Talkback: Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah (1991)

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Re: Talkback: Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah (1991)

Post by Terasawa »

Spydrmanjr wrote:Have we already discussed why King Ghidorah does not show up in the past and Godzilla is still apart of everyone's memories?
Yes, here.

As mentioned by eabaker in that thread, the time travel theory Zarm comes up with (in the linked post) is essentially the same interpretation that had been written about in G-Fan #9 (May 1994) by Tom Miller:
It is important to remember that time travel doesn't exist; it is probably impossible even in theory due to the severe violations of cause and effect inherent in the concept. Despite (or because of) this, time travel has always been extremely popular in science fiction and fantasy. As a result of the innumerable manifestations of time travel in film and print, preconceived notions of it have developed. This is a mistake. There are no "laws" of time travel other than those created, explicitly or implicitly, by the author of the given story. Therefore, the approach in Godzilla vs King Ghidora cannot be: "How does this agree with what is known about time travel?" (since nothing is known about time travel). Rather, the question is: "What can be deduced about time travel from what the movie shows?" In other words, the facts mustn't conform to the theory, rather the theory must conform to the facts. Approached in this manner, it is easier to resolve the questions raised by Godzilla vs King Ghidora.

The primary lesson is that the past cannot be altered but the future can be changed by time travel to the past. What does this mean? When the time travellers removed the Godzillasaurus from Lagos Island in 1944, their own past was not altered. The result of their effort did not become manifest until their own time, the time they left Japan, 1992. This is why memories of Godzilla persisted and nothing that had happened prior to their time voyage was altered upon their return.

This is understandable by looking at cause and effect. What's past is past. The effect, Godzilla's removal to the Bering Sea, cannot occur until after the cause, the Futurians' departure in 1992. The same applies to King Ghidora. One might expect that King Ghidora had been ravaging Japan ever since he had been created by the A-bomb test near Lagos Island, but he hadn't. Time travel doesn't work that way in the movie. King Ghidora appears in 1992, when the time travellers return. Again, effect must follow cause. The results of changes to the past occur in the future.
He also explains that the time travel model in the film means there's no ripple/butterfly effect, where one changed event cascades into many changes over time.

This results in an understanding that's much less tidy than Keith Aiken's stable time loop theory, but it's the correct understanding based on what the movie shows and tells us.
Last edited by Terasawa on Thu Jun 04, 2020 6:43 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Talkback: Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah (1991)

Post by Spydrmanjr »

Thanks for linking me to that. I could have sworn it was discussed and read it here but I forgot.

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Re: Talkback: Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah (1991)

Post by szmigiel »

I think the film fleshes out why the UFO stops in the 90's and not just go to 1944 to start with pretty well. The Futurians want to control Japan at the dawn of becoming the economic world power. We also have no idea how long it takes the Dorats to become King Ghidorah.

My biggest problem with the time travel to WWII isn't the acting/bad engrish it is the fact that Emi releases the Dorats. It should have been M11 under orders and she questions where they went as they are about to travel back. Would go a long way to making it like the others were manipulating her all along, and she knew nothing of the King Ghidorah destruction part of their plans.

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Re: Talkback: Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah (1991)

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szmigiel wrote:My biggest problem with the time travel to WWII isn't the acting/bad engrish it is the fact that Emi releases the Dorats. It should have been M11 under orders and she questions where they went as they are about to travel back. Would go a long way to making it like the others were manipulating her all along, and she knew nothing of the King Ghidorah destruction part of their plans.
I agree. As it plays out it makes Emmy seem duplicitous (she isn’t) or foolish.
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Re: Talkback: Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah (1991)

Post by UltramanGoji »

I've always read it as (or maybe I'm remembering a bit of dialogue or something, it's been a while) Emi knew what King Ghidorah would do but was shocked when Wilson and Grenchiko were going to continue to let it destroy Japan even after they had already made their point.
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Re: Talkback: Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah (1991)

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szmigiel wrote:I think the film fleshes out why the UFO stops in the 90's and not just go to 1944 to start with pretty well. The Futurians want to control Japan at the dawn of becoming the economic world power. We also have no idea how long it takes the Dorats to become King Ghidorah.
Yup. And considering the "minimal ripple effect" aspect of time travel here, a trip directly from the twenty-third century to 1945 would leave the events of 1992 unatltered. They'd just return to their own time and find King Ghidorah waiting for them, but that wouldn't accomplish their goals at all.
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Re: Talkback: Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah (1991)

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UltramanGoji wrote:I've always read it as (or maybe I'm remembering a bit of dialogue or something, it's been a while) Emi knew what King Ghidorah would do but was shocked when Wilson and Grenchiko were going to continue to let it destroy Japan even after they had already made their point.
You're correct. I'm not sure how Sony translated it in 2014 but Emmy says

キングギドラを我々が操作するなんて聞いてなかったわ

which is basically "I wasn't told that we could (would?) control King Ghidorah!" Wilson says they (the Futurians) will guide Japan's reconstruction after King Ghidorah destroys it; Emmy apparently didn't know this either because it pisses her off.

私たちのやろうとしたのはあくまで警告よ20世紀の日本にこれじゃ脅迫じゃないのまるで
やり過ぎだわ
(Basically, "We were going to warn 20th century Japan; this is more than just a warning. It's going way too far!"
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Re: Talkback: Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah (1991)

Post by HedorahIsBestGirl »

So Emmy didn't know that King Ghidorah was going to be used to destroy Japan? I feel like that didn't translate well at all in the English dub. Not sure if they butchered the dialogue or if I'm just misremembering but it was always my impression that Emmy was fully aware of the Futurians' plans but got cold feet once Ghidorah actually started wrecking havoc. If she really didn't know then she's gullible as hell, but at least she's a more sympathetic character.
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Re: Talkback: Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah (1991)

Post by UltramanGoji »

HedorahIsBestGirl wrote:So Emmy didn't know that King Ghidorah was going to be used to destroy Japan?
From what I gathered, two options (one might be based on the English dub, again it's been a while):

- Emmy knew that Ghidorah would be at least used to ravage Fukuoka a little bit to humble 1992 Japan but when Wilson wanted it to move onward to other cities, she became aghast that they wanted to destroy all of Japan.
- Emmy knew that they would create King Ghidorah and that it would attack Japan but had no idea that Wilson and Grenchiko were controlling it deliberately.

At least, that's my reading of it from my memory. Could be incorrect.
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Re: Talkback: Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah (1991)

Post by kamilleblu »

The budget for Godzilla vs King Ghidorah was roughly $12 million according to Toho Kingdom's main site. The remaining Heisei Godzilla films had similar budgets. That's a significant leap from the purported $5 million budget of Godzilla vs Biollante. Does anyone have an explanation for this or what these numbers would be adjusted for inflation?

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Re: Talkback: Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah (1991)

Post by MekaGojira3k »

I don't understand how the budget went up that much and the effects look so much worse imo.

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Re: Talkback: Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah (1991)

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This movie’s biggest problem is that it’s unfocused. It wants to be a time travel movie, but it also wants to be an alien invasion movie without actual aliens, but it’s also trying to explore Godzilla and his past. Plot needed serious tightening up. Also, people shit on KOTM for having a nuke be used to revive Godzilla, but this movie gets a pass? Even though the handling of it in this movie is way more casual and lacks gravitas (And also lacks the metaphor of the similar scene in KOTM)? Oh, silly me, American studio bad, Toho good.

The human characters are just kinda there aside from Shindo, he’s an interesting and well written character.

The monster stuff’s good, mostly. Godzilla’s rampage is cool, his fight with King Ghidorah is awesome. The fight with MKG... not so much. Heisei King Ghidorah’s rampage would be good if the flying prop wasn’t ass. I still say Heisei Ghidorah’s the worst King Ghidorah.

This movie’s definitely below GvMG2 and GvD, it’s dead center of the five 90s movies. I like it, but in case all that up there didn’t make it clear, not as much as most Godzilla movies.
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Re: Talkback: Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah (1991)

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GodzillavsRayquaza wrote:Also, people shit on KOTM for having a nuke be used to revive Godzilla, but this movie gets a pass? Even though the handling of it in this movie is way more casual and lacks gravitas (And also lacks the metaphor of the similar scene in KOTM)? Oh, silly me, American studio bad, Toho good.
It's in no way casual, nor does it lack gravitas, and it is essential to the movie's central device of paralleling Godzilla's increasing threat with the growing danger represented by unchecked corporate capitalism during Japan's economic boom.

You know perfectly well that there's more to both the praise this movie receives and the criticism KotM '19 receives than just, "American studio bad, Toho good." There's no call to be insultingly reductive toward people whose opinions differ from yours.
Last edited by eabaker on Wed Sep 30, 2020 12:10 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Talkback: Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah (1991)

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MekaGojira3k wrote:I don't understand how the budget went up that much and the effects look so much worse imo.
I don't know for sure, I'm just speculating about this.

Its possible that the script for GvKG requires more special effects scenes. With time travel, two versions of Godzilla, Dorat puppets, two versions of Ghidorah, UFOs, various optical effects, more elaborate interior sets for the UFO, etc.

GVB's script didn't seem to require much in terms of special effects so the budget was smaller because of it.

More money doesn't necessarily mean better. It means more resources to create the shots and sequences they need.
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Re: Talkback: Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah (1991)

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GojiDog wrote:
MekaGojira3k wrote:I don't understand how the budget went up that much and the effects look so much worse imo.
I don't know for sure, I'm just speculating about this.

Its possible that the script for GvKG requires more special effects scenes. With time travel, two versions of Godzilla, Dorat puppets, two versions of Ghidorah, UFOs, various optical effects, more elaborate interior sets for the UFO, etc.

GVB's script didn't seem to require much in terms of special effects so the budget was smaller because of it.

More money doesn't necessarily mean better. It means more resources to create the shots and sequences they need.
Also, consider that the Shinjuku miniature set alone seems to dwarf all the miniature sets in Biollante combined.
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Re: Talkback: Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah (1991)

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eabaker wrote:
GodzillavsRayquaza wrote:Also, people shit on KOTM for having a nuke be used to revive Godzilla, but this movie gets a pass? Even though the handling of it in this movie is way more casual and lacks gravitas (And also lacks the metaphor of the similar scene in KOTM)? Oh, silly me, American studio bad, Toho good.
It's in no way casual, nor does it lack gravitas, and it is essential to the movie's central device of paralleling Godzilla's increasing threat with the growing danger represented by unchecked corporate capitalism during Japan's economic boom.

You know perfectly well that there's more to both the praise this movie receives and the criticism KotM '19 receives than just, "American studio bad, Toho good." There's no call to be insultingly reductive toward people whose opinions differ from yours.
Not to mention the use of the nuke is totally different than in KOTM. In that film the nuke is required to revive a dramatically weakened Godzilla. It's used by our heroes and with very little resistance or reflection on the use of nuclear weapons (not that I remember, I haven't seen it in over a year).

In GvKG, the nuke is a tool of an out of control corporation. The Japanese government representative (Fujio) even bitches Shino out about how insane it is that a civilian owns nuclear weapons. Terasawa later comments on this foolishness as well. And the nuke ends up being totally unnecessary because the sub encounters a fully mutated Godzilla, not the dinosaur they expected to encounter.

And anyway, after Godzilla returns, nearly everyone involved in the dunderheaded nuclear sub ordeal gets a beat to comment on how majorly they fucked up. The first of these comments come immediately as Godzilla appears out of the ocean - there's never any celebration, just a sense of total dread.
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Re: Talkback: Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah (1991)

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Terasawa wrote:Terasawa later comments on this foolishness as well.
Uh... dude? You're commenting on it right now!
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Re: Talkback: Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah (1991)

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eabaker wrote:
Terasawa wrote:Terasawa later comments on this foolishness as well.
Uh... dude? You're commenting on it right now!
But in the movie I--I mean he, er... whatever--did it much more dramatically while making smoking look so cool.
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Re: Talkback: Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah (1991)

Post by GodzillavsRayquaza »

But the nuke in KOTM had consequences. A piece of ancient history got destroyed, Serizawa died, Godzilla was going to explode, and Boston ultimately got destroyed because of it. And also, maybe GvKG should have done a better job at showing that metaphor about capitalism and had the characters responsible act with more guilt then “well shit”.
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Re: Talkback: Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah (1991)

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GodzillavsRayquaza wrote:And also, maybe GvKG should have done a better job at showing that metaphor about capitalism and had the characters responsible act with more guilt then “well shit”.
The entire scene with Fujio, Shindo, et al. in the Teiyo boardroom is all about how out of control Shindo is because his enterprise controls nuclear weapons. Following that are several scenes where other characters (namely Terasawa and Emmy) comment on Shindo's/Teiyo's monstrous greed.

As to your last point, uh... Shindo allows himself killed by Godzilla. He realizes the grave mistake he made with the nuke and commits seppuku via kaiju.
Last edited by Terasawa on Wed Sep 30, 2020 12:56 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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