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The dialogue was almost exclusively exposition, trailer quotes, or safe brain dead quips by nothing characters. The pacing was a nightmare. It’s incredibly simple plot-wise, so it’s easy to follow, but everything happens so quickly and nothing is given room to breath. You’re immediately whisked from one set piece to the next, and then the set pieces barely deliver since they’re usually short and intercut with expository dialogue, needless drama, and character interactions with people you couldn’t care less about. at the end of the day, Godzilla didn’t win because of its own strength, capability, or anything it has agency over. It won the day because humans nuked it which gave it super powers that allowed it to kill ghidora instantly and without any tension. This also negates anything that mothra does in the movie, since all mothra does is fend off Rodan which didn’t matter in the end since Godzilla would’ve just killed it as well. Mothra does literally nothing in the movie because of this. It’s purely a visual.
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May 31, 2019 15:26
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Verisimilidude posted:This also negates anything that mothra does in the movie, since all mothra does is fend off Rodan which didn’t matter in the end since Godzilla would’ve just killed it as well. Mothra does literally nothing in the movie because of this. It’s purely a visual. Mothra literally guides and points the humans to Godzilla. Without her they’d never find him
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May 31, 2019 15:41
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Happy Noodle Boy posted:Mothra literally guides and points the humans to Godzilla. Without her they’d never find him So mothra does the thing they had to resolve because one scene earlier the script broke the radar that was already able to track Godzilla? That’s lazy writing at best
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May 31, 2019 15:46
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Happy Noodle Boy posted:Godzilla is actually a democratically elected monarch. They’re all going to Skull Island to hold elections and Godzilla vs Kong is actually a political thriller So kind electing a new lizard pope basically.
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May 31, 2019 15:56
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Seeing this tomorrow so I guess the gist of it is that the humans are still boring garbage and the monsters still own but they also still don't have a very big focus? Sounds like a Godzilla movie but with CGI monsters instead of rubber suits, I'm loving ready for it.
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May 31, 2019 16:10
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I feel like Charles Dance was wasted here, and that's real fuckin difficult to do If nothing else I hope bringing him in to this movie and making a red herring out of him was clearly done with an eye on his role in the sequel, especially given the stinger I do agree with the sentiment that Vera Farmiga plays lovely yet nuanced people to the hilt, and she's great at it even when she doesn't have too much to work with
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May 31, 2019 16:15
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Verisimilidude posted:at the end of the day, Godzilla didn’t win because of its own strength, capability, or anything it has agency over. It won the day because humans nuked it which gave it super powers that allowed it to kill ghidora instantly and without any tension. I don't really feel like Godzilla's nuclear cocaine juice-up was unearned because it felt like humanity was finally able to repay Godzilla for a millenia old quid pro quo. And regarding Mothra, she essentially gives Godzilla her nuclear energy when she passes away, which I think tipped him over the edge into his meltdown 🤔 Mothra was also the narrative's sole benevolent monster besides Godzilla which I think was important to establish. What I really like is that Mothra is almost definitely going to be in the next movie, there is always another pupa somewhere. And Rodan is still kicking it, so we're going to see the gang again in the Kong v Godzilla
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May 31, 2019 16:19
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Verisimilidude posted:
You're doing the Youtube thing where you pretend to be a dumbass in order to score points on a movie you didn't like (perfectly ok not to like this movie, btw) Mothra prevents Rodan from helping Ghidorah fight Godzilla, who even in Juice Mode was still mostly stalemated with Ghidorah. In fact we literally have a movie in Monsterverse cannon, G'14, that shows that Godzilla has a lot of trouble when he fights a big bruiser + a flying guy at the same time. So Mothra kept Rodan out of the fight because.... the "tension" of the final fight was that Godzilla would get killed *before* he powered up completely. Once he actually got there (with the humans' help, always with the humans' help!) it was just a victory lap for Burning Godzilla. And of course that fun shot where it looks like Ghidorah survived but no, he's literally being grilled alive by Godzilla.
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May 31, 2019 16:20
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Penpal posted:And regarding Mothra, she essentially gives Godzilla her nuclear energy when she passes away, which I think tipped him over the edge into his meltdown 🤔 Mothra was also the narrative's sole benevolent monster besides Godzilla which I think was important to establish. Yeah there's a pretty clear shot where Godzilla is down & out in the final fight with Ghidorah and Mothra disintegrates and her Mothra dust flows into Godzilla and revives him. Penpal posted:What I really like is that Mothra is almost definitely going to be in the next movie, there is always another pupa somewhere. Yeah they tease that during the final credits when there's a newspaper article that reveals that Monarch have found a giant egg which they think might be related to Mothra
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May 31, 2019 16:27
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Snowglobe of Doom posted:Yeah they tease that during the final credits when there's a newspaper article that reveals that Monarch have found a giant egg which they think might be related to Mothra Most definitely. The planet's crawlspace is probably lousy with the drat things.
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May 31, 2019 16:41
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On the post credits stinger, while a Mecha G (whether that's Godzilla or Ghidorah) would be cool, it'd be rad if they go batshit crazy. Jonah's organization should create a chimera kaiju from the other titans' dna. This would be an awesome way to introduce Destoroyah or even Bagan as the true enemy in GvK. They should also resuscitate the Ghidorah head to regrow into a new incarnation with Lefty's inquisitive less hostile personality or a single-headed variant with the same demeanor. A non genocidal King could be beneficial to the planet.
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May 31, 2019 16:45
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Also RE Godzilla VS Ghidorah, Versmilidude Ghidorah was losing every encounter to Godzilla until the humans hit him with the oxygen destroyer. Godzilla tore off one of his loving heads RIGHT BEFORE it hit them. All the humans did was reset the status quo. Mothra playing D is what kept Godzilla on his feet and her sacrifice is what gave him the win. Here's the best non spoiler review I can give Godzilla King of the Monsters 2019 after sleeping on it Do you like/want to see the giant Showa Era (50s to 70s) giant monster brawls in all their glory, but blown up with a modern budget? This is your movie, go see it. This is such a big, extraordinary love letter to how those monsters fought and the character they had and the kind of action you could find, just with a modern day Hollywood budget
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May 31, 2019 16:48
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DC Murderverse posted:14 also does scale much, much, much better (the defining feature of that movie, IMO) because it comes at it from a human perspective, whereas Godzilla was very much the Big Hero of KotM instead of a giant unknowable force of nature. I haven’t seen the new one yet but man, you are 100% right on how G2014 got across the sheer idea of scale, with these giant monsters. I think 2014 really did this better than any of the films that came before it.
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May 31, 2019 16:49
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If Godzilla vs Kong doesn’t have Biollante then this series has failed its objective.
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May 31, 2019 16:49
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Left-head Ghidorah was my favorite character in this movie. It was rad that head got to grow back and make Ghidorah a little more like a hydra.
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May 31, 2019 16:51
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Thinking about it In all three of their fights Godzilla has the upper hand until there is some form of human intervention: -Antarctica: Stalemate for most of the fight, but Godzilla starts getting the upper hand until Monarch attacks which allows Ghidorah to retreat -Mexico: Godzilla just straight up starts kicking Ghidorahs rear end (even ripping off one of its heads) until the Oxygen Destroyer ends the fight. -Boston: Godzilla is again kicking rear end until Ghidorah powers up via Power Grid (this one is the least direct form of intervention, but I’m still counting it because power grids are human invention) So I’m okay with the humans helping Godzilla get back into the fight Edit: beaten sort of bondster fucked around with this message at 16:56 on May 31, 2019 |
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May 31, 2019 16:52
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BTW Tekne, I have to say that your description that "Godzilla '14 is an operatic kaiju movie and KOTM is a metal one" is bang on. The harping about the plot feels completely overblown to me; it's serviceable and has a few nice moments (and a few small duds). "It's all exposition or characters stating their motivation" is pretty much true of any blockbuster, going all the way back to Raiders of the Lost Ark. This kind of movie lives or dies on the amount of screen presence of the actor delivering the dialogue which is why Charles Dance's banal lines seem really good and the others...not so much. Anyway I really enjoyed this, it does de-mystify and "cartoonize" Godzilla but that's inevitable in any serial that revolves around a mysterious/ivory-tower type character.
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May 31, 2019 16:55
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Thank you, I'm hyped to see what kind of music Godvilla vs Kong plays for us.
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May 31, 2019 17:03
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Megaman's Jockstrap posted:BTW Tekne, I have to say that your description that "Godzilla '14 is an operatic kaiju movie and KOTM is a metal one" is bang on. The harping about the plot feels completely overblown to me; it's serviceable and has a few nice moments (and a few small duds). "It's all exposition or characters stating their motivation" is pretty much true of any blockbuster, going all the way back to Raiders of the Lost Ark. This kind of movie lives or dies on the amount of screen presence of the actor delivering the dialogue which is why Charles Dance's banal lines seem really good and the others...not so much. I propose this imaginary edit of the film Remove all of the non Charles Dance white men from the script in the main cast. All of them. So that one general is fine, but the rest? Chuck 'em. Make Emma and Maddison more the main characters, with MONARCH's other characters picking up the slack as they try to get their colleague and close friend to see reason. Make Emma hate Godzilla, give her the vendetta, and have her seek Ghidorah out to replace Godzilla before realizing that Ghidorah is an alien entity that will destroy the planet worse than even humanity could. All the while MONARCH is just dealing with their poo poo with their soldiers and such. You'd have to change very little in the actual movie. You just have less Always Right Dad, more Actually Compelling Mom, and most of the dumber jokes are excised sight unseen. Serizawa's right hand woman can still die due to Ghidorah, Serizawa can still sacrifice himself. Infact Emma can learn about that and the fact that her daughter ran away and what Ghidorah actually is, to help fuel her sacrifice at the end of the movie. This is my suggestion
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May 31, 2019 17:04
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drat I really had a blast watching KotM! I haven't seen an IMAX film in a really, really long time but I'm going to make an effort to see this on the ultra-big screen.
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May 31, 2019 17:11
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Tekne posted:Thank you, I'm hyped to see what kind of music Godvilla vs Kong plays for us. Carly Rae Jepsen's Emotion, but with Kaiju.
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May 31, 2019 17:14
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It's so dumb that Bradley Whitford's character is even in this movie. "Someone's stolen our nukes, and there's only one person who can help us track them down: Robert Oppenheimer."
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May 31, 2019 17:20
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CRAYON posted:drat I really had a blast watching KotM! I did and it was totally rad, do this.
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May 31, 2019 17:21
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I liked it! The monsters were awesome, even though only 4 got to do stuff while the rest got cameos. The action was great and paced through the movie rather than back loaded, so it never dragged. I liked the human stuff too this time, most of their scenes were in service to the monsters so it didn't feel like they are stealing their spotlight. For comparison I was bored through most of 2014 Godzila. Haven't seen any of the originals, though I did watch and like the 1998 american one.
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May 31, 2019 17:31
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Yeah, definitely see this in IMAX if at all possible. It’s extremely worth it.
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May 31, 2019 17:35
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Tekne posted:Thank you, I'm hyped to see what kind of music Godvilla vs Kong plays for us. Drum & bass. Edit: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TnzFRV1LwIo
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May 31, 2019 17:45
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It was also good in Dolby Digital. Every roar and crash vibrates the seats.
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May 31, 2019 17:47
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I don’t understand the complaints about the lighting in this movie. I didn’t think it was murky or dizzying. Maybe it’s just me or my theater calibrated poo poo right. 
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May 31, 2019 18:11
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It should be a requirement to see this in IMAX to get the full experience. Although the Joker trailer in front of it was for some reason louder than anything in the movie. Is KOTM even playing in 3D? I remember Godzilla 2014 made me throw up afterwards.
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May 31, 2019 18:15
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The more I let the movie digest the more I’m finding issues with it which is sad because I feel most of them could have been avoided? Anyways my real big issue with the movie is really one thing: 1. Monarch. As others have mentioned, 2014’s Godzilla had an incredibly grounded settings with the focus staying with the Navy as they follow Godzilla / track the MUTOs and Monarch as the research group that can make some sense of these creatures. Everything they used was conventional and basic (because of the EMP threat) and the fanciest we ever got was... nothing. Maybe the containment of the first MUTO? The movie didn’t had a shred of sci-fi tech or anything futuristic. It was Godzilla thrown in the world as we know and the human plot was just trying to keep up / stop the destruction. So it’s now 5 years later and.... Monarch is apparently a multi-national trillion+ dollar operation with bunkers, field bases at each titan location, a gigantic underwater base, a gigantic air carrier, a loving air wing of fighter pilots, and their own platoon of soldiers to run operations with. What in the god drat gently caress??? Who funded this? Clearly not the US because they’re busy grilling the gently caress out of Monarch about the titans. The Navy was present in the hearing but they didn’t do anything in the movie outside of give a heads up the Oxygen Destroyer was coming. They have the ORCA and they can perfectly track Godzilla’s location and vitals with perfect projections of where he’s going and holy gently caress look at all this tech. They have the super cool drones and a god drat submarine. Anyways, the point of my rant is: why was ANY of this necessary? What’s the purpose of upping the technological capability of Monarch? None of it actually was effective or simply not used. The ORCA was the only thing that was relevant to the story and it could have been left as the only sci fi tool in the movie. The underwater base could have been a simple retrofitted oil rig. The air carrier could have been a B-52 or something actually real. Outside of the evacuation scene, any big plane could have served the role the carrier did (get chased, run ops from). The military personnel could have been embedded members of the US Navy / Marines / Army / Whatever. The perfect tracking / vitality reading of Godzilla? “Oh yeah we embedded a GPS and sensors into it’s hide and he almost killed us but now we can track him!”. Monarch could have been kept as a research wing of the US government (or now an international group) instead of this carbon copy of SHIELD. It just feels like the whole spectacle of what Monarch has and can do goes super loving against the Monarch presented in both Godzilla and Kong. The movie could have absolutely kept the groundness and realism 2014 had while still playing the same story beats but didn’t because it looked cool, I guess? It just feels dishonest. When Ghidorah wakes up all the titans they could have shown a genuine global effort of the world trying to evacuate and save humanity and to fight / kill some of these titans. Like an attack is made on Ghidorah in DC (which fails because hell yeah Ghidorah) but at no point any of the other world leaders decides to just go all out on the titan in their country? The first trailer just hinted to the world being genuinely and truly F U C K E D from this war of titans. Even the ending showing the world flora/fauna recovering thanks to the titans completely ignore the fact that millions of people probably died and a couple of US cities were straight up erased. Then again, gently caress Boston. A second more minor issue (ENDING SPOILER) was the apparent sentience all the titans now had? I understand Godzilla but the MUTO, a previously described parasite that fed on Godzilla or other titans, is seen at the ending loving bowing to the king? What made these titans different from the ones in 2014 which were clearly presented as animals? I mean, I’m all for smart Kaiju doing Kaiju things but again it just feels like such a wildly different direction that I’m having a real hard time seeing this movie as a sequel / follow-up to 2014 Happy Noodle Boy fucked around with this message at 18:28 on May 31, 2019 |
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May 31, 2019 18:24
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Happy Noodle Boy posted:The more I let the movie digest the more I’m finding issues with it which is sad because I feel most of them could have been avoided? Anyways my real big issue with the movie is really one thing: Silicon Valley venture capital. Also I think some of y'all are misunderstanding that the low-key faces of Monarch we see in G'14 were never intended to be the entirety of the organization. They were on the DL until the events of Godzilla'14. Then the cat's out of the bag and so are they.
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May 31, 2019 18:26
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Verisimilidude posted:at the end of the day, Godzilla didn’t win because of its own strength, capability, or anything it has agency over. It won the day because humans nuked it which gave it super powers that allowed it to kill ghidora instantly and without any tension. To be fair, humans interrupted him in the first place with that pesky superweapon of theirs. Also the Mutos in 2014 were pretty smart for animals.
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May 31, 2019 18:26
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Miching Mallecho posted:I don’t understand the complaints about the lighting in this movie. I didn’t think it was murky or dizzying. Maybe it’s just me or my theater calibrated poo poo right. The lighting in this film was completely fine, it's the first film that has issues. So much so that they recon the dark and stormy fight at the end of the first film into a fiery orange fight at the beginning of this. lol
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May 31, 2019 18:49
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Verisimilidude posted:The dialogue was almost exclusively exposition, trailer quotes, or safe brain dead quips by nothing characters. bondster posted:Thinking about it
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May 31, 2019 18:56
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Happy Noodle Boy posted:
I think it was purely a misplaced dedication to the ultra-goofy science of so many Japanese G-movies. A black hole gun? Really? This probably didn't need to be spoilered but, it reminds me of what happened with the new Star Wars movies. Abrams set the series in a direction and Rian Johnson more or less said, "gently caress that," yanked on the wheel and we got The Last Jedi. The difference, and I realize I might be in a minority here, is that Johnson performed a needed correction of Abrams' gently caress-up. Dougherty has done the opposite. He's flipped a bird at 2014 and, in my opinion, gone the wrong way. He was free to not like the setup and tone of 2014, but I think it's kind of dickish to all but wipe out the universe it established. quote:(ENDING SPOILER) was the apparent sentience all the titans now had? I understand Godzilla but the MUTO, a previously described parasite that fed on Godzilla or other titans, is seen at the ending loving bowing to the king? What made these titans different from the ones in 2014 which were clearly presented as animals? Eh, I'm ok with that. There are examples of real animals performing physical actions to show deference to an alpha.
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May 31, 2019 19:10
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Happy Noodle Boy posted:The more I let the movie digest the more I’m finding issues with it which is sad because I feel most of them could have been avoided? Anyways my real big issue with the movie is really one thing: I've got a feeling that the ramped up scifi aspects and the big-rear end air carrier and the gigantic secret bases and everything is building the groundwork for mechkaiju in a later film, especially given the post credit stinger.
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May 31, 2019 19:13
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Happy Noodle Boy posted:Monarch. Also some random sarcastic employee has the power to command the military to provide Monarch every nuke in their arsenal only for them to just use one on Godzilla
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May 31, 2019 19:24
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Megaman's Jockstrap posted:Carly Rae Jepsen's Emotion, but with Kaiju. Snowglobe of Doom posted:Drum & bass.
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May 31, 2019 19:35
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Complaining about wacky super tech in Godzilla movies would invalidate just about everything from Ghidorah the Three Headed Monster onwards. Would people be so pissed off about the ORCA if it was being used by space apes?
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May 31, 2019 19:53
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I get the complaints and issues, and the problems with the tone shift from G14. I just don't see how you overcome them but give us the expanded world of monsters. The first movie was darker and more grounded with the monsters as these forces of nature. How do you keep that tone when you are dealing with adding a 3 headed space dragon, a benevolent gigantic moth, and a mega pterodactyl, and 17 other randos, on top of Godzilla? Especially now that the monsters have more personality with forming alliances and rivalries. It's inherently absurd. How do you introduce all that crazy bullshit without the characters mentioning this absurd goofy poo poo? You could dial back the scope and just have Godzilla fight one thing, but then we don't get a monster battle royale. I personally would rather see the whole ridiculous universe of monsters even if it means awkward exposition like in the Japanese films.
Spoke Lee fucked around with this message at 20:09 on May 31, 2019 |
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May 31, 2019 20:05
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