GODZILLA: TOKYO S.O.S. (2003)

GODZILLA:  TOKYO S.O.S. (2003)

Tagline:  Terror Comes in Threes!

(Action, Adventure, Fantasy) [PG]

What is going on with these fairies? Why are there only 2, where did they come from? Are they magic? If they are magic how come they don’t make more fairies. If I was a magic fairy, there would be fairies everywhere and we’d be walking all over Japan just telling people stuff, hiding behind books, and singing the same song at all our fairy concerts. That’s right, we’d have a band and all that stuff. Get it together TOHO.  

In this one, the story picks up about a year after GODZILLA AGAINST MECHAGODZILLA. Godzilla has healed from wounds sustained in the last battle and Mothra has arrived to basically offer to defend mankind from Godzilla if they destroy Mechagodzilla. At least that is what Mothra’s fairies are telling an old friend of theirs and they seem pretty trustworthy. The main issue is that Mechagodzilla was built partly from Godzilla’s bones. Bloody hell, whose damn idea was that? Instead of listening to the fairies, the humans are trying everything they can to repair Mechagodzilla. 

One of the stronger points in this movie is that both the Godzilla suit design and Mechagodzilla’s design is freakin phenomenal. From my perspective, the Mechagodzilla design here is the best one we have ever gotten and that includes the one that shows up in READY PLAYER ONE. I also liked that Mothra’s wings are actually flexible. In a lot of the earlier films, her wings flap, but they are just super stiff and mechanical looking. I know what we are getting when we are talking about TOHO, but this is an improvement out of them on this functionality-wise. There are also some really cool uniform designs for the defense forces and Mechagodzilla pilots. Mechagodzilla is also given some weapons in this that let it fire rockets around buildings to target Godzilla which I thought was pretty epic. 

Tidbit – The fairies will not let you drop a model F-1 fighter, so just don’t even think about it. 

Disappointment – On the DVD 4 Kaiju are listed for this movie, but Kamoebas is dead in the only scene we see him in. He’s only appeared in three TOHO movies but at least he was alive in the other two. Originally this was going to be Anguirus that we see dead, which definitely would have been worse. 

Wait What? – There is a massive battle going on in the middle of the city between Mothra and Mechagodzilla and Godzilla. The editing choices make it seem like this battle must have lasted forever because Mothra’s larva are able to swim from Infant Island to Tokyo in seemingly 5 minutes. I am not sure how far it’s supposed to be, but having this whole sequence start well before the fight starts would have been a wise choice story-wise.

Overall I really like this one. GODZILLA AGAINST MECHAGODZILLA might be slightly better, but not by much. The human story in this one is more coherent just based on the fact that it doesn’t introduce ideas and then just abandon them. It does however have some continuity issues. In one scene for instance Godzilla is completely covered with silk or whatever it is from the Mothra larva. In the next scene, it looks like he just got out of the shower, dried himself off, maybe sat down and had dinner with King Ceasar or whoever he hangs out with on fight night, and then went right back to fighting like nothing happened. 

I am going to give this one a 6 out of 7 in spite of some of its issues. This movie finds my watch rotation often and it’s a lot of fun overall. 

GRAPHICS ARE THE PROPERTY OF TOHO COMPANY AND ARE USED FOR REVIEW PURPOSES ONLY. 

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