History Headscratchers / Gamera

** The Last Hope (a fan comic turned canon) says they did so they could have someone to defend them against Garasharp (a scrapped Showa monster). But if you ignore that, then they probably did it for the usual reasons: too see if they could, to have a powerful minion/workhorse, or maybe just by accident. All that matters is they were too strong to stop, necessitating the creation of Gamera.
* Gamera saves Toshio from falling off the lighthouse in the original film and this is used as evidence that Gamera is a "good turtle". No one involved mentions that Toshio wouldn't have needed saving if Gamera hadn't smashed the lighthouse in the first place. You don't get to be a hero just by rescuing someone from peril that was entirely your fault to begin with.
** It was really a shallowly-explored plot point. It would have been fascinating to explore why Gamera makes an exception for children, but instead they just presented it as a draw for children.
** Gamera is an AntiHero. Sure, he'll save children from harm, but he's still going to smash buildings and whatnot. Plus, you forget that the original Gamera was trying to cash in on the success of the Franchise/{{Godzilla}} films. Giant monsters rampaging across Japan is pretty standared, regardless of whether or not they're good or bad. The "FriendToAllChildren" aspect of Gamera was created to make him more kid-friendly to young audiences. Remember, at the time (mid 1960s), the Franchise/{{Godzilla}} films were becoming more light-hearted and geared towards kids due to more and more children going to see the Godzilla films at the time. Kadokawa Daiei Studios wanted to cash in on this, so they created Gamera.
*** In the original film, it didn't appear to me that Gamera was the friend to all children. It appeared that he accidentally saved Toshio by mistake, and it was Gamera that ''endangered'' him in the first place. It also seemed like Toshio had a ''very'' unhealthy obsession with Gamera to the point where he nearly died in a train crash just to see him. It wasn't until ''Gamera vs. Gyaos'' that Gamera was flanderized into the FriendOfAllChilden, and in all the films I saw after the first one, Gamera usually fights the monsters as far away as possible from any humans nearby. Even by ''Zigra'' the adults are happy to see him when he arrives to put out fires (aka consume them). The only instances where Gamera does attack humans are the original, the opening of ''Barugon'', ''Viras'' and ''Super Monster'' (the last two are due to him being BrainwashedAndCrazy and using StockFootage from the first film.)
* Why did the military decide to make Gamera a priority in the third Heisei film? I get it, he caused a lot of death and destruction killing the Gyaos...but the Gyaos are ''confirmed'' to be capable of wiping out an entire civilization that was ''more'' advanced than humanity. Then Iris, a ''known'' maneater who's actively hostile towards humanity, shows up...and they decide to fire on Gamera while he's in the midst of fighting Iris, who was heading ''directly'' for a populated area. Are the military suicidal? I'd understand if they'd played up the idea that Iris' cult was responsible for this, but I think I missed that if they said anything about that.
** It's mentioned that everyone is aware Gamera is slowly growing less and less attached to humanity, and more feral and aggressive as a result. Iris wiped out a village, but hardly anyone is even aware Iris exists when Gamera is shot down. Meanwhile, Gamera destroyed a ''large'' swath of a major metropolitan area during his last bout of Gyaos exterminating. A lot of powerful people are probably calling for the turtle's head.

** It's mentioned that everyone is aware Gamera is slowly growing less and less attached to humanity, and more feral and aggressive as a result. Iris wiped out a village, but hardly anyone at this moment is even aware Iris exists. Meanwhile, Gamera destroyed a ''large'' swath of a major metropolitan area during his last bout of Gyaos exterminating. A lot of powerful people are probably calling for the turtle's head.

* Why did the military decide to make Gamera a priority in the third Heisei film? I get it, he caused a lot of death and destruction killing the Gyaos...but the Gyaos are ''confirmed'' to be capable of wiping out an entire civilization that was ''more'' advanced than humanity. Then Iris, a ''known'' maneater who's actively hostile towards humanity, shows up...and they decide to fire on Gamera while he's in the midst of fighting Iris, who was heading ''directly'' for a populated area. Are the military suicidal? I'd understand if they'd played up the idea that Iris' cult was responsible for this, but I think I missed that if they said anything about that.

** Gamera is an AntiHero. Sure, he'll save children from harm, but he's still going to smash buildings and whatnot. Plus, you forget that the original Gamera was trying to cash in on the success of the Franchise/{{Godzilla}} films. Giant monsters rampaging across Japan is pretty standared, regardless of whether or not they're good or bad. The "FriendToAllChildren" aspect of Gamera was created to make him more kid-friendly to young audiences. Remember, at the time (mid 1960s), the Franchise/{{Godzilla}} films were becoming more light-hearted and geared towards kids due to more and more children going to see the Godzilla films at the time. Kadokawa (Formerly Daiei) Studios wanted to cash in on this, so they created Gamera.

*** In the original film, it didn't appear to me that Gamera was the friend to all children. It appeared that he accidentally saved Toshio by mistake, and it was Gamera that ''endangered'' him in the first place. It also seemed like Toshio had a ''very'' unhealthy obsession with Gamera to the point where he nearly died in a train crash just to see him. It wasn't until ''Gamera vs. Gyaos'' that Gamera was flanderized into the FriendOfAllChilden, and in all the films I saw after the first one, Gamera usually fights the monsters as far away as possible from any humans nearby. Even by ''Zigra'' the adults are happy to see him when he arrives to put out fires (aka consume them). The only instances where Gamera does attack humans are the original, the opening of ''Barugon'', ''Viras'' and ''Super Monster'' (the last two are due to him being BrainwashedAndCrazy and using StockFootage from the first film.)

** Gamera is an AntiHero. Sure, he'll save children from harm, but he's still going to smash buildings and whatnot. Plus, you forget that the original Gamera was trying to cash in on the success of the {{Godzilla}} films. Giant monsters rampaging across Japan is pretty standared, regardless of whether or not they're good or bad. The "FriendToAllChildren" aspect of Gamera was created to make him more kid-friendly to young audiences. Remember, at the time (mid 1960s), the {{Godzilla}} films were becoming more light-hearted and geared towards kids due to more and more children going to see the Godzilla films at the time. Kadokawa (Formerly Daiei) Studios wanted to cash in on this, so they created Gamera.

*** In the original film, it didn't appear to me that Gamera was the friend to all children. It appeared that he accidentally saved Toshio by mistake, and it was Gamera that ''endangered'' him in the first place. It also seemed like Toshiro had a ''very'' unhealthy obsession with Gamera to the point where he nearly died in a train crash just to see him. It wasn't until ''Gamera vs. Gyaos'' that Gamera was flanderized into the FriendOfAllChilden, and in all the films I saw after the first one, Gamera usually fights the monsters as far away as possible from any humans nearby. Even by ''Zigra'' the adults are happy to see him when he arrives to put out fires (aka consume them). The only instances where Gamera does attack humans are the original, the opening of ''Barugon'', ''Viras'' and ''Super Monster'' (the last two are due to him being BrainwashedAndCrazy and using StockFootage from the first film.)

*** In the original film, it didn't appear to me that Gamera was the friend to all children. It appeared that he accidentally saved Toshiro by mistake, and it was Gamera that ''endangered'' him in the first place. It also seemed like Toshiro had a ''very'' unhealthy obsession with Gamera to the point where he nearly died in a train crash just to see him. It wasn't until ''Gamera vs. Gyaos'' that Gamera was flanderized into the FriendOfAllChilden, and in all the films I saw after the first one, Gamera usually fights the monsters as far away as possible from any humans nearby. Even by ''Zigra'' the adults are happy to see him when he arrives to put out fires (aka consume them). The only instances where Gamera does attack humans are the original, the opening of ''Barugon'', ''Viras'' and ''Super Monster'' (the last two are due to him being BrainwashedAndCrazy and using StockFootage from the first film.)

** Gamera is an AntiHero. Sure, he'll save children from harm, but he's still going to smash buildings and whatnot. Plus, you forget that the original Gamera was trying to cash in on the success of the {{Godzilla}} films. Giant monsters rampaging across Japan is pretty standared, regardless of whether or not they're good or bad. The "FriendToAllChildren" aspect of Gamera was created to make him more kid-friendly to young audiences. Remember, at the time (mid 1960s), the {{Godzilla}} films were becoming more light-hearted and geared towards kids due to more and more children going to see the Godzilla films at the time. Kadokawa (Formerly Daiei) Studios wanted to cash in on this, so they created Gamera.

** It was really a shallowly-explored plot point. It would have been fascinating to explore why Gamera makes an exception for children, but instead they just presented it as a draw for children.

* Gamera saves Toshio from falling off the lighthouse in the original film and this is used as evidence that Gamera is a "good turtle". No one involved mentions that Toshio wouldn't have needed saving if Gamera hadn't smashed the lighthouse in the first place. You don't get to be a hero just by rescuing someone from peril that was entirely your fault to begin with.

* Gamera saves Kenny from falling off the lighthouse in the original film and this is used as evidence that Gamera is a "good turtle". No one involved mentions that Kenny wouldn't have needed saving if Gamera hadn't smashed the lighthouse in the first place. You don't get to be a hero just by rescuing someone from peril that was entirely your fault to begin with.