Creature Feature



American Godzilla 1998



By AL J. Vermette



Okay, so love it or hate it, we can all agree this beast is NOT Godzilla! However, is the movie…..the movie itself really a bad little film when it comes down to it? As a Giant Monster Movie goes, well it’s not all that bad when you think about it. Okay sure, this is not the Godzilla we all grew up with, but take out the name and you’re left with a pretty decent story, amazing special effects and let’s just face it….a damn good-looking monster design even if it’s not Godzilla in the traditional sense.


For those of us old enough to have lived through the hype of knowing that an American-produced Godzilla movie was in the works, we all remember that one of the movie tricks was not to reveal the new re-design of the title creature. We all knew right from the start that Godzilla was getting an upgrade from his traditional Japanese appearance. However, what we didn’t count on was just how radical that change would be. Hell, even the people at Toho, the film company that created Godzilla, lost their shit when they saw the new design.


Long before Legendary Pictures Monster Verse consisting of Godzilla 2014, Kong Skull Island 2017, Godzilla King of the Monsters 2019, and Godzilla vs Kong 2021, Centroplis Entertainment and TriStar got permission from Toho to produce an American Godzilla film as a sort of reboot to their series. They wanted to bring Godzilla to America and have him attack New York City ten years before Cloverfield would rampage through the Big Apple. This would be the very first Godzilla film to be produced outside of Toho and once the movie got green-lit, the producers wanted to do something different with the title creature, something that was fresh and new and never seen before in a Godzilla movie.


Using Jurassic Park as inspiration to make the creature more of an animal or something that could maybe…just maybe exist in the real world like dinosaurs once did was what the producers were aiming for. Spielberg himself once said that he was inspired to make Jurassic Park because he as a fan of the original 1954 Godzilla film wanted to do a sort of take on that when directing his film. So now coming full circle, the new Godzilla would take a more realistic approach to its redesign and use the posture and locomotion of a T-Rex as its inspiration like a living, fast-moving animal. It was decided early on that this newly redesigned Godzilla would also be the very first of the new CGI era.


This departure from the tried and true method of putting a man in a rubber monster suit that was the staple of nearly all monster films since the very first Godzilla in 1954 was a radical one. In monster movies, it was either a suit actor or stop-motion bringing monsters on screen to life until the advent of CGI in more recent years after the absolute perfection of Jurassic Park. That film changed the game when it came to creating realistic living creatures so it was only a natural progression that the new Godzilla would follow in that direction. Going digital when it came to Godzilla special effects was something even the people at Legendary Pictures also adopted for their Monster Verse and even Toho themselves would go on to do with Shin Godzilla when they dropped the man in a rubber suit for a fully CGI rendered Godzilla in 2016.




But like the effects in Jurassic Park, not all of Godzilla’s scenes are entirely CGI, as some were shot practically too. Animatronic heads, tails, and legs were used in the film to play the title beast plus full costumes were employed when it came to the baby Godzillas as they run amok in Madison Square Garden. The action with the babies was a combo of both CGI and suit acting as the cast ran from the 7-foot-high creatures who are trying to eat them. Like their father/ mother Godzilla….still to this day trying to figure that shit out, but the offspring are fast little runners who bear no resemblance to Toho’s Son of Godzilla (thank God) and looks like smaller cuter versions of the parent creature.


The new Godzilla design was the idea of Patrick Tatopoulos who used iguanas as the base model for his take on the creature. He was told to design a sleek and agile animal that could run, jump, swim, and climb so the older lumbering beast of the past was put aside for the faster more nimble Godzilla. The overall creature design was very impressive and had it been used for another creature, say a remake of The Beast From 20,000 Fathoms, its design would have gone over way better with the public. Oddly enough, Godzilla himself owes his very existence to The Beast Form 20,000 Fathoms because it was that very movie that inspired Toho to create Godzilla in the first place since they themselves were fans of the 1953 movie.


A year before Godzilla 1998, the marketing started getting the buzz ready for the movie. With ads saying Size Matters and showing just bits and pieces of the title monster in TV commercials, no one really knew just what the new Godzilla would look like until you saw the movie. Most diehard Godzilla fans were not happy with the film’s release. Despite the new creature's revolutionary design, most hated it at the time as it resembled nothing like the monster of their childhood….nor did the creature act anything like Godzilla. Gone were the creature's indestructible qualities we have come to expect and instead of fighting the military as the unstoppable force we know and love, this creature just ran away from helicopters and other forces. Although to be fair again, the producers were going for a more realistic animal and that’s where the issues lie.


The indestructible Godzilla was not seen here and that’s what fans could not get past. I saw this movie in the theater upon release and I too said the same thing “What he’s running from the army? A few missiles killed him, no atomic breath, what the hell is this?” I said to myself when sitting in the theater. And yet as I watched the movie on cable a few years later, I understood what the filmmakers were going for. They had the fan's best interest at heart but missed changing the creature too much. Now had this really been a remake of The Beast From 20,000 Fathoms (and why has that not been remade) or any other generic giant monster movie running amok in New York, the film would have been received way better. Hell, no one lost their mind over Cloverfield….and why, because it was an original monster and didn’t capitalize on the name Godzilla. If you watch the movie for just what it is….a monster movie, then it's really pretty damn good.


Okay, the characters are annoying for the most part (I know), but the story is pretty good, the slow reveal of the title beast is well executed before we see him in full. The creature's design is well thought out (even if it’s not really Godzilla) and come on, it's still entertaining. Godzilla 98 was going to be the first of a new American Godzilla franchise but because of the backlash that was never meant to be…..well almost.




So when the American Godzilla movie didn’t live up to what the producers had hoped for and it made less than what they were hoping for….not that it was not successful with a budget of 150 million, but brought in 379 million, their plans for any follow-up films were scrapped. However, there was a Godzilla project already in the works that would not only keep the American Godzilla idea alive, but would also surpass any issues that the movie had faced during its theatrical run.


Godzilla: The Series released four months after the movie on the FOX network on September 12 1998, was an animated show aimed at kids although many viewers also turned out to be adults (myself being one of them), and in a shocking turn of events was a sleeper hit with fans. In the movie, Godzilla was not the only member of the film to take criticism as the rest of the cast were not very liked, care about, and were kinda annoying. The series however ironed out the kinks in the character flaws and made them much more human, relatable, and just damn more interesting. The title creature himself although still sporting the same design as in the film seemed to be better received this time around.


The TV series picks up soon after the first Godzilla is killed and the last remaining baby Godzilla egg hatches. We see this happen in the film right at the end teasing the sequel that would never happen, but be picked up with the series as the only surviving baby breaks out of its shell. In the series when the baby hatches from its egg, the first thing he sees is Nick Tatopoulos, the lead character from the film. The baby sees him and the young creature imprints upon him that Nick is its mother. Not wanting the only remaining member of his kind destroyed by the military, Nick keeps the baby Godzilla a secret until the animal is now grown and is as nearly as big as his parent.


Still seeing the little human as his mother, the new Godzilla named for his parent becomes somewhat of a pet and science project for Nick and his team, who now work out of Area 51 and study other giant mutant monsters that were also created by nuclear tests in the wake of the first Godzilla incident. Since this Godzilla is basically under human control and will follow anything Nick tells him to do, this Godzilla becomes the hero of the story as he fights and defeats other monsters and helps protect the human race.


The series, unlike the movie it was based on, was received positively by fans and critics alike and ran for 40 episodes over a two-season run coming to an end in 2000. What made the series work and maybe not the movie was even though it was the same design of Godzilla that the film used, the show was better written and although aimed at kids like I said before, it was also something that grown-ups could enjoy as well. The film Godzilla was much more of an adventure, Kaiju movie whereas the series despite being animated was a drama, adventure, and thriller with a much more complex approach to its story.




It also had the title character facing off with other giant monsters, something that the first film didn’t do and that was exciting, especially for a Godzilla project. When the series ended in 2000, you would have thought that this would mean the end of the American Godzilla, but believe it or not he ended up next in the most unlikely place of all…Japan.


Four years later in 2004, despite the Japanese totally freaking out over what America did to their beloved monster, sort of….kinda embraced the creature when they licensed the American Godzilla design for their movie Godzilla: Final Wars. This Power Ranger, Kaiju mash-up of a movie was said to be Godzilla’s last film from Toho and matched their Godzilla against every monster in their line-up including the American Godzilla in a battle royal to the death. Even though every other monster was played by a suit actor, the American Godzilla now renamed just Zilla was a CGI-rendered creature. He like all of the other monsters were under alien control and were wreaking havoc upon the world with only the “True Godzilla” left to save the world. After dispatching classic Toho Monsters like Rodan, King Ghidorah, Anguirus, and others, Godzilla faced off with Zilla, who Godzilla assassinate with utter ease sending a message to the U.S. that our take on their monster was a sad one. The scene in the movie is kinda mean but funny at the same time.


Sadly this would be the last time the American Godzilla would be seen on screen, however back in 1998, his image was everywhere. Taco Bell used the monster in TV ads plus sold cup holders (I still have mine), toys were made, tee shirts, and everything and anything where the name or image of the new American Godzilla could be placed it was. The year of 1998 was truly the year of Godzilla and even though Toho disapproved of the movie and how radically we changed their monster, the movie did spark them into deciding to start making Godzilla movies after a long hiatus.


Today the American Godzilla is regarded as an experiment that as a movie was a failure and yet successful as a TV series. His new redesign is embraced and hated, but as I said early on in this article, is very well crafted and if you can get past the name is a very good-looking monster in his own right. In the end, he was a different take on the classic monster that showed him to be a very large animal that was just lost in our world, not knowing or understanding the danger he imposed upon us. Had he and his offspring survived, our species would have ended for sure despite him not knowing or understanding this. He was not attacking New York, but merely looking for a place to nest and raise his young.


When Hollywood tried again at a Godzilla movie with the 2014 film, they went the more traditional route with their creature design of Godzilla, and didn’t want to rock the boat again. But hey, making something new is what makes something new stand out.