactic decision is to make either choice seem possible based on cause and effect, think Luke’s temptation to the dark side in Star Wars episode 6, the suspense is there because of his struggle and the fact that his dark clothing and force choke usages suggests to us a level of compromise between light and dark. The only reason Haruo gets into the third Vulture for this final campaign is to resolve morale after the argument. It’s really taking the teeth out of the film’s central question to have the answer so clear not only to the audience but also the major characters aside from Yuko who spoilers will choose to regret her opinion.

 

 

The battle reenacts last film’s climax, but this time Godzilla Earth can weather the attack because he is a lot stronger than his offshoot. This manifests as Godzilla attaining a Scarlet Mode that somewhat references Burning Godzilla from the 90s films, and Martin explains this. At least this time, it makes sense to explain to people why they must evacuate, unlike his rants earlier and later. Martin leads the remaining humans away, while the Bilusaludo merge with the nanometal, and Galu-gu holds out hope that Harou will join them. Scarlet Godzilla is too hot for the Vulture pilots to approach, and since only the human inside is susceptible to heat, Galu-gu starts to fuse the pilots to the nanometal. Being rubbed with the scales earlier allows Haruo to resist, but Yuko loses control of her craft until Haruo can save her.

 

Still, this is where Haruo realizes that it is not worth it to become a monster just to defeat one. His options are fusing with the nanometal to be able to kamikaze run into Godzilla and destroy him or follow Metphies’ advice to destroy Galu-gu and the City control center. Though I have voiced major criticism with the arc, this is Haruo’s arc in the movie, and it should make the next movie’s conflict impossible based on Haruo choosing his humanity, but we’ll get there. He does agonize over it in the moment though. Changes in body awareness is one of the weird psychoactive properties of PCP use that is hard to fit into any reading of media except insofar as merging with the nanometal changes the boundaries of your body and mind. That is all that we can use to describe that here really. Oh, and Yuko winds up in a nanometal induced coma, another side effect of PCP that we have not gotten to yet. This movie gives us a bingo.

 

The morality has also shifted in a notable way. For probably the first time in this series, we are meant to view Godzilla destroying a City as the lesser of two evils. While Godzilla was explicitly evil in the first film of the trilogy, he is a more amoral figure in the latter two. That is why it is so interesting to compare it to Attack on Titan. Armin, the wisest of the main trio, tells Eren that they have to let go of their humanity to defeat the Titans, and boy does Eren listen? But the point is that there is likely a point where you will stop agreeing with Eren. According to this film and most that try to tackle the problem of losing humanity to defeat an inhuman threat, that point is at the adoption of the belief not its fruits. But it doesn’t have to be that way.

 

In the kaiju genre as a whole, the audience has a certain level of detachment that allows them to condone certain operations. It is not just that it is an underdog military going up against an inhuman threat, though that certainly helps, but the audience also can quickly accept and move on from a plot point wherein the government severely raises taxes to build an anti-Godzilla mech that promptly gets destroyed. In the real world, there would be outrage for that. Not so for the kaiju audience. One question Attack on Titan asks you is how much will you reconsider the blank check you grant the heroes striking back at their Titan oppressors when there is a civilian cost or when they are using those same tactics against humans? Unlike this trilogy, where you are watching a rudimentary morality play, your introspection is part of the conversation within Attack on Titan.

 

That will be all for this upload. We will cover the third film at a later date. In the meantime, please watch Attack on Titan and the anime trilogy so that I have not spoiled everything for you.