For the last year, I’ve had the pleasure of hosting a “Godzilla night” with friends interested in the series. Once a week we spin a wheel, which graces us with both titles to adore and tales less respected. On the topic of these lesser films, sometimes the failures of specific productions reveal something positive about the filmmakers. More often than not the lack of time, funds, and resources set up certain projects for failure, but the movies avoid the gallows due to the inventive talent behind the camera. Then there are the hallmarks of incompetence - longer production schedules - higher budgets - greater studio support - but the movie still fails. Godzilla (1998) is an easy target for this criteria, but staying within the same region of the series proper puts a more traditional title in the crosshairs.
It’s not the first time this former critic has declared a review of Godzilla vs. SpaceGodzilla (1994) to be his final word on the production. Inevitably, as soon as I put distance between myself and the movie, the debate about its quality rears its head. So here it goes again. The latest, “final word” on Godzilla vs. SpaceGodzilla—may it bring peace until the next final word.
When discussing the inauspicious meeting of Godzilla and his intergalactic clone, positive feedback has been avoided in the most belligerent act of distaste. In the spirit of fair play, a semblance of likable qualities will be traced. Takayuki Hattori’s score doesn’t always fit what’s happening on screen, but it makes for an engaging standalone listen. There are shades of John Barry in Hattori's quieter moments while SpaceGodzilla’s theme evokes a Jerry Goldsmith-ian errieness. The interstellar monster is underscored with a balance of wonder and terror similar to V’ger’s theme from Star Trek: The Motion Picture (1979). Despite Hattori’s occasional mismatching with picture, the music is likely the film’s strongest aspect.
Masahiro Kishimoto returns to add some dimension and color to the cinematography, something missing from Godzilla vs. MechaGodzilla II of the previous year. (If bland could be a color, MechaGodzilla II is it.) And Akira Emoto gives his all as Maj. Akira Yuki, whose revenge arc deserved more attention than this movie could give. At the very least, Emoto was given the chance to be in an infinitely better film 22 years later. (Shin Godzilla)
A peer once pedestalled the movie for simply being tokusatsu. The comment was in defiance of latter Godzilla projects having, regrettably, moved away from what the series was known so well for. Admittedly, this distinction categorizes SpaceGodzilla in a seemingly bygone style making it unique to its successors. This is seemingly arbitrary praise, but even in 1994 tokusatsu was facing an uphill battle. Perhaps any title made in that style is a gift. On the other hand, the movie doesn’t exactly do tokusatsu any of favors.
Years ago I watched an episode of The Simpsons that helped me paint an adequate critique of Godzilla vs. SpaceGodzilla. Entitled, “The Mansion Family,” Mr. Burns visits the Mayo Clinic where it’s explained he has every disease known to man, including brand new ones. Burns is yet to keel over because these germs are trying to get through the door at once and, as a result, they're getting stuck. They can't truly invade his body because they're clogging the entrance. Moreover, there’s no single overarching disease ravaging him, it's just all the bad stuff making each other look pretty normal. Now, off to the Godzilla series. Experience has seen a lot of fans cite other movies as the weakest in the franchise, but those picks are usually summed up with one, all-encompassing issue. All Monsters Attack (1969) is flogged primarily due to stock footage. Godzilla vs. Megalon (1973) is the worst because it’s a cheesy matinee. Godzilla vs. Hedorah (1971) stirs ire because of its heavy-handed themes or because, “Godzilla flies”. It’s amusing that Godzilla vs. SpaceGodzilla sometimes escapes consideration because, like Mr. Burns, all of the worst aspects of incompetent storytelling are trying to get through the door at once. There’s no single overarching problem to label the movie with. Instead, all of the catastrophic, thematic storytelling issues make each other look pretty normal. The problems ravaging it are clogging up the foresight necessary to label it as a franchise bottom feeder.
Early on, the Cosmos, Mothra's twin priestesses, approach Heisei Series regular, Miki Saegusa, to confirm SpaceGodzilla's mission is to kill Godzilla. Following this information she joins Godzilla Force (G-Force) pseudo-love interest, Koji Shinjo, and his partner, Kiyoshi Sato, on an island-faring mission to control Godzilla. At no point in this movie does she reveal to them, or the G-Force brass, that she’s been in contact with the Cosmos. Never once does she share the important tactical information she’s been given. Instead, she looks on as her colleagues charge blindly into a boring blood feud. Additionally, if SpaceGodzilla’s goal is indeed to kill Godzilla, why didn't he do it during their first meeting? Godzilla lost the battle. He was easy pickings. Instead, SpaceGodzilla leaves the badly wounded Monster King to writhe in pain while he imprisons Little Godzilla—supposedly in an effort to lure Godzilla? Again, why? He’s right there primed for execution you crystalline Smurf!
It’s ironic the late director, Kensho Yamashita, didn’t want the initial confrontation to even happen. [1] Rightfully, he felt it was unnecessary, and while there's a lot of “unnecessary” in this movie to unpack, I give him credit for having the foresight to understand there was no narrative reason for Godzilla and SpaceGodzilla’s first meeting. Regardless, special effects director Koichi Kawakita overruled him and Yamashita carried on without the same awareness for other story points.
The most egregious wasted space centers around the device designed to control Godzilla, oh-so poignantly named Project-T. (“T for telepathy,” one of the characters so transparently emphasizes for the audience.) The movie spends the entire first act establishing, setting up, and even testing Project-T. A great deal of effort is then put into a second act where the Yakuza kidnaps Miki to use the device on Godzilla. (Why? “Power,” apparently. Whatever that means.) This is one of the very first subplots introduced in the film and it’s deemed so important that it necessitates kidnapping and a rudimentary rescue shootout. As an aside, during Miki’s rescue, a scientist who betrayed G-Force tries repairing the damaged mind control device without shoes on. Why is he just wearing socks with his feet comically in the air? And why is that the most interesting part of an otherwise mundane action sequence?
In the end, nothing becomes of Project-T. The characters don't try to use it again. They don't try to control Godzilla to make sure he helps them defeat SpaceGodzilla. They don't even try to use it on SpaceGodzilla. (Which might’ve been an interesting reversal of the device’s intent, like MOGUERA.) The story is dropped completely, having wasted a great deal of screen time and build-up for something that never pays off. It has zero third act relevance and the movie could’ve trimmed the subplot altogether without any consequence to its resolution.
Project-T or no Project-T, Godzilla once again wins the day, with a finishing move recycled from the prior film. Battle worn, Koji asks, “What the hell was [SpaceGodzilla]?” Dr. Gondo replies, “A monster made up of the toughest part of G cells. If we keep polluting space, I'm sure we'll face another SpaceGodzilla someday.” The movie’s desperation to say something important is a remarkable self-parody. May we all drop to our knees and thank Yamashita and screenwriter Hiroshi Hashiwabara for paying last-minute lip service to 1994’s most relevant, dangerous, and completely not made-up hot-button issue. Space pollution! As if that wasn't stupid enough, Gondo adds, “It was a warning to mankind.” This is where the movie makes its most hair-pulling thematic choice.
SpaceGodzilla came out a month after the 40th anniversary of Godzilla. For 40 years - repeat - emphasize - and embolden - 40 years, Godzilla and all manner of sequels, spin-offs, rip-offs, and kin have been using its featured creatures for metaphors, symbols, and red flags. It is on this 40th birthday Yamashita and Hashiwabara decide to highlight the series’ maturation by literally calling its title monster, “a warning.” As if that fact hadn't been beaten into our heads for four decades. Not only did a character in the screenplay call the monster a literal “warning,” but the big fat cautionary lesson is that chucking garbage into space will illicit scientifically assured catastrophe. If you missed the academics behind the great space pollution fiasco in the early 1990s, fear not! Yamashita has conveyed the dangers of launching Slim Jim wrappers into orbit. Imagine the fundamental issue he must have with Superman IV: The Quest for Peace (1987).
If this were the asinine dialog Yamashita and Hashiwabara really wanted to stick to, they missed an otherwise clever opportunity. The story could have easily used this ridiculous warning as a pro-environmentalism metaphor. However, not once, did the parallel of pollution on Earth get likened to the circumstances that birthed SpaceGodzilla. In fact, the concern of pollutants, interstellar or otherwise, wasn’t even hinted at before Gondo’s insane line at the tail end of the movie.
An environmental theme might have also given Mothra, and the Cosmos’ involvement some weight. After all, the last movie to feature Mothra (Godzilla vs. Mothra [1992]) included transparent finger-wagging at humanity’s contribution to a dying ecosystem. Instead, their inclusion is proven to be unnecessary at every single turn. Mothra sends out these “Fairy Mothras” (which have no real explanation) to project the image of the Cosmos to Miki. Yet the information they give Miki is never relayed to anyone. As a result, their warnings are completely inconsequential to everything that happens. Like Project-T, if Mothra and the Cosmos were axed from the film, the final outcome wouldn’t change. And yet, even though it was the MOGUERA crew and Godzilla that did all the work, the Cosmos congratulated Miki for, “saving the world.” Exactly what did she do to save the world? She couldn’t even deliver pertinent information to those actually involved with the victory.
Poor Miki isn’t the only one at fault. Apparently, the birth of SpaceGodzilla was caused by Mothra… or Biollante? It’s bad enough that the monster has two origin points, but to add one that potentially contradicts a dubious timeline alteration, via Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah (1991), is just begging audiences to ask more questions they’ll never get answers to. And if it were Mothra’s fault the movie foregoes another grand opportunity to integrate her into the story. Mothra taking responsibility for SpaceGodzilla’s creation might have been an interesting place to corner the character. At a minimum, it would justify her involvement.
Even welcomed ideas, like bringing back Mogera (now, MOGUERA) are poorly thought out. The transformation sequence is a cause for much head-scratching. It is established that the robot’s chest piece houses a maser-like plasma cannon, which is fine. Every giant robot should have one, right? However, when it splits apart and transforms into Land Mogera, a giant drill protrudes from the same doors in its chest chassis. Where did the massive plasma cannon hiding behind the doors go? How did the head of MOGUERA slide into the chest if the Plasma Cannon is in there too? Where does the chest drill go when it’s combined? MOGUERA’s transformation, a weapon of the so-called “grounded” Heisei series, can’t seem to stick with Pauli’s exclusion principle which claims two objects, made of tightly bonded, normal matter, can not occupy the same space at the same time. Granted, the transformation sequence of a fictional big-bot is the least of the movie’s problems, but it does speak to the scarce detail across the board. Whereas Hashiwabara misses some potentially massive swings that could have improved the movie’s narrative and themes, Kawakita, historically a big fan of mech, forewent logic behind an aspect that is typically his forte. [2]
MOGUERA’s confusing metamorphosis is merely a symptom of larger effects issues. Detail is overlooked from nuance to execution. It’s far too easy to nail the special effects for the infamous asteroid scene when the Fukuoka set is wrought with decisions that invalidate the illusion of giant monsters fighting in a crystalline-infested city. Not once is Fukuoka shot from an angle to convey the crystals’ desolation at ground level. Audiences would have to wait for Gamera 2: The Advent of Legion (1996) to see pedestrians spectacularly toppled by protruding objects, phone booths knocked awry, and mortar crumble from seismic devastation. Instead, SpaceGodzilla’s “crystal fortress” enters safely from the bottom of the frame, void of street-level chaos. Nothing screams “malicious antagonist,” like a sterile attack on the unseen. Meanwhile, Fukuoka Tower, composed almost entirely of glass, is slapped around by Godzilla without a shatter or crack before finally toppling. Perhaps Japan mandated a new version of storm windows to withstand kaiju attacks. It’s disheartening that three months later, Gamera: Guardian of the Universe (1995) would convey this kind of damage, complete with interior decor exploding from windows and having only one-third the budget of SpaceGodzilla.
Perhaps the tirade should end before it devolves into nitpicking, but the disappointment with these details comes from the fact that other, cheaper productions were working miniature wizardry more effectively than what Kawakita puts on display here. And they were doing it at the same point in time, no less.
The legacy of SpaceGodzilla seems to be one astute filmmakers try to avoid. Masaaki Tezuka, director of the Kiryu Saga, mentioned that the initial screenplays for Godzilla: Tokyo S.O.S. (2003), “were all really boring. They all felt like Godzilla vs. SpaceGodzilla.” [3] Thus, the director penned his own story instead. Hashiwabara would go on to call the film, “so-so”, stating director Yamashita wasn’t a good fit for the production. [4] Yamashita, on the other hand, claimed he was mostly satisfied with the final product and named it his favorite of the two films under his direction. [1]
It’s worth wondering if SpaceGodzilla was responsible for Yamashita never having directed a feature again. Though he would continue to have a career in film, the director’s chair was never in his future. Hashiwabara carried on as lead writer for Godzilla 2000 (1999), but much of his screenplay would be changed at the director’s request—likely for the best. [4] He would then wrap up his Godzilla tenure with Godzilla vs. Megaguirus (2000). Kawakita completed the Heisei Godzilla series with Godzilla vs. Destoroyah (1995) and stepped away as Toho’s lead effects director after Mothra 2 (1997).
Director Charlie T. Kanganis once told me, “There are no bad filmmakers, just bad collaborations.” With that in mind, Hashiwabara’s suggestion that Yamashita was mismatched with the project sounds like the obvious culprit of a tone-deaf production. The Godzilla vs. SpaceGodzilla team was the perfect collaboration for one of the messiest, inane tokusatsu narratives, only held together by the celluloid dishonored with capturing it. There is a reason suit actor Ken Satsuma told Kawakita during shooting, “I think it would be good for us to stop soon.” [5] When the evil of space pollution is the thematic Hail Mary thrown to justify impetuous filmmaking, waving the white flag is the right move, Satsuma.
The latest final word.
Sources:
[1] Kensho Yamashita Interview Conducted by David Milner
[2] The Mysterians - Audio Commentary by Koichi Kawakita - Media Blasters DVD
[3] SciFi Japan TV Ep. 27 – Tokyo SOS Director EXTRA
[4] GODZILLA ON PAPER! Screenwriter Hiroshi Kashiwabara on Writing the Godzilla Series! by Brett Homenick
[5] Kenpachiro Satsuma Interview Conducted by David Milner
Blocked and reported.