Godzilla Singular Point, Ultraman Z, Titanotober, and More?!?!

singular-pointHey! I’m not dead!  

Where are the last two months’ reviews?  I’ll tell you: fuckin’ nowhere! Life is hard. Many, many things are total dogshit when it comes to life in 2020, but one of like four things that isn’t a complete, blood-shitting, teeth-grinding nightmare is being a kaiju fan! Holy shit there is so much going on and coming up! It even occasionally makes me hope that our inevitable extinction level event (be it a global ecological catastrophe, World War III, or uh tainted Moon water?) will hold off until…. maybe like 2022 or ’23 (tops). 

For October I was considering doing a mini episode round-up of Ultraman Z, the current and absolutely excellent installment of the long-running Ultraman series.  Buuuut October also saw the birth of a cool new kaiju art challenge, Titanotober!  But it’s also been forever since I reviewed Ultraman ’66 episodes. But also also but I’ve been wanting to review Gamera vs. Guiron for like, the last year or so. 

In classic Matt fashion I couldn’t figure out which one to commit to.  Throw in long hours at work, maintaining inter-personal relationships (that is, largely failing at maintaining said relationships), the chores and daily duties of everyday life, plus the twin siren songs of Animal Crossing AND Super Mario 3D All-Stars and you have a Voltron of responsibilities and distractions that’s better at eradicating free time better than actual Voltron is at killing off space monsters!

So what?  So this time I’m doing something a little different and dipping into a little bit of everything that’s swirling around in the kaijuverse… ESPECIALLY GODZILLA SINGULAR POINT HOLY FUCKING SHIT YOU SEEN THIS?!?!?!

If you haven’t, check it out! Then slap the “read more of Matt’s bullshit” button! If you want. You do you.  Self care, etc. XOXOXOX

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It’s not Pacific Rim Surprising that I like Pacific Rim Uprising

DUPoyAKV4AEM5TrIt’s crazy to think that it’s been nearly five years since Pacific Rim debuted in theaters.  While it got a middling-to-positive-ish reaction from mainstream audiences and critics, it spawned a small diehard cult following and made a big ol’ splash overseas (mainly China).

As for me, I loved it (with the exception of Charlie Hunnam’s inexplicably lame performance) and eagerly kept up with news of a sequel (or really any kind of follow-up–I take it the proposed animated series was shit-canned?).  As the years wore on, the sequel (temporarily named “Maelstrom”) looked less and less likely to happen, and with the excitement for Godzilla 2014 (and its associated MonsterVerse) building, I wrote a second Pacific Rim off as a potentially cool movie that we just weren’t likely to get. Fucking Grown Ups 2 beat the original at the box office, after all.

But Wanda Group and John Boyega have cancelled the apocalpyse, snatched Pacific Rim Uprising from the gates of Development Hell, and launched it into theaters last week! But is a Pacific Rim without Guillermo del Toro in the director’s chair really a Pacific Rim at all?  Find somebody that’s drift compatible, initiate your neural handshake, and make sure you’re war ready, we’re re-opening the breach!

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Get Filled to the Specific Brim with Pacific Rim

pacific_rim_ver12_xlgG-Fest has come and gone, so it’s time to dig back in with movie reviews! I’m gonna keep the G-Fest hype train rolling (sort of), with this month’s review: Pacific Rim.  I got to see it opening night at G-Fest back in 2013, and watching it for the first time in a lavish movie palace packed with monster fans was one of my all-time favorite moviegoing experiences.  It definitely doesn’t hurt that Pacific Rim is a big, crazy, fun, slam-bang, gee-whiz, pants-shitter of a spectacle film either.  The movie definitely has some issues that hold it back from being a full-on classic (genre or otherwise), but don’t let the flashy visual effects, bonkers premise, or broad characters fool you: this is 100% a labor of love from director Guillermo del Toro, and it shows in virtually every single frame of the movie.

I’m gonna dissect this mo-fo and see what makes a modern monster movie tick! I also have a (mostly) baseless theory that Pacific Rim beat a similar movie to the punch and straight into development hell! So connect your brain to a monster’s, strap into a giant robot, and get ready to cancel the apocalypse!

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