Pretty Much Pop #90: Godzilla vs. Kong vs. All the Kaiju!

Are gynormous monsters (“kaiju”) stamping on cities just stupid fun, or do they channel deep fears of our own helplessness? Mark, Erica, and Brian reflect on the MonsterVerse films, plus the history of Godzilla in Japan from the 1954 original to 2016’s award-winning Shin Godzilla. Do we care at all about the humans in these films? Are King Kong films too sad? Is there any legitimate sci-fi or political commentary in this genre? We touch on Pacific Rim, The Host, Cloverfield, Colossal, When a Monster Calls, Rampage, video games, and more.

For an overview, see Wikipedia on Kaiju, plus there’s Gojipedia. Here are a few articles we read:

Plus, here’s more on The Great Buddha Arrival and Wolfman vs. Godzilla.

This episode includes bonus discussion you can access by supporting the podcast at patreon.com/prettymuchpop. This podcast is part of the Partially Examined Life podcast network and is curated by openculture.com.

Sponsor: Get a loan to lower your monthly payments at Upstart.com/PRETTY.

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