Ken Watanabe is returning though. Variety reported that back in March. Pretty sure he's contractually signed up for three films which would make sense since 'Godzilla Vs. Kong' will likely be entering into production around the time 'Godzilla: King of Monsters' wraps. I expect Sally Hawkins will join him for three. I also wouldn't hold out hope for them being anything more than marginalized side characters in Godzilla 2 which by all account is going to be told through the eyes of the Stranger Things girl with her parents being the next leads.

Maybe Watanabe & Hawkins will be allowed to be the human protagonists of Godzilla Vs. Kong. Shrug.


UPDATE:
Adam Wingard (V/H/S, You're Next, The Guest, Blair Witch, Netflix's American Death Note) is the director of GODZILLA VS. KONG. http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/heat-vision/godzilla-kong-finds-director-adam-wingard-1008773?utm_source=twitter

Bradley Whitford added to KOM.

Gendo'sPapa wrote:UPDATE:
Adam Wingard (V/H/S, You're Next, The Guest, Blair Witch, Netflix's American Death Note) is the director of GODZILLA VS. KONG. http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/heat-vision/godzilla-kong-finds-director-adam-wingard-1008773?utm_source=twitter

Meh, I kinda wanted Edwards back to see him having evolved after Rogue One and having gotten past the build up to showing the monsters phase in the 2014 film.

I don't think Edwards is a good fit for these popcorn flicks. He ends up hiding the monsters, whether it's Godzilla or Darth Vader, but he doesn't hide them behind anything interesting.

If I'm going to see a movie called Godzilla: King of the Monsters I want to see Godzilla smashing shit and I don't care if someone thinks it's childish.

I love slow reveals. Godzilla's cinematic intro in Edwards' movie was nothing less than amazing, and the skydive scene was outstanding.

But, for whatever reason, Edwards can't do anything amazing after the reveal, so he just gears up for another reveal of the same monster. And it sucks.

I would have liked to see Gareth Edwards return but both mega blockbusters went phenomenally over budget so that would give any studio head concern.
The blockbuster filmmaking in GODZILLA 2014 is some of the best large scale movie magic I've seen in like a decade. It's the closest anyone has come to pulling off the early Spielberg magic when it comes to spectacle. The way he films Godzilla & the MUTO is incredible because it's both all practical camera placement - no magical flying CG camera - & the monsters somehow felt both fully contemporary effects wise but also perfectly in line with the classic Godzilla FX work of men in a suit. Godzilla & the MUTO moved & felt authentic to how they would in a classic Toho film.
The problems with Godzilla 2014 all stem from the human component were the movie seems to actively say "We know you're not here for the humans so we're going to make sure they're all EXTRA boring. Here's a little taste of Bryan Cranston doing great work selling a non-character though."

Anywho, of all the ongoing Cinematic Universes right now the WB MonsterVerse is probably the one I'm most interested in. While I personally was not a fan of KONG: SKULL ISLAND - another case of awful character work + I found the movie lacked scale & was poorly edited with rushed action beats - there's no question that is 100% the movie Jordan Vogt-Roberts wanted to make & it was exciting to go into the theater & see a relatively new filmmaker make a blockbuster. I didn't know what to expect when I saw Kong so it was an exciting watch nonetheless even if I didn't particularly enjoy the film.

So I'm onboard to see what twisted visions the WB will allow Michael Dougherty & Adam Wingard to bring to the screen. In Dougherty's case I feel Trick r' Treat is one of the few genuine great Halloween set movies to come out in decades & Krampus is the best Gremlins since Gremlins 2 - it's also a much better Amblin knockoff than the vanilla Stranger Things - so I have no idea what to expect from him in GODZILLA: KING OF THE MONSTERS. And in Wingard's case the man has shown he's perfectly capable of delivering truly great movies - You're Next is perfect for the genre it's in & The Guest is a delight - while also capable of making pretty bad movies - his shorts in the V/H/S anthologies & Blair Witch. I don't know what to expect out of his GODZILLA VS. KONG but I'm intrigued entirely.

Only real concern I have right now is Godzilla fatigue. New Godzilla in 2014, Anno's Shin Godzilla last year in 2016, a trilogy of anime Godzilla movies starting this November, Godzilla: King of the Monsters in 2019, Godzilla vs. Kong in 2020 & a probable Shin Godzilla sequel anytime in the near future.... that's a lot of the Kaiju King. There's a very good chance we'll start taking him for granted.

FreakyFilmFan4ever wrote:I love slow reveals. Godzilla's cinematic intro in Edwards' movie was nothing less than amazing, and the skydive scene was outstanding.

But, for whatever reason, Edwards can't do anything amazing after the reveal, so he just gears up for another reveal of the same monster. And it sucks.

Precisely. G14 "reveals" Godzilla over and over.

movieartman wrote:Bradley Whitford added to KOM.

Lyman vs. Lizard 2019

Zhang Ziyi added to KOM as the potential overall leader of Monarch.

So the anime Godzilla: Monster Planet trilogies version of the big guy looks very similar to the American 2014 reboot. Interesting.

https://headlines.yahoo.co.jp/hl?a=20170613-00000000-dal-ent.view-000

Monster Planet teaser.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1dF83zsTIMQ

As I feared the animation is extremely 3d & jerky.

movieartman wrote:Monster Planet teaser.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1dF83zsTIMQ

As I feared the animation is extremely 3d & jerky.

It doesn't look too bad IMO, but it would be better if it was smoother.

So if they're doing three of these should we expect one of these annually? Will this be Toho's Godzilla placeholder until Anno is finished with Evangelion & they try to get him back for Shin Godzilla 2?

I'm of two minds about this.

1. That animation looks pretty crappy.

2. MONSTER PLANET. A PLANET of MONSTERS. WHEEE

The animation could be worse, could be Roja the Robbers Daughter.

Studio Ghibli artstyle Falls right into the uncanny valley when you render it in 3D and don't give the animators enough of a budget to render it at the framerate of a video game or a theatrical film.

Gendo'sPapa wrote:So if they're doing three of these should we expect one of these annually? Will this be Toho's Godzilla placeholder until Anno is finished with Evangelion & they try to get him back for Shin Godzilla 2?

I wouldn't say that they're placeholders, it's just that the franchise is moving to a different medium for three films.

And if I have to be honest, I hope that Shin Godzilla doesn't get a sequel. I feel it could ruin the creepiness and mystery of the final shot.

FreakyFilmFan4ever wrote:^ The American version is the only version of King Kong vs Godzilla that exists anymore. Toho completely lost the Japanese version. That being said, the original Japanese version did not have the much rumored alternate ending where Godzilla won. King Kong was always intended to be the winner of that film. The currently existing Japanese version of the film simply reverse-engineers the American version to be more like the Japanese version with some editing and ADR.

This is wrong. Toho had recut the original negatives for the Toho Champions Festival, a program which ran in theaters that showcased cut down fantasy and sci fi films, and lost the cut scenes. They never lost the entire film though (although for decades all they had for the cut scenes were a poor LaserDisc transfer), and the negatives for the entire Japanese original have been restored for a couple of years now. They have never "reverse engineered" or ADR'd parts of the American version. In fact, the original Japanese version in it's entirety has been restored in 4K and has aired in Japan.

Speaking of Gareth Edwards, he should totally return to the MonsterVerse. The monster scenes in G14 have incredibly engaging visuals, and the build up to the set pieces are great. His direction on characters is lacking, and there's too little monster scenes for such a long movie, but the potential is there.

I don't really want to see another Edwards movie. He's a one trick pony and should stay away from anything that involves actual characters.

If he made a dialogue-free movie about inhuman aliens or monsters I think that would turn out very well and be quite enjoyable.

Necro-quote?

SoryuUberAlles wrote:Word up!

That's misleading. Within terms of the nuclear commentary, the Raymond Burr edition only excised the political debates surrounding the responsibility of releasing certain information to the public. All of the nuclear references that was present in the Japanese version was also present in the Burr version. The only real difference is that the Japanese movie states that no one should wield nuclear weaponry, whereas the American cut leaves that up for the viewer to decide.

1998 film excluded, the Godzilla (2014) movie was the only American Godzilla movie appreciated by both the US and Japan that excised any commentary on nuclear war. The themes of that film were more focused on modern guerrilla warfare due to America's response to Al-Qaeda and ISIL terrorists post 9/11.

A post N. Korea nuke launch might make the thematics of future original American Godzilla movies a bit more recognizable to fans of the Japanese movies.

No, I'm not looking forward to that.

The point of Godzilla 2014 is that we're too up our own ass about our power and our technology. The whole movie is about the humans trying and failing to exert control over the natural world.

It's about human arrogance but in a different way. Godzilla attacked in the '50s, prompting human efforts to destroy him covertly, as a warning... but not a warning about us, about disturbing an ancient ecosystem and upsetting the balance.

When the stupid humans dig where they don't belong and let these things out, Godzilla has to drag his grizzled ass out of the ocean and deal with it. Then the dumbasses shoot at him and force him to defend their own young. He must be totally fed up by the end when these tiny little pink apes are feeding the damn things he woke up to get rid of.

Japanese Godzilla: Nuclear weapons are terrible. If we use them we'll destroy ourselves.

American Godzilla: If we destroy ourselves the universe won't notice.

The American big-G is basically a slightly benevolent Lovecraftian monster god. He's a guardian spirit, but he's not guarding us by choice.

Anno's entry is a different matter. The threat isn't Godzilla himself, it's the way that Japan has been infantalized by America. Shin Gojira reflects Anno's mildly right-wing cryptofascist appeals to when the Japanese were manly men as seen in his interview with the Atlantic Monthly. It's still a stylish and entertaining black comedy, though. There's something universally true about politicians responding to a crisis with a meeting about having a meeting that transcends Anno's politics.

Something else besides the kaiju might make a return to the Godzilla Universe in 2019.
Click the link for a clue from the director himself:

https://twitter.com/Mike_Dougherty/stat ... 44/photo/1