The Godzilla Cringe Thread

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Re: The Godzilla Cringe Thread

Post by Voyager »

LegendZilla wrote: Sun Jun 26, 2022 3:23 pm Are we allowed to talk about was makes us cringe over real-life issues regarding the franchise, particularly over the fandom?
That’s what most of this thread is.
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Re: The Godzilla Cringe Thread

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The newest doozy over at r/Godzilla:

"Is 9/11 cannon to the Godzilla universe?"

Yes, it's an entire thread. Who the hell would even think to ask something like that?
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Re: The Godzilla Cringe Thread

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Spuro wrote: Tue Jul 05, 2022 9:48 pm The newest doozy over at r/Godzilla:

"Is 9/11 cannon to the Godzilla universe?"

Yes, it's an entire thread. Who the hell would even think to ask something like that?
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Re: The Godzilla Cringe Thread

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Spuro wrote: Tue Jul 05, 2022 9:48 pm The newest doozy over at r/Godzilla:

"Is 9/11 cannon to the Godzilla universe?"

Yes, it's an entire thread. Who the hell would even think to ask something like that?
I don't know what's going on in that thread, but from where I'm sitting there are story possibilities to look at. 9/11 was a big event here that played a major role in shaping the next two decades. How, for example, might things have played out if the same events had happened in a world accustomed to kaiju attacks and the associated urban death and destruction? Would anyone have blinked? How would the subsequent years have changed if the Afghanistan and Iraq Wars never happened? Etc. There's some interesting alternate history potential here.
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Re: The Godzilla Cringe Thread

Post by Voyager »

Intersecting maybe but knowing the subreddit, those possibilities are probably not being discussed.
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Re: The Godzilla Cringe Thread

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Hell, for that matter, real-world disasters and conflicts have been the inspiration for this franchise from day one. Hiroshima and Nagasaki, catastrophic pollution, the Cold War, Fukushima, etc. Why couldn't a hypothetical Godzilla movie have something to say about 9/11 and the War on Terror? Voyager is probably right, but I see no reason to act like this question shouldn't be asked.
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Re: The Godzilla Cringe Thread

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You might say that G vs Biollante had something to say about the war on terror as it involved a fictional Arab country and a bomb threat.
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Re: The Godzilla Cringe Thread

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I just find that with 9/11 stuff particularly you have to tread lightly. Both because of the innocent Americans that died as well as the hundreds of thousands of Muslim people that were murdered unjustly in the fallout. Rewriting that into a kaiju thing just feels a bit insensitive.

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Re: The Godzilla Cringe Thread

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edgaguirus wrote: Wed Jul 06, 2022 11:48 pm You might say that G vs Biollante had something to say about the war on terror as it involved a fictional Arab country and a bomb threat.
Except there was no war on terror pre-9/11.
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Re: The Godzilla Cringe Thread

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Executive Hamster wrote: Thu Jul 07, 2022 12:18 am I just find that with 9/11 stuff particularly you have to tread lightly. Both because of the innocent Americans that died as well as the hundreds of thousands of Muslim people that were murdered unjustly in the fallout. Rewriting that into a kaiju thing just feels a bit insensitive.
I mean... if tragic loss of life made things off limits for exploration in fiction, we wouldn't be having this conversation right now. There would be no kaiju genre.
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Re: The Godzilla Cringe Thread

Post by Major sssspielberg! »

JAGzilla wrote: Thu Jul 07, 2022 3:10 am
Executive Hamster wrote: Thu Jul 07, 2022 12:18 am I just find that with 9/11 stuff particularly you have to tread lightly. Both because of the innocent Americans that died as well as the hundreds of thousands of Muslim people that were murdered unjustly in the fallout. Rewriting that into a kaiju thing just feels a bit insensitive.
I mean... if tragic loss of life made things off limits for exploration in fiction, we wouldn't be having this conversation right now. There would be no kaiju genre.
I can't speak on the Japanese industry at large but one of the reasonsShin Godzilla rules for me is that it's about a multilayered national tragedy, doesn't shy away from the horror of that tragedy, but still manages to be an effective genre picture without being preachy. And it's technically a blockbuster.
That's just not the kind of movie that gets made in America. Dgmw, we've got lots of movies "about" 9/11, mostly thru imagery, but nothing thru that genre lens that really explores anything about 9/11. Because here, genre is genre and "real" movies are "real" movies, with few exceptions.
You could absolutely make a kaiju movie "about" 9/11, and all the factors that Hamster mentioned. But it would require a certain touch that I don't see any filmmakers being able to do in the current Hollywood climate.
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Re: The Godzilla Cringe Thread

Post by edgaguirus »

You can always go with the allegory or metaphor route. The original series Star Trek would never have been able to deal with certain social issues if it hadn't given them a sci fi twist. A similar approach might work with a 9/11 theme kaiju film.
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Re: The Godzilla Cringe Thread

Post by Executive Hamster »

JAGzilla wrote: Thu Jul 07, 2022 3:10 am I mean... if tragic loss of life made things off limits for exploration in fiction, we wouldn't be having this conversation right now. There would be no kaiju genre.
First of all, the destruction of cities in stuff in kaiju movies is fake. They aren't documenting a real tragedy. There is no loss of life. Secondly, theres nothing wrong with having movies about 9/11, Im specifically talking about doing a kaiju movie on it.

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Re: The Godzilla Cringe Thread

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Executive Hamster wrote: Thu Jul 07, 2022 2:58 pm
JAGzilla wrote: Thu Jul 07, 2022 3:10 am I mean... if tragic loss of life made things off limits for exploration in fiction, we wouldn't be having this conversation right now. There would be no kaiju genre.
First of all, the destruction of cities in stuff in kaiju movies is fake. They aren't documenting a real tragedy. There is no loss of life. Secondly, theres nothing wrong with having movies about 9/11, Im specifically talking about doing a kaiju movie on it.
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I'm talking about Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Two entire cities incinerated and thousands upon thousands of innocents killed. Nine years later, Toho made a movie about it starring a man in a dinosaur costume.
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Re: The Godzilla Cringe Thread

Post by UltramanGoji »

How the hell has this entire conversation about 9/11 and kaiju movies gone by and nobody has mentioned Cloverfield? There's your 9/11-inspired kaiju movie, full stop. I don't think you could approach the subject, literally or metaphorically, in any better way than what that movie did.
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Re: The Godzilla Cringe Thread

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Ok now you are intentionally misrepresenting the point I'm trying to make. Godzilla isn't ABOUT Hiroshima and Nagasaki (nor is it about Castle Bravo and Bikini Atoll). It is INSPIRED BY them, yes, but the movie isn't trying to say that "Hiroshima and Nagasaki was actually a kaiju attack" or something shitty like that. THAT would be extremely disrespectful, and similarly doing a movie where 9/11 is caused by a kaiju attack is also very disrespectful.

And UltramanGoji's comment is perfect on that. Its a movie inspired by 9/11 but its not trying to say that 9/11 was caused by a kaiju attack instead of a terrorist groups that was trained, funded, armed, and radicalized by the US government.

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Re: The Godzilla Cringe Thread

Post by JAGzilla »

Executive Hamster wrote: Fri Jul 08, 2022 6:36 am Ok now you are intentionally misrepresenting the point I'm trying to make. Godzilla isn't ABOUT Hiroshima and Nagasaki (nor is it about Castle Bravo and Bikini Atoll). It is INSPIRED BY them, yes, but the movie isn't trying to say that "Hiroshima and Nagasaki was actually a kaiju attack" or something shitty like that. THAT would be extremely disrespectful, and similarly doing a movie where 9/11 is caused by a kaiju attack is also very disrespectful.

And UltramanGoji's comment is perfect on that. Its a movie inspired by 9/11 but its not trying to say that 9/11 was caused by a kaiju attack instead of a terrorist groups that was trained, funded, armed, and radicalized by the US government.
I wasn't intentionally misrepresenting anything. I just think we were both misunderstanding each other's lines of thought here. I was talking about a Cloverfield type situation, not a literal 'Godzilla did 9/11' movie. I agree, that would be idiotic.
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Re: The Godzilla Cringe Thread

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Executive Hamster wrote: Fri Jul 08, 2022 6:36 am Godzilla isn't ABOUT Hiroshima and Nagasaki (nor is it about Castle Bravo and Bikini Atoll). It is INSPIRED BY them, yes, but the movie isn't trying to say that "Hiroshima and Nagasaki was actually a kaiju attack" or something shitty like that.
I know you're talking about the 1954 film but isn't this exactly what the Monsterverse did? Castle Bravo (the third time Japanese citizens were killed by American atomic bombs) was retconned as an attack on Godzilla.
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Re: The Godzilla Cringe Thread

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UltramanGoji wrote: Fri Jul 08, 2022 6:33 am How the hell has this entire conversation about 9/11 and kaiju movies gone by and nobody has mentioned Cloverfield? There's your 9/11-inspired kaiju movie, full stop. I don't think you could approach the subject, literally or metaphorically, in any better way than what that movie did.
I felt like that movie offered more trauma porn with regard to 9/11 than it did any kind of perspective on its social and political causes/ramifications.

Added in 1 minute 50 seconds:
Executive Hamster wrote: Fri Jul 08, 2022 6:36 am Ok now you are intentionally misrepresenting the point I'm trying to make. Godzilla isn't ABOUT Hiroshima and Nagasaki (nor is it about Castle Bravo and Bikini Atoll). It is INSPIRED BY them, yes, but the movie isn't trying to say that "Hiroshima and Nagasaki was actually a kaiju attack" or something shitty like that. THAT would be extremely disrespectful, and similarly doing a movie where 9/11 is caused by a kaiju attack is also very disrespectful.

And UltramanGoji's comment is perfect on that. Its a movie inspired by 9/11 but its not trying to say that 9/11 was caused by a kaiju attack instead of a terrorist groups that was trained, funded, armed, and radicalized by the US government.
Just because an aspect of a story is metaphorical/allegorical/subtextual doesn't mean the work isn't still about that thing.
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Re: The Godzilla Cringe Thread

Post by Jetty_Jags »

Major sssspielberg! wrote: Thu Jul 07, 2022 5:05 am Dgmw, we've got lots of movies "about" 9/11, mostly thru imagery, but nothing thru that genre lens that really explores anything about 9/11. Because here, genre is genre and "real" movies are "real" movies, with few exceptions.
Idk if I agree with that, surely the blockbuster scene actively reflected on 9-11. Say what you will about Chris Nolan, the dark knight, and it’s politics, the film is actively a investigation of a post 9-11 environment, it’s not even particularly subtle about it.
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