“Shin Godzilla” Theatrical Poster
Sometimes it’s easy to forget, what with all the superheroes flying about, that kaiju are having a moment of resurgence right now, with Godzilla in particular enjoying a new period of fan appreciation. 2014’s Hollywood Godzilla was a box office smash and helped convince Toho to revive the monster in its native Japan, resulting in the highly successful Shin Godzilla in 2016. Since then we’ve had the 2014 Godzilla enter into Legendary’s new connected film universe with Kong, dubbed MonsterVerse, and Toho has launched a Godzilla anime trilogy.
While kaiju fans await the return of Legendary’s Godzilla in next year’s Godzilla: King of the Monsters and work our way through the anime trilogy, there has been little word about how or when Toho would bring Goji back to the screen following Hideaki Anno’s Shin Godzilla. Well, we have our first official word on that today, as Gormaru Island has translated Toho’s Godzilla chief executive Keiji Ota’s remarks about the future of Godzilla for the studio.
Godzilla will now have two connected film universes, one in America and one in Japan. Ota compared his plans for Godzilla to what Marvel is doing with its movies: “The future of the series and its forwarding developments are very conscious of the method of “shared universe”. Godzilla, Mothra, King Ghidorah, etc. could all share a single world view much like a Marvel movie where Ironman and The Hulk can crossover with each other. It is said that each movie can be a possible film production where any one of them could lead a film of their own as the titular character.” One could make the point that Toho’s kaiju roster was one of the first connected film universes back in the 60s, as Godzilla, Mothra, Rodan, and Varan all appeared in their own movies before crossing over into monster bouts with other kaiju.
Now, some disappointing news for fans of Shin Godzilla: the Toho Godzilla connected universe series is a new jumping-off point, and will no relation to Shin Godzilla. The lingering final shot of that 2016 film will seemingly go unanswered and forever haunt the dreams of kaiju fans everywhere who wonder about the possibilities of what writer/director Hideaki Anno had at the store. However, fans should not be totally surprised by this development, as co-director Shinji Higuchi expressed some reservations about where and how the series could continue with an indestructible Shin Godzilla as its star, and Anno’s involvement in a sequel was never certain. Says Keiji Ota: “”Shin Godzilla” was a huge hit, but instead of thinking of doing the obvious idea of making a “Shin Godzilla 2“, instead think about a world that can be used for a long time, I’d rather make a World of Godzilla. For example, in the year when Mothra was featured, commercialization centered around Mothra. Commercialization is not limited to just figures, but also from daily necessities to apparel, games and so on. There are various things, so I would like to use Godzilla steadily.”
Toho and Legendary have a deal in place that basically says that both studios cannot have a live-action Godzilla appear on screen within the same year. Because Legendary’s Godzilla: King of the Monsters and Godzilla vs. Kong are slated for 2019 and 2020, the earliest a Toho Godzilla could ever appear was 2021. Though no plans are currently announced for future MonsterVerse films beyond Godzilla vs. Kong, additional sequels seem likely. Provided Legendary’s MonsterVerse and Toho’s new universe both continue pulling in large audiences, it’s possible that the two studios could trade off back-and-forth custody for Godzilla for many years to come.
