Well, they made 2 generic Robotic Godzilla's in the past 2 series, I guess they wanted to make something a bit more original for the 3rd one. I mean, first one was villainous (and partially existed as a throw back to when Godzilla was a villain, not a hero, while keeping him heroic hence the "Fake Skin" thing he had at first; it was basically there for Godzilla vs. Godzilla!), the 2nd one was meant to stop Godzilla after his reboot into villain stage that Heisei did, both were just giant robots. I guess they felt making the 3rd one more of a cyborg lent itself to be a little more interesting, or at least, added a new spin on a character like that.
You don't have to like it, just putting things into perspective here; this is the 3rd "Mechagodzilla" character, so just going "Hey, another Mechagodzilla, with a 3rd design!" probably was just going to be "bah, boring." At least this way, they could add moral bullshit in a (sad) attempt to make the human side interesting!
Anyway, that out of the way...
Gamera the Brave: Having finished Godzilla series recently (with the worst of the Millenium series), I went on to watch the only Millenium Gamera movie, and finish off that series (Ok, so I never saw Gamera vs. Jiger and Gamera Super Monster, but the former is Showa Gamera and the latter is apparently the WORST GAMERA MOVIE EVER, so I doubt I'm missing much). Considering the 90s Gamera was actually pretty good, and did well to salvage Gamera, I had at least moderate hopes for this movie.
Unfortunately, it was overall disappointing. I will state that its merely "disappointing", as opposed to "nearly unwatchably bad" like most of the older films.
Now when I read a quick preview, I learned that this movie is actually a sequel to the original 8 Gamera Movies of the 60/70s. As in...the bad movies. My general thoughts?
"Oh, so its related plot wise, but it should be on par with the 90s movies, at least, for special effects!"
I had forgotten what "Related to Showa Gamera" actually meant though for his character. A quick recap!
Showa Gamera: He's the friend to ALL CHILDREN!!!! This includes having a vocal theme song sung by 1st graders.
Heisei Gamera: GUARDIAN OF THE UNIVERSE!!! He can also Falcon Punch with his AMPUTATED RIGHT ARM.
I really don't have to say much more; the 90s Gamera (aka Heisei) is a bad ass, the Showa is a joke. This is contrast to Godzilla where Showa was more "Cheesey Pro Wrestler" thus fun it that guilty pleasure sort of way, while Heisei Godzilla just bleeds awesome...and even Showa Godzilla has his bad ass moments (His
Terror of Mechagodzilla entrance comes to mind) despite all the cheese. Showa Gamera is just pathetic, its a shock he was actually pretty cool in Heisei!
Anyway...basically, I had forgotten that and yeah...so the movie starts off actually like the Heisei, just back in the 70s, set around the time after the last Showa movie ended (...from what I can tell, Gamera Super Monster isn't canon cause its just a lot of stock footage of monsters + new stupid footage of humans.) It starts off with Gamera fighting...3 Heisei Gyaos...
I am saying to myself "Wait, why not just base it off the Heisei then? Gamera 3 ended with him fighting a swarm of Gyaos, why not just extend from there?" BUt lets not get into that...what's weird is the Gyaos are clearly smaller than the one in Showa, so you'd think and...wait, Gamera plot analysis, LETS MOVE ON!
its actually a pretty cool spectacle, watching him nuke one Gyaos, then the others attack, and he self destructs and...yeah, it was actually a pretty neat opening. But wait, Gamera is dead...this of course means we won't see Gamera for a while.
The movie is basically about some kid finding an Egg at some weird glowing rock, it hatches and becomes a turtle! He takes it home as a pet, and names it "Toto" cause that was the nickname is deceased mother gave it...turns out this turtle has SUPER POWARS!!! and can fly. For the next 40 minutes of the movie, its about the kid and his turtle, and how its growing up astronomically fast, such that in like 5 days, its as big as those Tortoises that live 150 years already...naturally, he has to get rid of it since he can't keep it a secret.
It was at this point what i realize I got myself into; this is a children's Kaiju movie, not a General Audience one
Anyway, as you'd expect, Turtle comes back, now much bigger, after the NEW Giant Mosnter appears, they fight, turtle evolves and such, eventually wins, the kids help out. They really wanted to remind us that Gamera was "FRIEND TO ALL CHILDREN!" back then, and not "GUARDIAN OF THE UNIVERSE!" Corny as the latter title is, at least THAT Gamera displayed levels of bad assery you'd expect from a popular Kaiju.
The special effects were good at least, and Gamera himself looked passable enough, though they displayed him more as "Cute" rather than "Monstrous"
...wait, I take that back; TOTO looked Cute but I guess the logic is "he's not a full adult, even when he's big." The actual Gamera in the beginning of the movie looked about the same he did in the 90s movies (probably the same outfit just refurbished), which was decent enough!
Then we have Zedus, the new guy. Ok, you know Jurassic Park? You know that spitting monster? Imagine a super enlarged version of him, but purple. That's this guy. He's the single most bland generic boring monster design yet. I was sad cause the the 90s Gamera? It started off with Gyaos, the only Gamera monster who was original and can be taken seriously to some degree, followed up with Legion who was pretty neat looking, and then Iris whose flashy as hell. So Zedas being bland and stupid...yeah, disappointing. The fight sequence wasn't bad at least; it did have the cheese factor!
So...yeah, while not unwatchable bad, it was still disappointing to see the movie go back to the "THIS IS FOR KIDS!" roots instead of the "everyone can have fun watching this!", especially since the 90s movies were actually good. Whatever, maybe I'll MST3k the older movies now or something if I hate myself <_<
If you're still reading this rant...WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH YOU PEOPLE?
