Top 10 EPIC Godzilla Moments
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#10: The Thousand Year Dragon
“Godzilla, Mothra and King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All-Out Attack” (2001)
Top 20 Most Epic Classic Movie Moments
So, here’s the thing about Mothra: across her many film appearances, she has a tendency towards dying, usually by sacrificing herself for the greater good. The elaborately titled 2001 entry in the “Godzilla” series features one of her more dramatic moments of self-sacrifice, and one with a surprising beneficiary. In this instalment, the normally evil King Ghidorah is on the side of good, helping Mothra and Baragon fight off an evil Godzilla. After falling in the epic final showdown, Mothra uses the last of her energy to power up Ghidorah, giving the so-called Thousand Year Dragon a fighting chance. Way to take one for the team, Mothra.
#9: Godzilla Kick!
“Godzilla vs. Megalon” (1973)
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Let’s be honest here, a lot of the classic “Godzilla” movies are pretty darned silly, and it’s harder to think of a better example than this one, which sees Godzilla teaming up with a robot named Jet Jaguar. During the duo’s epic battle with the giant insect Megalon, Godzilla employs some questionable fighting moves, not the least of which is this flying dropkick. We’re not even going to try to explain the physics behind this move, and it’s probably best to just go with it and enjoy the moment for how absurd it is. By this point, Godzilla was basically a giant green superhero, and while his antics may have been extraordinarily silly, they were also a lot of fun.
#8: Super MechaGodzilla
“Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla II” (1993)
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Combining giant robots has been a part of Japanese pop culture almost as long as Godzilla, so it’s no surprise that someone combined the two. After all, Godzilla has his own giant robot nemesis in the form of MechaGodzilla, and what do you do when that’s not enough? Go bigger, that’s what. After MechaGodzilla is bested by his scaly counterpart, it combines with a flying vehicle called Garuda to assume a more powerful form. While the transformation sequence isn’t as visually spectacular as most anime or Japanese Tokusatsu (pronounced Toe-ku-Saht-su”) shows, the added firepower this mechanical doppelganger obtains is nothing to scoff at.
#7: Godzilla’s First Appearance
“Godzilla” (2014)
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Say what you will about the 2014 “Godzilla”, but this moment was pretty great. Unlike Roland Emmerich’s poor attempt in ‘98, Gareth Edwards’ gritty reboot plays it very coy with the titular monster, showing Godzilla and the enemy monsters as sparingly as possible to maximize the impact when they are onscreen. This approach definitely works best for Godzilla’s debut, which is about as epic as one could possibly hope for, with Godzilla emerging from the sea like a living natural disaster, and eventually coming face to face with the M.U.T.O (Pronounced as “Muto”) to deliver an earth-shattering roar. Kind of like Godzilla’s atomic “kiss of death” *Xref in the final showdown, this was one moment that was definitely worth waiting for.
#6: Godzilla & Co. vs. King Ghidorah
“Ghidorah, the Three-Headed Monster” (1964)
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Up until this point in the “Godzilla” franchise, the titular monster had been very firmly on the villain side of things. But as bad as Godzilla was, the three-headed space dragon known as King Ghidorah was worse. At least three times worse, to be specific. This is why Ghidorah’s appearance and subsequent attack on Earth prompted Godzilla to team up with his fellow kaiju for the very first time, leading to this massive showdown between the invading astro-monster and Godzilla, Mothra, and Rodan. While it may look kinda goofy by today’s standards, this sequence was really a massive sea-change for the “Godzilla” franchise, and by extension kaiju films as a whole.
#5: A Grand Entrance
“Terror of Mechagodzilla” (1975)
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By the mid-70s, the “Godzilla” franchise had become a shadow of its former self, failing to bring in the kind of box office results that the studio wanted. In an effort to revitalize the series, producers brought back director Ishiro Honda (Pronounced “Ish-ero”) , who directed many of the early films. The results didn’t quite work the way they wanted, and the film underperformed enough to put the series into temporary retirement. Still, the film has more artistic flair than many of its contemporaries, a clear sign of Honda’s hand on the wheel. A great example of this is Godzilla’s entrance to the film, complete with dramatic backlighting and the classic Akira Ifukube (last name pronounced “E-Fuku-bea”) score.
#4: Battle Royale
“Destroy All Monsters” (1968)
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The final battle in “Ghidorah, the Three-Headed Monster” may have been the first time Godzilla and friends battled together against the space dragon, but it wasn’t the last. A kaiju battle royale to end them all, this entry in the franchise brought together an unprecedented number of monster combatants. It was basically the “Avengers: Endgame” of its time, and culminated in a massive showdown between Ghidorah and almost every kaiju that had been established at that point. In many ways, it’s the absolute height of the 60s and 70s era of “Godzilla” movies, with an emphasis on spectacle and over-the-top monster action. And really, what more could you ask for?
#3: Godzilla vs. Zilla
“Godzilla: Final Wars” (2004)
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Like we said earlier: The 1998 “Godzilla” reboot by director Roland Emmerich was… not great, to put it very mildly. Toho Studios, which produced the original films in Japan, evidently weren’t too happy either, as they began building up for the “real” Godzilla to get his fiery revenge on his American counterpart. In the franchise’s 2004 entry, Godzilla finally faces off against the intentionally poorly rendered CGI monster, now dubbed “Zilla”. (Show the “15 second fight”) Yep … that’s all it took to bring down this fish-loving oversized iguana. Considering missiles killed him in the ’98 film; it’s no wonder Zilla didn’t stand a chance against the king. Good Riddance!
#2: Godzilla Reborn
“Godzilla vs. Destoroyah” (1995)
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This entry in the series was meant to be Godzilla’s final curtain call, with the iconic monster dying when his internal nuclear reactor (because yes, Godzilla has one) melted down *Xref. But while Godzilla technically got a dramatic and moving death scene, you just can’t keep a good monster down. (Pronounced “Hey-Say”) The Heisei series of films , of which this movie is a part, heavily featured an infant Godzilla as well, who was there to witness the demise of his father. Absorbing the massive discharge of energy, the baby Godzilla quickly grew to full size, leading to this insanely dramatic final shot that capped off the Heisei series on a serious high note.
Before we reveal our number one pick, here are some monstrous honorable mentions:
Godzilla Meets Mothra
“Mothra vs. Godzilla” (1964)
Old “Friends”
“Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah” (1991)
Godzilla Flies
“Godzilla vs. Hedorah” (1971)
Atomic Breath Inside Orga
“Godzilla 2000” (1999)
#1: Godzilla Attacks Tokyo
“Godzilla” (1954)
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Before he was a guardian of the Earth, Godzilla was first envisioned as a parable for nuclear proliferation and the lingering scars of WW2. No sequence in the franchise captures this better than Godzilla’s first attack on Tokyo in the original film. After making his startling debut *Xref in the film, Godzilla goes on a rampage through Tokyo, one that draws on imagery like the firebombing of Tokyo and of course the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The result is a truly harrowing sequence that instantly made the film a cult classic, and one of the most important pieces of postwar Japanese cinema. The series may have become shallow spectacle later, but it started very differently.
