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By Joe Gibson
The following is the
second and final part of my review and literary criticism of Godzilla vs Megaguirus.
(Here is part one: Plan
9 Crunch: All About Cult Films: Transcript Version - Godzilla Vs Megaguirus:
Strengths, Stupidities, And Sophistry PART ONE). If you would prefer to
watch this essay, here is the link to the YouTube upload Godzilla vs
Megaguirus: Strengths, Stupidities and Sophistry. If you are stumbling
on this without the context of either the first part on the blog or the full
video, this part will pick up discussing Kiriko Tsujimori’s standout scene climbing
on Godzilla’s back, but you really should look at the setup I described for
getting to this point so you can understand my analysis getting to this moment.
The G-Graspers take
samples of the felled Meganula, and Godzilla approaches the raft where Tsujimori
and Okamura are. Tsujimori relocates Okamura back to the ship and puts on her
protective gear in the same manner with the same confidence as she puts on her
sunglasses. She swims over to Godzilla, the being that terrified her before she
lost her commanding officer, and she clings to his back even though the
radiation exposure registers on her suit. She shoots the micro transmitter into
Godzilla and jumps off into the ocean, so that they can track him without using
his energy. Finally, she calls him a lizard just as her CO did.
That scene is, for many,
a stand out moment in the entire Godzilla franchise, but I seldom hear
discussion about how this is evidence that she is acting as her commanding
officer in this, her coolest moment. He died trying to get her to safety, with
a strategic retreat, when she was so scared of Godzilla that she was not
thinking rationally. Now, she swiftly and decisively removes her subordinate
from danger, fearlessly climbs on Godzilla’s back and pushes herself to make
sure this retreat is not a total loss by planting the tracker and escaping to
curse the lizard once more. In that regard, she has surpassed her CO, but the
question is if she realizes that. Another question would be if she was only
able to do so because of her superior technology or her discipline.
Now comes the
introduction of a scientist to explain what the child already told us and the
film already showed us about the Meganulon life cycle, and this is another
example of the film’s odd exposition habits. As a small SGS searches through
the flooded Shibuya for Meganulon eggs and finds many, Tsujimori’s composure
betrays her, and this makes sense as she is currently not wearing the
sunglasses and in a deferential mood to Kudo, who designed the small SGS, and
the other experts in the room. She might also have realized just how severe
Jun’s mistake was, and she perhaps relates that back to her own mistake long
ago. Sugiura plays with a chessboard, and this is the only bit of foreshadowing
as to his later heel turn. Next, sans sunglasses but in more formal military
wear, she explains the operation to lure Godzilla to Kiganjima island to shoot
him with Dimension Tide, and she appeals to the next generation and children,
indicating she is likely still thinking of Jun. Sugiura assures their backers
that this plan will work.
Yoshizawa confronts
Sugiura on his assurance to the government that Dimension Tide was ready before
any tests, and Tsujimori, in full Major attire including a hat, takes Sugiura’s
side but does so politely (so Yoshizawa has only kind words for Tsujimori).
During the operation, there is another moment where a sunglasses-less Kiriko
looks at Godzilla with fear but then steels herself, marking a change from
Kiriko to Major Tsujimori in the operation. At the same time, the Meganula
theme begins to play in all of its glory as soldiers floating in Shibuya try to
shoot down as many Meganulon as they can before they mature. That is certainly
a sentence. The CGI is noticeably bad, but the music augments this scene in a
very important way.
When Godzilla finally
arrives at the island, his suit finally shows the brighter green pigment it is
known for, but very quickly, he is swarmed by dragonflies, so the contrast may
be the intent there. It makes sense that the Meganula would follow him here;
they found him before, and there are too many of them for him to kill before
they can take some of his energy. During all of this, the Dimension Tide is on
a timer, and Sugiura insists that they must proceed with the strike even if the
bugs are there.
After Godzilla kills most
of the Meganula, the strike fires on Godzilla, and Sugiura smiles prematurely.
The strike merely displaced Godzilla, either sending him backward or possibly
burying him (which will become important next time they fire the Dimension
Tide). Godzilla contemplates going after the Meganula, then turns around to
glare at Tsujimori and then starts heading to the National Chemistry Institute
in Shibuya, which we learn from Sugiura on a phone call as he knocks all of the
pieces off his chess board.
The Meganula return their
stolen energy to their queen and die, but we do not have time to think about
that as Tsujimori and Kudo argue. Though lacking the physical markers of the
change, Tsujimori switches from aggressive to meekly apologetic in a very pronounced
manner. Back in Shibuya, Megaguirus’ magnetic powers cause the technology to
malfunction, and she bursts out of the water with her iconic design consisting
of a reptilian face, tail with a stinger and rapid CGI wings. I like Megaguirus
a lot, and I also think her parts of the film are the most unscathed from plot
contrivance. It just takes a bit to explain her powerset as I have not
adequately done in the past. Her flight causes sonic booms and uncomfortable
vibrations in the human ear, and now she can harness Godzilla’s energy. In the
past, she was merely fast, strong and territorial. So is Godzilla though, as he
is still on his way to Japan. In a brief cameo appearance, we see Jun trying to
evacuate with the crowd.
Tsujimori finally asks
Sugiura why Godzilla is attacking, recapping that it was definitely plasma
energy that summoned Godzilla in 1996 and that Japan no longer produces energy.
Again, I think that means that the Griffon jet and other advanced technology
cannot be plasma powered because that would mean that somewhere else is
producing the plasma power and not getting attacked if the contained plasma
plant within the Science Institute is enough to summon Godzilla now of all
times.
Megaguirus interrupts the
Griffon’s battle with Godzilla, and this battle theme is another highlight of
the movie’s soundtrack. This review will not replace the experience of watching
the film, and to prove that point, I will not recap the choreography here. I
like this fight a lot and think it shows off the fighting styles of the kaiju
involved very well. Despite being so climactic, it technically plays out almost
as a cul-de-sac in the film.
I will say that as payoff
to Megaguirus affecting technology before, she affects the G-Graspers’ tech
including Dimension Tide now. In this scene where Tsujimori’s eyes are not
covered, she looks more vulnerable than the rest of her team, and this corresponds
to the raising stakes. When Kudo returns to the base after his injuries
sustained from Megaguirus, Tsujimori shows concern, until he calls her out on
it, and she resumes a gruffer mission-oriented demeanor. Throughout the film,
she shifts her attitudes very deliberately and constantly, and you’ll see why
it is important that I bring this up literally every time it happens in the
sophistry section of the essay.
The dispatch of
Megaguirus means that Godzilla can resume his rampage, and Tsujimori finally
admits they are helpless against Godzilla. This is an important but very, very
understated part of her arc in the film. As the Griffon becomes airworthy, it
convenes with Sugiura, who fled to the room and Yoshizawa, who followed him
there. Tsujimori, guard fully down, asks Sugiura very emotionally why Godzilla
is attacking the Science Institute, and here is the exposition that plasma
energy was explicitly banned but Sugiura is still using it anyway to generate
wealth and, implicitly, though again this contradicts a lot of the inferences
you have to make in the movie, fund and power the G-Graspers. Tsujimori accuses
Sugiura, finally blaming him for all of the people he sent to die fighting
Godzilla for the last 5 years.
Now is the most confusing
part of the movie. Her ideals having been broken down by the reveal that the
G-Graspers were founded on avoidable casualties and the Dimension Tide
literally falling out of the sky, she puts the helmet back on, steels her
demeanor again, has Dimension Tide lock on her in the middle of the capital
city and detonates Dimension Tide to take out Godzilla. This only somewhat
diminishes the strength of her character. The best analogy I can think of is
the 1976 King Kong and how it misses the mark for the most part but still
somehow has the best version of Jack Driscoll as Jack Prescott and the only
actually believable love story in the franchise, yet the wonky themes still
mischaracterize Jack briefly towards the end of the film. How can avenging her
CO in the most reckless way possible wearing insignias that exacerbated the
problem be the ideal way to end this story?
Well, that stumped me
before, but let’s draw to make sense of this. That is the point of this video
after all. The imagery is very similar to the later circumstances of Minus
One’s final charge, but I only bring that up for your benefit to understand this
scene better. Obviously, this film existed independent of Minus One for about
20 years, but nonetheless in the same manner as Shikishima putting Noriko’s
picture on the dashboard, she puts the dog tags, the symbol of her lost
commander in front of her, executes a kamikaze run and ejects her seat at just
the right moment to deal a critical blow to Godzilla. In this context, I wonder
if we can view this as the death of the split Tsujimori and the beginning of a
character free to live as she wants to. She immediately makes fun of Kudo for
his concern over her, so the reading also exists that the Kiriko part is what
died, but then the film shows us that she let her hair down finally, and she
stands on top of a building surveying the damage, quite literally where she was
before her CO died. In a bookend, she visits Kudo once more for help but with
her hair down and sunglasses off. They tease each other to close out the film,
though I have made the mistake in the past of implying there is not still a
dutiful formality to their interaction that muddles the romantic interest.
Of course, the real end
of the film is a post credits scene where Jun, at school trying to move on with
his life, hears Godzilla roar. Plot recaps indicate that Godzilla also emerges
from the ground similarly to how he did on the abandoned island, but I never
noticed that before, nor had I about it in the discourse of the film. The
building rattles, and we hear an explosion, and he reacts in shock as if
something happened. That’s what is actually in the film. I find it more
interesting if Godzilla is trapped in some other dimension able to imprint
ripples on the world still, but that is an idea popularized in the discourse
that I have already established overwrites certain aspects of the film.
Fittingly though, it is ambiguous and hard to tell exactly what it is trying to
say. All evidence in the film suggests however that if you do not destroy every
part of Godzilla decisively, he will come back very soon after.
(Partial) Conclusion
(Keep Reading For Sophistry Section)
There is a tension in
this review that may or may not be obvious to you at this time. I clearly like
the film a lot because I spent so much time embroiled in this, and yet, as I
indicated was a possibility, this review is far more negative than positive.
There is also an air of incompleteness, I am sure, as we have only talked about
the strengths and the stupidities, but I promised sophistry. Going into this
project, I assumed that the movie would be a 2 out 10, but with the strengths
in mind, as inconsistent as they are, I think the movie deserves a 3 out of 10
for including certain narrative short-hands that mitigate the problems without
really solving any of them. For context, again, I believe a 5 out of 10 film
would be perfectly balanced in strengths and stupidities and also would round
up to a good film, so it actually is a sizable victory that this film achieved
that extra point that takes it that much closer to being good.
One of the things
reviewing these films has taught me is that my opinion on and feelings about a
movie can be wholly separate to its actual quality, as best as I can determine
it. Though it is tragic and often frustrating when a piece of art does not live
up to its full potential, appreciating a film, respecting a film, and liking a
film can be about honoring it, including its lessened quality. Godzilla x Kong:
The New Empire is a 4 out 10 movie (maybe lower), but I love it for how close
it gets to crossing that threshold into being an actually good film. I do not
need to pretend that there are not systemic issues in the film to like it, but
also how much I like it and how much I care about appraising it fairly means I
also try not to invent problems with it to be able to share my assessments
without having to defend them. I like a lot of 4 out of 10 movies and will
argue that people oversimplify every score below a 7 out of 10 as simply bad
with no degree of nuance and thus no productive takeaway on what the successes
and failures present should teach us about writing stories. At the end of the
day, my argument is that if any film deserves respect, all do, and my opinion
is that I like certain movies a lot.
But Wait, There’s More?
More than even just
wanting to review it fairly, I now have a vested interest in trying to
formulate a schema where this movie makes sense. And technically speaking, at
least based on my forays into an English degree, that is generally where actual
literary criticism comes from as opposed to what I define as a review. The bias
that Hamlet should make sense and be cohesive is the point from which New
Criticism analyzes it according to every single plot point to conclude, in
opposition to authorial intent and audience consensus, that Hamlet has an
Oedipal Complex. There are aspects of this that are important to the kind of
reviews I like to write; authorial intent is not Word of God, the general
audience seldom is as clinical in their assessments as a review should be, and
the best stories have total cohesion and consistency across every plot point,
theme and character arc.
However, New Criticism is
an egotistical scam, allowing the Critics to write incredibly cryptically and
teach each other’s works to keep each other employed all while getting
increasingly self-important and pretentious about the role of the Critic as
they define it. Indeed, I like to say that every literary theory basically
serves to commodify tactics every audience member uses (whether consciously or
subconsciously) to advance the careers of whichever old white man got to coin
the term. As I see it, being a card-carrying practitioner of any of these
theories means you are respecting the theory and its progenitors over the art.
Similarly, someone that focuses on supplementary material (Word of God
statements in interviews or a commentary track) respects the author over the
art, and someone who reviews a film based predominantly on their own emotions
respects themselves more than the art. Though each of those has their place in
the discourse (and further, each of those aspects can and should appear in a
review), I believe the art deserves the most respect out of these options in a
true review.
However, to do what I am
about to do, I have to ignore the film’s narrative shortcomings, not actually
meeting the film where it is at and thus disrespecting it, because of my
respect for Tezuka’s later films using these archetypes, my subjective like of
this film and my participation in the institution of literary criticism. I will
write any kind of essay that I can, but I will call out when I am not living up
to the standard I hold for Reviews. So, for the Sophistry part of this essay,
allow me to attempt to convince you that this 3 out of 10 film is actually a 10
out of 10 through the esteemed scholarly practice of using big words and
abstract concepts as trickery to pretend a story I like is better than it is.
How This Movie Is
Actually The Best If You Ignore Everything Except Me Right Now But Including Me
Five Seconds Ago
So where to go about
rehabilitating this movie’s reputation? The first thing we need to do is accept
that everything needed to understand this story is in the film itself. In this
cohesive experience with a collaborative script, a prolific director (in the
Millennium series at least), some amount of studio meddling, and wildly
variable audience opinion, the one true objective view of this film cannot come
from any of those components, only the finished film itself. If the movie is
good, for it to be good, the things within it must all work together toward it
being good. Again, as I mentioned, good stories are cohesive, but cohesion is
defined by the film itself, so the organic unity of this film’s execution is
what legitimizes it.
We will ignore the
‘heresy of paraphrase’ for this exercise because that really only applies to
poetry, and a ‘review’ is necessarily a separate experience from a film itself.
Still, that is actually the main reason I did not describe the final battle, so
that a New Critic cannot accuse me of ignorance about the “heresy of
paraphrase.” Otherwise, I hope this to be an accurate depiction of the process
and outcome of New Criticism. The marriage of structure and meaning in New
Criticism means I cannot continue to complain about the exposition habits in
this movie but must figure out why they are the way they are. The elements of
form are also significant, as I have paired the soundtrack to the action as
Godzilla and the Meganula both have significant leitmotifs.
In New Criticism, we have
to be very stringent about what outside information we use. A notable allusion
to a previous work counts, and, in much the same vein that New Critics read
Hamlet and used his symptoms to justify bringing in a discussion about the
Oedipus complex, the objective correlative can only include an external concept
if you truly justify it. However, for the most part, the only thing that
matters right now is the film and the critic, so if you have any notes on the
director Masaaki Tezuka and his intentions, burn them now!
Or maybe don’t; you see,
this is where it gets a little difficult. New Critics have to be well read
scholars aware of major allusions in a text, as that becomes a narrative
shorthand to group together concepts. Tezuka’s name, naturally, appears in the
credits and thus within the film itself. Is that a notable enough allusion to
the primary creative of the world we are seeing to implicate him in its
creation? Even if that does not count, Tezuka actually plays a character in the
film: the teacher in the post credits scene. Tentatively, I would still say we
cannot discuss him without better reason, especially because his other films
came after this one, but I am open to contrary opinions in the comment section.
In any case, the allusions I made to Spider-Man 2, Godzilla Against
Mechagodzilla, Godzilla vs Biollante, and the Tell Tale Heart are all
irrelevant and have to be ignored in New Criticism of the film. More to the
point, my speculation that more of Godzilla 1954 is canon than we realize must
also disappear. The film never mentions the Oxygen Destroyer and only
juxtaposes rocket launcher guns to a black hole gun, so I do not have warrant
to read that into the text.
The goal of New Criticism
is to find the objective correlative that unites the film, the whole film and
nothing but the film so help you God, and I did some of that in the Strengths
and Stupidities segment in order to make this a little easier on both you and
me. The relationship between Tsujimori and her commanding officer is the focus
of her arc, as she takes on the role of him as a source of strength to
alleviate her guilt. Nothing says this explicitly in the film, but I walked you
through all the little moments that lead us there, thus proving, with every
scene in the film, that she is a well-rounded consistent character. I still
believe her character to be a great one, but it was ultimately circular logic,
and to do the task I set out to do, to use New Criticism on this movie, the
rational part of me that explains the trick of this sophistry will have to
leave you as abruptly as the Jun left the movie.
Since I eventually
settled on the themes of masculinity vs femininity in regards to understanding
her personality split, firing a gun to prove her strength at two notable
moments, and letting down her hair once she left her CO’s dog tags behind when
defeating Godzilla, I could maybe read in specific stories like Mulan or the
writings of Qiu Jin, but probably not. Even those still feel a little bit off
topic, and we have more stuff to explain with the objective correlative.
The expository habits in
the film are functional, bringing in foreshadowing directly when relevant and
abridging very important events for some reason. The revelations about plasma
technology feel like an afterthought, but character considerations are put in
the forefront, as we see the scenes introducing Tsujimori and Sugiura in full,
when they may have been better summarized, and even Yoshizawa’s truncated
backstory still informs aspects of her character, see how the stilted snapshot
nature of the flashback is likely how she allows herself to experience it. One
of the few plot devices that gets set-up many scenes ahead of its payoff is
Kudo’s Dimension Tide Operating System, first designed as a Nurse and then
after Tsujimori. This connects to how he tries to protect the feminine side of
Tsujimori in the gym and as a Chibi sprite, but, in both instances, she forces
out the “real” Tsujimori to shoot a gun very well. In that sense, the character
relation of the Dimension Tide to grief is more important to the film than the
presence of black holes in the equation, and the fact that Tsujimori can use
this endless grief for good even in reckless circumstances means that the
characters are primary to the theme as well.
Within this film, it
seems that the optimal morality in this film is a system wherein we judge
actions and plot points by their consequences, specifically the Godzilla
related ones. So, Godzilla-repelling ends justify the means. Society bans
nuclear energy because it attracts Godzilla; once plasma does the same, they
ban it as well. The emergence of Megaguirus uses material from the Meganula and
Godzilla, so even the Big Bad of the film can only become such with Godzilla
and his power within her. Before this, the child that carries her to Shibuya is
a sympathetic character; after, we do not see him in that same light, mainly
because he disappears from the movie. But what this means is that this
sympathetic aspect of the Meganula is gone after that point. The grown
Megaguirus is coded with the reptilian ferocity of Godzilla, not with the
childlike innocence of an egg. The flooding of Shibuya is not a holy baptism or
necessarily a yonic image but relates Megaguirus to Godzilla further as they
both rise out of the water. Also, the Meganula seek energy but only Godzilla’s,
making it reflective of him rather than continuing the motif of plasma
summoning monsters.
The averted fate of an
all-consuming Godzilla-caused nuclear meltdown juxtaposes the all-consuming
deluge of Shibuya, which juxtaposes the all-consuming nature of revenge and a
black hole gun, but the actions of Godzilla and of the power of Godzilla in the
Meganula are what is evil, and the actions that prevent Godzilla are good. This
is what the film shows us, and it remains entirely consistent to this theme, as
this understanding solely resolves the paradox of Tsujimori’s recklessness and
the ambiguity of Dimension Tide and the G-Graspers. Furthermore, Kudo’s
presence wholly augments the G-Graspers’ efforts, debatably being what redeems
them. The Dimension Tide can only work if he helps, the Godzilla tracker is his
invention, and he develops a mini version of the Search Godzilla System just in
time for it to help them with the Meganula infestation. Furthermore, his
automated chibi Nurse operating system takes on the visage of Tsujimori when it
fixes the problems with Dimension Tide, communicating that the union of Kudo
and Tsujimori is what can win against Godzilla in this movie.
Under the schema of New
Criticism, the horror imagery is more important. We are ignoring other kaiju
movies except for possibly Rodan (but it is safer not to even bring him in
anymore), and the Meganulon in this film stars in a suspenseful and gory scene
against a human couple in Shibuya, then the horde menaces Godzilla. In the
final battle, Megaguirus sneaks up on Godzilla several times, stabs him and
smiles wickedly, flying over the Griffon in the same kind of misdirect as the
two city workers that the Meganulon passed before striking the couple. It does
not matter that the director had no considerable horror experience; that is
actually preferred. The art speaks for itself, and this is a film with deep
horror elements.
The film’s confusing
morality, ambiguous storytelling and withholding of certain crucial information
until it is almost pointless to know also effectively puts the viewer further
on edge about the experience. I cannot invoke specific strains of horror, but I
can conclude by saying that this means that Godzilla vs Megaguirus, like a New
Critic’s poetry, is a work that you cannot just summarize, because it behaves
as its own experience, inspiring all sorts of different feelings to make its
own unapologetic whole. I started this essay off by explaining how Godzilla vs
Megaguirus is overwritten in popular discourse, and though I am showing disdain
for New Criticism while doing this, I think New Criticism gives us a schema for
how to visualize that, very effectively.
Thank you for getting this far in the essay; whether you found it through the blog or previously watched the YouTube version, it helps us all the same, and I hope this gives you a reason to revisit Godzilla vs Megaguirus, which you can stream for free on Tubi. If you do, I would ask you to do so without Godzilla 2000 in mind, without knowing that Misato Tanaka will actually play a nurse in Godzilla Against Mechagodzilla, a film that makes the plot points of this one seem more cohesive and without a tendency to overwrite the film's meaning...unless you find it more fun that way.
