Hey there, kaiju lovers! Like I did with the Monster Hunter review I did on the Forever Classic Podcast, I’m re-uploading this episode of Kaiju Weekly for any of you who missed it. While I experimented with a “Special Report” episode on season one of Netflix’s Pacific Rim: The Black, I couldn’t find time in MIFV’s schedule to make to make a proper episode on it. Then I had the chance to sub for Travis Alexander, one of the co-hosts of Kaiju Weekly, on their review of it. So, with their permission, I’m re-sharing it here. I highly recommend listening to Kaiju Weekly because it’s a fun and entertaining podcast, and the one in the kaiju community with whom I have the closest ties.
The original show notes:
We continue “Mecha May” with a look at the 2021Netflix anime series, Pacific Rim: The Black featuring returning guest and friend of the podcast, Nathan Marchand of The Monster Island Film Vault.
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Set after Pacific Rim: Uprising, Kaiju have ravaged Australia, two siblings pilot a Jaeger to search for their parents, encountering new creatures, characters, and allies.
We’ve reached the point where the “Year of Gamera” gets even goofier—and where Nate begins to miss seeing the Mystery Science Theater 3000 episodes even more. He’s joined by returning guest, Earth Destruction Directive host Luke Jaconetti, and newcomer/MSTie Greg Meyer to discuss Gamera vs. Guiron. The “Kennys” get more precocious and useless (Tom is dead inside). The monsters get more outlandish (Guiron is Knifehead, anyone?). And the villains get … shapely jumpsuits? Listen as Nate, Luke, and Greg connect this movie to Chronicles of Narnia and Barbarella, among other things, and muse about their favorite riffs from the MST3K episode. Nate’s descent into madness continues.
The Toku Topic is the First Traffic War in Japan. It may sound like a forgotten Transformers storyline, but it’s actually a time period when car accidents increased dramatically in the Land of the Rising Sun. Hence why Akio is obsessed with making a world “without wars or traffic accidents” in this movie.
Beforehand, Nate is visited by Jessica Shaw, his pseudo-sister clone, and she tells him she’s bringing Luke and Greg with her first tour group, who will then watch their live broadcast. Then afterward, the infamous Terran spacewomen, Flobella and Barbella, come to Earth to kidnap Gamera—but not if Monster Island’s own magical girl superheroine, Crystal Lady (aka Jessica), has anything to say about it!
Follow Jimmy on Twitter: @NasaJimmy Follow the Monster Island Board of Directors on Twitter: @MonsterIslaBOD Follow the Raymund Martin and the MIFV Legal Team on Twitter: @MIFV_LegalTeam Follow Crystal Lady Jessica on Twitter: @CystalLadyJes1
Flower, James. “A Guide to English Language Gamera” (Arrow Video Gamera: The Complete Collection).
Galbraith IV, Stuart. Japanese Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror Films: A Critical Analysis and Filmography of 103 Features Released in the United States 1950-1992.
Gamera: The Complete Collection, Disc Three Special Features.
Gamera vs. Guiron Commentary by David Kalat (Arrow Video’s Gamera: The Complete Collection).
Hayahawa, Hiroshi; Fischbeck, Paul S.; Fischhoff. “Traffic accident statistics and risk perceptions in Japan and the United States.” Accident Analysis and Prevention, no. 32 2000, p. 827–835
LeMay, John. The Big Book of Japanese Giant Monster Movies Volume 1: 1954-1982.
Macias, Patrick. “A History of Gamera: Gamera vs. Guiron” (Arrow Video’s Gamera: The Complete Collection).
Milner, David. “Interview with Noriaki Yuasa” (Arrow Video’s Gamera: The Complete Collection).
Oguchi, Takashi. “Achieving safe road traffic — the experience in Japan.” IATSS Research, no. 39, 2016, p. 110–116.
In the first of a double-whammy of “Year of Gamera” episodes that continue to chip away at Nate’s sanity, today’s movie is 1968’s Gamera vs. Viras. Nate is joined by returning guest (and Jimmy From NASA nemesis) Jack “GMan” Hudgens and Jack’s friend J.R. Villers from The Drift Space podcast to discuss this outlandish but imaginative kaiju flick. It’s near and dear (haha!) to Jimmy’s heart because, believe it or not, it dramatizes an exciting chapter of his childhood. Yes, MIFV’s intrepid producer is one of the precocious “Kennys”! In order to survive, Nate makes many Star Trek references/comparisons and several puns. The discussion also includes talk about hentai (don’t ask) and how the Rocky films stole the Gamera series’ formula—and it includes Sly Stallone impersonations. The Toku Topic is the Scout Association of Japan since the Gamera kids in this—again, including Jimmy—are both Boy Scouts.
Follow Jimmy on Twitter: @NasaJimmy Follow the Monster Island Board of Directors on Twitter: @MonsterIslaBOD Follow the Raymund Martin and the MIFV Legal Team on Twitter: @MIFV_LegalTeam Follow Crystal Lady Jessica on Twitter: @CystalLadyJes1
Flower, James. “A Guide to English Language Gamera.” (Arrow Video Gamera: The Complete Collection)
Galbraith IV, Stuart. Japanese Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror Films: A Critical Analysis and Filmography of 103 Features Released in the United States 1950-1992.
Gamera: The Complete Collection, Disc Three Special Features.
Gamera vs. Viras Commentary by Carl Craig and Jim Cirronella (Arrow Video’s Gamera: The Complete Collection)
I can tell you that my notes included bullet points about:
Eric mispronouncing something.
H.E.A.T. being sent to the Hollow Earth to get Titanus Doug succeeded in finding him, and he was released on Monster Island today.
The fact that a kaiju version of Alcoholics Anonymous should probably be started in light of Kong’s latest antics. Speaking as someone who’s been known to drink a bit too much Jack Daniels on occasion (and get into bar fights), I know how Kong feels.
Realizing I’m 0-2 against Kong with Mechani-Kong Mk. 2. In my defense, I was trying to incapacitate and not kill him both times. If I ever went all out with Mechani-Kong Mk. 2, the results would’ve been much different. Regardless, my pride has recovered since then.
Nate needing to get his own tux! He asked me to loan him mine, but it wouldn’t fit. He owes it to himself to get his own, just like Eric said.
How getting Jet Jaguar fitted for a tux was … weird. Especially now with his Singular Point mods. I had to call in a favor with a special tailor.
How it wasn’t “Kongtainment,” Nate. It was just “Kong Containment.”
Here’s Nate’s leftover notes … which is a lot.
The Film
Someone should merchandise Jia’s Kong doll. (I’m sure the Board will get on that. –Jimmy)
I like the MV credits sequences. There are lots of throwbacks to past MV films in here. Like Randa talking about the many ecosystems. Then we get a rundown of Godzilla and Kong’s past exploits.
I heard some people say that Bernie was Alex Jones. That’s not far off. I didn’t mind him, but that might be because I know a few people like him. (Even Alex Jones is right sometimes. –Jimmy)
Like in K33, they just put Kong on a huge raft with no explanation of how. I prefer that. Given the big jump in technology in this, you just learn to accept it.
Some things get repeated a bit too much at first. “Ancient rivalry” is one.
Call me crazy, but the finger touch reminds me of the Da Vinci painting of God touching Adam. (I thought Kong was the “king” not the “god.” –Jimmy)
I love the van scene because it makes me think of Stranger Things with the ‘80s-sounding techno.
I heard someone complain about the Tide pod reference. It would’ve been a long time after that, but it makes sense that he’d be leery of internet challenges and would still be dealing with lawsuits. Maybe it was an adlib?
The score doesn’t have nostalgic tunes like KOTM, but it does have shades of them. It’s somewhere between G14 and KOTM.
I love how Kong is puzzled by snow. (Sometimes it puzzles me, too, so he’s in good company. –Jimmy)
Josh naming MG seems a bit odd. It really should’ve been Ren Serizawa. (Or me. –Jimmy)
I really did feel a bit sorry for the Skullcrawler MG kills. It does show how much of a threat MG is because those things were terrifying in Kong: Skull Island.
The Heisei Gamera trilogy is all over the MV G-films. This has Gamera 3 in it. Godzilla is protecting the Earth/nature and not humanity, which means he causes lots of collateral damage without regard to humans.
When Jia signs about Kong’s heartbeat, she beats her chest a bit like Kong. I like that. (It’s cute. Is it her sign for Kong? –Jimmy)
Toku Topic: Theaters vs. Streaming
These are mostly quotations from the following sources:
“According to a study held in June 2020, just 14 percent of adults said that they strongly preferred seeing a movie for the first time in a theater, and 36 percent said that they would much rather stream the film at home than visit a cinema. Preferences for watching a new release in a cinema instead of via a streaming service in the United States changed significantly between 2018 and 2020, signaling a shift in consumer behavior and potentially a risk for movie theaters in the country. Also important to note is the effect of the coronavirus on consumer confidence. There was a drop in the share of movie fans willing to visit cinemas between March and June 2020, likely the result of consumers fearing the risk of infection and feeling more comfortable viewing movies in the safety of their own home.”
“Studios and exhibition have always had a lovely but contentious relationship,” one movie theater operator with locations in the southern part of the U.S. said on condition of anonymity. “Exhibition is basically a business that has blank screens and empty seats and we can’t do what we do without the studios.”
“These windows were created by studios decades ago in an effort ‘to get multiple bites out of the same apple,’ another movie theater operator said.”
“Netflix Inc has streamed original movies at the same time, or just a few weeks after, their debut in cinemas. Competitor Amazon Studios has said it would like some of its films to play for only two to eight weeks in theaters before hitting the Amazon Prime Video streaming service.”
“Director Steven Spielberg told Britain’s ITV News last year that movies seen primarily via streaming should compete for Emmys, not Oscars. A representative declined to comment on whether the director will urge the Academy to address the issue.”
Before the pandemic, there was talk of extending the theater duration times for big budget films and allowing smaller films to head to “direct-to-consumer” channels faster. But when cinemas were forced to close for six months (or more), cinemas were forced to adhere to much shorter releases. Many faced bankruptcy.
Theaters owners and other industry observers were quick to criticize Warner’s move. Chris Johnson, the CEO of Classic Cinemas, called Warner’s decision “ridiculous and short-sighted,” and Adam Aron, the CEO of AMC Theaters, argued that Warner would “sacrifice a considerable portion of the profitability” of movies that bypassed the traditional theatrical release. David Sims piled on in The Atlantic, saying of Warner’s decision, “Audiences will have little incentive to pay more to see these films in theaters.” His conclusion? “Theater chains are right to fear for their survival.”
You know who else hated it? Christopher Nolan. He spoke against it vehemently in defense of the theater-going experience (it might’ve been to promote Tenet, but who knows).
“PwC partner CJ Bangah told me her big consulting firm’s annual media and entertainment outlook is projecting a 65% drop in global revenues for the movie sector.”
“Worse, Bangah said, recovery for the film industry is a long ways away. As she delicately put it, it’s ‘within the realm of possibility’ that the industry will fight through an “uphill battle” to full recovery, but ‘we’re not forecasting a return to 2019 revenue levels in the five years of our forecast for cinema.’”
“Shorter windows would keep some customers at home, said Greg Marcus, chief executive of The Marcus Corporation, owner of the fourth-largest U.S. theater chain. ‘If you damage the business and take away 10 percent of our customers, we won’t be able to reinvest in the theatrical experience,” Marcus said. “That would ultimately hurt content providers.’”
“In the study, we analyzed what happened to theatrical revenue in Korea from 2015 through 2018 — a period during which Hollywood studios significantly shortened the exclusive theatrical windows for their releases, from three months to only one month. We found that, after controlling for differences between movies with early digital releases versus traditional release windows, early releases had a statistically and economically insignificant impact on theater sales, equivalent to around a 0.8% drop in total theatrical revenue during the first eight weeks of the movie’s theatrical run in Korea. Most theatergoers, it turned out, remained loyal to the theatrical experience even when they had the option of watching the movie at home while the movie was still showing in theaters.” Take this with caution.
“What we learned in our Korean study suggests that a similar effect may exist for movies, which in turn suggests that John Fithian, the president of the National Association of Theater Owners, was right when he argued that ‘theaters provide a beloved immersive, shared experience that cannot be replicated’ — but that Jason Kilar, the CEO of WarnerMedia, was also right when said that early digital releases provided an opportunity to give customers a choice ‘whether that choice is to enjoy a great new movie out at the cinema, to open up HBO Max, or to do both.’”
In 2019 (before the dark times—before the COVID), Christina Garnett wrote, “Maybe we’ve already chosen the user experience we want… instant, at our fingertips, and cheaper than the traditional alternative.”
Okay, it wasn’t as much as I expected.
Next week you’ll hear the return of another member of my ever-growing rogues gallery, and this time he brought a friend: Jack “GMan” Hudgens and J.R. Villers from The Drift Space podcast. They came to continue the “Year of Gamera” with a movie that dramatizes an exciting chapter of my life: Gamera vs. Viras. Yes, I have lasso skills and helped Gamera fight aliens. How do you think I got a job at NASA? Then poor Nate has to suffer through a second Gamera movie in a row with Gamera vs. Guiron, and he’ll be joined by Luke Jaconetti of the Earth Destruction Directive podcast and Greg Meyer, who hosts several podcasts.
Finally, the “Kong Quest” comes to an end! After months of delays due to avoiding competition and COVID-19, Godzilla vs. Kong has been released. It’s not a fever dream—it’s real! Nate is joined by his friend, Nerd Chapel founder Eric Anderson, to discuss the epic rematch nearly 60 years in the making. They host a special premiere for the Legendary film at the newly opened Denham Theater, an event that’s been delayed and rescheduled as often as the film’s release. A cavalcade of special guests attends, including the little Iwi deaf girl Jia. She is the youngest of “Kong’s Queens,” all the surviving ladies who have captivated the Eighth Wonder over the years. Nate and Eric dive deep into the deceptively simple movie, discussing Kong’s “hero’s journey,” the Jules Verne-ian/Edgar Rice Burroughs-ian world-building, and its theme of mankind trying to control forces greater than themselves. You’ll also hear them compare the movie to Conan the Barbarian, Die Hard, and The Lord of the Rings.
The Toku Topic isn’t about the content of the movie itself but a debate raging around it: movie theaters vs. streaming services. Which do you prefer to see a movie for the first time?
Afterward, Nate and company hear that Kong had too much to drink at the after-party and has gone on a drunken rampage. MIFV’s intrepid producer, Jimmy From NASA, volunteers to handle the situation the best way he knows how: Mechani-Kong Mk. 2. That goes about as well as you’d expect, so Nate and Eric recruit one of “Kong’s Queens” for help so beauty can save the beast for once.
Prologue and Epilogue written by Nathan Marchand with Eric Anderson.
Music: -“Here We Go” by Chris Classic -“Pensacola, Florida (Godzilla Theme” by Junkie XL -“Skull Island (Kong Theme)” by Junkie XL -“A New Language” by Junkie XL -“Main Title” by Moscow Symphony Orchestra, composed by Max Steiner
Sound effects sourced from Freesound.org (including some by InspectorJ).
Follow Jimmy on Twitter: @NasaJimmy Follow the Monster Island Board of Directors on Twitter: @MonsterIslaBOD Follow the Raymund Martin and the MIFV Legal Team on Twitter: @MIFV_LegalTeam Follow Crystal Lady Jessica on Twitter: @CystalLadyJes1
This is a re-release of the most recent episode of The Forever Classic Podcast, which is hosted by my GigaGeek Magazine colleague, Alex McCumbers. Given that I’m the “kaiju academic,” as Alex puts it, and he’s as hardcore a gamer as you can get, we figured we’d combine our knowledge and fandoms to review the 2020 Monster Hunter movie starring Mila Jovovich. This secret Toho movie (for real) is based on the monstrously (ba-dum-tssh) popular video game series from Capcom. So, if you wondered what I thought of this film, here you go! I might even start playing the games now!
Alex’s original show notes:
With the release of the Monster Hunter film, Alex employs the expertise of his good friend Nathan Marchand, a Kaiju Academic, Writer, and Podcaster. Does the monumental game Monster Hunter World translate well into film? Not really, but that doesn’t stop it from being fun.
It’s the day after the BIGGEST kaiju film of the year—if not the decade—Godzilla vs. Kong has premiered across the world in theaters and on HBO Max, and Nate is diving headlong into a spoiler discussion! You won’t believe what you hear: surprise appearances from a famous henshin hero and the new so-called “king of the monsters.” Heck, apparently even Nate and his intrepid producer, Jimmy From NASA made cameos in the movie! That’s what happens when you need a podcaster and an engineer. And then a famous “final warrior” calls in to explain how he gave Godzilla a nose ring.
Whether you’ve seen the film or not, you’d be a fool not to listen to this special bonus episode!
Follow Jimmy on Twitter: @NasaJimmy Follow the Monster Island Board of Directors on Twitter: @MonsterIslaBOD Follow the Raymund Martin and the MIFV Legal Team on Twitter: @MIFV_LegalTeam Follow Crystal Lady Jessica on Twitter: @CystalLadyJes1
Due to contractual obligations, Nate covers a “13th” Gamera movie as part of the “Year of Gamera”: Gammera the Invincible (he’s a loony). This heavily-edited Americanized version of Gamera the Giant Monster was given the Godzilla, King of the Monsters! 1956 treatment—but it’s far less interesting as a movie and as a piece of kaiju film history. Nate details the key differences—one being the de-emphasis of Psycho Kenny, er, Toshio-san—and explains the rather mundane reasons for why the movie was drastically changed. Also, he gives the Board-appointed “king of the monsters” a new nickname: “Gamera-Double-M.”
Follow Jimmy on Twitter: @NasaJimmy Follow the Monster Island Board of Directors on Twitter: @MonsterIslaBOD Follow the Raymund Martin and the MIFV Legal Team on Twitter: @MIFV_LegalTeam Follow Crystal Lady Jessica on Twitter: @CystalLadyJes1
Flower, James. “A Guide to English Language Gamera.” (Arrow Video Gamera: The Complete Collection)
Galbraith IV, Stuart. Japanese Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror Films: A Critical Analysis and Filmography of 103 Features Released in the United States 1950-1992.
As part of Ryan “The Omni Viewer” Collins’ “One Monstrous Moment: Alpha Edition” to celebrate our favorite moments in kaiju media in anticipation of Godzilla vs. Kong, I’m submitting an entry featuring an unlikely scene from an unlikely series. In this case, from episode eleven of Ultraman: The Ultimate Hero (aka Ultraman Powered). What happens when a henshin hero battles a truly innocent monster? What can we learn about co passion and empathy from this oft-derided Ultra series? Listen to find out!
Music: –Ultraman Powered/Ultraman: The Ultimate Hero BGM (by Suzuki Kisaburo?)
Follow Jimmy on Twitter: @NasaJimmy Follow the Monster Island Board of Directors on Twitter: @MonsterIslaBOD Follow the Raymund Martin and the MIFV Legal Team on Twitter: @MIFV_LegalTeam Follow Crystal Lady Jessica on Twitter: @CystalLadyJes1
