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| “ | Nature has an order. A Power to restore balance. I believe he is that power. | „ |
| ~ Serizawa on Godzilla. |
Godzilla is the titular main kaiju protagonist/one of the two main protagonists (alongside Ford Brody) of the 2014 film Godzilla. He later appeared in a cave painting in the 2017 film, Kong: Skull Island, where he is fighting King Ghidorah, his ultimate nemesis. He is set to fight King Ghidorah (and presumably Rodan and Mothra) in the 2019 sequel, Godzilla: King of the Monsters, and will appear in Godzilla vs. Kong, where he is set to fight King Kong.
He is an incarnation and version of Godzilla who made his presence known to the public in 2014 during his hunt for the two M.U.T.O.s, and the very kaiju whom existence kickstarted the foundation of Monarch, a secret governmental organization serving as the main protagonistic forces of the franchise.
He was portrayed by T.J Storm in motion capture.
History
Godzilla: Awakening
Origins
In this graphic novel, it is revealed that Godzilla is a prehistoric amphibious reptilian monster who fed off of Earth's natural radiation. Over the years, however, as the radiation emitted from the planet gradually declined, Godzilla retreated to the ocean depths, where it could absorb radiation from the Earth's core.
Discovery
For an incredibly long, albeit unknown amount of time, Godzilla remained dormant in the ocean, appearing occasionally at various points in human history, inspiring the mythologies of several cultures. That was until 1954, when he was awakened by a nuclear submarine due to sensing nuclear energy in it. Drawn by nuclear energy that utilized by humans to powered their submarines, Godzilla attacked and fed on American and Soviet nuclear submarines in the South Pacific Ocean, with each nation believing the other was responsible for the attacks.
Fighting Shinomura
After being discovered, the U.N. tried to keep him secret and destroy him with atomic bombs under guise of nuclear testing, all of which failed to do so. During that time, another giant monster, Shinomura, made an appearance and fought Godzilla until both were bombed under the guise of Bravo Tests. Whereas Shinomura was destroyed by the blast, Godzilla survived, and went to hiding since then. As result of the emergence of both monsters, an organization called Monarch formed to keep him secret and study him, as well as to prepare for the possible emergence of another giant monsters (which was later confirmed with the discovery of King Kong and the Skullcrawlers).
Kong: Skull Island
Cave paintings
A cave painting of Godzilla during the post-end credits scene of Kong: Skull Island.
Although Godzilla doesn't physically appear in this film, the monster can be seen in two of the cave paintings fighting his ultimate nemesis, King Ghidorah, during the post-end credits of the movie. The cave paintings of Mothra and Rodan can also be seen, although they don't physically appear in the film, and Godzilla's roar can be heard afterwards. Monarch fears Godzilla's existence, as they believe he poses a threat to humanity.
Godzilla
Pursuing the M.U.T.O.s
In 1991, the spores of two of his ancient enemies, known by humans as the M.U.T.O.s, were found in the Philippian mines. 15 years later (2014), the male M.U.T.O. hatched out of his chrysalis after 15 years of absorbing nuclear radiation from a power plant in Japan. Godzilla begins listening as the male M.U.T.O. lets out a mating cry to his recently hatched female counterpart, and attacks the creature as he is laying waste to a Hawaiian airport, though the male M.U.T.O. escapes by flying away, and Godzilla retreats into the ocean. By this point, he made his presence known to the public.
Arrival at San Francisco
After this, Godzilla, while still in the ocean, hunts the M.U.T.O.s while they're lured to San Francisco with a nuclear warhead by the American military. Godzilla surfaces just before hitting the Golden Gate Bridge, and the military opens fire with tanks and gunfire. This has little to no effect, however, and Godzilla descends into the ocean once again, but not before clearing his path by accidentally destroying the bridge during the confusion.
Fighting the M.U.T.O.s
Godzilla surfaces once again in San Francisco to confront the recently arrived male M.U.T.O., and the two battle all the way into the night, while a bomb disposal squad led by Ford Brody is sent in via HALO jump to defuse the bomb that was placed to lure the M.U.T.O.s to San Francisco. Shortly after their arrival, the female M.U.T.O. lays her eggs, and Godzilla makes a loud roar at her, prompting the both of them to fight. Godzilla gets the upper hand during the battle, but the male M.U.T.O. arrives, and both creatures take on Godzilla, who is quickly overwhelmed by the two of them.
Before either of them can kill Godzilla however, they're distracted by Brody, who saved the monster by destroying the female's recently-laid egg sacs. While the female is distracted by Brody, Godzilla used the opportunity to pummel her with his atomic breath. Before he can finish her off, the male M.U.T.O attacks Godzilla once more, but Godzilla fights back and manages to kill him by slamming the male M.U.T.O. into a skyscraper with his own tail, rupturing the male M.U.T.O.'s internal organs in process. The impact, however, brings the entire building down on Godzilla, and he collapses to his hands and knees, extremely weak. He briefly looks Brody in the eyes, before being consumed by smoke and debris.
Brody then escapes to the pier, where the rest of his unit is trying to send the bomb out into the ocean where it can detonate without risk of fallout hitting the city. The female M.U.T.O., still alive from her encounter with Godzilla, follows the radiation and kills the rest of the squad, leaving Brody alone to send the boat out to sea with the bomb. As the M.U.T.O. closes in on the bomb and Brody, Godzilla emerges from behind, grabbing her and blasting her in the mouth with his atomic breath, making her neck explode, before tearing her head off and letting it fall into the water.
Victory
With both M.U.T.O.s killed, Godzilla then collapses from exhaustion in the city, seemingly dead. When morning comes, however, Godzilla rises up from the ashes around him and lets out a triumphant roar as the humans below cheer and applaud for their supposed "savior", proclaiming him "King of the Monsters." With both of his enemies dead and with balance in nature restored, Godzilla descends back into the ocean to become dormant once again.
Godzilla: King of the Monsters
Godzilla is set to fight King Ghidorah in this installment. He will also apparently fight Mothra and Rodan, based on the film's synopsis, which states that "they all vie for supremacy, leaving humanity's very existence hanging in the balance."
Godzilla vs. Kong
Godzilla is set to fight King Kong in this installment.
Personality
Unlike his more aggressive and misanthropic incarnations whom are often at odds with humanity, this version of Godzilla had no interest with humanity nor having any malicious intentions toward them; instead, he preferred to avoid any confrontations with their military forces, and chose to spare them once his business with the M.U.T.O.s was done, as seen in the end of the film. Not only that, he was also noticeably less destructive if compared with other incarnations, and also attempted not to provoke human military forces that attacked him as much as possible. When having himself surrounded by navy ships in close proximity during his pursuit for M.U.T.O.s, he carefully (and cautiously) swim near them, and even carefully dived below the said ships to escape instead of just ramming them. While responsible for some human deaths over the course of the film, the said deaths and destruction were actually the result of Godzilla's own size and collateral damage that he left behind after his battle against the two M.U.T.O.s. Also, when destroying Golden Gate Bridge, it was because he was reacting when his gills were being blasted by artillery shots.
While his personality is still far from typical Gentle Giants, and therefore more like a territorial animal, Dr. Ishiro Serizawa theorized that he is the driving force to restore balance to nature whenever that balance is disrupted. The theory proved to be correct, as had Godzilla not stopped the two M.U.T.O.s, their progeny would overrun the world, and no one can stop them from disrupting the balance. This suggests that Godzilla considered the entire Earth to be his territory, which explained his tenacity to chase the two M.U.T.O.s through long distance pursuit. He also showed a degree of emotion as he looked directly at Ford.
In an indirect way, Godzilla is the most powerful ally that humanity ever had.
Physical Appearance
In response of the previous deviating Hollywood incarnation that Toho denounced as a separate kaiju called Zilla, Hollywood filmmakers, who later worked on the ongoing MonsterVerse series, eventually recreated the Hollywood version of the character which is more faithful to Toho's Godzilla where this Godzilla is designed to resemble his original counterparts, particularly the 1954 version to keep his character in Hollywood movies consistent with Toho's. Even so, this Godzilla was given more natural physiology than the rest of his incarnations because in the MonsterVerse franchise, he was the last known member of a prehistoric reptillian kaiju species of the same name, which naturally evolved to gain their nuclear-based powers, which was due to prehistoric times where his kind roamed the planet. Radiation at that time was higher than in present day, and thus, he has not gained his powers from humans' nuclear tests, and therefore, he lacked keloid scars other incarnations usually possessed.
For the MonsterVerse incarnation of the character, his face is shaped very squarely, with a broad neck and possesses gills that enable him to stay underwater indefinitely. His eyes are a yellow color, and his teeth are small and not nearly as straightly lined up as many previous Godzilla incarnations. His nostrils are more separate than previous incarnations, with them being in opposite sides of the snout. Godzilla's head and neck seem to lean forward more so than any previous design. His dorsal plates are smaller than the previous designs, but they still retain the core maple-leaf shape, although straighter and very sharp, somewhat like the Godzilla from Godzilla 2000: Millennium,the Godzilla from Godzilla vs. Megaguirus and the Godzilla from the Kiryu saga. His claws are a black color, and his feet are wider and resemble an elephant's foot more than the other Godzilla incarnations' feet do. His skin is more reptile-like and crocodile-like as opposed of resembling keloid scars and rougher than the other incarnations, and is a blackish color. His body and tail are very wide as well, making him look somewhat bulkier than other Godzilla designs.
Legendary Pictures has confirmed that their Godzilla's tail is 550 feet and 4 inches long, his height is 355 feet, there are exactly 89 dorsal plates running down his back, the palm of his hands are 34 feet and 4 inches each, feet that are about 59 feet and 6 inches long, and that his roar can be heard from three miles away.
Powers and Abilities
This incarnation of Godzilla has tons of abilities, many of them being more powerful than other incarnations' abilities:
Strength
In addition with his great size, Godzilla is incredibly strong. In the 2014 reboot, it is shown that he is capable of smashing through the Golden Gate Bridge (though it was mostly accidental), outpowering the Eight-Legged M.U.T.O. with ease, manhandling both the M.U.T.O.s, and having a strong bite; he also killed the Winged M.U.T.O. with his huge tail, which can also bring down a huge building.
Intelligence
During his fights with the M.U.T.O.s, he figures out how to defeat them. He let the flying M.U.T.O fly at him and then slam him with the tail into a building to kill him and kills the Eight-Legged one by firing into her throat.
Atomic Breath
Godzilla firing his atomic breath.
Like his Toho counterpart, Godzilla posseses Atomic Breath. Godzilla's atomic breath is a powerful, concentrated blue beam of pure radiation blasted from his mouth. It is strong enough to bring down the Eight-Legged M.U.T.O. in two shots, and he often uses it as a final blow on his opponent.
The atomic breath that Godzilla demonstrated in the film might not have been released in full strength unlike his counterpart, since in the graphic novel Godzilla: Awakening, Godzilla was shown breathing a more beam-like atomic breath, which could be stronger and more powerful than the atomic breath used in the film, and could be just as destructive as the atomic breath used by his Japanese incarnations.
Amphibiousness
Using his gills, Godzilla is capable of living and breathing underwater. He is also a great swimmer. As this version possessed gills for swimming underwater, it's possible that he could swim far longer than his other incarnations.
Durability
Godzilla is immune to Conventional Weaponry and is tough enough to survive constant beatings from the two M.U.T.O.s, but the only body part that was least durable was his gills, as seen when he became panicked when one of the missiles hit his gills and forced him to retreat, and as a result, he destroyed Golden Bridge in accident.
Weaknesses
Arms
It's shown Godzilla has small arms, which allows an opponent to leap onto his head and attack since he can't reach over and fight back. This was the case with the male M.U.T.O., in which he leaped onto Godzilla's head without being taken off. The male M.U.T.O. attacking Godzilla like this allowed the female M.U.T.O. to ram Godzilla into a building.
Gills
Godzilla's greatest weakness seems to be his gills. This was shown when the military (scared because he was a giant monster) shot at Godzilla's dorsal plates while rising out of the sea, but he didn't suffer any damage. When they fired at his gills, it caused him to accidentally smash through the Golden Gate Bridge, since he was suffering from a lot of agony at the time before continuing to hunt the male M.U.T.O.
This was also shown when Godzilla was being beaten down by the mated M.U.T.O. pair. At one point, he roared at the female M.U.T.O., but her mate attacked him, and after that, he suffered extreme agony when the female M.U.T.O. slashed through his gills with one of her claws.
Reception
The company Toho disliked the Tristar Godzilla design a lot, and thus dubbed the monster "Zilla" (even though, legally and canonically, it's still Godzilla, as the real Zilla was in Godzilla: Final Wars). However, Toho loved the 2014 design of Godzilla, and because of this, they gave Warner Bros. and Legendary Pictures the rights to 3 other monsters: Rodan, Mothra, and King Ghidorah. All three are set to appear in the 2019 sequel, Godzilla: King of the Monsters.
Trivia
- In the U.S. trailers, Godzilla was thought to be the main antagonist for the film, but in the Japanese trailer, he was revealed to be a protagonist. This was likely done to hide the main antagonists that he actually hunted down before returning to the ocean.
- This Godzilla's recent design is based on the original 1954 design, the ShodaiGoji suit from the original Godzilla film, as director Gareth Edwards wanted to create a Godzilla design that's very modern, but still respects and resembles the design from the original Toho films.
- This version of Godzilla's fighting style mostly resembles a bear and Komodo dragon's fighting style, and is reversal of his previous incarnations' fighting style: whereas Godzilla in previous films uses his atomic breath more often than close combat, Godzilla in the 2014 film uses his teeth, claws, and tail more often, and only uses his atomic breath as last resort weapon; however, this may change in future films.
- Unlike his Japanese counterparts, this version of Godzilla is not a misanthrope.
- It is unknown why Godzilla and King Kong would fight each other in Godzilla vs. Kong, given the fact that they are both heroic monsters; this would classify both of them as Good Vs. Good.
- However, it is safe to assume that they believe each other are a threat, with Godzilla believing King Kong is a threat to the balance of nature, and King Kong believing Godzilla is a threat to Skull Island.
- This is the first incarnation of Godzilla to possess gills, the other being the Godzilla from the Toho 2016 reboot, Shin Godzilla, except that the latter only had gills in his 2nd and 3rd forms, not the entire movie like the MonsterVerse Godzilla did.
