Godzilla in popular culture

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

As an enduring and iconic symbol of post-World War II Japanese cinematic history,[1] Godzilla, the King of the Monsters, has been referenced and parodied numerous times in popular culture.[2] Godzilla and other atomic monsters have appeared in a variety of mediums, including cartoons,[3] film, literature, television, and video games.

Contents

[edit] Film

The Godzilla films have carved out an enduring and resonant place for themselves in cinematic history. As such, motifs from the series have been echoed, parodied or paid tribute to in numerous later films.

  • Bambi Meets Godzilla is the title of a humoristic 1969 Canadian cartoon created entirely by Marv Newland. In 1994 it was voted #38 of the 50 Greatest Cartoons of all time by members of the animation field. Only two minutes long, this cartoon is considered a classic by many animation fans.
  • Godzilla was awarded a Lifetime Achievement Award at the 1996 MTV Movie Awards.
  • In the Inspector Gadget movie, the evil clone shadow-puppets Godzilla, making it breath fire through his hat-mounted flamethrower.
  • In The Lost World: Jurassic Park, the entire third act is rife with references to Godzilla, due to an escaped Tyrannosaurus rex being loose in San Diego. A noteworthy scene includes a group of Japanese businessmen fleeing the tyrannosaur while shouting "I left Tokyo to get away from this!" Also in several interviews, Spielberg mentioned that he drew on inspiration from the first Godzilla movie (the American version) when filming Jurassic Park.
  • In the film Things To Do In Denver When You're Dead, Treat Williams' character shouts "I am Godzilla! You are Japan!" before he and Steve Buscemi's character kill one another.
  • In the film Tom and Jerry: The Fast and Furry, there is a movie studio producing a theatrical film and portrays a man in a Godzilla suit destroying Tokyo, until Tom and Jerry trip over the Godzilla actor.
  • In the film Toy Story 2, when Woody's friends and another Buzz Lightyear are in the car, Mr. Potatohead says to Rex "Stand back, Godzilla."
  • In Friday the 13th Part III, a woman sits down on a hammock and opens a Fangoria magazine to flip through a few pages before finding one that has the words: "25 years with Godzilla". She looks at it for a moment before blood from a murdered friend drips down and she is killed by Jason Voorhees.
  • In the 1987 film One Crazy Summer actor Bobcat Goldthwaite becomes trapped in a Godzilla costume, and after another characters throws a lit cigar into the open mouth of the costume, he wrecks a model of a city while smoke pours from his mouth.
  • In the sequel-japanese film Always: Sunset on Third Street 2, Godzilla appeared in the first scene to wipes out the community on Third Street and then destroyed the newly-completed Tokyo Tower with his radioactive breath. this is the first time that the original-styled Godzilla was created completely by computer animation.[4]

[edit] Television

Godzilla, as seen on Drawn Together.
Godzilla, as seen on Drawn Together.
  • In one episode of Ultraman, A Godzilla like monster named Jirass defeated Ultraman by a single blow who is bodoh and fights like bapok
  • In The Powerpuff Girls show, many episodes depict a recurring Godzilla-like monster character attacking the city as well as monsters similar to the ones that co-star in Godzilla's films.
  • Godzilla appears in an episode of Drawn Together titled Super Nanny, accusing Ling-Ling, a Pikachu-influenced character, of turning his back on his Asian culture by trying to become more American to obtain a driver's license, playing off a well-known stereotype of Asians being bad drivers.
  • In Danny Phantom, Godzilla's roar is reused time after time in the series for the more monstrous ghosts. Dorathea "Dora" the Dragon & her brother Ghost Prince Aragon from the Nickelodeon show Danny Phantom emit Godzilla-like roars when they are in their dragon forms.
  • In The Super Mario Bros. Super Show! there is an episode where Bowser eats Super Sushi that causes him to grow enormous in size and begins attacking a Japanese-themed city calling himself "Koopzilla". In the Super Mario Bros. 3 cartoon episode "Dadzilla", Kootie Pie and Big Mouth Koopa go to Hollywood to find their "real father" (Bowser having grounded Kootie Pie for not cleaning her room, making her feel he wasn't her real dad on account of his meanness), and come across Madzilla, a giant robot based on Godzilla used for filming his movies. They bring him to life with their wands and make him believe he is their father. In the end the Mario Brothers chase the Koopa Kids back to the Mushroom Kingdom and offer Madzilla a home on Giant Island.
  • In SpongeBob Squarepants, the episode Mermaidman and Barnacleboy II, Mermaidman claims that they usually had a supervillain enemy called the Atomic Flounder who is now retired. The Atomic Flounder can breathe a Atomic Breath in blue color parodying Godzilla's atomic breath. Instead of having spine dorsal back fins glowing up, he instead closes his eyes and waits for his voice and mouth to get the power.
  • An episode of Animaniacs features a creature who is meant to represent Godzilla, but only vaguely shares Godzilla's body type, making a cameo appearance alongside Rodan. The segment they appear in is a parody of Jack and the Beanstalk, with the Warner Siblings taking the role of Jack and Ralph the Guard as the Giant, and presented in part as a parody of Dr. Seuss's Green Eggs and Ham. ("Would you, could you, in Japan? With Godzilla and Rodan?" "I would not, could not in Japan, with Godzilla and Rodan!")
  • In Camp Lazlo, After Elebug metamorphoses, he resembles Kamacuras, another Godzilla monster, and makes a roar like Godzilla in Creepy Crawly Campy.
  • In a Ben 10 episode, "Super Alien Hero Buddy Adventures", Wildvine faced a model of a dinosaur that resembles Godzilla.
  • In an episode of Kong:the Animated Series, Ramon De la Porta uses a Cyberlink to fuse with a komodo dragon to become a monster identical to Godzilla, even having an atomic breath.
  • The Death Saurer, a mecha from Tomy's Zoids franchise, appears to be deliberately evocative of Godzilla, right down to its size and its oral Charged Particle Cannon. The Gojulas and Gojulas Giga also bear similarities.
  • In the Futurama episode "The Devil's Hands are Idle Playthings" one of the Holograms features Godzilla. Also, in the earlier episode "Leela's homeworld" a creature with the name "brainzilla" is briefly mentioned.
  • In an episode of ¡Mucha Lucha!, Rikochet overeats so that he will be eligible to challenge Potato Potata Jr., Francisco of the Forest, and El Haystack Grande at once. Becoming obsessed with eating, Rikochet grows until he is about 20 feet tall and grossly obese. Deciding to have one last "snack", he attacks a doughnut truck. When he does so, he lets out a roar identical to Godzilla's.
  • On the episode of Fairly Odd Parents "Catman meets the Crimson Chin" Timmy makes a robot dog named Dogzilla.
  • In the Robot Chicken episode "Celebrity Rocket," Godzilla and his wife think about using a toy when MechaGodzilla comes in with a Drill Bit out... Cee-Lo voices Godzilla in the episode "Squaw Bury Shortcake" in a segment that parodies Training Day. Also in an episode Godzilla becomes a mentor to a younger monster and shows him how to defeat a monster by killing Mazinger, and at the end of the skit, he says a quote from the movie Training Day "King Kong an't got shit on me (before King Kong appears in the background, slinging his dung at Godzilla)".
  • On a first season episode of Wayans Bros., Shawn and Marlon are costumed characters entertaining kids at a Japanese party who do battle with a Godzilla-type character and even damage a model city in battle.
  • In a honey-nut Cheerios commercial, Godzilla's foot was shown crushing down on to people with the honeybee flying around his head getting him to eat the cereal.
  • A Crest toothpaste commercial used King Ghidorah showing the monster spraying out crest toothpaste from his three heads instead of his gravity bolts.
  • A recent Subway commercial featured a Godzilla type creature-Toho Studios has ordered a cease and desist on the ads, Subway has yet to pull the ads
  • In Rugrats, a green T-Rex with spikes named Reptar is obviously a reference to Godzilla, also sporting a Pteranodon ally, Dactar, which is a spoof of Rodan.
  • In an episode of Code Monkeys (The Takeover),Dave dresses up in a Godzilla costume in his second attempt to scare Japanese business men while Clarance is in a Mothra costume.
  • In the premiere episode of the television show Pushing Daisies, the main character and his friend, as children, dress as Rodan and Godzilla respectively.
  • Godzilla (and similar lookalikes) appear on Pucca.
  • In an episode of Catscratch (The King of all Root Beer), A parody of Godzilla's theme song is played as Waffle and Mr. Blik fight each other over the city. Godzilla's roar is also heard multiple times along with Rodan's.
  • In an episode of Camp Lazlo, Chef McMusli calls a meat monster "Meat-Zilla".
  • In the original Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles animated series, Godzilla was spoofed by a creature from hollywood called Gorgonzola, a robot of which was used to terrorize the city. A creature resembling Kamacuras was also referenced in the series, referred to as 'Bugzilla' in the episode Raphael Meets his Match, was shown as a movie creature battling a giant snail being watched by one of the turtles.
  • Another Godzilla pastiche was referenced in the TV show Dinosaucers, which again featured a robotic version of said hollywood creature appearing an episode. This robot came equipped with a built in light which emulated Godzilla's atomic beam.
  • Chappelle's Show features a skit in which Dave Chappelle appears as a giant version of himself and is labeled "Blackzilla" by a Japanese city he attacks. The skit comes complete with Dave making the signature Godzilla roar and people in the city pointing to him and shouting "Blackzilla!". The skit ends with Dave having sex with a volcano.
  • A cutout of Godzilla appears in the "Haunted House" stunt in the stunt comedy series Super Dave.
  • In an episode of Ed Edd 'n' Eddy Ed has a toy that looks like Godzilla and can breath fire. It is called

Little Blue Ed, and Ed is able to make the dinosaur toy breathe fire by stretching a string.

  • In Hannah Montana, the episode ``O, Say Can You Say the Words? has Jackson, Hannah's brother, having

chocoholic problems, and imagines pillows as chocolate bunnies. Then, the chocolate bunny says ``Oh no! It's Jackzilla! before getting eaten by Jackson.

  • In The Adventures of Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius When Jimmy's baseball team, went to Tokyo for a baseball game, Sheen wanted to see Bonzilla. After they lost game they went to see him, but it turns out that he is only 12 inches tall.

In America's Funniest Home Videos, the scene is a hot air balloon festival. The hot air balloons are being set up and in the center of the shot is a dragon balloon. The humorous part of the scene is a man walking across the field and the dragon starts to topple over. It then appears as the man is being eaten by the dragon. What makes it humorous is that the "Godzilla" roar can be heard as the balloon is coming down.

  • In the episode of Courage the Cowardly Dog Courage in the Big Stinkin' City, when courage opens a door it shows King Ghidorah using its gravity beams.
  • In the opening sequence for The Flinstones, when the characters enter the drive-in a sign says "The Monster, Now Playing" and it shows a stone carving picture of a Godzilla-like monster.
  • In an episode of POKeMON, while James, Jessie, and Meowth are interviewing the trainers in the POKeMON League one trainer mentions Venomoth and Jessie refers to it as "bugzilla.
  • At the end of the Kappa Mikey episode Back To School, it shows Guano and two anonymous people in mascot costumes designed like Godzilla and King Kong.
  • In the movie Kappa Karaoke when Guano andOzu sing Power Ballad Beat the Hero, the genie takes the form of a robotic Godzilla-like version of himself.
  • In an episodes of Kappa Mikey the LilyMu cast are watching a monster movie featuring Megazilla (Godzilla), a mega giant turtle (Gamera), Mega Moth (Mothra), and a mega three-headed dragon obviously spoofing king Ghidorah.

[edit] Video games

  • The city-building computer game SimCity features a Godzilla-style monster that attacks the player's city, and the player is required to limit the damage and rebuild.
  • The Rampage series of video games is heavily inspired by Godzilla and King Kong films. Players take control of gigantic monsters -- one of them, Lizzie, resembling Godzilla -- as they destroy all the buildings in a city and survive onslaughts of military forces.
  • War of the Monsters, a video game in which players take control of large monsters and battle in city environments, features a Godzilla-inspired monster named Togera.
  • The original release of Sega's The Revenge of Shinobi featured a Godzilla-like boss on Stage 7. To avoid a possible conflict with Toho, it was replaced in later versions with a dinosaur skeleton.
  • The Pokemon Tyranitar and Feraligator appear to be references to Godzilla, as they bear similarities in terms of their aggressive disposition, oral breath weapons, and jagged dorsal fins.
  • In a video game called Ed, Edd n Eddy: The Mis-Edventures, Ed plays as Edzilla, a parody of Godzilla in a bonus level called "The Revenge of Edzilla". The Kankers even spoofed King Ghidorah as the Kankernator.
  • In Destroy All Humans! 2 the final mission of the Takoshima (Tokyo) level is battling an irrated (By Soviet Union and Blisk) Japanese intern called Kojira. Its design is more like the TriStar Godzilla then the Toho Godzilla. The beast can breathe nuclear radioactive gas, shoot lasers out of a third-eye on the forehead, shoot out radiation in form of missiles, and crush things with its tail or feet. It also recovers whenever it destroys anything.
  • The single-player online RPG AdventureQuest contains the monster "ZardZilla" as well as the armor "Frogzilla Form," both of which are meant to be combinations of the game's beast known as the FrogZard and Godzilla.

[edit] Literature

Many books have been released pertaining to Godzilla and the Godzilla Series. Including various Collection Books and Manga:

  • Dav Pilkey,the writer of Captain Underpants writes about a book called DOGZILLA which the city is Mousepolis instead of Tokyo and a giant dog from a volcano comes out by the city's first barbecue restaurant.The mice use bath to drive Dogzilla away instead of in Gojira as the Oxygen Destroyer to kill the original Godzilla in 1954. In pilkey.com, the Dogzilla infornation can be read.
  • Doctor Who: The Completely Useless Encyclopedia contains the following (humorous) dedication at the beginning: In Memory of Godzilla: 1954-1996. The dedication is also incorrect, as Godzilla had been 'dead' since December of 1995, when Godzilla vs. Destoroyah was released to Japanese theaters. Thusly, the dedication should have listed Godzilla's life as being 1954-1995.
  • Gojiro is the 1991 debut novel by former Esquire columnist Mark Jacobson. It reinterprets the Godzilla film series from the perspective of the daikaiju—not a fictional creature depicted on-screen via suitmation, but an irradiated varanid–turned–B-movie star named Gojiro (an homage to Gojira, the Japanese name for Godzilla).

Random House publishing produced four novels based on Godzilla, respectively entitled Godzilla Returns, Godzilla 2000 (which had no relation to the film which would later use that name), Godzilla at World's End, and Godzilla vs. The Robot Monsters. These books, as well as several novels aimed at younger readers in their later childhood and early teen years, and several picture books aimed at more juvenile readers age four and up, were produced during the late 90s and early part of 2000. The releases were intended to cash in on the release of the 1998 Godzilla film, as well as the video release of the remaining films of the Heisei Godzilla series. The more mature novels were written by Marc Cerasini, who presented Godzilla as a force of nature much like in the Heisei series and was neither truly good nor evil, with Mothra appearing in two books as a benevolent, supernatural and sentient creature who occasionally made a point to help people when monsters threatened the Earth. Other monsters besides Godzilla appeared in the three novels which followed Godzilla Returns, which featured only Godzilla. A fifth novel in the series written by Cerasini, Godzilla and the Lost Continent had been planned for release, but never materialized, though an early cover design for the book did briefly surface on websites such as Amazon. The junior novels depicted Godzilla as sentient, and distinctly as a sympathetic character and in the later novels as an outright hero, and were written by Scott Ciencin. the remainder of the books were standard storybooks with text appearing on pictures depicting some part of the text in illustrated form. One book, Godzilla saves America in 3-D, was based on the events depicted in Cerasini's Godzilla 2000.

  • In the book ``Cupids Don't Cook Hamburgers, a female character says ``Don't be so silly. Godzilla is more

lovable then Eddie.

  • In the book Arthur's April Fools the kids refer to the bully as King Kong and one of the kids says to the bully as and I quote "Go pick on someone your own size! Like Godzilla!

[edit] Music

  • Composer Eric Whitacre composed the song Godzilla eats Las Vegas.
  • Ginuwine uses Godzilla's roar in his song "What's So Different".
  • In the 1987 musical, Honor Finnegan vrs. the Brain of the Galaxy (produced by the Improv. Olympic of Chicago), Ms. Finnegan sings a moving tribute to her love affair with the creature in the song "Godzilla" (music and lyrics by Charles Silliman).
  • The Creatures' 2003 album Hai! contains a song entitled "Godzilla", which was released as a single with multiple mixes.
  • Pharoahe Monch released his first single in 1999 called Simon Says. The song became a major hit, however he was later sued for the use of a Godzilla sample for the beat and forced to remove the song from the album as a result.
  • Heavy metal legend Rob Halford referred to Godzilla in the song "Made in Hell" from his solo band Halford
  • On the soundtrack album to the Godzilla movie, Green Day has a remix of their Brain Stew song with Godzilla's signature roar at various moments through out the song.
  • Welsh rock band Lostprophets' second album, Start Something, features a song titled "We are Godzilla, You Are Japan".
  • In the They Might Be Giants song "I'm Impressed" they reference Godzilla and his flaming breath.
  • The Rage Against the Machine song "No Shelter" features the line: "Godzilla pure mother fuckin' filler, Get your eyes on the real killer". In an ironic twist the song was featured in the soundtrack to the 1998 hollywood Godzilla movie.
  • There is a French Death Metal band called Gojira.
  • In 1990, the Norwegian musician Bjørn Lynne composed a piece called "Godzilla" (under his pseudonym Dr. Awesome) for the Amiga-music-disk "Micro Concept" by the Demogroup Crusaders.
  • On the Japanese front cover to Gorrilaz b-sides G-sides, Noodles is holding a Godzilla figure.
  • Sir Mix-A-Lot's song, "My Posse's On Broadway" samples Godzilla's roar repeatedly throughout the song.
  • Ska group, the Scofflaws, recorded a humorous song, "Ska-La-Carte," where they cycle through naming off items of sushi, then Japanese film monsters, including Godzilla, finishing with a request for a cheeseburger instead.
  • TNA Wrestler Samoa Joe's entrance theme parodies Godzilla's theme, and actually contains a portion of the theme in the opening portion of his entrance music.

[edit] Anime

  • The Digimon Tyrannomon as well as several related Digimon like Dark Tyrannomon and Master Tyrannomon resemble Godzilla.
  • In episode 39 of Hunter × Hunter when Gon and Killua enter their hotel room Godzilla can be seen fighting Mothra on the Television screen.
  • Gojira's original 1954 movie is briefly watched by the characters in the second Urusei Yatsura movie, Beautiful Dreamer.
  • In the Air movie, there are two posters of Godzilla's movies appearing on different walls in Misuzu Kamio's bedroom.
  • Godzilla and some other kaiju, appear in Dr. Slump in side stories.
  • Godzilla makes an appearance in an Idol Defence Force Hummingbird (another Toho production) CD Drama, which includes authentic Godzilla sound effects and music.
  • In the anime called Mouse, Hazuki is a giantess inside a Godzilla suit; in the end of the show one person says the last line from the original 1954 Godzilla: "If we keep on conducting nuclear tests another Godzilla will appear a second time".
  • Godzilla is on the news channel in an episode of Love Hina, attacking a small town.
  • In an episode of The Adventures of Mini-Goddess, Gan-Chan turns into Gabira, a Mold Monster who looks like Godzilla. Somewhat ironically, the name Gabara was also the name of a monster in one of Godzilla's own films, making his first, last, and to date only appearance in the film All Monsters Attack. This particular "Gabira" has not been seen since that film. There was even a Mechagodzilla look alike called Mechanical Gabira in one of the episodes.

[edit] Other

  • In the Strong Bad email "Unnatural" from homestarrunner.com, Bubs suddenly turns up one day one hundred feet tall. Immediately, during a shot resembling Godzilla's initial appearance in Godzilla, Mothra and King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All-Out Attack, Japanese music plays while he is labeled (through song) as "King Bubsgonzola Supreme," which is also a slight reference to King Ghidorah. Upon seeing him, Strong Bad lists a number of origin theories, which include him being mutated by radiation and coming from the depths of the ocean (as well as him being from space, another Ghidorah reference). After Bubs is returned to normal size by the efforts of Strong Sad (who is referred to by Strong Bad as "the nerdy scientist type," which are frequently featured in Godzilla movies), it cuts to a shot of him wading through the ocean out into the sunset while the King Bubsgonzola Supreme song plays again and a Japanese symbol, reminiscent of Godzilla's (which is his name spelled in Japanese) appears on the bottom of the screen.
  • In the South African cartoon strip Madam & Eve one cartoon shows the characters of the strip waiting for godzilla, eventually when he arrives thay are all squashed by his foot.
  • Washington Capitals goaltender Olaf Kolzig often goes by the nickname "Godzilla" (sometimes shortened to "'Zilla") and has a depiction of the monster painted on his goalie mask.

[edit] References

  1. ^ Godzilla and Postwar Japan - "William M. Tsutsui (Univ. of Kansas) explores the role of the Godzilla film series in popular culture"
  2. ^ In Godzilla's Footsteps: Japanese Pop Culture Icons on the Global Stage ed. by William M. Tsutsui, Michiko Ito. Palgrave Macmillan, 2006 ISBN=1-4039-6461-0 summary
  3. ^ Professor Ferenc M. Szasz and Issei Takechi, "Atomic Heroes and Atomic Monsters: American and Japanese Cartoonists Confront the Onset of the Nuclear Age, 1945-80," The Historan 69.4 (Winter 2007): 728-752.
  4. ^ ALWAYS- SUNSET ON THIRD STREET- 2. www.scifijapan.com

[edit] External links