New Replies (Page 680)

The entire Godzilla Wars saga is over with probably the longest chapter in the series.

Final part.

Okay, for that particular example, continuity time!

Ken Watanabe the actor was 55 years old as of the date of the first movie, 2014. In the movie itself, in 1999, he plays Ishiro Serizawa without noticeable make-up dressing to make himself look younger, so it's a fair presumption to make that the character was in his 50s in 1999. That would make the character close to 70 years old in 2014, and fit in line with Awakening's depiction of when he was born. CONTINUITY!

[Edit]: That's also a good idea, there. Since it's gonna be awhile until Godzilla: King of the Monsters, that might be our only avenue for answers until the film's release.

I'm honestly half-tempted to try and reach out to Dougherty on Twitter and get a response as to whether or not he and the filmmakers are treating Awakening is canon or if they don't even know what it is.

"Well, the Stable Time Loop Theory is also just a fan excuse by any stretch of the imagination (unless I'm missing some official confirmation somewhere), yet plenty of people seem to agree on its implementation in the Heisei continuity."

When the "fan" in question has worked for Toho, their L.A. Office, multiple filmmakers from the series (including the director of the movie in question), etc, it holds more legitimate weight.

And real world examples? You literally shot down Serizawa isn't 70 out of convenience. The comic has not made itself relevant to the movie series. It should not be included and I see no reason the films should be tied to it.

Thanks to that article, I can enjoy Godzilla vs King Ghidorah a lot more now. It always confused me as to how this time travel plot point affected the 2 previous movies but now I know how through this examination.

Well, the Stable Time Loop Theory is also just a fan excuse by any stretch of the imagination (unless I'm missing some official confirmation somewhere), yet plenty of people seem to agree on its implementation in the Heisei continuity.

And nothing I've said is really an excuse, just observations that put the arguments against the graphic novel's inclusion as part of the continuity under scrutiny, since the primary arguments presented thus far don't hold up under further examination based on real-world evidence.

All of what's been said thus far equally applies to many other media franchises. The Marvel Cinematic Universe is the most egregious example, as The Incredible Hulk (2008) has gotten the exact same treatment as Godzilla: Awakening has, referenced only in passing and/or by association. Personally speaking, if you had simply noted the comic in the text post alongside the Skull Island: Birth of Kong comic series, I wouldn't be going off on this mini-tirade.

However, I'll happily continue this in PM if this has gotten too out of hand in this thread.

"Every potential discrepancy has an explanation"

Lets not confuse 'explanation' with 'fan excuse'. I see no reason to include it either and nothing in the films indicates we should.

"as long he or they(3 heads) uses them in combat like pinning his opponent down, punching, scratching, sumo wrestling and etc."

So everything his wings shouldn't be used for and just make him a three headed Smaug. Got it.

I like that the new origin for a new medium.  Now we have Legendary, Shin, and Monster Planet versions.  All taking different yet interesting takes on the monster king

I honestly wouldn't mind seeing Wing Walking Ghidorah as long he or they(3 heads) uses them in combat like pinning his opponent down, punching, scratching, sumo wrestling and etc.

It's not that it's good, it's that the current precedent for multimedia franchises is to include all the media material in a franchise's continuity so as to formulate a single narrative canon. By explicitly not including some works, it muddies the waters as to what exactly should be considered or not, and thus makes the whole point of a singular canon moot. In the past, this wasn't an issue or even a consideration, but the times have changed on this matter.

As to some other points, age has never been the best determining factor. For example, Ishiro Serizawa looks exactly the same in 1999 as he did in 2014, a 15 year difference. As per Awakening, he'd be in his late 40s to early 50s in 1999, a plausible age. Not to mention that plenty of people look much younger than their age would suggest; there's a 70 year old grandmother who looks like she's in her late 20s. Thus, I can buy that an active MONARCH agent like Ishiro Serizawa could look the way he does.

The visual depiction is irrelevant because of medium differences and has already been retconned as per Kong: Skull Island, which has utilized the classic real-life footage instead of Operation: Lucky Dragon's CGI sequence, implying that the two are different now. As well, like the "1954 line" and the 1943 U.S.S. Lawton incident, Godzilla awakening thanks to Hiroshima isn't mutually exclusive with being active beforehand.

In my own personal opinion, quality or not, I see no outstanding and explicit reason to exclude Awakening in its entirety from the MonsterVerse continuity. Every potential discrepancy has an explanation, and minor inconsistencies are by no means deal-breaking. As well, we're left with a single narrative canon that has no picking and choosing, and follows in established modern precedent.

Well the depiction of Castle Bravo is completely different in Awakening than in the film, there's nothing indicating that Hiroshima had anything to do with awakening Godzilla since Kong establishes he was active in 1943, there's no way Serizawa is 70 years old, and nothing specific to Awakening aside from Monarch's founding date and the involvement of certain individuals has been retained or acknowledged in any subsequent film. I don't see why people feel the need to make all these rationalizations just to keep the comic canon. Why? What's so great or important about it? I thought the comic was pretty forgettable and didn't add much of substance to the lore, and even ignoring my personal feelings I haven't gotten any indication that Legendary cares about the comic and intends to reference it in future films. The comic is really just irrelevant at this point. It was written independent of the finished version of the film and hasn't been acknowledged in any way since its release. If Legendary comes out and says "Awakening is still canon and important to the backstory of the MonsterVerse," then I'll eat my words, but until that point I think the comic is nothing more than a forgotten piece of tie-in media that has little bearing on future installments.

You know, reflecting back on it, what ARE the continuity discrepancies with Awakening as of the MonsterVerse right now?

The 1954 "we awakened something" deal has been neatly addressed, Castle Bravo has been duly confirmed, MONARCH's origins have been solidified, and elements and characters have already been officially included such as General Douglas MacArthur.

The only thing I can think of off the top of my head is the Shinomura, and even then it's not much of a discrepancy considering that major characters and events are introduced as important to franchise continuities despite not being known earlier all the time nowadays. Plus, the current precedent set by the new Disney canon of Star Wars, Halo for video games, and others is that of an interconnected universe, unlike the past examples brought up in this thread.

I understand your reasoning Gman but you have to admit that pole is a little biased. XD

Having two being named mocking titles and the third one be named "The Real King Ghidorah" makes people lean a little towards that last option.


Anyways, personally I wouldn't mind a wing walker Ghidorah; Smaug pulled it off pretty well and still managed to be towering as well as threatening. Plus, It might be cool if Ghidorah moves around normally on 4 limbs but when it's time to battle, he rears up and displays his wings in full to make his appearance even larger. But eh, I can see them going both directions.

I will not accept a King Ghidorah with more than 4 limbs though. X) 2 Wings and 2 legs. That's all you get. And you better be golden.

^ Will do. Such an article will likely be a long endeavor, but I have most of the pieces already. Feel free to send me a direct message about it or find me in Wikizilla's chat room.

Anyway, some side notes for anyone reading this topic:

The place of Destroy All Monsters in the continuity is somewhat confusing. For years most English-speaking fans including myself have assumed it is set chronologically last in the Showa series, but many Japanese sources I've seen tend to treat it as being set between Son of Godzilla and Godzilla vs. Hedorah instead. If and when I get to making an actual article about this topic, I'll probably go into further detail.

For anyone wanting some clarification on how the time travel in Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah affects things in the Heisei timeline and how I came to the conclusion regarding it that I did in this topic, I recommend reading this article by Keith Aiken from SciFi Japan.

^If you would like to head such an article with citations, I would love for you to do so. Lets chat about in private at some point.

^ I actually wasn't sure if you were still working on that article, but this is something I wanted to go into depth about for a while so I decided to type up this blog post for the time being. It certainly could be refined into an actual professional article (complete with citations) at some point, so it's not intended at all to be a serious article like the one we discussed. It's just sort of a spur-of-the-moment blog post brought on by recent discussions.

Sweet thanks for all the info. I'll hafta grab these books and go through them myself. 

The King of the Monsters,
No need to explain, I figured something along those lines was the reason why it was included.

I know we discussed this a lot last year for an abandoned article regarding continuity. Honestly, I should have just asked you to write the whole thing--Especially since you did this thread.

I had a similar visual in the works as well. I'll need to go back and find it/finish it.

Last part of Part 2.

Oh. Well I'm glad that this dialogue can carry into two different pages. 

The Godzilla compendium is a fun throw away book. Although Tomoyuki Tanaka says one thing doesn't hold much merit to it. The thing is, these movies were written by different script writers and screen writers. Going back on Godzilla raids again, while the coordinates are there, he specifically said he couldn't confirm if Tsukioka said "kamiko-jima" or not. That's adding your own input to it. While there's a possibility that the subtitles could be wrong, I seriously doubt that is the case. Again, going off the film alone, the pure fact is Tsukioka said Kamiko Island. It's there, there's no changing it. Perhaps if I find a more original Japanese version of the film with better subtitles, perhaps I'll find more of a better translation. 

Either way, it's taking some time to translate these books I own. More to come soon. Substituting Hiragana and Katakana for Kanji is a b###*. 

You all can look at the films The way you want to, it should be heavily noted that Toho had no real plans of continuing Godzilla after raids again. Even Tomoyuki Tanaka said "It's been 7 years since Godzilla raids again. How were we going to revive him?" And as Gman stated, when Toho realized they could make bank with their own crossover, that's what lead to Mothra vs Godzilla or as the Japanese title say "Mosura tai Gojira." 

They moved that whole discussion to the Godzilla Continuity page

^Yeah when you bring up time codes off a movie you know it's getting deep. I'm sorry Huge-Ben, but I must agree with The King Of The Monsters. Hearing the commentary on Godzilla Raids Again they even say that this Godzilla is the one that carries on into the rest of the Showa series. I have the Godzilla compendium(if you consider it any source of info, I sure do) it also says that this Godzilla is the one that carries on in the series. He is credited throughout the series. Honestly as a kid I saw that this Godzilla was the same one throughout the series. Are we even still talking about that anymore? Or has the island Godzilla trapped on in 55 more relevant?

This is one of the deepest discussions I've seen on this website

The full-resolution version of the timeline photo has a disclaimer under Awakening mentioning continuity discrepancies. It was only included in the image because it was one of the only pieces of official Godzilla 2014-related material available at the time outside the film itself, and one that a lot of people would have been familiar with. I was actually against including it in the image at all, as I never really put any stock into that comic.

I more annoyed at seeing 'Godzilla: Awakening' on the continuity timeline photo. If we're going to do that we need to find all the comic offshoots of the other series and connect them as well--Like the Terror of MechaGodzilla short story sequel that takes place decades after Destroy All Monsters. We shouldn't cherry pick if we're going to include something as irrelevant as 'Awakening'.

You keep going back to everything I've already stated. First you agree and now disagree. Which is it? We've come to accept that the island is real. I'll admit you own a few books that I don't, but I'll gladly share what I do own. The authentic Godzilla encyclopedia, The unpublished material and resource book produced by Tomoyuki Tanaka, the All Toho Kaiju encyclopedia, funny we share the same book because this book proves that Rodan revived in 64 Which Shinichi Sekizawa retconned that fact, the Heisei perfection resource and guide book, 60 year history of Toho special effects resource book, and the Perfect history of Toho special effects resource book, the chronicle history of Godzilla book, the entertainment bible of Godzilla #41, and last but not least, the Godzilla graphic collection. Not to mention I've placed my orders for the DNA of tokusatsu book and The life of Ishiro Honda from Godzilla to Kurasawa book. If you want to see pictures of each, please feel free to contact me on my Twitter account. @thebigbadben90 is my account. 

In the scene where Tsukioka gives his position, he also gives his latitude and longitude: 148 degrees east, 53 degrees north. If you plug that in, guess where it takes you. The Sea of Okhotsk, north of the Kuril Islands and between Hokkaido and Russia.

What's more, "Kamiko Island" may be a subtitle error from Classic Media's DVD release. All the Japanese sources I see call the island "Miko Island" (Miko-jima) instead of Kamiko Island, and I can just barely hear Tsukioka say "Miko-jima" at 1:02:50 in the DVD, though I can't confirm he doesn't say "Kamiko-jima."

I don't get what you're trying to say. There are plenty of fictional islands in the films that are given names (Odo Island, Iwato Island, Solgell Island, etc.), and the fact that a tiny obscure island sharing the name of this fictional island exists in real life isn't that surprising. A great current example is Isla de Mona from Godzilla: King of the Monsters. It's a fictional Mexican island in the film, but is also the name of a real-life Puerto Rican island. I'm not denying that Kamiko Island exists, I'm just saying it isn't the same island from the climax of Godzilla Raids Again.

Perhaps you'd like to show me some screenshots or quotes from your book that definitively "go against" my sources, which include Tomoyuki Tanaka's Definitive Godzilla Introduction , Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah Super Complete Works, Godzilla 1954-1999 Super Complete Works, Godzilla Dictionary, and the All Toho Monsters Dictionary (I have all the Japanese titles for these books on-hand, but for some reason it won't let me post with Japanese text). These sources all explicitly call the Godzilla from 1955-onward "Second Generation Godzilla", meaning 1962 and 1955 are the same Godzilla. Tanaka's book also says Godzilla was frozen in the Kuril Islands and floated to the North Pole, easily explaining how King Kong vs. Godzilla connects to Raids Again.

Then that's your problem. Why even mention it in the film if it doesn't exist? Again, that is cherry picking. Godzilla is a cold blooded animal as Akira Ifukube described him. Why swim to the arctic when you're a cold blooded animal? 

For once, I have to follow up with the most up to date book from Toho. The all Kaiju encyclopedia. This book alone, along with a few other books I own go completely against your sources. If you having an issue that perhaps it's not the same island is going over, then again, my books back up what we're talking about. The fact is, the island is real whether you like it or not. 

The issue is I don't believe the Kamiko Island in the film is the same real-life Kamiko Island you are talking about. It may be a completely fictional island that happens to share its name with a real one located in a different location. Godzilla being in Osaka previously isn't an issue because Godzilla can swim over great distances, and there is quite a big time skip between when he defeats Anguirus and is next sighted. It's not that far-fetched for him to have swam all the way to the Hokkaido area in that time.

And the facts are that sources say Godzilla was frozen in the Kurile Islands, Tajima is pointing where the Kuril Islands are located on a map in the film, the characters that go after Godzilla in the climax all launch from Hokkaido, which is near the Kurile Islands, and the fictional Kamiko Island is cold and covered in ice, typical of many of the islands located in that area. Combine that with Toho saying the 1962 Godzilla is the same Godzilla from 1955, and to me it all points to the intention being that Godzilla was frozen north of Hokkaido. Hidemi's worry that Tsukioka will be "entering the other country" also makes sense, because the Kurile Islands are disputed territory between Japan and Russia.

Also, Godzilla in Godzilla raids again attacked Osaka. That is a little further away from Hokkaido. Tsukioka and Kobayashi work in Hokkaido, that much is true, but even if Kamiko Island is fictional or not, the point is that is where Godzilla was last seen and heading towards. If Kamiko Island is the same island as Kamiko-Shima, like my Japanese co-workers are implying, then it seems to me that maybe, just maybe, that is where Godzilla raids again ends. 

Although I'm annoyed to not see Godzilla: Awakening on the MonsterVerse continuity blurb, I understand why it wasn't included, even if I think that reasoning is entirely irrelevant and pointless.

Good job.

Since you can't find it on the map, I'll gladly help.

http://www.getamap.net/maps/japan/japan_(general)/_kamikoshima/

I rewatched the scenes in question from Godzilla Raids Again more closely. Tsukioka says the island is Kamiko Island, but this island seems to be completely fictional, as I've received no results from searching its English or Japanese names. A few scenes later as the JSDF is planning its strike against Godzilla, you can see the character Tajima pointing to a map to show his men Godzilla's location. If you pause it at exactly 1:03:52 on the DVD, you can get a decent look at the map, and it appears to be a map of Hokkaido. Tajima was pointing directly north of Hokkaido on this map, which is the location of the Kuril Islands. That would definitely support the sources that say Godzilla was frozen in the Kuril Islands, and would make sense considering Tsukioka, Kobayashi and the JSDF are launching from Hokkaido. The JSDF even send ships to the island from Hokkaido, which would take a long time if they were sending them all the way to Korea instead of the Kuril Islands.

@Huge-Ben, I think I might actually know where this confusion is coming from. It seems you believe Kamiko Island is said to be near Kurashima Island, which is a real island located near North Korea as you've said. However, I don't think they say Kamiko Island is near Kurashima, they might say it's near Kurirushima, which is a Japanese name for the Kuril Islands that sounds similar to "Kurashima."

Nice. this is cool.

@King Of The Monsters, thank you for clearing that up.

I'm learning all kinds of lingo in these conversations.

So even though my theory now has some ground. Still a fan theory and has no real impact on the real context of the films.

Well, I began my collecting on eBay a long time ago. And I still do. Naturally, I mostly buy them from Japan and it has never failed me. Considering that is the only place I've bought these sets from, I can only suggest that.

But, be aware that some are pricey even for a single gashapon figure because the old ones from the 90s are quite rare.