The Godzilla Cringe Thread

[Legion1979]

All I can say is that this is why kids need to spend less time on the internet, especially cesspools like YouTube.

[gottatalktothefake]

We need to get the kids off the internet, I’ve been saying this for years, nothing good comes of it.

The man in the suit is a pretty run of the mill analog horror thing, which means it’s not very good. I personally don’t give a shit about it and am tired of hearing about the damn thing. It certainly isn’t worth bullying a teenager over.

Added in 9 minutes 8 seconds:

The Godzilla fandom: where a fan-made analog horror web series has been watched by more fans than 90% of the movies have.

Apparently the collective fandom was so mean to this guy he not only abruptly ended his YouTube series, he also tried to commit suicide. The entirety of the reddit Godzilla community are rapidly damning all Godzilla fans for being so evil and toxic. But as a rational, middle age adult, all I can think is, something isn't right about this. There more to this I tthink than dumbass kids bullying some random content creator.

And yeah it's asinine how clearly more "fans" care more about whatever this shit is than they do about actively seeking out and enjoying the actual movies. Most people on that preschool of a subreddit will not watch films if they can't stream or pirate them. (physical media is dead, guys) They also seem to hate everything that hasn't been made in the past 10 years. Most Showa threads are all variants of some brat begrudgingly admitting they like a certain film, even though we can all relax because this person knows all the rest of that era is campy, stupid crap. And their dumbass tier lists will prove it.

The Godzilla subreddit was great about eleven years ago, it was a tight nit group of fans. But it started going off the rails at around 10k subscribers. Now we are here, where the vast majority of the community is underage and the posts are just fucking garbage for the most part.

I checked the thread about the cancellation and it’s all Fnaf and other kiddy profile pics just posting reaction images. A far cry of what it used to be.

[miguelnuva]

Kids get bullied on the internet and off, even as a kid I was much safer on the internet then at school. Parents needs to spend more time talking to their kids and we as a whole need to get rid of the stigma that talking to doctors about mental health doesn't mean one is crazy or weak minded. We also need to tell people stop worrying so much about what others think on the internet and we all have different opinions.

That's why the fandom has lasted so long, Godzilla can put at a film like The New Empire and Minus One and we all can disagree and like them and still come together as a fandom at the end of the day.

[Legion1979]

One of the most recent posts up there right now is a photo of the Heisei Godzilla with an image of Handsome Squidward's face over it. That's the level of maturity and intelligence there.

[THECRAZEBLING]

I'm a firm believer that in the idea that analog horror, as long as it's executed well, has a right to exist as much as any form of media does. Doesn't mean you have to like or watch it, but what Unknowingly did was pretty good from what I watched of it. There was no excuse for the harassment he received whatsoever. And while it's pretty dumb to write off the ENTIRE Kaiju community as a bunch of toxic assholes, there is a strong belief that there is a troubling trend where people decide to flip a shit at any sort of content creator for what they presume to be "tone-deaf" or "disrespectful". Or any stupid reason for that matter.

[Mechagigan]

The Godzilla subreddit was great about eleven years ago, it was a tight nit group of fans. But it started going off the rails at around 10k subscribers. Now we are here, where the vast majority of the community is underage and the posts are just fucking garbage for the most part.

I checked the thread about the cancellation and it’s all Fnaf and other kiddy profile pics just posting reaction images. A far cry of what it used to be.

It's genuinely all fandom reddits - I think there's more children on the internet now, more than ever. Not to sound too rude or whatever but I find the Godzilla reddit just about pointless, at least to read or contribute to. Same for any other nerdy reddit I used to enjoy. The site's showing its age. I suppose it's good the younger crowd have a place to get together, but then again, that's how insanity like that Man in the Suit creepypasta meltdown gets started. General immaturity

I will say it's terrible he was literally harassed, that's ridiculous - but again, unrestricted access to the internet doesn't work out for children, probably ever. I think off the bat the series was a touch disrespectful to the history of the series and whatever, which, I mean, isnt a sin, and should be expected of a creepypasta made by a kid, so whatever - I just didn't like seeing Nakajima borderline erased and turned into a spooky monsterman in this weird little fanfiction that got mad popular. Bad situation all around.

Course I've got nothing to say since I joined this forum at about 14 years old. But hey, hopefully it wasn't too obnoxious

[MajinTails]

It's genuinely all fandom reddits - I think there's more children on the internet now, more than ever. Not to sound too rude or whatever but I find the Godzilla reddit just about pointless, at least to read or contribute to. Same for any other nerdy reddit I used to enjoy. The site's showing its age. I suppose it's good the younger crowd have a place to get together, but then again, that's how insanity like that Man in the Suit creepypasta meltdown gets started. General immaturity

I will say it's terrible he was literally harassed, that's ridiculous - but again, unrestricted access to the internet doesn't work out for children, probably ever. I think off the bat the series was a touch disrespectful to the history of the series and whatever, which, I mean, isnt a sin, and should be expected of a creepypasta made by a kid, so whatever - I just didn't like seeing Nakajima borderline erased and turned into a spooky monsterman in this weird little fanfiction that got mad popular. Bad situation all around.

Course I've got nothing to say since I joined this forum at about 14 years old. But hey, hopefully it wasn't too obnoxious

I don't think there's more children on the internet nowadays compared to before, it's just that all the other spaces for them no longer exist in the way they did the 90s, 2000s, even the early 2010s so they show up more on places like reddit, tiktok, youtube, etc etc - some if not even most of which they probably or at least possibly shouldn't be on. There's also the fact the internet is changing rapidly and particularly discussions can get a lot larger and even sometimes more vitriolic, so combined with the fact it's also more centralized then it was in say the 2000s and whatever you like is probably also just more popular, you inevitably just notice kids and shit more even if there's a good chance the quantity / ratio of them hasn't really changed much as time progresses.

Putting aside that even most of the places I know now don't have or allow people who are up to or planning something, back then there were places like the official cartoon network, disney, LEGO etc websites which had games, videos, and other content that made them...a site kids could use, and were actually moderated and controlled, but which in the modern day whose replacements are intended only for parents that are shopping or as glorified advertisements / redirects for whatever streaming service to sign up for. There's YouTube Kids but the problem isn't that it's a kids app but rather they clearly do not give a damn about curating it, and also the way they went about it has harmed creators more then it has actually addressed any of the issues that are happening.

Of course there's stuff like those parents who do nothing but give their kids a ipad and pretend that's a babysitter, and this stuff is more accessible period, so maybe I'm wrong and the truth's probably somewhere in the middle.

[JVM]

I did social media management some months ago for an adult-oriented program and we had tons and tons and tons of kids joining up, who would then simultaneously use the content and adult nature of the program as an excuse to be awful while simultaneously reporting adult users for "making them uncomfortable" if they made adult jokes in public spaces. Often they would make an issue that someone's avatar was based on art done in the community but artists who had also done pornography... except it was only young users who pointed it out and recognized it, who were passing those images around anyway. It was a really gross experience overall but it really showed me how much of the modern internet is TikTok kids.

I was a kid in fandom, too, and I was annoying, but I was never as bad as reporting random people. I did have issues with "anyone who thinks/feels this is stupid" kind of statements but that's a world away from what I saw as a moderator.

...

Re: Reddit, I'm just going to say I think people on Toho Kingdom overvalue r/Godzilla types of fans too much. I don't think we should discount that there are fans who think the way the fans there do, but it's becoming a really awkward feeling when people come here to complain about the Facebook and Reddit fandom that I do not interact with, as if all of us know about it, and feel like I should be keeping an eye for the sake of following discussion here. My assumptions about how kaiju fans feel is basically 85% Toho Kingdom and 15% G-Fest. I personally think kaiju fandom has a tendency to hyperfixate on its worst tendencies by miles and it comes off kind of insecure. I'm getting sick of the whole 'death threats represent an entire fandom actually' thing I've seen a few times before, ie Star Wars. Like, holy fuck call out the bad people and jackasses for sure, but this 'everyone is complicit by being a fan of the same thing' attitude feels incredibly self-defeating. I can't tell you how many good fans I've seen leaving fandom spaces to avoid feeling dragged in on the dicks.

[darthzilla99]

Maybe I'm just prudish, but I'm getting annoyed at the Facebook meme going around of Evolved Godzilla figure grabbing the My Dress up Darling figure.

[HedorahIsBestGirl]

I find a lot of the "what if"-ing that goes on in the fandom to be pretty cringeworthy. Specifically, the astronomical percentage of "what ifs" that amount to "what if X kaiju had shown up in X movie?" I'm not opposed to what if scenarios but damn, use your imagination. And if the extent of your imagination is "what if we threw Anguirus into Terror of Mechagodzilla?" then I honestly feel kinda sorry for you. Worse still is when the what if is "what if X version of X kaiju had appeared in the movie instead?" My first thought is always: "who the fuck cares?" For example, a lot of dumb YouTube videos have been getting recommended to me with titles like "What If The Heisei Series Used Showa Godzilla?!?!?!?" Then he would look different, I guess? Is this really what some fans waste their free time on?

[Legion1979]

Yes, that is really what fans waste their time on, and it's so damn stupid.

There's a lot of great disucssion to be had about these movies, but it seems this is all everyone wants to talk about - "what if" scenarios. The ones that annoys me most are the ones that challenge people to completely change things about the Showa series, as if arbitrary changes are what those movies need or something.

[Fearsome Godzilla]

I find a lot of the "what if"-ing that goes on in the fandom to be pretty cringeworthy. Specifically, the astronomical percentage of "what ifs" that amount to "what if X kaiju had shown up in X movie?" I'm not opposed to what if scenarios but damn, use your imagination. And if the extent of your imagination is "what if we threw Anguirus into Terror of Mechagodzilla?" then I honestly feel kinda sorry for you. Worse still is when the what if is "what if X version of X kaiju had appeared in the movie instead?" My first thought is always: "who the fuck cares?" For example, a lot of dumb YouTube videos have been getting recommended to me with titles like "What If The Heisei Series Used Showa Godzilla?!?!?!?" Then he would look different, I guess? Is this really what some fans waste their free time on?

I have seen that as well. While I don't dislike What-Ifs, I do think that some of them are overly pretentious or biased towards preconceived interpretations from the writer.

The Godzilla fandom has — much to my displeasure — been afflicted by the powerscaling disease. If I'm being honest, I don't inherently dislike powerscaling or anything similar to it; it's funny to debate whether or not your favorite characters could measure up to their combatants, or otherwise. However, a lot of these posts are supplied by the weak rhetorics that Godzilla is, in any capacity, an universe-ending creature who would wash black holes or whatever from the map.

You will see this with channels like Gojicenter or Dangerville, whose views are wholly dependent on "What if Shimo fought Shin Godzilla?" Or "What if Heisei Godzilla were to face Keizer Ghidorah?"

Again, I don't hold any ill-will towards any of these individuals, it's the bread maker of many YouTubers and I respect the grind. However, I must reiterate that, from the perspective of discussions and unbiased conversations, it can be very irritating. Talk and have fun with your "Character vs. Character" discussion, I won't ever impend you from doing so, but don't try to apply such a specific, overly-subjective perspective to unrelated discussions.

[Desghidorah]

I find a lot of the "what if"-ing that goes on in the fandom to be pretty cringeworthy. Specifically, the astronomical percentage of "what ifs" that amount to "what if X kaiju had shown up in X movie?" I'm not opposed to what if scenarios but damn, use your imagination. And if the extent of your imagination is "what if we threw Anguirus into Terror of Mechagodzilla?" then I honestly feel kinda sorry for you. Worse still is when the what if is "what if X version of X kaiju had appeared in the movie instead?" My first thought is always: "who the fuck cares?" For example, a lot of dumb YouTube videos have been getting recommended to me with titles like "What If The Heisei Series Used Showa Godzilla?!?!?!?" Then he would look different, I guess? Is this really what some fans waste their free time on?

I have seen that as well. While I don't dislike What-Ifs, I do think that some of them are overly pretentious or biased towards preconceived interpretations from the writer.

The Godzilla fandom has — much to my displeasure — been afflicted by the powerscaling disease. If I'm being honest, I don't inherently dislike powerscaling or anything similar to it; it's funny to debate whether or not your favorite characters could measure up to their combatants, or otherwise. However, a lot of these posts are supplied by the weak rhetorics that Godzilla is, in any capacity, an universe-ending creature who would wash black holes or whatever from the map.

You will see this with channels like Gojicenter or Dangerville, whose views are wholly dependent on "What if Shimo fought Shin Godzilla?" Or "What if Heisei Godzilla were to face Keizer Ghidorah?"

Again, I don't hold any ill-will towards any of these individuals, it's the bread maker of many YouTubers and I respect the grind. However, I must reiterate that, from the perspective of discussions and unbiased conversations, it can be very irritating. Talk and have fun with your "Character vs. Character" discussion, I won't ever impend you from doing so, but don't try to apply such a specific, overly-subjective perspective to unrelated discussions.

The powerscaling side of the Godzilla fandom could be divided into two camps IMHO. One side which just goes off what the films show and doesn't rely on specific calcs (as it is not like the filmmakers are physicists), and the other side which relies extremely heavily on taking statements from writers or 3rd party books as gospel. No problem with either if it's done for fun, but I can admit some frustration with the second camp often very aggressively insisting they are right (and I have found numerous times they badly translated something, took it out of context, or failed to understand a single writer doesn't often speak for a film franchise).

The former might see MV Godzilla blowing up a good portion of a city block with a sweep of their beam and conclude the beam can, in fact, blow up a good portion of a city block.

The latter will see that and use some wanked physics statements of MV Godzilla's beam being stronger than "any force of nature" and conclude it upscales from black holes and supernovas, and therefore he is holding way back when attacking and MV Godzilla is a planet buster but is small potatoes to the likes of Heisei.

IMHO the really wonky powerscaling is probably the most befuddling aspect to the VS debates in the fandom to me. If someone wants to take 3rd party statements to their logical extreme to see where the numbers go, that is perfectly fine and fun to do. But some will then very viciously attack and insult anyone who doesn't agree that a vast majority of Godzilla versions are not, in fact, planet busters for being ignoramuses. Like it somehow insulting to the franchise not to buy that. Some are plenty mature about it, others not so much.

Doesn't help many times its younger fans parroting calcs they heard and nobody is checking to see if the physics even make sense. Some are good but I've caught numerous cases of bad equations and formula use, and physics isn't even my primary science background.

It sucks the fun out of VS debates if someone barges into the conversation shouting, "(insert random statement here) puts A at planet buster+ with Dwarf Star levels AP over B's continental- durability, A slams no-diff!"

[miguelnuva]

Yes, that is really what fans waste their time on, and it's so damn stupid.

There's a lot of great disucssion to be had about these movies, but it seems this is all everyone wants to talk about - "what if" scenarios. The ones that annoys me most are the ones that challenge people to completely change things about the Showa series, as if arbitrary changes are what those movies need or something.

What if videos are just the new fanfiction trend. People make videos instead writing it out.

What if are a sign the fandom is getting bigger.

[MajinTails]

God yeah the Powerscaling stuff I think is starting to fall out in some places thankfully. I agree with some of the posts above that the prospect of vs debates isn't totally asinine, and in fact it very likely inevitably comes up in certain spaces so long as there is anything tangible for it - just look at Godzilla with how much of the series is some kind of "versus" format or formula. Ironically I think it's crossover fights - which are really probably what made it popular to begin with - that rotted away and ruined it. Since after awhile many people just started to make some random series that is their favorite or which they prefer over another, that they might also deliberately or not have misinterpreted or just totally disregarded the actual story and narrative value thereof, into this omega wtf they shoot black hole lasers and would one shot dbz nonsense. Despite crossover versus kinda sucking now I think debates of characters from the same story / series / franchise etc or even different continuities of that media can still be fun, especially if they lean more into the straightforward "what if these characters met, how would they react and behave, what would they think of each-other and who has better capabilities" then the pseudoscience "dimensional tiering, poorly made calcs and translations, out of context fluff, vagueness etc" type but unfortunately the Godzilla fanbase has fallen into the latter even with regards to just same verse fights, it seems.

As far as the what if videos go I think those are popular only because, as miguelnuva said, they're basically just extensions of the same old fanfictions and different continuities and other things that have existed for decades. Even the real world has that with those alt history / history fiction genres. To be frank, it's probably also because crossover stuff is stupidly popular on the internet, and even time travel and multiverse stuff is kinda saturated in tons of official media for franchises and whatnot right now (a bit too saturated for my tastes, personally). If you ask me the real problem with the current what if trend is that it's super formulaic and has no actual pay off - very often once you've seen one you've seen all even factoring in other channels - and some of the premises are just ridiculous. No, I don't need to watch the 6585848th video of Goku being betrayed by his friends and locked into the hyperbolic time chamber then becoming some super buff super saiyan god 43805845 that one shots beerus and zeno. It's super ironic how pretentious and uninspired it all is too, given the potential and ideas that comes just from the mere thought of making what ifs.