Zilla
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| Godzilla film series character | |
|---|---|
| Zilla | |
 |
|
| Species | Mutated Green Iguana
|
| Alias | Godzilla |
| Height | 60[1]-90[2] Meters |
| Length | 100 Meters |
| Weight | 500 tons[1] |
| Abilities | Hurricane breath Speed Burrowing Atomic breath (Godzilla: The Series) Enhanced Regeneration (Godzilla: The Series) Enhanced Stamina (Godzilla: The Series) Fire breath (Godzilla: Final Wars) |
| Origins | Nuclear testing in French Polynesia |
| Relationships | Numerous Zilla offspring Godzilla(Counterpart) Zilla Jr.(Son) |
| Major enemies | Godzilla |
| Controlled by | Xiliens Tachyons |
| First appearance | Godzilla (1998) |
| Created by | Dean Devlin and Patrick Tatopoulos |
Zilla (ジラ Jira?) is Toho Studios's official name for the star of the 1998 TriStar Pictures film Godzilla.
Created from a French nuclear test, Zilla is a mutated iguana. Before Toho officially dubbed the creature Zilla, many fans, who did not care for the reimagining of Godzilla for the Centropolis film, developed several nicknames to differentiate its title character from the "original" Godzilla. These nicknames included American Godzilla, Fraudzilla, Deanzilla (because of writer/producer Dean Devlin), Trizilla (because of TriStar Pictures), and most popularly "GINO" or Gino, an acronym for Godzilla In Name Only.
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[edit] Godzilla vs. the Gryphon
TriStar secured rights from Toho to produce an American Godzilla film in 1992. One of the key players in this arrangement was Henry G. Saperstein, who had brought several Godzilla films to America with his United Productions of America. TriStar originally hoped to have the film released in 1994. However, it was not until May of 1993 that Terry Rossio and Ted Elliott were asked to write a screenplay. The script was completed in November, but TriStar had yet to select a director for the film.
In July of 1994, well after the originally announced release date, TriStar tapped Jan DeBont to direct the film. DeBont confessed to liking the older Godzilla films, although he stated that many of the later ones with their monster free-for-alls were a bit silly. Although he intended to keep humor in the picture, DeBont also pledged to deliver stunning effects and preserve the indomitable spirit of the Japanese Godzilla. DeBont assembled a team and had Rossio and Elliott rework the script to make it more to his liking. The revised script was ready in December of 1994.
After Industrial Light and Magic turned down working on the Godzilla project, in October of 1994 it was announced that Stan Winston's Digital Domain would be doing the effects work for Godzilla, with a reported budget of around $50 million.
This would have been the plot of the film:
Somewhere in the icy waters off Alaska, a salvage ship is retrieving reactor cores dumped there by the Soviet Union during the Cold War. Something goes wrong and a mammoth explosion destroys the ship. On shore, the snow catches fire and crevice cracks open, oozing steaming blood.
US government scientist Keith Llewellyn is flown to the military investigation of the incident, leaving behind his wife Jill and daughter Tina. The investigation into the Alaska incident is being given top secrecy by the military. Soldiers cart off entire barrels of the 'blood', which upon examination resembles nothing so much as amniotic fluid. Keith soon joins the team in the cavern the military has discovered beneath the crevice. There, he discovers that the enormous cavern is far from empty, there is a giant monster embedded in the ground, its head and claws poking through the dirt. Keith climbs onto the head, noting its dinosaur-like structure. As he stands on the monster's muzzle, he watches in horror as one of the eyes suddenly snaps open. The monster bursts from his prison, killing the team inside the cavern, and soon destroys the entire base camp. The reign of destruction continues when the monster appears at the Japanese Kuril Islands, wiping a fishing village from the face of the earth. A surviving fisherman calls the monster 'Godzilla', after a legendary dragon.
It is 12 years later. Cryptozoologist Aaron Vaught, a best-selling author, and his assistant Marty Kenoshita, sneak into a mental hospital in Japan. They interview the fisherman, who shows them pictures he has drawn of Godzilla, locked in battle with another monster. MPs arrive before the interview can progress and detain Vaught and Kenoshita. At the same time, a meteor crashes into Lake Apopka in Kentucky. The impact deluges a nearby town in a rain of frogs and fish, torn from the lake by the violence of the meteor's impact.
In Massachusetts, the US military has established the 'St. George Project', a top-secret project to find Godzilla. Jill Llewellyn is the project's director. It is learned that Godzilla was last seen six years ago when he destroyed an oil tanker. In the hopes of drumming up more funding from Congress, Aaron Vaught has been brought on-board as co-director, the Pentagon hoping that the best-selling 'authority' on monsters will impress the politicians. It is a decision that does not exactly thrill Llewellyn. Adding to her problems is the fact that base MPs have just arrested Tina for trying to steal a car. Meanwhile, back at the cavern in Alaska, another military base has been constructed. Two sentries are surprised to see a strange light emanating from a previously undiscovered cave branching off from Godzilla's cell.
In Lake Apopka, the strange bio-metallic meteor begins to stir. Flowing through the sediment like a mass of liquid metal, the probe enters a cave. It extends tendrils, snaring bats nesting in the cave and absorbing them. The probe regurgitates the bats, now altered into monsters with 12-foot-wingspans. The 'probe bats' leave the cave and their 'parent' and fly into the night.
Vaught, Llewellyn, and Kenoshita fly to the Alaska site, where the amniotic 'blood' has begun to flow again in the cavern. Vaught deduces that this was the proper time for Godzilla to be re-awakened, but the salvage ship tragedy disrupted things and released him early. The side cave is lined with strange organic structures, remnants of an ancient society with advanced biotechnology. No one sees a small creature strike Marty Kenoshita and burrow into his neck. Even Kenoshita does not feel the creature's attack.
Events progress. In Kentucky, strange cattle mutilations occur. In the Pacific, Godzilla is reported, swimming towards San Francisco.
A command post for the 'St. George Project' is established at the Presidio. Llewellyn and Vaught soon arrive, but Kenoshita takes ill and is rushed to a hospital. The Navy dispatches two missile carriers, a battleship and a submarine to intercept Godzilla. Godzilla retaliates, cracking one of the carriers in half when he resurfaces from beneath the ship, and blasting the others with his fire breath. The military considers using a small nuclear device to kill the monster, but Vaught advises against it, He feels that Godzilla is a living nuclear reactor. What the monster breathes is not fire but something that ionizes oxygen, so great is its heat. Llewellyn further postulates that the amniotic fluid was not food, as previously supposed, but a tranquilizer to keep Godzilla asleep. The fluid is hastily transported from Alaska and fireboats spray the substance on the water at the mouth of San Francisco Bay. Godzilla swims right into the oily liquid. Roaring feebly, he emerges from the water and collapses on the southern extremity of the Golden Gate Bridge. The military secure the unconscious Godzilla to six super-helicopters and airlift the monster back to the St. George Project in Massachusetts. Godzilla is housed in a huge hangar. Tina realizes that her mother has been trying to hunt down and kill Godzilla for the past 12 years. She protests that the monster is just a force of nature, not responsible for the damage he causes. Not wishing to listen to this point of view, Jill sends her daughter to stay with an aunt in New York.
At an army hospital, the strange infection that has griped Kenoshita is becoming worse, consuming his internal organs and leaving his face an eyeless blank surface. Before death claims him, Marty tells Jill Llewellyn that he has been taken over by an ancient force. The force has told him of its history, and the threat that has come to Earth. An alien civilization employs probes to aid its colonization of the universe. These probes consume the native life on the target world and create a doomsday beast from the genetic material. By the time the aliens arrive, the probe will have wiped out all life on the target planet. An ancient Earth civilization warded off these probes by crating Godzilla from dinosaur genes. Godzilla would awaken when the probes arrived and destroy them before they could reproduce. In Kentucky, the probe bats continue to absorb animals, returning to the cave with their genetic collections to deliver to the main mass of the probe, which is slowly beginning to take on a definite shape.
Vaught, upon hearing the late Kenoshita's story, decides that Godzilla was heading for Kentucky, where the meteor crashed. Local storekeeper Nelson Fleer drives Vaught out to Lake Apopka. The two men don scuba gear and dive into the water. They discover a tunnel leading upwards from the bottom of the lake. The tunnel leads into a series of caves, and Vaught is horrified when he stumbles upon a giant paw. The paw is attached to the newly formed shape the probe has assumed. The monster has the body of a puma, the huge wings of a bat, and a hydra-headed tongue composed of snakes. The probe has become the Gryphon of the Japanese fisherman's drawings. Fleer accidentally bangs his air-tank against the cave wall, the sound awakening the dormant Gryphon. The men beat a hasty retreat, but the monster's roar pursues them even into the water. As they surface, they seem safe. Suddenly, the water churns and the huge Gryphon emerges, lifting into the air. The Gryphon flies away, descending upon the Clarksburg, Virginia. The monster destroys a train and blasts a fuel storage tank with energy bolts, as well as killing hundreds.
Despite the steady drip of amniotic fluid being given to him, Godzilla awakens, destroying the hangar and slipping into the Atlantic. It is clear that he has sensed the Gryphon's awakening. It is later determined that the two monsters will run into each other in one of the worst scenarios possible. Evacuation of New York City is begun. Jill Llewellyn tries to make her way into the city to save Tina. She is trapped in the Queens Midtown Tunnel when Godzilla steps on it, but manages to swim to safety. Jill finds her daughter just as the Gryphon arrives and the battle of the monsters begins.
The Gryphon attacks Godzilla from the sky, forcing the dinosaur back towards the shore. Gripping the frame of a proto-skyscraper to secure himself to the ground, Godzilla pulls the Gryphon downwards and savagely mauls its leg with his teeth. Horribly, the Gryphon's wounds heal instantly and it blasts Godzilla with its energy bolts. Godzilla topples into a row of buildings and the Gryphon tears into his flesh with its talons. The battle continues across Manhattan, the two monsters wrestling into skyscrapers and warehouses. The Gryphon finally delivers a double-kick that sends Godzilla crashing into the base of a building which topples onto both monsters, burying them in rubble.
Vaught realizes that Godzilla cannot hope to defeat the Gryphon as long as the tank of amniotic fluid is still attached to him, the liquid weakening the giant beast. Army helicopters distract the Gryphon while another gunship drops Vaught and Fleer onto the stunned Godzilla, to blast the restraining device from Godzilla's neck. The Gryphon blasts the gunship from the sky just as Vaught and Fleer attach explosives to the restraining device. Jill and Tina distract the Gryphon again by crashing a gasoline tanker into the alien horror's leg. As the Gryphon is turning toward Godzilla, the restraining device is destroyed. Godzilla rises and blasts the alien with his atomic breath, wounding the Gryphon. The Gryphon tries to retreat, but Godzilla pursues it. The battle moves to the East River. Godzilla creates a fog of steam that blinds the Gryphon by breathing on the water. The Gryphon crashes into the Brooklyn Bridge, getting tangled in the support cables. Godzilla tears one of the Gryphon's wings off, but the monster instantly grows another one and pulls itself free from the bridge. The Gryphon rises into the sky and then power dives at Godzilla. Godzilla waits until the last moment and then leans forward. The Gryphon is sliced in half as its body connects with Godzilla's dorsal plates, so great was the beast's velocity. Godzilla rips the head from the alien monster and sets fire to the body.
Victorious, Godzilla roars and heads out to see. Air Force jets begin to attack the wounded monster, but Jill Llewellyn calls them off. She has finally come to terms with Keith's death and forgiven Godzilla. Jill, Tina, Vaught and Fleer watch from the shore as Godzilla disappears into the sea.
The entire film was estimated to cost around $120 million. DeBont sent crews to construct a Japanese fishing village on the Oregon coast, filming Godzilla's attack on the Kuril Islands as the backbone for a teaser trailer. The sets were built, but filming did not occur. Sony, TriStar's parent company, panicked when they saw the massive price tag being affixed to DeBont's Godzilla project. In late December of 1994, TriStar and Jan DeBont parted company after the director refused to accept the studio's new budget restrictions. Although the script was rewritten again, this time by Donald MacPherson in May of 1995, the project was to all intents, dead. TriStar began to court Dean Devlin and Roland Emmerich, the team who had just reaped huge profits with Independence Day in late 1995. By May of 1996, Devlin and Emmerich officially had the job. They agreed to bring the movie in for about half of what DeBont wanted, $65 million.
[edit] Godzilla (1998 film)
The film's opening credits play over a montage of French nuclear tests in the Pacific Ocean (which are actually historical footages of American nuclear tests), observed by various species of lizard. The nest of a Green Iguana is irradiated by the fallout.
Years later, a Japanese fishing ship is attacked by an unseen, giant monster, and only one sailor survives. Traumatized, he is questioned in a hospital by a mysterious Frenchman (Jean Reno) as to what he saw. His only reply is, "Gojira."
Another seaborne attack just by the Eastern Seaboard culminates in the eventual destruction of a fishing ship. The crew, however, survive, after witnessing their boat sinking, but it shot up from underneath and landed with a huge splash in the surface.
Dr. Niko "Nick" Tatapolous (Matthew Broderick), an NRC scientist, who happened to be in the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone (Ukraine) researching the effects of radiation on wildlife, is interrupted by the arrival of an agent of the U.S. State Department. He is sent to Panama, escorted by the military, to observe the wreckage of the recovered Japanese fishing ship (which had three gigantic claw marks on one side) and a set of massive dinosaur-like footprints in the grassy soil. The Frenchman is also there, observing the scene and introduces himself as an insurance agent. Aboard a military aircraft, Tatapolous identifies skin samples he recovered as belonging to an animal "unknown to science".
Gojira then heads to New York City, dragging three trawlers under the sea on the way, then creating havoc in the Fulton Fish Market, before rampaging through the city. Manhattan is evacuated and the military attempt to kill the monster, first luring it out with a huge pile of fish. It takes the bait, but then shrugs off small arms fire, and is chased by three AH-64 Apache attack helicopters. They fire, only to knock the top two dozen stories off the Chrysler Building. Gojira escapes, but not before Nick realizes that the monster reproduces asexually, and is collecting food not only for itself, but also for its offspring. Nick is determined to find its nest.
However, a videotape from Panama is stolen by Nick's ex-girlfriend, Audrey Timmonds (Maria Pitillo), a would-be TV journalist for news channel "WIDF." Audrey originally intended to broadcast the tape herself, but her boss broadcasted it instead and mispronounced "Gojira" as "Godzilla." The military is outraged by the broadcasting of the classified tape and Nick is thrown off the team. Nick is then kidnapped by the Frenchman who introduces himself as Philippe Roaché, an agent of the DGSE, the French Secret Service. He and his team have been keeping close watch on events, and are now ready to help clear up the mess they feel responsible for, but cannot acknowledge.
The military lures it out again, into the waters of the Hudson River with three U.S. Navy nuclear submarines. Two subs fire torpedoes at Godzilla. However, through some quick evasion, Godzilla manages to have the torpedoes hit the sub Anchorage instead. One sub fires, again, and this time, Godzilla is torpedoed, and seems to be dead. Meanwhile Nick and a French team, led by Roaché, surreptitiously followed by Audrey and cameraman Victor "Animal" Palotti (Hank Azaria), track Godzilla through the subway tunnels to the Madison Square Garden, finding hundreds of eggs. They start to lay explosives, but the eggs start to hatch. The Baby Godzillas begin to look for food, and since the team smell like fish, they become inevitable targets. After failing to contain the infants and losing several members of the team, the remaining four of them take refuge in a TV broadcast booth. Knowing that the Baby Godzillas will eventually force humanity into extinction if they escape, Nick, Audrey, and Animal alert the authorities, who order an immediate strike by a trio of F/A-18 Hornets. The four escape just before the building is destroyed, only for an extremely enraged Godzilla (who managed to survive the assault in the river) to emerge from the wreckage. The four make a getaway in a taxicab, and lure it to the Brooklyn Bridge where it becomes entangled in the steel suspension cables, and is an easy target for the fighters. After it is hit by twelve missiles, it screams in pain and falls to the ground, its heart beating slowly until it breathes its last breath.
As Nick, Audrey and Animal reconcile, Roaché quietly walks off with the videotape and calls Nick to tell him he will return it after "certain information" has been removed, and disappears into the night.
All seems well until we see in the smoking ruins of the Garden, a single egg has survived and hatches...
[edit] Godzilla, Mothra and King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All-Out Attack
Zilla is mentioned briefly in the prologue of GMK, where it is suggested that American scientists had mistaken it for the original Godzilla.
[edit] Godzilla: Final Wars
Zilla did not appear on the silver screen again until six years later, appearing in Godzilla: Final Wars and finally taking an official place in the ranks of Toho's kaiju and being re-named "Zilla" to differentiate it from the Toho Godzilla. Ryuhei Kitamura, the director of Final Wars, who is fluent in English, chose this name because he thought the American film "Took the God out of Godzilla."[citation needed]
Under Xilian control, Zilla attacks Sydney, Australia, and later battles Godzilla there. He charges at Godzilla and jumps over his atomic breath, but is sent flying by a tail swipe from Godzilla into the Sydney Opera House, where a second blast of Godzilla's ray destroys both Zilla and the famous structure. The fight itself lasts 13 seconds, giving Zilla the record of the shortest battle in Final Wars, and one of the shortest defeats in any Godzilla film.
Zilla is the only monster in Final Wars realized completely through CGI instead of suitmation.
Zilla is suggested to eat two people in his initial attack on Sydney, something few other Toho kaiju have done. Though disputed, it appears as if Zilla possesses a breath weapon, as the film shows a crowd of people running until they are all blown away by a wall of fire which precedes the appearance of the monster walking into camera view. In an interview, the director of Final Wars confirmed this and stated that Zilla was emitting an acid fire from its stomach.
Godzilla: Final Wars references the 1998 Godzilla movie when Zilla is defeated. The Controller, in the Japanese version, says "I knew that tuna-eating lizard was not up to much", a reference to the American creature's diet of fish in Godzilla. In the American version, he calls Zilla a "tuna-head".
[edit] Godzilla: The Series
In 1998, Godzilla: The Series, a Saturday morning cartoon not to be confused with the original series from Hanna-Barbera, continued the story of Zilla's surviving offspring from the 1998 film in a role reminiscent of the Japanese films of the late Shōwa era.
The series revolves around the only surviving offspring of the first Zilla seen in the climax of the 1998 film. After the original monster was killed, Niko "Nick" Tatapolous the NRC scientist who first studied Zilla convinces the military to conduct a search for any eggs that may have survived. Nick offers his assistance, and ends up falling into a small cavern containing amniotic fluid and one large egg. The egg immediately hatches, though the infant does not attack, and escapes by burrowing to safety.
Nick's wish to capture and study the infant is met with opposition by the military who wish to destroy it. With the help of Dr. Mendel Craven, Elsie Chapman, and Randy Hernandez, Nick sets a trap for the infant. Unfortunately, the trap was designed for something the size of a human; the hatchling had gone through a rapid growth spurt and is now 35 feet tall. He quickly destroys the trap and snatches up Nick. Before he can kill Nick, however, the "Zilla" detects the scent of his own kind on Nick and releases him. Nick realizes that the infant had imprinted on him, believing him to be his parent.
Over the next few weeks, HEAT studies Zilla. They realize that he is sterile. Unfortunately, Monique Dupre, a French secret agent assigned to monitor HEAT's activities, tip off the military, who immediately attack and apparently kill Zilla. HEAT have no time to mourn, as they have to go to Jamaica to investigate reports of people being attacked. They get ring side seats as giant squids attack the HEAT Seeker, but Zilla, who had survived, grown fully to 180 feet tall, and followed HEAT, quickly deals with the squids.
Not long after, HEAT discovers that another creature was responsible for the attacks, a giant, mutant, tar-eating crustacean called Crustaceous Rex (or "C-Rex"). After an intense fight, Zilla manages to collapse a cliff on top of C-Rex, apparently killing it (since it returned in the three-parter "Monster Wars," it seems the mutant was only buried and managed to escape). Major Hicks, an army commander and recurring character in the series, is persuaded by Nick that having "at least one mutation" on the side of humanity is a good thing, and orders his men to stand down and let Zilla remain free.
[edit] Powers and abilities
[edit] Zilla/Cyber-Zilla & Final Wars Zilla
For the 1998 Centropolis film, the attempt was made to interpret Godzilla more realistically than had ever been done before - to see him as an animal, and not as something else entirely. Built like a theropod dinosaur with his body held horizontally on long legs, Zilla has a rectangular box-shaped head with a thick lower jaw - a "proud chin" - and long powerful arms similar to those of a spinosaurid. The characteristic maple leaf dorsal fins of the Toho Godzilla are instead rows of large curved dorsal spikes that begin at the back of the head and continue down the length of the body and whip-like tail, growing larger on the back with the two largest fins on the shoulders.
Originally, Zilla was not to have any sort of breath weapon in the 1998 film, but an angry fan petition forced Emmerich and Devlin to include one in their screenplay. Since Zilla is such a large animal, whenever he roars, a blast of powerful wind blasts out of his mouth. This breath weapon has many fan-created names, but in the script and the DVD audio commentary it's called POWER BREATH. Twice in the film it gives off the illusion that Zilla is breathing fire. The first time, he uses his Power Breath near two burning vehicles and the second time he roars near two vehicles that crash into each other, causing an explosion. In Final Wars, Zilla uses what appears to be a form of fire breath; its director states that it is a form of burning acid from Zilla's stomach.
Zilla lacks the Toho Godzilla's strength, fast regenerative abilities and near-impenetrable hide, as proved by its death in the original film, but it is faster and more agile, being capable of running at 480 kilometers per hour[1], outrunning several helicopters in one instance. In Final Wars Zilla, Toho's version of the creature, showed the ability to make fast enormous leaps, demonstrated when he jumped over Godzilla's atomic ray to attack. Zilla is also not as aggressive or combative and only acts aggressively when severely provoked and will usually flee, as opposed to the Toho Godzilla who is a vicious fighter and more than willing to destroy anything in its path and would aggressively fight anything until he has killed and/or destroyed it.
In the animated series, aliens called the Tachyons find the original Zilla and resurrect him as Cyber-Zilla. As Cyber-Zilla, it possesses numerous new weapons, such as a sonic emitter, eight dorsal fin missile launchers, and Atomic Flame Breath like his son, but with a blue color. Metal parts replaced most of Cyber-Zilla's body including a cybernetic right arm and a strange metal "helmet" for the cyborg's head. Cyber-Zilla's roar was also changed to a more metallic sound. When he becomes a cyborg his skin changes from grey to brown and his back plates change from blue to grey. The color change is most likely indicating decay, since he became a cyborg several years after he had originally died.
[edit] Zilla (the series)
Zilla's only surviving son who appears briefly at the end of the 1998 American Godzilla and the star of Godzilla: The Series, differs from his parent in many ways. He is the same size as his parent and is extremely fast and maneuverable. He also possesses many of the Toho Godzilla's notable abilities, including a fast healing factor, a much tougher hide, and the ability to fire a concentrated blast of radiation from his mouth, which is green in color and resembles a flamethrower. His dorsal fins, neck frills glow blue and his eyes flash yellow (in some episodes red) just before he uses it.
Unlike his parent, who was asexual, this Zilla is sterile. In one episode he falls in love with a mutated komodo dragon, named Komodithrax. Sadly, Komodithrax and the giant egg she laid (Komodithrax could fertilize her own eggs) die at the end of the episode. Zilla is also much more aggressive than his parent; rather than fleeing from an attack, he will usually, like the Toho Godzilla, fight or destroy his attackers. He is intelligent, and shows the ability to make moral decisions, shown in the episode "Deadloch" where he fights against the Loch Ness monster, then later aids her in recovering her stolen baby.
This Zilla also shows some planning and strategy in his fighting style, though this can be abandoned for sheer savagery and straightforward attacking if he is angered enough. He has even shown to have sense of humor, as in the climax of one episode of the series he splashed members of the HEAT team with water in a playful fashion. When the Tachyons invaded in the Monster Wars three-parter episode, he showed that he was slightly more resistant to mind control than other mutations.
This Zilla has been given nicknames in order to differentiate him from the original Godzilla; these names have been Toonzilla, Zilla Junior and G.I.N.O. (Godzilla In Name Only).
Because of the series, Zilla Jr. has gained mainly positive respect, despite the negatives from the movie.
[edit] Baby Zillas
The Baby Zillas are the offspring of Zilla. The first Zilla asexually laid over two-hundred eggs in Madison Square Garden. When they hatched, they fed on fish that their parent had left for them. When they ran out of fish to eat, they began hunting for other sources of food. They also began eating humans who smelled like fish. All the Baby Zillas were killed by a missile strike to the Garden, except for one. He appeared briefly at the end of the 1998 film and later starred in Godzilla: The Series. The Baby Zillas were fast and agile, like their parent, and Tatopolous said that they were all asexual and were "born pregnant". For reasons not explained, the Zilla from Godzilla: The Series is sterile.
[edit] Reproduction
Zilla reproduces asexually; a trait which is not uncommon with some reptiles. In the 1998 film, Nick Tatopolous states all the Zillas were "born pregnant". However, the last baby Zilla, which appeared briefly at the end of the 1998 film and would later star in Godzilla: The Series as an adult, is sterile (possibly due to a birth defect). In one episode he falls in love with a mutant komodo dragon named Komodithrax. She had the ability to fertilize her own eggs, thus laying a giant egg all by herself. Zilla and Komodithrax begin to raise a family, Zilla being the egg's surrogate father. Sadly, both Komodithrax and the giant egg fall into a deep chasm and die at the end of the episode.
In Final Wars, Zilla (Toho's version) never laid eggs or had any sort of urge to reproduce, his motivation for attacking Sydney, Australia being alien mind controled rather than searching for a nest site; so it's unknown if he reproduces the same way as his American counterpart.
[edit] Filmography
[edit] Other appearances
Zilla made an appearance in a 2006 Doritos commercial, in which he picks up a truck of Doritos and shakes chips into his mouth. In another Doritos commercial, he devours a spicy variant of Doritos, roars in pain, and dives into the Hudson River. Both were meant to parody the bait scene in the 1998 movie. At the time of the release of the 1998 movie, he made several commercials for Taco Bell, crossing paths with the Taco Bell chihuahua.
He also made an appearance in Armageddon alongside other Godzilla toys during the opening sequence in New York, when a little dog attacked the Godzilla toys on sale. This was a friendly jab at the other big special effects movie of that summer, the Roland Emmerich American version of Godzilla, which was released a month and a half earlier.
In the Robot Chicken episode "That Hurts Me", the segment "Godzilla Remade Again" featured Dean Devlin and Roland Emmerich remaking Godzilla once more; the segment goes on to show a scene of Baby Zillas attacking, only to begin inexplicably roller skating and dancing in a rink. When the studio head bemoans the fact that he trusted Devlin and Emmerich to make a decent Godzilla film, for the second time, and that they instead have produced an unmarketable pile of crap, for the second time, Devlin and Emmerich give each other a high-five.
Zilla's roar is uttered by a garden snake in the very beginning of the Camp Lazlo episode "Snake eyes."
[edit] Video games
"Godzilla-USA" (Zilla) was a playable character in Godzilla Generations for the Sega Dreamcast. Unlocked after finishing the game with "Godzilla 1954", he is the fastest of the playable characters. His roar restores less health than the other Godzillas, but he is a bit tougher to compensate. His breath weapon is a powerful blast of air; while the shortest-ranged, it has the longest duration, able to take down the Super X in one blast and the Super X-II and Super X-III with two blasts if timed right. His special attack is a fast run that crushes and smashes everything he runs over and into. He doesn't take damage while charging and it lasts a fair amount of time.
"Godzilla '98" (Zilla) also appeared in Godzilla Trading Battle for the PlayStation.
For Gameboy Color, the game Godzilla: The Series, and it's sequel Godzilla: The Series - Monster Wars featured Zilla.
[edit] References
- ^ a b c Godzilla [American]. Retrieved on 2007-06-06.
- ^ Zilla [Millennium]
