RIP: Godzilla's next film will be his last, ending a 50-year series of 28 movies.

BBC On Line ^ | Wednesday, 3 March, 2004 | staff writer

[yankeedame]

Last Updated: Wednesday, 3 March, 2004, 14:39 GMT

Final battle looms for Godzilla

Japanese cinema favourite Godzilla's next film appearance will be his last, ending a 50-year series of 28 movies. The giant lizard will star in Final Wars this December - ending a movie franchise that has attracted almost 100 million fans in Japan alone since 1954.

In that time, he has become an icon of Japanese culture and a global star.

But he may return if a "new generation of directors emerge or a brand new film-making method is found to create a whole new world", the film studio said.

The new film "will compile the fruits of 50 years' work and put an end to the series", according to Yukihiko Mochida, spokesman for the Toho studio.

Topical

Final Wars will feature 10 monsters from past Godzilla adventures.

They will include the new, stronger Monster X and will go on the rampage in New York, Shanghai, Sydney and Paris.

Godzilla has taken breaks from his big screen roles twice previously - once in 1975 when the popularity of television saw the number of cinema-goers fall, and once again in 1995.

The green monster was resurrected as a computer-generated creature in a Hollywood blockbuster five years ago but the $120m (£65.5m) film was a flop.

The first Godzilla film featured the lizard emerging out of the sea after being awakened by a US atomic bomb test at Bikini Atoll in the South Pacific in 1954.

Up to 1,000 people per day flocked to see an exhibition on the character in Tokyo in 2002 - double the number that usually went to the Japanese museum where it was held.

(all photos mine -- YD

[Rocko]

And this spring-summer will be the re-release of the undubbed, un-Raymond Burred original:

The Original!

I love the way Godzilla screams. I love the way his back scales light up. The love the way he jumps up and down when he whips-a**!

I just love him.

[Jonah Hex]

Godzilla ISN'T REAL!

You're wrong. You're so wrong. Godzilla is a real movie star and a part-time body double for the junior senator from New York.

Godzilla isn't real, hunh. Next thing, he'll be saying Santy Clause, the Easter Bunny, Cleveland, Cincinnati, or Toledo isn't real.

(chewing on a scallion)

[Piranha]

Jonah, I was wrong. I have been affected by the skepticism of a sceptical age. I do not believe except what they see. I think that nothing can be which is not comprehensible by my little mind. All minds, Jonah, whether they be men's or children's, are little. In this great universe of ours, man is a mere insect, an ant, in his intellect as compared with the boundless world about him, as measured by the intelligence capable of grasping the whole of truth and knowledge.

Yes, Jonah, there is a Godzilla.

He exists as certainly as fear and trepidation and big, scaly reptiles exist, and you know that they abound and give to your life its highest beauty and joy. Alas! how dreary would be the world if there were no Godzilla! It would be as dreary as if there were no Jonahs. There would be no childlike faith then, no poetry, no romance to make tolerable this existence. We should have no enjoyment, except in sense and sight. The external light with which childhood fills the world would be extinguished.

Not believe in Godzilla! You might as well not believe in fairies. You might get your papa to hire men to watch in all the oceans, forests and Japanese cities to catch Godzilla, but even if you did not see Godzilla coming down, what would that prove? Nobody sees Godzilla, but that is no sign that there is no Godzilla. The most real things in the world are those that neither children nor men can see. Did you ever see fairies dancing on the lawn? Of course not, but that's no proof that they are not there. Nobody can conceive or imagine all the wonders there are unseen and unseeable in the world.

You tear apart the baby's rattle and see what makes the noise inside, but there is a veil covering the unseen world which not the strongest man, nor even the united strength of all the strongest men that ever lived could tear apart. Only faith, poetry, love, romance, can push aside that curtain and view and picture the supernal beauty and glory beyond. Is it all real? Ah, Jonah, in all this world there is nothing else real and abiding.

No Godzilla? Thank God he lives and lives forever. A thousand years from now, Jonah, nay 10 times 10,000 years from now, he will continue to make glad the heart of childhood and strike fear in the heart of Japanese city-dwellers.

[Jonah Hex]

ROFLOL!!!

[Seruzawa]

Good deal. I've got the Raymond Burr DVD version. I've wanted the original for years.

Maybe I'll be able to take a break now. I'm really tired of having to work day and night building oxygen destroyers.

signed,
Dr. Seruzawa

[Eric in the Ozarks]

I'd like to see two out of three falls with Godzilla vs Ricky-dozan.

[Jonah Hex]

I'm really tired of having to work day and night building oxygen destroyers.

I hope you're keeping the no-pest strips up, Doc. Remember what happened last time?

[Jonah Hex]

If you want to see a fight, just wait until the Big G finds out about McDonalds eliminating their "Supersize" option!

[TheBigB]

Somebody call Cook's!

[Godzilla]

Noooooooooo, nooooooooo say its not true.

[Rocko]

Godzilla, I think you should look for a new agent. I think you've got at least another 28 movies in you.

[socal_parrot]

Maybe take up fishing or some other hobby.

[Jonah Hex]

I think you've got at least another 28 movies in you.

Just avoid the porn industry.

[Poohbah]

S**t. Another remnant of a wonderful childhood gone.

[GreenLanternCorps]

But if he keeps making movies he won't have the time to play on the PGA Senior Tour!

[Jonah Hex]

Godzilla's idea of fishing...

[Radioactive]

I think that there could be a new movie after this one.

Godzilla VS the Gecco from Geico.

Godzilla destroys the world and the Gecco from Geico rebuilds the world with insurance money.

I'm hoping that Godzilla wins.

I hate that damned Gecco.

My all time favorite Godzilla movie though was Godzilla VS. Bambi.

A classic.

[Rocko]

Godzilla vs. the PGA Senior Tour:

Squish.

[Starter]

You're chewing on a green onion?

[Blue Scourge]

Lol...Godzilla vs. Bambi is a classic indeed...