We Can Plan to Scan the Snowman Ban(ned) in Japan

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Jujin_Yuki_Otoko_posterI thought I was so cool, I had the next few months’ reviews all planned out. Then out of nowhere, Godzilla fan and all around cool internet person Chickenman456 gives me the hook-up on Half Human, the BANNED monster movie Ishiro Honda, Eiji Tsuburaya, and Tomoyuki Tanaka collaborated on immediately following Gojira. Not just the gutted American version (which itself is not particularly easy or affordable to come by), but the borderline impossible to find Japanese original as well!  It’s something I always kind of casually kept an eye out for, but never really expected to find… kind of like this movie’s heroes and its titular titan!

We’ll find out why it got banned in its homeland, how the Hollywood release chopped it from 94 minutes to 63 (despite adding a bunch of shit!), and more! Put on your parka, it’s time to dig into Half Human!

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Gimme some more-ah Hedorah!

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5354832036_bbcaab4cb6_bEarth Day and 4/20 were this month, so I had to review 1971’s oddball eco-conscious epic, Godzilla vs. Hedorah! This seems to be a love it or hate it entry in the Godzilla series. It boasts artsy weirdness, scenes of kid-friendly wackiness immediately contrasted with people-melting mass-murder, a gelatinous dookie beast from outer space, trippy cartoon segments, and I’m gonna go ahead and spoil it because it’s so fucking rad: Godzilla shoots his atomic breath at the ground to take flight. Seriously, if you haven’t seen the movie, you gotta at least watch this 30 second clip of the best thing in the universe.

If you haven’t guessed already, I fall squarely in the “love it” camp.  I have good company, too! Legendary film critic Roger Ebert listed it as his favorite Godzilla film.  Series producer Tomoyuki Tanaka wasn’t so pleased: upon viewing the rough cut, he fired Hedorah writer-director Yoshimitsu Banno.  We’ll talk about that, how the suit actor portraying Hedorah had to get surgery–while still in the monster suit!–how Hedorah indirectly spawned 2014’s Godzilla, and all kinds of other fun insanity! Get on the floor-ah, here comes Hedorah!

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I’ve got 10 Cloverfield Lane on the 10 Cloverfield Brain

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10c_1-sht_online_teaser_alt10 Cloverfield Lane came out this month! Just like its 2008 predecessor Cloverfield, it was a surprise announcement, and the true nature of the film has been shrouded in secrecy.  And just like with Cloverfield, 10 Cloverfield Lane built up excitement and mystery with a complex and creepy alternate reality game (or ARG).

So what’s the connection between the two movies? What did J.J. Abraham Lincoln mean when he said 10 Cloverfield Lane isn’t a sequel but a “blood relative” to Cloverfield?  Is it a mean older brother? Precocious twin sister? Cool uncle? Cousin that’s constantly in and out of jail? Grab a Slusho, lock yourself in your doomsday bunker and keep reading to find out!

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Eye of the Jiger

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Jigerposter1Hope you had a good (or at least not-shitty) Varantimes Day!  I always like to try and tie my reviews to something current-ish, so this month I went hunting for a little giant monster romance! Last year worked out great with Rodan‘s star-crossed terror-dactyls. This year… let’s just say kaiju generally aren’t lovey-dovey creatures.

Gamera gets pragnent in this one! Implies a little hanky-panky, yeah?  Except Gamera is a boy and there’s no sex, just a (non-erotic) shanking.  Also two kids abort the murderous monster-baby.  Hahaha, hoo boy.  This is truly one of the craziest, most fun entries in the classic Gamera series, and that’s saying a lot considering we got shit like this in a previous installment.

So light some candles, put on some slow jams, and check yourself for ancient curses and/or monstrous parasites, because we’re talking about 1970’s Gamera vs. Jiger!

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Give Groot the Boot: There’s No Dispute that The Iron Giant is Vin Diesel’s #1 Cute, Nearly Mute Brute

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27b51c785f7cf49c22e3129a63283eeaIt’s a whole new year, homies! I want to kick this one off with something a little different.  Looking back at my last five reviews, three of them star established franchise monsters (my personal unholy trinity of Godzilla, King Kong, and Gamera), four were made in Japan, three were made in the glory days of the 1960s monster boom, and four were high-flying monster-mashing battle royales.

For real, at the rate I write these, I could probably review nothing but 1960s Japanese kaiju films and be flush with content for years.  I would also be flush with fun, because those are the best movies in the universe.  BUT that’s not the sole point of MONSTERS CONQUER THE WORLD! I like to sweep the greater giant monster moviescape and yak about shit from different regions and time periods. In addition to perusing Japan’s kaiju collection, I’ve also sampled monster fare from the good ol’ US of A, jolly old England, and even mother-fucking real-life Mordor North Korea! So this month I’m reviewing another really unique entry in the colossal creature canon: The Iron Giant.  It’s an American movie from 1999 that focuses more on heartwarming, unusual friendships than city-shattering mayhem.  It’s a little more E.T. than Godzilla.  And even weirder: it’s animated!

So grab your vintage Superman comics, chew on some scrap metal, and get ready to duck and cover with the Iron Giant!

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What do Snake Plissken and King Kong have in common? “Escapes”!

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Things you’ll find at the North Pole: snow, maybe a ringed seal or two, ice, a jolly magical chubster distributing toys based on a vague morality system, some polar bears… oh yeah and King Kong’s gigantic robotic doppelganger chilling with his evil creator, “that international Judas” Dr. Who!

“Wha-huh?” I’m talking about 1967’s King Kong Escapes!  The Toho/Rankin-Bass (the company best known for bringing Rudolph and Santa to stop-motion life) co-production that pits a suitmation King Kong against his mechanical twin!  I love to tie my reviews to the season, but until somebody makes Attack of the 50ft Krampus, Kong’s James Bond-inspired adventures at the North Pole are as close as we get to seeing Christmas on Monster Island.

So strap on your grenade belt, hop in your hover car, and pick a fight with your evil robot self, because King Kong is escaping!  Continue reading →

Gamera is my Jam-era

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Gamera turned 50 years young this month! To celebrate, I had to review his debut flick Gamera, or Giant Monster Gamera, or Gammera the Invincible, or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Gamera.  It’s the movie so nice MST3k riffed it twice!

Gamera’s first feature is the only one to cast him as the villain, the only one in black and white, and the only one that doesn’t have the Gamster taking on an opposing monster.  It’s the poster child for early installment weirdness, even more so than the straight-laced Gamera vs. Barugon.  Even though O.G. Gamera is a city-smashing, crowd-roasting terror, that somehow doesn’t stop him from being crowned “The Friend of Children” which means this movie is populated with some seriously fucked-up human characters.  It’s great!

We’ll talk about all that, plus how this movie started out as a failed attempt at a rat-attack horror movie.  Load up on freeze bombs, eat some fire, sign off on Plan Z, and get ready to slam-era with Gamera!

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Don’t be a Whore of the Gargantuas, Check out War of the Gargantuas

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War_of_the_GargantuasHappy Halloween month!  It’s my favorite time of year: the crisp cool air, the beautiful colors of changing leaves, dark nights perfect for horror movie marathons, candy, pumpkin spice everything, apple pie, costumes, Halloween parties, all that shit! Last year I had a perfectly Halloweenish kaiju movie, the delightfully bizarre Frankenstein Conquers the World.  This year I just have to follow up with its superior sequel, 1966’s terrific War of the Gargantuas!

Of course, just how much of a sequel it is will depend on what cut you’re watching, but we’ll get to that later.  What’s important to know right now is that in spite of its wet-fart of a leading man, Gargantuas delivers a simple and satisfying sci-fi story and some of the absolute best monster mayhem committed to film. It’s a cult favorite in an already cult genre that’s secretly influenced some of the heaviest hitters in Hollywood.  So put down that giant octopus, spit out those shredded shirts, and get the words unstuck from your throat, because we’re going to war with the Gargantuas!

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Custody Battle Royale (with cheese): Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla II

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Godzilla_vs._MechaGodzilla_2_Poster_Japan_4I’ve been cranking out Monsters Conquer the World for a little over a year now, and I noticed two glaring omissions in my output so far: I have yet to cover a “Heisei” era movie, and more importantly, I haven’t yet covered a Mechagodzilla movie.  Obviously Godzilla’s robot doppelganger is a big deal, but what the hell does the current emperor of Japan have to do with kaiju movies?  I’ll answer that by picking apart 1993’s Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla II! Which confusingly enough is not a direct sequel to Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla, nor is it even the second film to feature Mechagodzilla, it’s the third.  

Plus, it’s Godzilla’s official 40th anniversary movie (despite being off by a year)! We’ll blast through a primer on the Godzilla series in the late 80s and early 90s, talk about some of Toho’s crazy unused ideas for the movie, psychics, deliciously bad CGI, singing plants, butt-brains, and more, so strap in! Mechagodzilla is go for launch!

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Get Filled to the Specific Brim with Pacific Rim

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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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