GODZILLA TOKYO S.O.S. (2003)
So this is a weird one, or a weird pairing at least. Of course it's clear that these are the only two films from the Millennium Godzilla series that fit together as one whole story. On the other hand they feel like the same movie being made twice. It's fun that they exist in a world in which the 1954 film events exist alongside various other Toho monsters. But then several characters established in the first story are jettisoned for the second resulting in a weird disconnect, making the goals of this combined narrative feel a little confused. I guess this sort of repeating cycle is to be expected with the studio still using the '60s and '70s for it's inspiration rather than introducing any original monsters.
After the strange spiritual ideas presented in GMK, this goes back to basics and feels much more familiar in many aspects. Even the opening is reminiscent of Vs Megaguirus with another military unit facing off against Godzilla but failing in their efforts, leaving a female protagonist with a personal stake in the fight. Although it has to be said Akane (Yumiko Shaku) is more pouty than vengeful. There's even another father and daughter team at the centre of the story like Godzilla 2000. The rest of the plot involves yet another Mechagodzilla, again created by human forces as they'd done in the '90s. It's a weird mixture of old staples but it's still technically impressive as a creature spectacle, even if the new robot looks a little like a giant action figure.
Most of the new elements come into play when it's revealed how Mecha-G 3, or Kiryu as its dubbed, has been created. For one reason or another (probably because it sounds cool) the machine is a cyborg that has been built around the skeleton of the original Godzilla after its defeat in 1954. I've always thought that the whole monster, bones and all, was dissolved by the Oxygen Destroyer during the climax. But it's a nice bit of science fiction nonsense that serves an interesting purpose as things progress. If it sounds like a pretty bad plan that's because it is, and things soon go awry when the preserved DNA in the machine reacts to the latest incarnation of Godzilla.
The rampage set pieces are easily the best part of the story as the military realises they don't have full control of their creation. The usual themes of scientists meddling with powers they don't fully understand are present and correct, adding a little nuance to the cartoony proceedings. The same can't be said of the human drama which centres around several tired old ideas. These include single father Tokumitsu (Shin Takuma) who's obsessed with his work much to the disdain of his introverted daughter, and a lot of angry defence force pilots who blame Akane and not Godzilla for the events of the prologue. The results are a mixed bag but the central sci-fi concepts are at least mildly compelling.
If only the direct sequel expanded on these central heroes, but Akane only gets a brief cameo and her relationship with Tokumitsu is thrown out completely. Instead Tokyo S.O.S. focuses on characters from the original 1961 Mothra including her twin fairies, who arrive to warn mankind that using Godzilla's bones is an affront to nature. But the military hasn't learned from their mistakes in the last film and have instead spent their time giving Kiryu new weapons. Maybe they should just build a machine that isn't reliant on weird DNA computers? It's made clear that other giant creatures exist in the world of these two films and they need this defence measure, but maybe it would help if the Godzilla skeleton wasn't on land attracting them.
It is at least a novelty to see clips from War of the Gargantuas and even the remains of a creature similar to the turtle in Space Amoeba. Dr. Chujo (Hiroshi Koizumi) from Mothra even shows his grandson newspaper clippings from that film's events giving this all a unique connected universe vibe. But of course the military aren't interested in decommissioning Kiryu when so many possible threats exist and soon both the current iterations of Godzilla and Mothra are trashing Japan's cities. Again this is all excellent in terms of the battle sequences and there's less questionable CGI than early films from this decade, but it's all just more of the same and in some instances the battles with Kiryu feel very interchangeable.
As a double dose of monster mayhem this is all fine and there are many individual moments to enjoy. But as two halves of an overarching story it leaves a lot to be desired both in terms of character beats (which are even less memorable in the second instalment) and action stakes. Throwing Mothra or her larvae into the fray just doesn't add enough when we've already seen how the two versions of Godzilla are matched against each other. Tokyo S.O.S. feels like a part two that wasn't written naturally and ends up being a pretty simple rematch rather than a real expansion. Again it's all fine, but with a few returning characters and an emphasis on their relationships to the Kaiju involved it could have been much more.
3/5
BONUS REVIEW
GODZILLA FINAL WARS (2004)
Last, and in a way least, we get to the biggest and most extreme entry in the Millennium line-up. Which goes to show that sometimes less is actually more. As a big anniversary even it has a lot of ground to cover and it certainly throws a lot of monsters on the screen from previous decades. It's fun to see the likes of Gigan created with more than a shoe-string budget this time, but generally the results are very mixed. Maybe it's because the film seems more concerned with the movie and music trends of the early '00s rather than the legacy of the series as a whole. Many fans enjoy this as it was intended; an overblown over-energetic monster brawl. But it feels messy and ham-fisted more than anything.
Rather than going back to the style of the outer space plots of the original Mechagodzilla or Astro-Monster films this generally feels like a weird attempt to cash-in on things like X-Men since the story spends so much time on 'mutant' characters. Director Ryuhei Kitamura's style also feels very much a part of this awkward post-Matrix period of action cinema with the story featuring a lot of leather, a lot of flips, and another chosen one plot twist. It's very melodramatic and extremely overwrought (particularly the villain X, played by Kazuki Kitamura) in ways that seem out of place considering the charm of the older films it's drawing inspiration from. Maybe I'm missing the point, but I much prefer Akira Ifukube to Sum 41.
It's something I really want to like but on repeat viewings no number of references to Gorath and Atragon can distract from the bad CGI and the lack of subtlety. The alien invasion plot in its nearest counterpart Destroy All Monsters was done in a way that let the creature effects breathe, but here it's constantly rushing from one thing to another making the monsters feel weightless and the geography feel non-existent. There may be a cute bird-flip towards the Roland Emmerich version of Godzilla but it was done with a more sly hand in GMK. I guess it's supposed to be in the name of all out fun but the end result is often migraine inducing instead of a celebratory highlight real. As much as I enjoy the same director's film Versus as a guilty pleasure, the same can't be said here.
2/5
