YMMV / Godzilla (2014)

• Alternative Character Interpretation: See here.
• Americans Hate Tingle:
  • The movie has gotten a pretty bad rep in places where Godzilla hasn't been established as a pop-culturally relevant franchise, and so most people have grown up with the previous American reboot instead. Being that one of the main focuses of the film was to approach it from a "fan perspective" and distance it as much as possible from the '98 movie, it's easy to see why this strategy backfired in places where audiences harbored no love for the Japanese Godzilla or had no idea that a Japanese Godzilla existed, especially since reviews agreed that its faithfulness to the source material was one of the movie's main selling points. Basically, the two movies' receptions are inverted compared to countries where the brand has had a history.
  • The film did really poorly in the South Korean market. Box office analysts have compared the South Korean market for this movie with Pacific Rim and noticed how it was an unusual outlier considering Godzilla did better than Pacific Rim in every other territory.
• And You Thought It Would Fail: It had a lot to live up to as it was the second American reboot to the series, which left many longtime fans feeling skeptical about whether or not they would be able to pull it off after the last attempt (even in spite of Toho’s approval before release). Not helping matters was that the film's director, Gareth Edwards, had only done one smaller scale film before this, and on top of that there was the amount of articles written by various entertainment outlets that predicted it would be a Box Office Bomb on the grounds that it was a Godzilla movie, a series that has been mostly ridiculed by many western critics as poorly made, nonsensical kids flicks. It ultimately grossed $524 million at the box office, went on to launch the MonsterVerse and won over both film critics who praised it for its visual effects and human drama, and series fans who thought it did the character justice.
• Base-Breaking Character: Ford Brody and Admiral William Stenz. See here for details.
• Broken Base:
  • When this leak of Godzilla himself was posted online, fans were split. Many believe he looks like he should and that he retains most of his most notable features. On the other hand many don't like the many changes that were made to his design. Then there were those who were just glad he wasn't a repeat of Zilla.
  • When word came that Toho had seen the full film several weeks before release and thought it was great, fans were split on whether that praise amounted to anything. Some fans thought that it was proof that the film would be great if the original makers of Godzilla thought it was so, while others pointed out that Toho have also put their seal of approval on lesser Godzilla films like All Monsters Attack and even (initially, at least) Godzilla (1998).
  • Viewers tend to be split between the camps of "strong entry in the Godzilla series that carries the spirit of the 1954 original" and "weak due to boring human leads and too little Godzilla," with a middle grouping of "good overall, but could have used more Godzilla presence." This spread even to professional movie critics.
  • The short amount of screen time Godzilla got compared to the human characters. Those who didn't mind it point out that the amount of screen time Godzilla had in the Showa Era films were relatively similar to this film. Those who did mind are divided between whether Godzilla became a secondary character in his own movie, or felt his on-screen presence was sufficient but could have been balanced out by making the human characters more interesting.
  • The way the movie keeps teasing the audience by cutting away from the monster battles to the humans. The teasing either makes the climax all the sweeter or sours the whole experience by weakening the fights in the rest of the movie.
  • The design of the Mutos. Some think they're too bland with their drab black/grey color, especially since Godzilla is the same color and they fight several times at night. Other like them for how utterly different they look from any previous kaiju, looking nothing like a man in a suit.
  • Although there's really no argument in the hard-core part of the fanbase, some of the more "flexible" fans and general monster movie lovers are divided on whether this movie is better or worse than the 1998 film. Frequently argued-over topics include which one's more fun, has more memorable characters, what their actors are given and how well they pull it off, gives more screen-time for the titular creature, and which depiction of Godzilla is more serviceable to modern, non-fan audiences.
• Critical Dissonance: Not as severe, but noticeable. The movie gained generally mixed to mostly positive reviews from professional critics who praised it for its cinematography, effects and affective human story. General audiences and longtime fans, however, are much more divisive on the overall film, with some who felt it was a bland, boring disappointment that spent too much time on the human drama and not enough on the actual monsters, whereas others felt it was a solid, yet by-the-numbers Hollywood blockbuster that did its job well enough, and those who agree with the critics and felt it was a great revival of the classic character.
• Draco in Leather Pants:
  • The MUTOs often get this treatment. In the film, they're depicted as being completely callous to the damage they cause to humans, but fans tend to focus more on the fact they're only interested in defending themselves and living out their life cycle, whilst overlooking the catastrophic consequences their survival and reproduction would entail; depicting them as Tragic Monsters.
  • Admiral Stenz and the military, who are portrayed quite sympathetically in this movie, debatably also get this treatment, particularly in regards to their Nuke 'em plan. Movie-goers, focusing on how this movie portrays the military as being more out-of-their-depth than reckless and incompetent, tend to focus on and embellish how hesitant the military are to use nukes, and say their plan once they settle on it is reasonable and rational. This ignores how: (1) Godzilla is certainly a Destructive Saviour, but his physical Kaiju battles cause a lot less devastating fallout across a smaller geographical and environmental area than an exploding nuke would, with civilians caught in a Kaiju battle having a higher chance of surviving that than if they were caught in the blast or the subsequent radioactive fallout of a top-grade megaton-yield modern nuclear warhead, (2) The original attempts to nuke Godzilla failed to kill or even so much as scratch one kaiju, and now the military are hoping a single nuke will kill three of the creatures, and (3) The military are overlooking how in the likely event that even one of the three kaiju survives the nuclear blast, it'll absorb the excess radiation and become an even bigger danger to the world, whereas the worst-case scenario of letting Godzilla and the MUTOs fight is that there's one or two less of the rampaging monsters for humanity to worry about once they're done.

• Ensemble Dark Horse:
  • Joe Brody is considered to be the best human character in the movie, and to some, the franchise as a whole. Being played by Bryan Cranston probably has something to do with that. The real reason he's listed as part of the ensemble is because he dies in the first half of the movie, but gives a memorable performance in that time.
  • The MUTOs have become quite popular, even among those who mostly didn't like the movie. They kick a lot of ass whenever they're on screen, almost outfight Godzilla, and arguably have more romantic chemistry than the main human characters. They also have a unique, interesting design paying homage to plenty of classic Hollywood monsters like Cloverfield and the Xenomorphs, helping them stick out more in the Godzilla rogues gallery.
  • The nameless Badass Driver bus driver who not only passes through a military/police barricade, he drives like hell when Godzilla has an explosive skirmish with the military.
  • Sergeant Morales has only three scenes but he is liked for being amicable and polite even in the face of danger.
  • Dr. Vivienne Graham has become strangely popular with the fandom, partly due to Sally Hawkins' role in The Shape of Water, where she has amorous relationships with a mysterious aquatic creature, causing fans to joke about Dr. Graham's true motivation for studying the monsters.
• Fandom-Enraging Misconception: Saying that this is a remake of the 1998 film doesn't sit well with Godzilla fans. Same thing goes for when journalists or critics say that the '98 film was "the last Godzilla film" until this one, out of apparent ignorance of Godzilla: Final Wars and the rest of the Millennium series.
• Fandom Rivalry:
  • A minor one with Man of Steel, with jokes about how Godzilla's battles with the MUTOs apparently caused less property damage than Superman's battle with Zod. Godzilla actually caused significantly more collateral damage (most of the damage in MoS was caused by Zods' doomsday weapon; the fight itself was mostly Zod chasing Superman around the city), though the counterargument is that Godzilla is hailed as a hero by fans in and out of universe despite being a giant rampaging animal stopping other giant rampaging animals, while Superman is hated in and out of universe despite deliberately saving the world from actively malicious genocidal aliens.
  • There's one with Pacific Rim revolving around debates over which stylistic approach is best for a Kaiju film, the fantastical and lighthearted one for Pacific Rim or the realistic and dark one for Godzilla. Although there's a sizeable portion of people -including Del Toro himself- who'd love to see a crossover.
    • The Godzilla fanbase in general is either friendly with Pacific Rim fans, united in their love of kaiju — or would like them to piss off because Godzilla is a genuine Japanese kaiju property, not an imitation, and would so totally own all the robots and creatures in that film. It didn't help that Godzilla was more financially successful and received more attention including a crossover with King Kong.
  • While there are certainly plenty of fans that appreciate both, one formed with the film's own sequel almost as soon as it came out, somewhat inevitably given their radically antithetical approaches and styles. Those who prefer King of the Monsters call Godzilla (2014) a dull, slow film about bland, boring people that doesn't have enough monsters and takes too long to get to the action. Those who prefer Godzilla call King of the Monsters a loud, stupid film about nasty, unlikable people that overexposes and normalizes its monsters with poorly-shot action.
• Fan Nickname:
  • "Vishnu" for the giant centipede in the teaser trailer, named after the part of the Oppenheimer quote that plays over its shot in the teaser trailer. A rumor on the internet was that Talaghan was its official name, but this was proven untrue.
  • While the MUTOs aren't given names in the film, fans refer to the male one as "Hokmuto" (for being discovered in Hokkaido) and refer the female one as "Femuto" (for obvious reasons) based on script rumors.
• Friendly Fandoms: With Pacific Rim, also a Legendary Pictures production revolving around giant monsters. Many fans even tried to put the Big G on the Kaiju categories used by the Pan Pacific Defense Corps - for comparison, Gipsy Danger was a staggering 260 feet tall, while Godzilla is 350! The Category 4's seen in the film were roughly 260-280. Slattern, the first and only Category 5 Kaiju, is a 596 foot behemoth, but measured from head to tail, while on all fours he's the same height as Gipsy and on his hind legs is a third taller. Godzilla, given his size and destructive capabilities, would fit snugly between a Cat. 4-5 Kaiju (though some fans, Gareth Edwards included, maintain that Godzilla would be considered a Category 6 in terms of sheer power and invincibility).
• Harsher in Hindsight: In the earliest stages of the film, Toho required Gareth Edwards to have the film take place mainly in Japan. Edwards says that the Fukushima plant leak, which happened after this stipulation was given, made it where the team had to be extra careful in being respectful to the victims of that leak. It's possible that the meltdown sequence and subsequent evacuation of Janjira when the MUTOs attacked is a very heavily veiled reference to the Fukushima accident.
• Hilarious in Hindsight:
  • Sally Hawkins as Dr. Graham was mostly ignored as a minor supporting character in the film's release. Now that Sally Hawkins has gotten a big-screen role in The Shape of Water, where she has a sexual relationship with a strange amphibious creature, it's become popular for many fans to joke that Dr. Graham is studying monsters for different, personal reasons. Others just straight-up ship her with Godzilla.
  • Back in 1985, Warner Bros.'s Pee-wee's Big Adventure featured a brief scene where Pee-wee rides through a film set where Godzilla is fighting King Ghidorah. 29 years later, WB is now making an actual, full Godzilla movie.
    • The "Hillarious" part really comes in that apparently Toho was less than amused by Warner basically using the monsters without authorization.
  • Speaking of Warner Bros., this isn't the first Godzilla movie they've been involved with, though thankfully they're handling things better than they did last time.
  • Yucca Mountain being depicted as fully operational (as well as the storage site for the Female MUTO's spore) by 2014 comes off as particularly amusing when you consider that funding for the site was cancelled three years earlier, and as of 2021 seems unlikely to ever be restarted.
  • The leaked SDCC teaser revealed that one of the monsters Godzilla was originally going to fight was a red, multi-limbed, centipede-like creature. The Godzilla Power Hour and Marvel's Godzilla, King of the Monsters (1977) had Godzilla face off against similar-looking◊ monsters◊.
  • This◊ image making fun of the 1998 film with Snickers' "You're not you when you're hungry" campaign is funnier now that there is an official Snickers commercial made to promote this film.
  • Godzilla's feet are rounder, sauropod-like and with relatively short talons, which is what they were like in Bambi Meets Godzilla.
  • In The Amazing Spider-Man, Captain Stacy joked about not being "the mayor of Tokyo" in response to Peter Parker's claim that Dr. Connors has turned into the giant lizard monster roaming around New York, in a Shout-Out to Godzilla. The Amazing Spider-Man 2 ended up being a direct box office competitor with the old menace of Tokyo himself in May of 2014.
  • In Lilo & Stitch, a scene featured the titular alien Stitch (while in Hawaii) making a scale model of San Francisco then smashing akin to a kaiju rampage. Godzilla would eventually come to both Honolulu and San Francisco in the movie. Additionally, both films feature Elvis' "(You're the) Devil in Disguise".
  • When Godzilla's appearance was more clearly revealed to the Japanese by the Asia trailer, Japanese fans complained that he looked too fat. While this led to the obligatory jokes about him eating too many Snickers' bars (see above), a Fiat commercial released soon after these complaints first popped up implies that it's more because he had been "craving Italian" lately.
  • As awesome as Godzilla using his atomic breath is, it's hard to watch it and not want to scream ""I'M A-FIRIN' MAH LAZOR!!."
  • Godzilla being revered as a god wasn't new, but the next Toho film now ramps that up and gave him an official meaning, "God incarnate".
  • In the 2019 NBA Finals, Toronto Raptors defeats the Golden State Warriors, at their homecourt in San Francisco, to won their first championship title. Coinciding with the recent release of the sequel, many fans joking that Godzilla truly invades the aforementioned city.
• Hype Backlash: Strangely enough, from professional movie critics - while one side derided it as yet another blockbuster, many critics demanded more Godzilla fighting.
• I Am Not Shazam: The movie features a Covert Group called MONARCH. However, it was misidentified by the public as being named "M.U.T.O." in the months leading up to the film's release. This confusion can be blamed on the M.U.T.O. Research website set up as part of the Viral Marketing. M.U.T.O. stands for "Massive Unidentified Terrestrial Organism" and refers to the Kaiju that is being researched. But some of the responses included phrases like "Please stop wasting M.U.T.O. resources" or "M.U.T.O. assures all personnel", making it seem like the name of the organization. Inversely, another few of text responses refer to certain activities being "reported to MONARCH," but this whole confusion led people to speculate that MONARCH referred to either A) the codename for an individual within the organization, or B) the name of some fictional security software.
• Just Here for Godzilla:
  • It does star the Trope Namer himself, after all. The first official teaser trailer leans on this heavily: all it really reveals about the film's plot is that Godzilla's in it, he causes loads of destruction and this upsets and frightens many people (i.e. the simplest, most basic elements of a Godzilla story). This was tantalizing enough to shoot the trailer to more than 10 million Youtube views in a week.
  • Similarly, most fans didn't expect Godzilla: Smash3 to be particularly good when it was first revealed, but the game was still closely examined because it gave the best yet view of the new Godzilla design.
  • Among non-fans and even people who actively dislike Godzilla, Bryan Cranston has become enough of a draw for them. Jeremy Jahns mentions this in his review of the teaser:
    "Yeah, that was Bryan Cranston. Okay, well... I'll watch the movie. I was on the fence with the big lizard tearing shit through a city, but you bring in Heisenberg and — alright, I'm there."
  • Ironically, one of the biggest criticisms leveled against the movie was exactly Godzilla's and Cranston's limited screen-time (the former mostly has cameos until the final fight, the latter is killed off about half an hour in), and while most critics applauded this "held-back" approach, audiences were less forgiving (there was a significant drop in attendance following a strong opening), proving this trope to be a double-edged sword.
  • Some Marvel Cinematic Universe fans who don't mind about Incest Yay Shipping only watch the movie just to see the actors who portray Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch (Aaron Taylor-Johnson and Elizabeth Olsen, respectively) as married couple.
• Like You Would Really Do It:
  • Did anyone really think they were going to kill the Big G off before he could defeat the Mutos? It's slightly more convincing when he collapses and lies dormant after his victory, but this is a character that lived through being nuked.
  • Subverted with Joe Brody. Some viewers didn't think he would die from his wounds, believing that a character so prominently featured in the trailers wouldn't be killed off in the first act.
• Magnificent Bastard: See here for Godzilla.
• Memetic Mutation:
  • With the reveal of Godzilla's new design having disproportionately huge thighs and feet, fans jumped on the bandwagon on calling Godzilla "thicc".
  • Many fans joked about Godzilla being "too fat", saddling the Monsterverse Godzilla with pejorative nicknames like "Calorie Monster", "Godzilla Deluxe", and "Sumozilla".
  • Monstrous Ugly Terrifying Orga-lookalike^ExplanationA pejorative nickname of some fans about the MUTO, criticizing their appearance for looking too much like Orga from the Godzilla 2000 film.
  • The Kiss of Death, Godzilla's finishing move on the female MUTO, was widely memed by the fandom, calling it the "Atomic Deepthroat" or joking that since the MUTO eat radiation, Godzilla was giving them an ironic taste of their medicine.
  • The two MUTO being courting mates showing affection to each other has drawn many comments on it "being a better love story than Twilight", or joking that the MUTO have more romantic chemistry than the human leads.
    • Meanwhile, fans who oppose the portrayal of the MUTO as Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds and thinks that sympathy directed toward them is a case of Draco in Leather Pants often joke that the "romantic chemistry" of the two was going to end praying mantis style.
  • The ominous Oppenheimer quote ("Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds") has gotten juxtaposed against animated GIFs and other images of many of the sillier moments from the Showa films (for example, this image from Invasion of Astro-Monster, this image from Godzilla vs. Hedorah, and this image from Godzilla vs. Megalon).
  • There's this image◊ of Giorgio A. Tsoukalos from Ancient Aliens making fun of people who were too quick to jump the gun as far as equating the Mutos with Destoroyah.
  • Already in the comments section for the trailers there are loads of comments on how Walter White/Heisenberg will face off against Godzilla, or defeat him using Meth and Ricin. Hell, there are even tons of comments theorizing that Walter White escaped to Japan and created Godzilla to kill Skylar!
  • This GIF◊ of the very end of the second trailer, which shows Godzilla being viewed out of a door that is closing, has spread across the internet with various funny comments, usually along the lines of Screw This, I'm Outta Here
  • Certain fans, joking at the speculation that the silhouette of what appears to be an airborne Kaiju is Rodan, have begun to argue that it really is the Giant Condor that inexplicably showed up in Ebirah, Horror of the Deep.
  • This video remixes the second trailer into one that paints the film as the "feel good movie of the year."
  • Others have synced the trailer to The Godzilla Power Hour's theme.
  • The Twitter hashtag "#demandtoknow" has been repurposed for some quirky contexts. This Cinema Blend article, for one, says:
  "At best, this is a legit scary movie. At worst, this is a borderline traumatic experience. Forget about WB and Legendary Pictures gambling with a hefty budget: is Godzilla gonna have to give us some therapy? #demandtoknow"
  • This video remixes the train scene with Thomas & Friends.
  • This video takes the audio of the first official main trailer and syncs it up with footage from Attack on Titan.
  • "[Gareth] Edwards channels poppycock" is a largely nonsensical insult from an infamous negative review by Tony Macklin that has become a common Appropriated Appellation among Godzilla fans.
  • To hide a good fight that many people wanted to see is now being known as "a Godzilla 2014" or to "Godzilla 2014" something.
  • Godzilla's noticeable avoidance of collateral damage wherever possible led to many people praising him as a better hero than the Destructive Savior version of Superman in Man of Steel.
  • When it was announced that the film would eventually lead to a crossover with King Kong, fans had a field day in pointing out how the odds are stacked against Kong's favor. Even with the reveal that Kong in Kong Skull Island would be far bigger than previous incarnations, many still joked that he'd still be only barely up to Godzilla's knees.
  • "Let them fight◊", Serizawa's comment in the lead-up to the fight between MUTO and Godzilla in San Francisco, is a popular reaction image often used in response to fights between two or more unpopular figures or entities.
  • As of the release of King of the Monsters:
    • Many fans joked that the new film is vastly superior in that people can actually SEE the fight since it's nowhere as dark as the first.
    • Godzilla's new redesign for the film has been compared to him having hit the gym between movies.
    • With criticism of the first being the lack of monster action, and criticism of the sequel being TOO much monster action, many memes popped up about critics being two-faced and hating the movies either way.
• MisBlamed:
  • Legendary Pictures, Warner Bros. and Gareth Edwards were all criticized for "lying" about the second trailer being released by February 14 of 2014, with accusations of Invisible Advertising being bandied about afterward. Except that none of the people involved with the film ever said anything of the sort. The rumour started with some random Lebanese news website, which claimed that the trailer would come on Feb. 7. Then movie news sites and Godzilla fan sites parroted that and then got the date changed to Feb. 14 along the line, and Godzilla fans subsequently got overhyped and then overly disappointed as a result.
  • While it's tempting to cite this film as yet another example of Hollywood's obsession with reboots, it's important to note that Warner Brothers did not just thoughtlessly resurrect Godzilla for lack of any new ideas: Toho Studios previously decided to retire the series for ten years in 2004 following the Grand Finale of Godzilla: Final Wars, and 2014 just marked the end of the planned hiatus. Godzilla was always going to come back in 2014, regardless of the current state of Hollywood.
  • One of the biggest complaints about the movie, particularly from those who first watched it only after its time in theaters, is how poorly-lit many aspects of the film are, to the point of bordering on Obscured Special Effects, which many have accused of being a tactic to reduce the amount of money that would have to be spent on animating the kaiju. However, this can actually be blamed on the home video releases themselves, as every known release suffers from a horribly botched transfer that drastically darkens the lighting on almost every scene; many fans who saw the movie in theaters have reported that the effects were much more visible in the theatrical release.
• Money-Making Shot: The end of the Nature Has An Order TV spot features a clear, if brief, shot◊ of Godzilla roaring up into the sky in broad daylight.
• Narm: Even as a serious Godzilla movie, there are still a couple of moments.
  • Elizabeth Olsen's "running" in this scene.
  • "We call him...*dramatic head turn*...Gojira."
  • The way Godzilla finishes off the last Muto, which sort of looks like a Kiss of Death, can be seen as unintentionally silly.
  • As he seals the facility at the beginning of the movie in a scene notably used in the trailers, Joe Brody gives out a long yell. It's supposed to be a sorrowful cry but since it's Bryan Cranston it sounds like the frightened wails of Hal on Malcolm in the Middle. It's hilarious and nostalgic as it had been years since Cranston had reason to do a proper Hal scream but really takes the audience out of the scene.
  • The scene where the military investigate the nuke graveyard and find the female Muto escaped... leaving a giant hole in the side of the mountain and is clearly marching to Vegas in the midday sun. Failed a Spot Check of epic proportions.
  • There is nothing more hilarious than the line which explains that M.U.T.O stands for "Massive Unidentified Terrestrial Organism"...and then the same character immediately points out "It is however, no longer terrestrial, it is airborne." I guess MUFO "Massive Unidentified Flying Organism" isn't as catchy?
  • The marine who gives the countdown to arm the nuke on the ship in San Francisco Bay does so in a ludicrously over-the-top military yelling style. Coupled with the fact that the placement of the keyholes means the bomb could easily be armed by one person with both arming keys, and that they really should have waited until they were much further offshore before arming the bomb and are instantly smashed by the flying MUTO makes this scene face-palmingly silly.
• Narm Charm: There's charm in some of the above Narm moments, but moments where it works for the better are also plentiful.
  • The Muto courtship scene, where the male offers the female a nuclear warhead, comparable to the Spaghetti Kiss from Lady and the Tramp. Yes, it's kind of silly and clashes a bit with the mood of the film, but it also shows a more sympathetic side to the monsters.
  • Some of Godzilla's mannerisms make him come off as less an unstoppable juggernaut acting on nature's behalf and more a grumpy old man who simply wants everything to be done with. Surprisingly, this sort of works; his bouncing between the two gives him a large amount of sympathy and personality while reminding the audience he's a walking engine of chaos, both frightening and endearing the audience.
  • In the aftermath of the monster battle, the news banner declaring Godzilla to be "Savior of our City?" can feel a bit over the top, but what takes the cake is some San Francisco people cheering Godzilla.
• Older Than They Think: Some people (mostly from countries where the Japanese films haven't been released) are expressing their surprise (and in some cases bitter disappointment) upon finding out that Godzilla was not, in fact, created by Roland Emmerich. Even if they are aware of the franchise's Japanese roots, a few still see the fact that the monster does battle with other giant creatures as a unique direction, at times comparing it to more recent "monster VS monster" flicks (like Mega Shark vs. Giant Octopus), even though he's been doing that in nearly every movie since 1955's Godzilla Raids Again. Likewise, his ability to shoot radioactive breath comes as a surprise to many who grew up on the 1998 film.
  • The movie's origin for Godzilla, that he was an ancient creature from an older, more radioactive Earth, was also used in Godzilla Raids Again.
    • What's more, the idea of Godzilla not being heavily mutated goes all the way back to the original 1954 film. It was in the popular Heisei Saga where the origin of Godzilla being a normal dinosaur which was heavily mutated and irradiated came from. In the 1950s to 1970s Showa era, it was implied the atomic bombing only irradiated an already-gigantic kaiju rather than changed their size and shape all that much.
  • While some cynical moviegoers might sneer at Warner Brothers' attempt at reviving the Godzilla franchise after it had lain dormant for ten years (citing it as yet another example of "Reboot Fever"), this is actually the second time that the series has taken a decade-long hiatus: the franchise was previously laid to rest between Terror of Mechagodzilla (1975) and The Return of Godzilla (1985), with the latter film bringing Godzilla back to his roots in a Darker and Edgier solo adventure.
  • As mentioned on the main page, numerous plot similarities exist between the 2014 film and the tragically scrapped 1994 script as oppose to the 1998 film the latter was reworked into. Godzilla being a Destructive Savior, an ancient rival monster for the Big G to square off against, an action sequence next to a large bridge, an enemy monster ending up impaled on a well known structure, and Godzilla's method of finishing off his opponent via nuclear breath down the throat; all existed in the 1994 script. The similarity was even stronger in earlier drafts for the 2014 movie, with scenes including Godzilla being discovered in an ice cave and a fight between a winged monster and jets.
  • A popular complaint about the movie is that it focuses too much on the humans and not enough on the giant monster fights. Historically however, monster fights have almost always taken a back seat to the human driven story in Godzilla films. So much so it named a trope.
  • When Godzilla's design was revealed, it was noted that he has gills on his neck, and fans didn't like the idea initially. The original film and Showa series' Godzilla actually had gills at the base of his neck, which explained away how he could breath underwater which is also an out of universe explanation for the holes to allow the suit actors see when performing as the monster).
• One-Scene Wonder: Sam's unnamed bus-driver, who manages to get a couple dozen kids through the apocalyptic battle of the Golden Gate Bridge without a scratch.
• Only the Creator Does It Right: Some fans automatically dismiss the film, not on the grounds of its own merits or flaws, but because it is not from Toho.
• Popularity Polynomial: After his last film in 2004, Godzilla has received very little public or internet attention. But once footage and trailers for this film started being released in December of 2013, Godzilla started trending very often on social network sites, leading to revived interest in the franchise specifically (hence why many of the films were brought back into circulation after years with no home video releases) and the Kaiju genre in general (hence the sustained interest in Pacific Rim and the Continuity Reboot for Gamera).
• Replacement Scrappy: Ford Brody replacing his father as the protagonist of the film, in spite of the film's advertisements implying his dad would have a much bigger role, did a bit to fuel his Base-Breaking Character status.
• Retroactive Recognition: Jared Keeso plays "Jump Master".
• Ron the Death Eater: Ford Brody gets this hard. For behaving like a well-trained, experienced, and disciplined military officer, people call him emotionless. For wanting to stop nuclear bombs and out of control, dangerous giant monsters, which could threaten his family, people think he's "abandoning" said family. Granted, these things could have, perhaps, been articulated a little better, but it's not out of the realm of reason to expect people to understand these things without overdoing the exposition.
• Shocking Moments: The final battle in San Francisco is awesome. Special props needs to be given to the use of the Atomic Breath, which garners a "HOLY SHIT!" from one of the soldiers that sees it In-Universe, and it's especially awe-inspiring when it's used to decapitate the female MUTO.
• Signature Scene: Thanks to the popularity of the teaser trailer, the HALO jump and the shot of Godzilla emerging from the ashy remains of several buildings as his silhouette is seen roaring became this for that movie well before it even came out.
  • Since the movie's release, the incredible reveal of Godzilla's trademark atomic breath late in the film has become nearly as talked-about as the HALO jump.
  • The nightmare-induced sequence where the MUTO hatches in the Janjira power plant.
• Sleeper Hit: Another American Godzilla after the derided Roland Emmerich movie did not seem like a good idea. Yet Godzilla (2014) won over critics and audiences and started a MonsterVerse, continued by Kong: Skull Island.
• So Bad, It Was Better: A lot of the comments from people reacting to the trailers is along the lines of "If it doesn't have monsters portrayed by People in Rubber Suits and human characters played by B-list actors whose lip motions don't match up with their spoken dialogue, then it doesn't count as a Godzilla movie." Indeed, the improved special effects, more talented cast that includes Bryan Cranston, and darker, more realistic tone are held up as examples of outright pretentiousness. Then again, a good number of these complaints come from people who have not seen the original 1954 film.
• Special Effects Evolution: Though it's not the first Godzilla film to portray Godzilla digitally, people did find this film's version a lot more convincing than the first one.
• Special Effects Failure: The film has a brief one in some rather obvious CGI insects in the scene were Dr. Brody and his son revisit their Japanese home to get information on Godzilla. While not as bad as some of the examples in the franchise, it's still incredibly jarring in contrast to the rest of the film's effects.
• Spiritual Adaptation: At least a few fans have pointed out that the premise of Godzilla fighting against an invasive species is similar to Gamera: Guardian of the Universe, right down to Godzilla’s characterization being similar to Gamera in that both don’t cause intentional destruction even after getting attacked by the military, and are only going after their enemies (Gyaos and MUTOs).
• Squick:
  • The sticky white substance that the male MUTO left behind on the wrecked nuclear submarine in Hawaii. It's supposed to be saliva, but it resembles semen, a resemblance that is easy to catch onto considering the plot involves the male trying to mate...
  • The female MUTO. Imagine a woman who is pregnant with several dozen babies and whose belly is translucent and glowing, and you wouldn't be too far off. There's also the scene where the eggs can be seen getting emptied out of her womb through the see-through skin.
• Strawman Has a Point: Just a little bit. The military's plan to attempt nuking the kaiju is far from perfect and is if anything less practical than letting the kaiju fight each-other first would be, but Admiral Stenz makes it clear to Drs. Graham and Serizawa before finalizing the plan that he's listening if they have any better suggestions. Graham doesn't have any specific suggestions, whilst a lot of viewers were sympathetic to Stenz' dismissal of Serizawa's initial "[Gojira] is here to restore balance" suggestion because they felt Serizawa was behaving too much more like a mystic than a scientist for the setting and was making himself appear to Stenz like a Cloudcuckoolander, making Stenz seem all the more rational for turning him down.
• Tainted by the Preview: Thankfully subverted. The "Smash3" tie-in game initially showed that Godzilla's spine did not light up when he charged his Atomic Breath, and the developers said this reflected how it was in the film. Fans weren't happy with this. However, when the game was released, the spine-glowing was restored - and it was eventually revealed that the spines do glow in the movie.
  • Ironically inverted with the actual film. A great deal of its Broken Base response comes from the fact that the trailers made Godzilla look like the main threat and Bryan Cranston look like the main character. This resulted in a polarizing reception when neither of these emerged in the film.
• They Changed It, Now It Sucks!: There are fans who don't like how they changed Godzilla's roar, or design, or even atomic breath (which may seem weaker or less substantial than usual, partly due to how small it looks compared to Godzilla's bulk, and that its appearance is more akin to the Showa films' vapory blast◊ rather than the more solid energy beam◊ of the Heisei and Millenium films.)
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character:
  • Drs. Ishirō Serizawa and Vivienne Graham. See here for details.
  • The multi-legged monster from the very first teaser. All we ever see of it is one brief glimpse in the teaser, it never appears in subsequent trailers, and it was eventually confirmed to not appear in the final film. It wasn't even given an actual name.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
  • Some critics feel that the Green Aesop and the nuclear geopolitics allegory that Gareth Edwards talked so much about in interviews leading up to the film's release were not as fleshed out as they should have been in the final product.
  • In one interview, he specifically characterized this film as portraying Godzilla as Gaia's Vengeance out to punish humanity. His portrayal here is a complete 180 from that.
• Too Cool to Live: Joe Brody is considered one of the best human characters the MonsterVerse has seen as of this writing if not the best, and he unexpectedly dies roughly a third of the way through the movie.
• Ugly Cute: The MUTO's, when the two of them nuzzle each other’s faces after meeting up in San Francisco can get this reaction from some people.
• Vanilla Protagonist: The bland soldier protagonist is bland because he's in the same movie as scientists involved with conspiracies, secretive groups, and Godzilla who is why some people are watching the movie.
• Visual Effects of Awesome: This film features far more convincing digital effects than the 1998 film, the moment Godzilla shows up in all his glory being the most poignant of the awesome.
• What Do You Mean, It's Not Political?:
  • The Examiner wrote a piece speculating that the reason Godzilla seems fatter in this movie is for him to be a critique of the excesses of American greed and consumerism.
  • William Tsutsui, author of ''Godzilla on My Mind'', suggests this film as being the turning of Godzilla into an American icon with the cheering he gets along with the MUTO love scene and violence being more overt than the Japanese films.
  • The review at 1000 Misspent Hours draws several parallels between the US response to the MUTO attack and The War on Terror.
  El Santo: The US military interposes itself into an ancient conflict between combatants its leaders understand poorly if at all, in response to a devastating attack by one of the antagonists on American soil. The best efforts of the most dedicated common soldier fail to resolve or even to contain the battle, and ultimately make things significantly worse, partly because their commanders insist on a delusionally misguided strategy, and partly because high-tech firepower is simply the wrong tool for the job in the first place. Experts in the relevant fields are sidelined, ignored, and even treated like criminals while the authorities make bullets and bombs their first and only resort. And in the end, there’s no practical solution but to get out of the way while the old enemies duke it out— even if getting out of the way means accepting the risk of becoming collateral casualties in the fight. Oh— and along the way, the expected smashing of famous skyscrapers comes packaged with whole squadrons of airplanes falling out of the sky and exploding on impact against the crumbling concrete towers. Did Edwards and Borenstein deliberately set out to render thirteen years’ worth of military, diplomatic, and foreign-policy fiasco in the Middle East as kaiju eiga? I don’t know. But I do know that the atom bomb is yesterday’s nightmare, and that each era tends to get the monsters it needs in turn.
• Whole-Plot Reference: Much of the film's plot bears close resemblance to Rudyard Kipling's Jungle Book story, Rikki-Tikki-Tavi, with Godzilla taking the role of Rikki and the two MUTO as the cobras:
  • The MUTO are a mated pair, in which the female is bigger and more dangerous
  • Godzilla is their natural enemy, who indirectly benefits the humans by hunting them
  • Godzilla fights and kills the male MUTO first, while the nest of eggs is destroyed, enraging the female
  • The female directly threatens a primary human character in retaliation, but is saved by Godzilla who arrives in time to kill her
  • Godzilla becomes viewed as a 'protector' of sorts by the humans
• Win Back the Crowd: Gareth Edwards and the rest of the film crew have made a special point of emphasizing how this film is faithful to the Godzilla spirit. It worked for the most part, with mixed to positive reactions (with more enthusiastic responses elsewhere) and 500 million dollars worldwide at the box office.
• The Woobie: Joseph Brody - the guy had to manually lock down the Janjira facility with his wife inside, who had followed his suggestion to investigate the facility in the first place. He is overwhelmed with guilt by this, which costs him a stable relationship with his son, much of his sanity, and respect from the scientific community, leaving him to suffer fifteen years of bitter loneliness as he searches for the truth. When it seems like he could save thousands of lives with the knowledge he's attained on the MUTO, he dies.

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