What Made You a Godzilla Fan?

Godzilla and I were born the same year: 1954. I began watching the movies in the early 60s and never looked back. In those early films, Godzilla as a "monster" was unique because he had a personality; he wasn't just a destructive reptile. He responded emotionally to situations. You could tell when he was mad; it was clear, too, when he was happy. You could tell that he understood that he could use his powers for both good and evil. He was tenacious - even when his butt was kicked in battle, he got up and kept on swinging. He is a metaphor for all our lives. 

Because he is awesome my first Godzilla film was Godzilla vs mechagodzilla 2 and I was 5 at the time and I thought it was a dinosaur movie and I was intrigued and I just fell in love so I started watching Godzilla movies

As far back as I could remember I have always had a deep love for Godzilla. I was born in 1998 so I never really had a long connection with Godzilla, not like other people who grew up watching the Showa series. Before I knew what Godzilla was I was going through a dinosaur phase. One day I was going through some DVDs I could watch and I saw "Godzilla 2000". Being the 4 year old me I immediately loved it because Godzilla looked like a giant dinosaur. But when I watched the movie I soon figured out that there is a lot more magic in the Godzilla movies than just him resembiling a giant dinosaur. His atomic breath, the fight with other monsters, and the Godzilla suits themselves made for an awesome childhood!

For me, it was seeing Godzilla, King of the Monsters on Channel 9 (then KHJ-TV, now KCAL) in Los Angeles in the mid-'60s. I believe KHJ had this feature called Million Dollar Movie. And the way it worked was that for one week they showed the same movie each night. Well, one week I stumbled across Terry Morse's edit of the original starring Raymond Burr. And that was it. Then there was that roar. I'd never heard anything like it. I thought Repoter Steve Martin's narration of the events in Tokyo that night was spellbinding. It was too scary to look at, but, at the same time, I couldn't look away. This was a monster that could not be defeated. And it wasn't a plot devise required to legitimize heroic behavior on the part of the human characters.

Ifukube's score became etched in my mind. I couldn't stop thinking about it. And not just the marches. But also the slow, bass clarinet-led pieces providing the background for the sight of a burning Tokyo with a helpless populace that can only look on.

And, I've been a fan ever since.

I live in South Africa and Godzilla movies dont make it into South African theatres, only Iguana Get U Sucka in 1998 and GOOOWWDDZEEELLLLLAAAAA 2014 today. So it was 2002 and I was turning 5 at the time and my Dad said he got a huge surprise for me. At night he came home with Godzilla vs Destroyah DVD, boy he told his friend in USA to find a nice dinosaur DVD or something for my next birthday a few months before, and he came back with Godzilla vs Destroyah. My sister thought Godzilla Jr was cute, she was ten at the time. She now thinks im absolutely crazy about Godzilla. Destroyah gave me nightmares in his final form becuase he looked so badass and scary

And I catched all that I missed about previous Godzilla movies. Although I have only watched GMK and Final Wars I have seen the plots of all Godzilla movies even though I only remember some of them. I also plan on getting the 1954 original

YouTube then I went on to seeing Godzilla movies

Mine was by discovering the S.H Monster Arts figures on big bad toy store then watching DeigoDoom's reviews on them, now because of It I listen to the soundtrack on youtube sometimes :D

The fact that it was a giant reptile with flame-looking spikes on its back and that it puked a giant lazer out of its mouth.

I mean, c'mon. That's awesome.

My first godzilla movie was final wars. I watched it as a 6 year old kid.I watched godzilla because of my facination for dinos.I found him accidentaly in the web and thought he was cool.The movies i watched are GMK,Final Wars and 2014.I hope to watch Shin Gojira my first new japanese godzilla movie!IM SO EXITED!!!!!!!!!!

I just wanted to first of all introduce myself. My names Adam and Was the owner of Monstervalleytoys.com. I am in New Orleans currently and lovin every minute of it. What got me into Godzilla was my older brother who at a young age introduced me to the movies. The rest is history. Unfortunately due to his death I had to shut down the toy store which mainly consisted of Godzilla and Ultraman toys and collectibles. I now have over 10,000$ in toys that I am looking to move if anyone is interested. Anyway thanks for having me.

^I'm sorry about your loss. How long ago did you shut it down?

My dad got me into Godzilla by telling me about the whole showa series and how he watched it on tv as a kid. Surprisingly it was G98 that started the whole conversation

Sorry 'bout that Monstervalley.  :(

As for me, my "friends" got me into Godzilla from my fascination with dinosaurs.  But now, I have a deep hatred for them because they're TRAITORS!

I always loved dinosaurs as a kid. i dont exactly remember my first Godzilla movie but i believe it was Godzilla versus Mecha G, where he looks exactly like Godzilla and he hurts Angurius. but ive always been fascinated with giant monsters, and i still am. 

I absolutely loved G14, i understand why people were upset about the lack of his screen time but it made the moments he was in it much more memorable. i cannot wait to see what Legendary does with there kaiju universe!

It's sort of nice how this thread is still going--Albeit, off and on.

I'm fan of Godzilla because it's massive size and ability to destroy everything he doesn't like..

I was raised in a very religious household.  We weren't allowed to was swearing or sex but we could watch all the violence we wanted.  I remembered laying in the floor watching Son of Godzilla on those old giant tvs.  I think it used to come on TBS back in the day.  

Recently I have been searching for nostalgia and I remembered how much I used to love GZ.  He is a nice clean addiction to have.

I loved the whole package!  Giant monster battling great looking models of real fighting vehicles and imaginary fighting vehicles (my favorite was the Maser) and then facing off against at least one other giant monster (my favorite was Ghidorah from the very beginning).

The first time I was allowed to stay up past my bedtime when I was a child was to watch "Godzilla vs The Thing" (aka "Godzilla vs Mothra") on a Saturday night episode of Creature Feature which was broadcast over my hometown's local UHF station.

One of my fondest memories was when my grandfather took my older brother and I to see "Godzilla vs Megalon" at the theater when it was released in the United States (1976).

Entering my teenage years I lost interest when I discovered girls and the "cooler" things to entertain myself.

When I got out of the Army in 1992 I stumbled against "Godzilla vs Biollante" in my local video store and was curious. After watching it the first time that night, I ended up renting the video cassette seven days straight and watching it at least twice every night after work.

I'VE BEEN HOOKED EVER SINCE!  

For me it is all about Godzilla's roar. I can't get enough of it. It is my ringtone on my phone and I uploaded it to my laptop as the alert for an incoming message.

Well, I was born in the mid 90's, so I wasn't around during the original run of Godzilla movies. For me, it wasn't even specifically a Godzilla film. Rather, I was a HUGE dinosaur fanatic (what kid isn't) by the time I was 2. I could name almost any dinosaur by its full name and scientific name by the time I was 4. (I always had a great memory for things I REALLY liked) But I'm getting off track, already. I watched all the Land Before Time Films that I could and went absolutely crazy over anything Dino related, I still have storage bins full of dinosaur figures that I played with for hours on end.

When I was probably 4 or so (around the year 2000), my mom took me to see Jurassic Park at a drive in movie theater, because it was one of those discount nights where they show an older film, and Jurassic Park was about 7 years old by then. Anyway, everyone thought I would be afraid of the movie, but instead it fired me up even more, which lead to me wanting to see every dinosaur related film and documentary. Which leads us directly into Godzilla....

One Friday evening, in '02 or '03, my dad went to Hastings (so sad they went out of business last year) to pick up some movies to watch, and while he was in there, he saw Godzilla 2000, and was surprised to see they still made them, since he remembered watching them as a kid in the 70's. So he decided to buy it and see if it was any good. I distinctly remember sitting in our family room in the basement, leaning up against a bookshelf, and thinking that I was watching the coolest thing ever. (A GIANT DINOSAUR THING THAT SHOOTS FIRE (I know, it's atomic breath) OUT OF ITS MOUTH) Let's just say that after that, it was all downhill. (for my parents, since I was on the prowl for anything Godzilla related)

Over the years, I would beg my mom to buy me anything Godzilla related. We went to the mall every few weeks to check the video stores for new shipments of old Godzilla movies on VHS. We went to Best Buy all the time to see if they had Terror of Mechagodzilla (one I could never find, no matter how hard I searched) since they were supposed to carry it, but never had it in stock. 

I always dragged my mom into KB toys whenever we were in the area, where I picked up a variety of Godzilla figures over the years. 

Man, good times. 

My father was the one who got me into Godzilla. Sadly neither of us can remember which film it was.

I don't remember my first Godzilla movie, but I used to have a lot of Godzilla toys growing up without knowing that they were actually from Godzilla. I guess I just got into it because giant monsters interested me. 

It was my love for dinosaurs and the simple fact that he destroyed buildings and breathed atomic breath and I love that as a kid and I still do.

 I'm not sure if I posted in here already, but I can't seem to find any post so I'll go ahead.

As a little kid, I loved dinosaurs. I had lots of them and I'd spend hours on end playing with them. And some of these dinosaur toys I had were actually Godzilla figures, but I hadn't recognized that. I had two figures of Burning Godzilla (one big and one really small), but when I played with them I pretended they were Bowser from Super Mario Bros., which I also loved as a kid. I faintly remember having a Mecha King Ghidorah toy when I was little also, but I think I gave it away because the middle head had snapped off. Later, on one rainy afternoon, my mom put on a Godzilla movie for me to watch, and I loved it. I really liked Godzilla, and I felt sorry for him because I felt like he was just misunderstood. 

In third grade, I started drawing Godzilla comic books, where I made Godzilla a super hero that fought other monsters. Also, for my birthday I remember getting a few Godzilla toys which I still actually have today.

Then my mom bought me a box set of Godzilla VHS tapes from a nearby thrift store. They were the classic, Showa era ones. 

There was also this channel on TV that played re-runs of the classic Godzilla films, so I had some fun watching and recording those. When I was sick or something I remember watching them. Then I went to a video store at the mall, and I found a 3-in-one DVD of Godzilla VS Mothra, GMK and another one that I can't quite remember. I used to watch those all the time.

And since then, I have been a faithful Godzilla fan. 

When I watched Godzilla 2000

I met Gareth Edwards on the set of Godzilla back in the day, I had initially no interest in the big green galoot until I sat down and talked with the man, he was so passionate in what he was working on, I couldn't help it, he sold me.

My brother introduced it to me. He asked me to watch king of monsters and I loved it. The ironic part is I needed a pep talk about how it wasn't real to watch it.

One of my very first memories of my life is literally Godzilla. my older brother must of put on a channel featuring a classic Godzilla movie. I was hypnotized, giant monsters destroying whole cities, fire literally coming out of there mouth, aliens and flying saucers? What's not to like for a 2 year old little boy? ever since then my brother and father and I rented every Godzilla or giant monster movie the local Blockbuster or video rental shop had. every Christmas I would wake up and open presents and I would just be so happy to find a new Godzilla vhs in my stocking or a new monster toy. im 30 now and every November I dedicate an entire month to watching Godzilla and other Toho movies. Now I have a 2 year old daughter named Ripley who can share in the same passion as I did with my brother and father. waking up early on a Saturday morning or staying up late we can enjoy a good old Godzilla movie together until the day I die.

What made me a godzilla fan was James Rolf's (angryvideogamenerd) "cinemassacre monster maddness 2008 Godzilla-Thon". But the first godzilla movie I seen was Tokyo S.O.S or godzilla 1954.

I watched the first Godzilla with Raymond Blur. Than I watched all the reruns of the 1960’s Godzilla and the 1970’s Godzilla on Creature feature on channel 50 from Detroit. I was hooked line and sinkered from there. I have most of the the Godzilla movies from the 1970’s all the movies from 1985-Present. And some toys as well.

Godzilla 2014 made me a fan.

The main thing that brought me into this series was the movie Terror Of Mechagodzilla, it was the first Godzilla film I have ever saw and I watched it a lot when I young. Along with Terror Of Mechagodzilla I watched Godzilla 2000, Mothra Vs Godzilla, and Godzilla (1998), but sadly the disc got scratched and I haven't ben able to watch it for 11 years. But as luck would have it, when I was finding more Godzilla films I found a copy at my local cinema store and when I watched it again, it brought back the memories as a child and I had the same feeling when I first watched it as a child. It is still my number 1 favourite movie and I have been a Godzilla fan since

^Good man.

I was a kid in the 70s. I was way into dinosaurs and watched anything with dinosaurs in them. There was a show called Creature Feature back then- every Saturday- and each episode showed a movie like Creature from the Black Lagoon, Frankenstein etc. I saw Godzilla on that show. I was pretty young so I kind of tuned out of the plot and dialogue and perked up when Godzilla appeared and went berserk or fought the several weird and cool opponents. I was a bit young to understand the concept of what he represented.  I always genuinely felt bad when he got knocked down or seemed to lose a fight. He was probably my first favorite anti hero before I even knew what that concept was.

I knew about Godzilla for my entire life but never got into it until the 2014 trailers started coming out. I thought it looked like a good movie ended up doing a bit of research on Godzilla. I quickly found out about the movies and other monsters and watched some of the older movies.

Now I've seen 18 of the movies and have a small MonsterArts collection.

^Which have you yet to see SFK?

^King Kong vs. Godzilla, Ebirah, Horror of the Deep through Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla, Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla II, Godzilla vs. SpaceGodzilla, and 1998.

^ooooo.... all fun movies in their own right. King Kong Vs Godzilla is amazing! you need to see that one first out of all of them in my opinion.

Sci-Fi King25,
Wow. Big list. Exciting that you have so many ahead of you. Definitely should pick them up.