YMMV / Godzilla, Mothra, King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All-Out Attack!

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• Alternate Character Interpretation: It's up to debate whether or not Godzilla is actually evil.
  • It's possible he is Forced into Evil by the vengeful souls.
  • On the other hand, Godzilla might possibly still remember his death in the original film and he could be a willing accomplice.
  • Another question is if the dead souls truly wanted destruction on this scale or was Godzilla too much for them to handle and he's actually the one running things.
• Anvilicious: Though the themes of a nation forgetting its past are quite relevant to modern Japan, the director made no effort to hide his utter contempt for the target audience, thus diluting much of the message with mean-spirited jabs and frequent Demonization of young people. Then again, when a possessed Godzilla shows up, he destroys a building with some actually nice people in it.
• Author Tract: The whole movie is one big tract against Japanese nationalism and militarism. Due to the director's long time pacifist beliefs, the movie is very critical of modern Japan's outlook on the Pacific War, with it being outright stated that Godzilla is being fuelled and controlled by the spirits of the people who died in World War II's pacific theater, including the victims of the Imperial Japanese Army.
• Awesome Music: It's quite different from other soundtracks in the franchise, but Kow Otani (also known for Shadow of the Colossus, Zatch Bell!, and the Heisei Gamera Trilogy) delivers an incredible score that's right at home with the atmosphere of the film.
• Base-Breaking Character:
  • This film's version of Godzilla is quite polarizing among fans. Some love how malicious and downright evil this Godzilla is compared to past entries as he’s seen deliberately attacking innocent civilians and praise the design for its ghost-like appearances (soulless white eyes and more bone-like spines). Others, however, saw it as a bad case of Adaptational Villainy, believing the more sadistic side to be far removed from the victim of hydrogen bombs the original was portrayed as, and found some of the design choices (like the potbelly structure) were more comical than creepy.
  • King Ghidorah’s status as a hero in the film is either praised for doing something new with the character while sticking true to the original look, or criticized for straying too far from his villainous roots and felt him being too weak compared to Godzilla diminished his status as one of Godzilla’s toughest enemies.
• Ensemble Dark Horse:
  • Baragon tends to gain fans when they see the utterly adorable way his suit actress, Rie Ota, would do her own roars during filming.
  • The girl in the hostel only has about two minutes of screen time, but is just as well-liked as some of the characters with thirty minutes of screen time. This is due to her Nice Girl dialogue and well-acted sense of terror as Godzilla threatens the hospital that she's trapped in.
• Fan Nickname:
  • Guardian Ghidorah, Spirit Ghidorah, or GMK Ghidorah, for this version of King Ghidorah.
  • Ghost Godzilla, for the portrayal of Godzilla in this film.
• Fan-Preferred Cut Content: A significant number of fans wished that the original script with Anguirus and Varan instead of Mothra and King Ghidorah was used, since Mothra and King Ghidorah already get enough attention, while Anguirus didn't have a single appearance in the entire Heisei Era and Varan hasn't had a significant appearance in any media since his debut film in 1958, so this could've easily been his breakout role. The fact they had to flip Ghidorah's morality from evil to good, make him much smaller than Godzilla, and completely change his backstory for a third time to fit Varan's role in the movie adds to the argument it would've made much more sense if he was kept as Varan.
• He's Just Hiding:
  • It can be tempting to hope that the girl in the hostel survives the destruction of the hospital, given how she already survived being crushed by a collapsing building once in the movie.
  • The other kids in the hostel may have survived Godzilla stomping on it given how they are all standing close to the girl who survives hospitalized (with one even being just a couple feet away from her).
  • The tourists commenting on the Ugly Cute appearance of Baragon are last seen imperiled by a rock slide but, aren't explicitly killed and it can be nice to hope they got away.
• Hilarious in Hindsight:
  • Kaho Minami plays a JSDF officer in this film. Her then-husband would play an adviser to the American military in Godzilla (2014).
  • The "Red Godzilla" lines in the movie later became a reality in one certain film...
  • At various points during the film's preproduction, Godzilla would've fought a CG version of Kamacuras and the Atragon warship in a heavily altered version of Japan, but Kaneko ultimately found the alternate history aspects distracted from the story he wanted to tell. All three elements would later be used in Godzilla: Final Wars.
  • Shusuke Kaneko later went on to direct Live-Action Adaptation of Death Note series. More than a decade later, the director of Netflix's Death Note movie, Adam Wingard, later went on to direct the Crossover movie Godzilla vs. Kong, creating somewhat of an odd complete circle.
  • The original unused script would've given Anguirus (who was replaced by Mothra), previously a melee-only monster ice powers (as part of an elemental trio with the wind monster Varan and the fire monster Baragon). Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire would give Godzilla a very similar foe to this concept: a spiny, quadruped reptilian with a spiked tail end, crown of horns, and ice powers.
• Just Here for Godzilla: Plenty of people are primarily attracted to the movie because it has King Ghidorah as the good guy for once.
• Lost in Translation: A number of lines that originally made sense or were to be taken seriously were butchered in the process of producing the DVD subtitles and dub for the film:
  • During the final battle, a D-03 missile shot at Godzilla accidentally hits King Ghidorah instead. In the original audio, Lieutenant Miyashita exclaims a Japanese expletive roughly equivalent to "Fuck!" or "Damn!" in English, which is rendered as "Got it!" in the dub, and "Excellent!" in the subtitles, even though this is the complete opposite of what was intended to happen.
  • A man wishes a group of soldiers good luck in Cantonese^note "Add oil, soldiers!" (加油, 士兵大哥!) with a woman alongside him translating the statement into Japanese for the men; in the dub, the man says his line in English, but the woman follows up with "Yes, good luck everyone! You're going to die!"
• Misaimed Fandom: Godzilla was meant to be an entity of pure evil in this incarnation. Didn't stop fans from rooting for him anyway. It helps that a number of fans rationalize Godzilla's maliciousness on the fact he's possessed by the countless victims of Imperial Japan seeking revenge for their deaths in World War II, giving him an understandable motivation.
• Narm: Ghidorah is killed and revived repeatedly during the climax. The first time is awe-inspiring, but by his third death it almost becomes funny.
• Never Live It Down: Godzilla terrorizing the bedridden hospital patient and destroying the hospital after acting as if he would leave the building and its residents unharmed is a hard scene to forget. It's often considered to be one of Godzilla's cruelest and least forgivable deeds in his entire cinematic history, even if it's solely this incarnation which is explicitly so evil.
• Nightmare Retardant: This Godzilla suit has been widely criticized for being kinda fat. It's near impossible to keep a straight face when he runs while jiggling his gut around. Further, some have realized he looks like◊ King Koopa.
• Replacement Scrappy: King Ghidorah in this incarnation due to being weaker and heroic. He was originally going to have Varan fill this role but Executive Meddling got in the way. Ghidorah's designer actually decided to put some of Varan's features into Ghidorah's heads.
• Rooting for the Empire: Shusuke Kaneko had stated in interviews that the GMK Godzilla is supposed to be pure evil. 'Course, since we are talking about Godzilla, he gets more praise than the "heroic monsters" in the film (IE: Mothra, Baragon and Ghidorah).
• So Bad, It's Good:
  • The film is by no means a bad film, but the actors and extras tend to overact during their scenes. Regardless on which language you watch in, the movie is still a fun film to watch.
  • The International Dub, more so than ever considering the darker tone compared to previous Millennium era Godzilla film, has just about every character either overacting during minor scenes, or underacting major, even emotional scenes.
• Space Whale Aesop: Japan mustn't forget its past, lest a giant, radioactive, zombie dinosaur come out of the sea and destroy Japan.
• Special Effect Failure: Plenty enough that despite being in an era where top-notch special effects are used creatively, ths film has plenty of bad CGI that you can tell certain parts are fake.
• Squick: How Godzilla is ultimately defeated; a drill mounted missile burrows through his chest from the inside, causing his thermonuclear breath to stream out of the wound when he tries to use it, ultimately blowing him apart.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character: Baragon's Ensemble Dark Horse status makes it a shame that he's the only monster to be killed prior to the third act, which has some of the best action scenes of the movie.
• Ugly Cute:
  • Upon seeing Baragon approach, one of the tourists in Hakone goes "He's frightening, but also cute!" Her husband insists they take a picture with her and the monster together before fleeing.
  • Mothra, who is more menacing and wasp-like in this incarnation.
• Visual Effects of Awesome: Looking past the obvious CGI used in the movie, many of the films practical effects are among some of the finest constructed miniatures and suits used in the Millennium era.
• The Woobie: The girl in the hostel. She suffers a traumatizing Break the Cutie moment when Godzilla attacks her village. Then she's left incapacitated and terrified as Godzilla passes the hospital she's in and apparently kills her after a cruel Hope Spot.

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