King Ghidorah

[Drunk Monk]

I got some Ghidorah schwag at the Godzilla store in Japan. Ghidorah has always been my favorite Kaiju. But as I started donning my Ghidorah shirt, I began to wonder about the original films. I figured I’d better check in with them again, just in case time has made them cringeworthy.

Ghidorah, the Three-Headed Monster (1964)
This was the first Ghidorah film and upon watching it, I’m not sure I’ve seen it before. I think the film that I thought was first was actually the second one. Ghidorah is a bad ass, emerging from a meteorite egg. There’s a princess from some imaginary country that gets possessed by a Venusian after a failed assassination attempt and warns earthlings that Ghidorah will destroy earth just like it destroyed Venus. Mothra, still in caterpillar form, appears thru the mini-twins on a variety TV show, the Rodan pops out of a volcano and Godzilla comes up from the sea. It takes all three of them to defeat Ghidorah. 

It’s got some of the goofiest kaiju fights. Godzilla is clumsy and keeps falling on his back then struggling to get back up. Rodan pecks him on the head a lot. Mothra talks both of them into joining forces against Ghidorah after a long discussion in Kaiju-ese. Godzilla’s breath doesn’t affect any of the other kaiju so he throws a lot of rocks. Rodan makes a jet engine sound when he flies and doesn’t alway flap his wings, but both Rodan & Ghidorah have wings, so there’s flying fights guest feel very pro-wrasslin. Mothra just spews spider web but that really annoys the other Kaiju because Godzilla’s arms are too short to wipe it off and Rodan & Ghidorah don’t have arms; they have wings.

Ghidorah does what he does best - wreak havoc with his three epileptic heads shooting lightning bolts everywhere as he straffs Japan. 

Thr best park was there were scenes in Ueno park and Shibuya where I was when I was in Japan. Ueno was unrecognizable - it’s a big park - but Shibuya was at a distinctive intersection that I recognized for the architecture. Now that area is completely covered in neon and giant TV screens. 

I’m planning to watch more Ghidorah films chronologically if I can find them on my streamers. He appears in 11 films now with the 12th on its way this year for Godzilla Minus 0.

[Drunk Monk]

Invasion of the Astro-Monster (1965)
I’ve never liked Rodan. He’s just a big awkward pterodactyl. He just flaps his wings and stuff blows over. King Ghidorah appears when Godzilla is getting silly. Godzilla dances about and has an almost cute head with big googly eyes. Perhaps this is why Ghidorah appealed to me so much. In contrast, he’s just a bad ass kaiju.
I remember this installment well. I may have seen it several times. Aliens from Planet X kidnap the three kaiju and use magnetic waves to control their brains so they attack earth, which is what they do anyway. They snatch Godzilla & Rodan who are both sorta hibernating with the cover story that they’re trying ti deal with Ghidorah who ended up on their planet kinda randomly. As usual, Ghidorah is a mass of flying chaotic lightning, strafing everything in sight.
What struck me most was the American character Glenn. He’s so stereotypical, loud, a tad obnoxious, throwing big haymaker punches, but he works. He’s one of the main heroes. He gets seduced by a Planet X spy who falls in love with, a fatal betrayal to her mission. 
I have a fantasy of cosplaying a Planet X alien but I’d have to shave and I’m not doing that.

[Drunk Monk]

Destroy All Monsters (1968)
This is a mess of a film, like a kanji Battle Royale. Aliens called Kilaaks are hiding in the volcanic Mt. Fuji because they are made of metal and need to stay hot. They are mostly women in silver suits. They release all the Kaiju from Monster Island (Ogasawara island chain, which is a real place) and send them to destroy the world's stuff like the Arc de Triumph and the Kremlin. It's got a lot of B-list kaiju: Panda, Gorosaurus, Anguirus, Kumonga, Baragon, Varan, and the most annoying Minilla (son of Godzilla). As a Hail Mary play, the Kilaaks release Ghidorah, who fights them all and loses. That's right, Ghidorah dies in this one. Godzilla stomps on one of his heads. But it takes him, Mothra, Rodan, Anguinus, Spida and a few others to take him down. Minilla dances on the Ghidorah's body, which was downright insulting. 

The next two appearances of Ghidorah are Godzilla vs Gigan and Godzilla vs King Ghidorah, both behind paywalls. Maybe I can find them on the internet archives.

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Ha. Found. 
https://archive.org/details/godzilla-vs-gigan-x-264-pcm

[Drunk Monk]

Godzilla vs King Ghidorah (1991) 
I decided to skip vs. Gigan and move straight to the main attraction. I did get invited to the G-0 screener and assuming Marc doesn't sting me, I'm all in. Sorting that Kung Fu connection right now. 

This movie is weak. It's serves somewhat as an after-the-fact creation story for G & KG. G was a radio activated dinosaur (called Godzillasaurus) and KG is from radio activated kawaii dragon puppets called Dorats. Some time travelers (called Futurians - gotta be some horrid Japanese translations going on here) come to the present to rid the planet of G by going back in time and preventing his irradiation, but they leave the three Dorats who fuse to become KG. which gets unleashed in the present. Then one of the Futurians, the Japanese gal, falls for a Japanese dude in the present and decides to go to the future to get KG and give him a bionic third head, tuning him into mechaghidorah. Meanwhile they find the godzillasaurus and irradiate him to become Godzilla and fight mechaghidorah. There's a lot of confusing time travel paradoxes plus there's a white guy playing a super bionic android terminator who is rather annoying. 

What makes this odd is it's the 90s, when CGI is taking hold. There's a lot of nascent CGI effect that look really bad now, especially set against the live-action man-in-rubber-suit kaiju. It's uneven and confusing both plot wise and style wise. 

Not D00M recommended.

Seen on the Internet Archives. Unfortunately it was a dubbed version.