Moguera

Moguera (モゲラ, Mogera) is a Kaiju (Japanese giant monster) featured in two of Toho's science fiction films. The name is derived from mogura (土竜(もぐら) the Japanese word for mole.

Appearance

The Mysterians and Godzilla vs. Spacegodzilla

Showa

In The Mysterians, Moguera is a robot used by the Mysterians to assist in destroying humanity to make them bend to their will and supply them with a sufficient amount of land and women. It attacked a small village with its eye beams, and proved immune to machinegun fire, flamethrowers, and mortar rounds. It was destroyed when the bridge it was standing on collapsed due to the military dynamiting it.

A second Moguera appeared as Markalite beam cannons assaulted the Mysterians' base. This Moguera tried to destroy one of the Markalites by burrowing underneath it, but the weapon fell on top of it, crushing and destroying the short-lived second Moguera.

Heisei

In Godzilla vs. SpaceGodzilla, M.O.G.U.E.R.A (Mobile Operation Godzilla Universal Expert Robot Aero-Type) was a UN-built mecha designed to fight Godzilla following the failure of G-Force's Mechagodzilla.

Mogera has an expansive arsenal of weapons. The most heavily-utilized and standard weapon are the plasma laser cannons built into its eyes, which rapidly fire yellow plasma shots. A drill bit is located in the center of its face, which can be used for close range fighting. It's cone-shaped hands are capable of releasing blue energy beams, known as autolasers. Furthermore, the hands can open up and launch spiral grenade missiles. Its chest secretly conceals a plasma maser cannon, a powerful energy weapon. It can fly through earth's atmosphere at Mach 1 and through space at Mach 44. It is also capable of moving on land via independent leg action, or with the treads built into its feet and legs. Mogera is the aggregate form of two vehicles: Land Mogera, a tracked armoured fighting vehicle able to drill through the earth; and Star Falcon, a VTOL craft capable of space flight.

Mogera's first assignment was to intercept SpaceGodzilla, which was discovered on a course toward Earth. A battle ensued in the asteroid belt leaving Mogera seriously damaged, though able to return to Earth for repairs. It was during the repairs that it was fitted with the spiral grenade missiles, and the plasma maser cannon. Following the devastation caused by SpaceGodzilla, Mogera (under its new pilot Yuki Gondo) aligned itself with Godzilla to destroy the greater threat. It shattered SpaceGodzilla's shoulder crystals (thus preventing SpaceGodzilla from absorbing power from crystals), but was damaged beyond repair during the battle; its remains were subsequently obliterated by Godzilla's spiral ray.

Originally, Godzilla was planned to battle Spacegodzilla and a second Mechagodzilla, but it was thought it'd be too onesided for Godzilla to face the same robotic twin that very nearly killed him the year before, so the weaker Moguera was revived as an ally to Godzilla.

Other appearances

• Moguera appears in the video games Godzilla: Save the Earth,Godzilla Generations: Maximum Impact, Godzilla: Unleashed and Godzilla Unleashed: Double Smash. His incarnation in Maximum Impact was called 'MGR-IInd' and his Double Smash version made him look tougher.

• The 1988 Nintendo game Godzilla: Monster of Monsters, featured Moguera as an enemy, and is perhaps the first time Moguera and Godzilla are featured together.

• A robot named "Mongroun" that is very similar to, and most likely based on Moguera, appears in episode 48 of the anime Sonic X. In the same episode a giant moth also appears, very similar to Mothra.

• Mecha Morgan is an alien invading cyborg that appears in the Katamari games. It is about 100 meters tall, has a drill nose and hooked metal hands.