Elephant... Rule? I guess?

Sorry, I couldn't bring myself to just use one of the same two pictures floating around. So here's the big purple tyrannosaur.

I was watching this SNL episode the other day when update came on, and Seth Myers said something about the "largest feathered animal" next to a picture of what looked like an orange Dilong. I was like "neat, another feathered tyrannosaur. THAT'S interesting enough to make weekend update." I don't remember the joke either, because it wasn't very good, or because drunk uncle was so good the rest of update seemed like a waste of time by comparison.

Just today, I got the urge to look it up (which made me remember how pissy I get when a new extinct dinosaur makes the news and everyone describes it in what I like to call "retard language," and conveniently forget that the animal actually has a fucking NAME), and it took a while for it to register, but I'm now realizing that, at something like 9 meters long, this MIGHT actually be a big deal. I think.

Let me take you back in time, back before Tianyulong. The world was a very different place. People lived in sin and shunned the sun, dangerous mutants roamed the land in droves and science was no more sophisticated than banging two sticks together. These were truly the dark ages, when it wasn't immediately apparent that Ornithischian "quills" and Theropod feathers had a common source.

Back then, people still ran around like a chicken with its head cut off every time they found feather impressions in the extremely detailed Chinese rocks that I believe have to do with lakes and mud or something... well, I'm not an armchair geologist, you know.

Anwyas, so Dyzio is regarded as some bullshit about... I don't even remember, it's bullshit, though. "Feathered dinosaurs" isn't redundant yet, and generally the only dinosaurs that people admit to having feathers are the ones from China with impressions of them, because I guess logic is optional in cases like these. And I'm talking about the time when feathers weren't just limited in known specimens, but obviously in range. Maybe this will be a surprise to some of you, but maniraptorans are MOST dinosaurs by an overwhelming majority. The fact that all the little tropical feathered specimens from Cretaceous China happen to be... except for maybe one or two (and remember we're in a time machine, so they haven't found Guanlong yet) all maniraptorans shouldn't surprise anyone. Most folks interpreted this to mean only Coelurosaurs have ever had any kind of feathers (we knew about pycnofibres, but, again, the world before Tianyulong was a scary, dark place where nightmares live).

On top of that, all of the feathered dinosaurs at this point weren't very big. Maybe like 2 meters long for some of the raptors, but that's it. Because of this kind of attitude where, instead of interpreting this information to mean that a lot of different lineages of dinosaurs had feathers, they interpret whatever specific dinosaurs they find with feather impressions on to have feathers, and every thing else to be some sort of Jurassic Park-mutant-chupacabra-abomination-from-hell. Naturally. It was around this time I became aware that, aside from the more logical "we haven't found feathers on a carnosaur (remember, Dyzio doesn't count for contrived reasons), so only dinosaurs from the base of the earliest fuzzy one should have feathers (coelurosaurs)" there was what I like to call the "Elephant Rule."

See, in our post-Tianyulong age of enlightenment with free podphones for everyone where you can download your mother over a D6 FTL ADSFASDFGADF connection, it seems obvious that, in an environment where mostly the smaller, more delicate animals survived and/or attract attention, clearly that doesn't mean that ONLY animals of a certain size have feathers. But back then, there was this idea that, like Elephants aren't particularly hairy animals, feathers have a purpose in heat regulation, and above a certain size they aren't really necessary. Fair enough. Only, mammals aren't dinosaurs. It sort of makes sense, but a Loxodonta is only like 2 meters tall, maybe 3, and there are living dinosaurs that big that are covered in all kinds of feathers. Still, the notion that there is a size threshold where feathers stop serving any purpose and perhaps risk the danger of overheating has been something a lot of folks are expected to assume for the good of the country.

You might be able to tell that I never really liked that idea. Fast forward to our utopian post-Tianyulong society with hive-minds and floatr and mammoth-cloning and here I am looking for why no one has come forward about feathered sauropods. Logic dictates the earliest sauropodomorphs, at the very least, MUST have had some sort of hollow integument roughly analogous to pycnofibres, proto-feathers, and ornithischian quills. But alas, where are the fuzzy Panphagias? Even I sort of have to admit, as an endotherm myself, that at a certain point being fuzzy is a death sentence, especially in the Cretaceous, but what IS the limit? The sky? If you ask me, that's kinda too lame, but I suppose a fuzzy Amphicoelias MIGHT be a little out-there.

But then comes along Yutyrannus, at 9 meters long, which is the biggest fuck you to the elephant rule I've ever seen. Motherfucker isn't even "just some quills on the arm" ala Concavenator, he's straight up a giant Dilong.

So, all of that was basically to reflect on this:
0.7m - Tianyulong (Jesus allegory) & Sinosauropteryx (orange compsognathid)
0.9m - Sinornithosaurus (Dave)
1.6m - Dilong (first fuzzy tyrannosaur)
2m - Argentavis (~8m wingspan), Psittacosaurus, Velociraptor
2.2m - Beipiaosaurus (therizinosaur)
3m - Guanlong (second fuzzy tyrannosaur)
3.6m - Dinornis (largest moa)
6m - Concavenator (only arm quills?), Dilophosaurus (Dyzio is beyond fuzzy)
9m - Triceratops (only tail quills? [yes, there are skin impressions for the rest]), Yutyrannus (beyond fuzzy)

So the only trend I can see here is that Ornithischian quills don't really follow the same rules as straight-up Theropod feathers. Other than that, it seems weird that a 9 meter long tyrannosaur is completely fuzzy while the 6 meter long Concavenator "only" has arm quills. In fact, I don't believe that in the slightest. Doesn't it make more sense to say that all they saw of an integument where the scaled belly and feet, and the quill nobs, and then took a exclusionary attitude and said that's all there is, rather than using deductive reasoning and saying "hey, carnosaurs had feathers too... maybe we should check out Dyzio again."

Meanwhile, a chinese tyrannosaur turns up, and nobody questions it... double standard, or hypocritical? You decide.

Anwyas, the point here was to just look at the "elephant rule" and what evidence there is to support it that I know of. So far, what we know about endotherms (me included) says that at some point a heavy coat is going to boil you alive, and that dinosaurs aren't mammals, so we can't expect it to work exactly the same, and so far we have not found a definitive limit for theropods, although it seems like Triceratops really is the elephant rule for ornithischians. That said, I don't REALLY expect advanced thyreophorans under 9 meters long to be particularly fuzzy, but you get the idea.

Feathers: I could have told you this stuff years ago.

Next up: Did Amphicoelias have advanced flight feathers? Inquiring minds want to know!

Godzilla Continuity part 10: The "Legends" Timeline

This should be purty easy and quick.

1954: Godzilla
1955: Godzilla Raids Again
1956: Rodan
1961: Mothra
1964: Godzilla vs. Mothra and Ghidorah the Three Headed Monster
1967: It is possible some iteration of Son of Godzilla without the titular character happened here, but I'm waiting until Kumonga's spotlight issue to be sure.
1971: Again, It's possible Godzilla vs. Hedorah happened in some capacity but without the superhero Godzilla, but I'll wait until Hedorah's issue to say anything.
1972: Godzilla vs. Gigan but with the following exceptions
 - Anguirus attempted to take down Gigan AND King Ghidorah by himself and was rendered unconscious
 - Godzilla arrived seperately, and probably never interacted with Anguirus, but beat both monsters on his own
1978/1979: Godzilla sinks a Russian nuclear sub and grows from 50 to 80 meters.
1984: Return of Godzilla with the obvious exception that Godzilla has been previously seen many times between 1954 and now. Miki's parents are killed in this rampage.
1989: Godzilla vs. Biollante more than likely happened, but this time around Miki actually WINS her fight with Godzilla, gains notoriety in the U.N.G.C.C., and begins a successful ESPer institute in Japan.
1991: The Return of King Ghidorah (2nd ver.) wherein the real King Ghidorah comes back from space to harass Earth once more, but is defeated by Godzilla after sinking Shindo's secret nuclear sub, bring Godzilla and King Ghidorah roughly the same size as each other.
1992: Possibly the first time Battra appears.
1993: Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla II with exceptions in that Baby Godzilla is never born, It's the surviving 1956 who appears and not the Adonoa one, who becomes mutated and enlarges to near-Godzilla size in the same way. Super Mechagodzilla is not completely destroyed, but there is something that happens that causes his further use to be taboo.
1995: Destroyah forms the same way as his original appearance. Godzilla doesn't die, and Junior isn't even there. Godzilla kills or nearly kills Destroyah, who either escapes or there is a second one later.
1999: Surviving monsters begin to live in the Ogasawara Islands, causing the place to be dubbed "Monster Island." Residents include Godzilla, Mothra (the adult surviving twin from 1964), Anguirus, Rodan (the surviving one from 1956), Kumonga, Battra, and King Ghidorah, who is amazingly more mellow these days.
2004-2010:  The events of Godzilla Legends #3 pan out, Titanosaurus goes to live on Monster Island in the aftermath.
2010: Rodan's egg is found. From Godzilla Legends #2.
2011: Godzilla: Gangsters and Goliaths and Godzilla Legends #1
2012: Godzilla Legends #2

In a nutshell, that's what it looks like right now. Of course, as the last two issues of Legends have yet to come out, and IDW will surely add to this in other miniseries, hopefully including the conclusion of the stories seen in Godzilla Legends #1 and of course #3, I will either edit this entry or make a new one... depends on how I feel.

Godzilla Continuity part 9: Dr. Rex Sumerall in comic form...

Godzilla Legends #3 pretty much demands that I start taking the IDW "Legends" timeline (as I'm calling it) seriously. Why? Cuz Miki. Yeah yeah Mugal was in it too and he's still an alien but whatever. Miki's the real star of the show. No, not Titanosaurus, Miki. Go figure.

Anwyas, here's the thing. The MOST LIKELY course of action that's going to happen is the Legendary movie GINO 2 will end up being... well, GINO 2. There's little I've heard that will save it at this juncture, and what I have is unsourced rumors. As well, the original out-the-door date of sometime this year looks like a lot of bullshit, and current dates have it set as late as 2014. That's a the 60th anniversary. Currently the longest Godzilla has gone between movies is 9 years, between 1975 and 1984. Waiting from the 50th to 60th anniversary will not only break a record, it will mean that, if the legendary thing IS GINO 2, and there's a very good chance it will be, then that means Toho will have missed an anniversary. That, or they rush one out the door just to have it done. Either way, that will be the day Godzilla dies. Hence my sudden fascination with Guilala.

...and the comics. Godzilla will have to take the walk of shame off his movie monster throne and go somewhere else. Oh, he's not going anywhere, he's Toho's biggest baby. But where will he go to? These IDW comics were my guess, and now after the early Kingdom of Monsters, Gangsters and Goliaths, and this new Legends series, I've made a good bet. There is of course, the inevitable Godzilla/Transformers crossover. This MUST happen. It isn't negotiable.

...why is Godzilla green?

Ok, so it's important. But if it's on the same level as the films, Godzilla's primary medium, we need to talk about continuity.

The Kingdom of Monsters continuity hasn't really extended beyond it's pages yet. We know that the Tunguska event is somehow connected with Rodan and KG has been up in the Himalayas for a long time. That's all there is to that. As for the books themselves, they work out a little something like this:

1-5 or so take place within a few weeks, maybe a month of each other
6 takes place long enough after that to have built Mechagodzilla
the rest take place a few months afterwards, when the U.S. government moves underground

All in all, I'd say the earlier stuff (up until issue six or maybe including it) take place in 2011 while the rest occurs in 2012.

So that's that.

Gangsters and Goliaths take place in a different continuity, and we aren't given any explicit background about it either. And it's clearly not the showa timeline, since it features a G-Force made Mechagodzilla, and a King Ghidorah that's still alive. I'm assuming, of course, the book takes place in 2011.

Just to make things waaaaaay more complicated than they need to be, the writers felt it necessary to include a whole shitload of monsters that don't add anything to the plot. Anguirus, Rodan, Battra, Kumonga, and Titanosaurus appear in the comic in bit roles for no fucking reason. Honestly, Mechagodzilla didn't really even need to be there. Which is a shame because minus the clusterfucked cast of kaiju G&G just screams mid-60's Godzilla movie in the best of ways. It's a lot like Dogora, actually, which is one of my favorite movies ever.

Oh yeah, Battra and King Ghidorah on Monster Island... because that makes sense @___@

So, before getting into the legends stuff, let's break down what G&G shows us:

Godzilla: Clearly alive. Absolutely no reason to assume it's junior. Probably the second, Lagos Godzilla. We have no idea of his previous actions, only that he exists now and isn't particularly seen as the 1970's superhero.

Mothra: The fairies are called "Elias" mostly, but say they go by many names, which serves to lend a bit of "everything counts" attitude to the comic, which we'll get into more with Legends. NO IDEA what generation of Mothra this is, only that it's fully grown already.

Rodan: Nothing known. Showa look to it. Lives on Monster Island. Roughly the same size as Godzilla.

Anguirus: Same as Rodan, only not QUITE the same same as Godzilla (this will be important later).

Kumonga: Same as Anguirus.

Titanosaurus: Same as Kumonga, except, from what I can tell, about Godzilla's size ala Rodan.

Battra: Only seen in Larva form, doesn't seem to give a damn about Mothra or anything else, so it's not safe to assume this resembles the Heisei Battra in any way, shape, or form. Furthermore, whereas the Heisei Battra Larva stood nearly as tall as Godzilla (despite him being 90 meters LONG, not tall =/ ), this one seems quite small. It just acts like all the other useless monsters in the comic.

King Ghidorah: Not particularly safe to assume it's like the Showa version. It's certainly not dead like the showa version. We DO know that KG attacked Tokyo 20 years before the events of the comic. Assuming G&G takes place in 2011, that makes it 1991, the year Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah came out, but not the year it took place. So assuming that movie is canon to this comic isn't safe either.

Mechagodzilla: It's pretty much exactly the same as the Kingdom Mechagodzilla, that is to say, the heisei Mechagodzilla but with a built-in Garuda. So, it's like Super Mechagodzilla... without needing to combine. Notable in that it was once used as an anti-Godzilla weapon, but apparently it worked like crap, and even though the thing works perfectly fine, no one at G-Force thinks to use it even when there are 6 kaiju loose in Tokyo. So, i'm thinking it's pretty much EXACTLY like the Kingdom Mechagodzilla, because as the thing was fully operational, I don't see what else could be done to make piloting a perfectly fine super-mecha so taboo.

Monster Island: It exists. Monsters that live here do so of their own volition and with only Mothra's stern nagging to keep the peace. There is no government involvement, so DAM definitely never happened. No Gabara is visible, so it's probably not just the dream world. :P

The Legends mini-series does something a little different: every issue is a completely new almost-the-same continuity. Both G&G and Legends have clearly taken an attitude about the timelines that states "everything happened but not really I guess." Because of this, I'm choosing to synchronize all the Legends issues not only with each other, but with G&G as well. Why? I just told you: because everything counts until it doesn't, and nothing says it doesn't yet.

Go back to the Showa or Millennium timeline parts if you're confused about this seemingly anti-logic. But the basics behind the timeline of Legends and G&G seems to be, simply, this:

Assume everything from all the sources happened until we show you something contradictory. Don't worry about which Mechagodzilla exists in this timeline... we'll tell you when it's important. Also, both of them do, so that's not even an issue.

...pretty much.

Not pictured: every other monster IDW can currently protray.

So let's go through the Legends one by one (there's three so far) and see what we can find out about this nebulous, fan-wank universe.

LEGENDS #1

Anguirus: This is interesting... Anguirus is shown being completely dwarfed by Destroyah... and slightly smaller than the King himself. It appears that Anguirus is retaining his 60m height, which makes him half the size of Destroyah and a little more than half the size of Godzilla. Also, this is important, we're told that Anguirus has lost every battle he's ever fought, and moreover, we're SHOWN three of the battles. The first being a run-in with "kaiju alpha," Godzilla, in what appears to be Gyakushu-Goji form. It's clear what Matt's trying to say here. We also see Anguirus getting bloodied by Gigan and dropped by King Ghidorah. DAM didn't happen, but stock footage from that fight did appear in Godzilla vs. Gigan, so it's very close to counting. We also see Anguirus do his rolling thunder attack, something he never did in the showa days.

Destroyah: Same size, only seen in it's final form. Declared second only to Kaiju-Alpha in power (this is Godzilla, by the way). Assuming the events of the first movie took place, it still means that there is prior knowledge of Destroyah, meaning either it survived it's first appearance or this is a SECOND Destroyah. However, the events of Godzilla vs. Destroyah can't have happened because "kaiju-alpha" is referred to as both the 1955 creature and the current Godzilla... so Godzilla didn't die, and that REALLY isn't Junior.

Godzilla: It's becoming clear that at some point Godzilla must have increased in size. Also, with Godzilla exuding such an aura of fear, he was clearly not a super hero in the 70's. So, how did Godzilla vs. Gigan play out in this universe? Anguirus couldn't even team up with Godzilla, because the humans in this story are surprised Godzilla didn't attack him. And these guys are professional monster-fighters, they'd have a record of Godzilla and Anguirus teaming up, and they DO know about Anguirus's battles with Gigan and King Ghidorah. I'm thinking maybe Anguirus got trashed up a bit when the initial signal tape played, and then was unconscious by the time Godzilla got there. In the late 70's, a russian nuclear sub is sunk by Godzilla, and he reaches his current, heisei-scaled size. Something like that.

Gigan: Matt is trying to tell us we should acknowledge GvsG as more or less canon. Hence, Gigan is a Nebula M Cyborg kaiju who kicked the shit out of Anguirus, but couldn't handle Godzilla. Did Zone Fighter finally kill him in this timeline? I wouldn't think so.

King Ghidorah: So, now we know that, at least in some capacity, King Ghidorah enacted his role in GvsG in this timeline. This makes him the showa iteration, but also softens him a bit. See, the original showa KG was a super terro-beast that was too powerful for even the Garogans to handle. Here, as we assume the super-hero shenanigans of the 70's didn't happen, and KG didn't die in 1999, we have a confused, lonely space monster moving from world to world destroying for no reason but not particularly enjoying his life. Once he comes to earth, he tends to stay here. Sure, he may have been chased off once or twice, but we know he lives on Monster Island now, and is content to live there, even if maybe Mothra has to tell him what-for every once in a while.

Normally, it would be hard to tell just from the shape of the teeth... but those sure do look like fangs to me. but maybe I'm dead wrong, either way the homage is obvious.

So far, the Legends series has been telling us that a vast assortment of random, applicable movies count, but each time they drastically change the story and mix up the elements so that the end result, the story we're seeing in the comic, is both referential and a fresh new take. I'm totally digging the shit out of it. Moving on:

LEGENDS #2

Here we only see Rodan and a baby Rodan. This time he looks like the Heisei one, but there's no reason to believe he's a different creature or a different size.

We know that the egg was found 2 years before the rest of the events of the comic. We see the baby Rodan hatch at the end, and the adult fly it back to Monster Island with it (and that kid as well). There isn't much to go on about when the story takes place here...

So, if you want an explanation about why the G&G Rodan is showa-based and this one is heisei-based, you could say that the baby Rodan in this comic is the adult in G&G. But, of course, there's no real need to do that. Each of these are effectively stand alone stories, and I don't really expect the art to match up 100%.

Basically, though, we do know there are two Rodans. So either the baby in this one IS the adult in G&G and the previous adult died, or this comic happened in 2011 or so and the baby is still too young to go out and knock over buildings. OR it happened AFTER G&G. It would need to be 2 years later though, so 2013 at the earliest.

This is the weakest of the three so far and it has the least amount of impact. So it's not much of a big deal.

And now we get to...

LEGENDS #3

Miki: She says she's fought off Godzilla SUCCESSFULLY before. Now, maybe she's exaggerating her "victory" in Godzilla vs. Biollante, but then again, maybe she's not. Furthermore, despite us already knowing Destroyah is a known entity in this timeline and did NOT kill Godzilla (we are shown this again in a referential panel in this issue, lest you think I'm implying something that isn't there), but Miki's main plot in GvsD is that she begins losing her powers and connection to Godzilla and Junior. Here, she's totes on her game. What's more, she's an adult. We can say that an altered version of her battle with Godzilla happened where she won in 1989, and this is present day, given her current age. Why so long to act on the fact that supers exist in Godzilla's world? Well, considering that there wasn't a serious institute until the 1990's in the heisei timeline while there was already an espionage branch of ESPies in 1974 in showa times, this isn't really a question that I feel deserves an answer.

Mugal: The plot of TOM if unfolding NOW, so obviously this guy has no past in the timeline.

Titanosaurus: No origin or anything given, I LOVE him in this comic. You really get to see him, just... freak the fuck out. He really is just a peaceful dinosaur. If only those darn monkeys would leave him and Tristan alone. :c

Mechagodzilla: See what I mean? There's three Mechagodzilla's now. Two of them are alien. Maybe that means continuity with G&G is broken? Pffft, whatever. As much as we want to see it, remember using Mechagodzilla in this timeline is taboo for nebulous reasons, so the G-Force and alien Mechagodzilla's wont even meet up anyways.

I could put this together in an actual timeline, but for right now i'm tired. Other than the actual timeline we have... the Dark Horse comics and the video games to cover, as well as the Mothra Series (which is important because it includes, obviously, Mothra, but also Fairy Mothra and King Ghidorah, and was a source of a lot of "pfft, yeah right"s about word of god regarding the heisei timeline before GFW happened).

See you then?

Prolly will, actually.

Godzilla Continuity part 8: The branches of the heisei tree

HE'S FROM THE FUTURE WHERE THE PAST NEVER HAPPENED!

So, after I posted that part about millennium continuity, I went back and started reading the previous parts.

Weeeeellllll...

I made some mistakes. I also noticed that I never elaborated on the actually splitting of the showa-heisei split timeline. I want to address that now. I'm going to start by giving a brief rundown of the relevant events that carry over into the heisei timeline, but start from the Showa one, and then work our way through each of the branching series of events.

-12,000: Mothra and the civilization that worships them are present in some form
1944: The Lagos Island Godzillasaurus saves a Japanese Garrison from an American naval fleet.
1954: Godzilla - confirmed mutation of Odo, Lagos, and a female Godzillasaurus. Odo Godzilla is killed by oxygen destroyer. Minilla's egg layed here. Angilosaurus on Iwato Island also affected. Adonoa Island's Pterasaur population is also affected, but in a mostly detrimental way. The last clutch of unmutated Godzillasaurus eggs were also laid there.
1955: Godzilla Raids Again
1962: Godzilla vs. King Kong
1964: Godzilla vs. Mothra, Ghidorah the Three Headed Monster
1965: Godzilla vs. Monster Zero
1966: Godzilla vs. the Sea Monster
1967: Son of Godzilla - mutations of already gigantic mantises, Kumonga has been living on Solgell all this time. Minilla's egg emits a magnetic field to call it's parents, and hatches 13 years later.
1971: Godzilla vs. Hedorah
1972: Godzilla vs. Gigan
197X: Godzilla vs. Megalon
1973: Zone Fighter
1974: Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla
1975: Terror of Mechagodzilla
1999: Destroy All Monsters (present here are Baragon, Manda, Gorosaurus, and Varan, who have origins not connected to Godzilla)

Put simply, that's the showa timeline, now let's look at Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah. That movie shows us that the timeline diverged in 1944, and, for the sake of Final Wars, it's better to assume that in most cases that's the only divergence, as some events will need to carry over for lack of any other explanation. However, instead of just going and putting up the whole heisei timeline, let's do something else.

Remember that cause happens before an effect. Arrow of time and all that. The future that Emi, M-1, and the racist Americans come from is NOT the future that follows the end of Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah. How the hell could it be? The events of the film are a result of the future presented at the end of Godzilla vs. Biollante, and Emi even tells us as much in the movie.

I realize some people have a really hard time thinking this way, so i'm gonna break it down as much as I can.

See, the Futurians are going back in time to alter the past, creating a new timeline where they replace Godzilla with a monster they can control. This means that, in future they leave to come back to 1992 in, everything that has already happened still happened (or else they couldn't time travel to it), and that their monster, King Ghidorah, has not yet been created.

However, we've got a bit of a snag here and the blame falls squarely on Omori's sloppy writing: if it's the timeline they went back into to change, it should mean that the Lagos Godzillasaurus has not yet been teleported, and they should be in the showa future, and not the heisei one.

There's still a way around this. Causes always happen before their affects. 1944 happens earlier than 1992. Go ahead and look it up, it's true. So one could easily say that by traveling back to 1992, their actions in 1944 already happened. But then they would still already have needed to happen for Emi's future to even exist, so it's still not a real explanation.

At any rate, here's what the timeline Emi originally came from looked like, direct changes in red.


-12,000: Mothra thwarts an invasion by Xiliens and Gigan, but dies in a drawed battle against Battra.
1944: The Lagos Island Godzillasaurus saves a Japanese Garrison from an American naval fleet. Emi, Miki, M-1, and others come back from 1992 and teleport the dinosaur to the bottom of the Bering Sea, where it stays in suspended animation.
1954: Godzilla - confirmed mutation of Odo, and a female Godzillasaurus. Odo Godzilla is killed by oxygen destroyer. Angilosaurus on Iwato Island also affected. Adonoa Island's Pterasaur population is also affected, but in a mostly detrimental way. The last clutch of unmutated Godzillasaurus eggs were also laid there.
1967: Gigantic mantises left untouched by humans, Kumonga has been living on Solgell all this time.
1974: Okinawa's stone guardian sleeps through an uneventful year.
1978: Russian nuclear sub sinks in the Bering Sea, mutating the second Godzilla.
1984: A volcanic eruption awakes the second Godzilla, Return of Godzilla
1989: Godzilla vs. Biollante - Godzilla never recovers from the A.N.E.B. and presumably dies
1990's: Without Godzilla around, and having invented a render nuclear weapons useless, Japan experiences an unprecedented economic boom, and in the decades to come, becomes the richest nation of Earth.
2032: Xiliens plan conquest of Earth with a monster army possibly including Anguirus, Manda, Zilla, Hedorah, Gigan, Ebirah, Kamacuras, and Kumonga. Mothra may have helped humanity. Keizer Ghidorah is their trump card, but the advanced technology of the future is able to thwart the aliens. Keizer Ghidorah's cells, and M base, are used to create telepathic, genetically engineered designer pets called Dorats.
2204: Eco-terrorist group E.U.O. steals the MOTHER time machine and loads up with three dorats, planning on sending them back in place of Godzilla to create a monster that can me controlled.

Yes, I added stuff. Thing is, though, i'm trying to fill in holes with things that make logical sense. Keep in mind that an altered final war scenario where Mothra and the Gotengo take down Keizer Ghidorah without Godzilla isn't canon or anything, but it would be a cool fanfic :P So yeah, lots of that are just fanwank designed to make the timelines more coterminous with each other.

So, the plan to erase Godzilla is a massive failure, and the futurians are actually responsible for creating the heisei Godzilla in the first place. Go figure. Their presence and the creation of King Ghidorah creates a new series of events, where Godzilla is purposefully revived to combat King Ghidorah. In this timeline, Godzilla is completely indestructable with current technology, and the future that Emi returns to in order to build Mecha-King Ghidorah is NOT the one she originally left. In this timeline, Glenchiko's bullshit story about Godzilla completely destroying Japan in his original hometime actually does happen. Let's look at what went down, with changes in blue this time:


-12,000: Mothra thwarts an invasion by Xiliens and Gigan, but dies in a drawed battle against Battra.
1944: The Lagos Island Godzillasaurus saves a Japanese Garrison from an American naval fleet. Emi, Miki, M-1, and others come back from 1992 and teleport the dinosaur to the bottom of the Bering Sea, where it stays in suspended animation. In it's place Emi lets three Dorats free.
1954: Godzilla - confirmed mutation of Odo, and a female Godzillasaurus. Odo Godzilla is killed by oxygen destroyer. Angilosaurus on Iwato Island also affected. Adonoa Island's Pterasaur population is also affected, but in a mostly detrimental way. The last clutch of unmutated Godzillasaurus eggs were also laid there. The Dorats fuse together and mutant into the significantly larger King Ghidorah, possibly as a result of the M base, but due to the peaceful nature of Dorats, it remains dormant for nearly 40 years.
1967: Gigantic mantises left untouched by humans, Kumonga has been living on Solgell all this time.
1974: Okinawa's stone guardian sleeps through an uneventful year.
1978: Russian nuclear sub sinks in the Bering Sea, mutating the second Godzilla.
1984: A volcanic eruption awakes the second Godzilla, Return of Godzilla
1989: Godzilla vs. Biollante
1992: Futurians from 2204 arrive with a plan to erase Godzilla from history. It turns out to be a trick to place King Ghidorah into the timeline and destroy Japan before it becomes too strong and mass produces the ANEB that crippled efforts to create a monster in their own time. However, Colonel Shindo, a survivor from the 1944 incident, revives Godzilla with a modern nuclear sub, increasing Godzilla's size and power allowing him to completely destroy King Ghidorah.
late 1990's: Godzilla has become far too powerful for any force on Earth to stop, and proceeds to turn all of Japan into a nuclear wasteland devoid of all life except some Shokilas and Godzilla himself.
2032: Xiliens plan conquest of Earth but Godzilla is just WAAAAAY too fucking much for them to handle. Keizer Ghidorah manages to die a quick and agonizing death. It's possible Godzilla had a meltdown at this point. Keizer Ghidorah's cells, and M base, are used to create telepathic, genetically engineered designer pets called Dorats.
2204: Emi time travels from 1992, asking to use the corpse of King Ghidorah to create a cyborg and send it back to 1992 in order to stop Godzilla from completely destroying all of Japan. She is successful, and Mecha-King Ghidorah time travels from here back to 1992.

So, I mentioned Godzilla's possible meltdown because fighting Keizer Ghidorah is a good place to do it, and Keizer Ghidorah HAS to die, and we know that in the 2204 where MKG is built, Godzilla has not been lauded as a hero or anything, so thwarting an alien invasion would need to be eclipsed by a direct consequence which does far greater damage.

So, finally MKG gets back to 1992, and manages to stop Godzilla and create a new timeline where Japan has access to fancy future tech. yay! This is the showa timeline proper, and it looks something like this (changes in green):


-12,000: Mothra thwarts an invasion by Xiliens and Gigan, but dies in a drawed battle against Battra.
1944: The Lagos Island Godzillasaurus saves a Japanese Garrison from an American naval fleet. Emi, Miki, M-1, and others come back from 1992 and teleport the dinosaur to the bottom of the Bering Sea, where it stays in suspended animation. In it's place Emi lets three Dorats free.
1954: Godzilla - confirmed mutation of Odo, and a female Godzillasaurus. Odo Godzilla is killed by oxygen destroyer. Angilosaurus on Iwato Island also affected. Adonoa Island's Pterasaur population is also affected, but in a mostly detrimental way. The last clutch of unmutated Godzillasaurus eggs were also laid there. The Dorats fuse together and mutant into the significantly larger King Ghidorah, possibly as a result of the M base, but due to the peaceful nature of Dorats, it remains dormant for nearly 40 years.
1967: Gigantic mantises left untouched by humans, Kumonga has been living on Solgell all this time.
1974: Okinawa's stone guardian sleeps through an uneventful year.
1978: Russian nuclear sub sinks in the Bering Sea, mutating the second Godzilla.
1984: A volcanic eruption awakes the second Godzilla, Return of Godzilla
1989: Godzilla vs. Biollante
1992: Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah
1993: Godzilla and Mothra
1994: Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla II - Investigation on Adonoa Island yeilds an unmutated Godzillasaurus egg and draws the ire of one of (if there were more than one) the Rodans living there, who were not aware the egg is a nest parasite. The egg is the current Godzilla's second cousin.
1995: Godzilla vs. Space Godzilla
1996: Godzilla vs. Destroyah - Godzilla Jr. becomes the third Godzilla.
1997: Godzilla has a south seas adventure, meeting Anguirus and either a reconstituted or second Rodan, and the female Godzilla, with which he lays Minilla's egg.
1998: Okinawa is defended from Godzilla, who is clearly not as peaceful as he was when he was younger.
1999: The Gotengo is built and has a decisive battle with Godzilla, finally sealing the monster away in Antarctica.
2032: Godzilla: Final Wars - Keizer Ghidorah's cells, and M base, are used to create telepathic, genetically engineered designer pets called Dorats.
2204: Unknown, but this is the future Emi returns to after dropping Mecha-King Ghidorah in the past. There may not even be an E.U.O. in this future.


So that's that. The ever changing face of the heisei branching timeline. There was much unconfirmed guessing included, but it was only there to make events seem more hinged on the actions of the time travelers. I have no idea how the heisei Kumonga or Anguirus actually came to be, but these are my best guesses. I covered my attitude about this in the part dealing specifically with the ramifications of GFW on the rest of the heisei timeline.

Ok, that's all, bye. =/

Godzilla Continuity part 7: The "Millennium Series" aka Forget Everything part 2

UPDATE: Hey so I noticed this thing has been getting some attention recently, so I wanted to point out that some of the information presented here is out of date and I wasn't aware of certain information at the time I wrote this that sinks my fan theory pretty readily. While not on exactly the same subject, a new article I just finished covers exactly what that certain information along with some other stuff. So if you're as into Godzilla continuity as much as I am, you might find it pretty interesting, and more accurate than this old thing.

HAPPY DECEMBERWEEN! "Millennium" Godzilla helps ring in the season BECAUSE HE'S GREEN. Didn't look into this too much, but it said the tree was put up in Odaiba on the source I downloaded it from, so i'm guessing this is from christmas 2000.

I have a happy funtime Decemberween eve present for you while i'm sitting here at one in the morning being all scroogey. This isn't, I guess, the next part of the Godzilla continuity thing, as I think I mentioned something about the rebirth of mothra timeline and other heisei era things that don't fit in the heisei timeline, but I did finish up, for all practical purposes, the heisei timeline, since I covered Final Wars.

Just to make this as clear as I can about Final Wars, though: the Godzilla in GFW IS Junior. That's not a crackpot fan theory, it's a fact. It's not debatable. If you don't like it thenyoucangyyyyeeeeeetout. It is never verbally stated in the film, but it is shown through the editing. It is also the only possible existing timeline in which to place the action of the film.

And for those who like to put GFW in it's own disconnected continuity: you aren't really wrong either, as Kitamura did knock out all other references to the timeline in the film, but whatever fan-made timeline you choose to construct for it that is UN-supported, remember that it has to conclude with the coda of GvsD showing us the current Godzilla. If you can do that without making GFW a part of the heisei timeline, more power to you, because there are no other guidelines stated in the film. Me? I'm going with what both the movie and the man himself, Shogo Tomiyama, said. Word of God and all that.

But for this segment it's time we go back. Back to 1999. The world is a different place now. Power Rangers in space is ending and with it all the relevant seasons of said show (except maybe dino thunder). I still listened to the radio. "Alternative" rock was still a thing. Prince was quoted more than necessary. Smash Bros. changed the world for the better. Nostradamus was right. King Ghidorah returned. The world was swallowed in the grip of pain and misery as the great King of Terror destroyed all civilization. A meteor was headed straight for the Earth. We built a moon base with regular traffic to and from made possible by the moonlight SY-3. On Earth, all the world's monsters were gathered in the Ogasawara Islands in a government run sanctuary named "Monsterland." Godzilla, Anguirus, Rodan, Mothra... AND GOROSAURUS!!! The world lied in ruins, and GINO (the pre-official name for Zilla, for all you youngin's) was still fresh in our minds.

Remember in 1999 when Godzilla went to New York? No, not 1998, the year after that. The thing in 1998 wasn't Godzilla, that was something else. It didn't really have a name before 2004 though. We just called it "faggot." Just kidding, in the peaceful utopia of an Ishiro Honda-ian future, there are no more wars between countries, people cooperate, science brings people closer together, people are treated as equals regardless of sex, gender, age, nationality, race, or even the few religions that are allowed to survive, and mankind no longer calls each other faggots. Oh yeah, I forgot, Zilla isn't people, it's a faggot. =/

So GINO ruined everything. As a crotchety old man, I can actually remember the days between memorial day 1998 and august 2000. The pain and anger GINO caused has been sort of forgotten by the youth of today, much like the hooligans from the next film in the sokougeki timeline, GMK. People don't just tolerate Zilla as a seperate entity nowadays, they actually LIKE that faggot. Back in 1999, this was unthinkable, and saying that where the grand G-fan thoughtocracy could hear you resulted in a false trial before J.D. Lees before being sent to the elaborate beheading machine crafted from the bones of infidels.

It took Toho exactly no time at all to understand the level of incompetency they sunk to by allowing that abomination to be created. Originally planning a longer hibernation for big G, like 2004 or so, they sprung into action and fired back with an ACTUAL Godzilla movie. Godzilla 2000, which was both made and takes place in 1999.

Despite being directed by Takao Okawara, and still being a 90's Godzilla movie... and it still being the literal heisei era (it's not just a buzzword for G-fans, it actually refers to the era of the current Japanese emperor which started in 1989, or Heisei-1), this film broke continuity for the second time and decided to inaugurate a third, all NEW series of Godzilla films.

The decision for doing this is one I've never understood. First of all, there's Junior. Second, remember at the end of GvsD Junior actually becomes the new Godzilla. And finally, what the heck happened to junior?

Instead we get a film where Godzilla is green, there is absolutely no indication what films are included in this new timeline, if any, and Godzilla just sort of shows up, and he's a new size. Also, he's green.

It ain't easy being green, although he still LOOKS gray in most of G2K, and most of the greenery is in GXM. Honestly, the most troubling part about this is when idiots (like Geoff Darrow) start some shit about Godzilla being green, and you have to correct them, but then go back and make this weird exception. =/

So, while I remember hearing some buzz about the only movies in the timeline were the original Godzilla and Return of Godzilla, but that's obviously not the case because Godzilla is 55m tall in G2K. The movie itself makes NO references of any kind directly referencing past events, not even the original Godzilla. All we know is that Godzilla exists, and occasionally shows up on the Japanese mainland to wreck some shit.

The next year, we got Godzilla X Megaguiras, which I have heard from several folks is supposed to be yet ANOTHER continuity-less film. This, and the following film GMK, sort of set a precedent for the millennium "series" being completely standalone films with no references to each other or any other Godzilla or Toho monster flick.

Well, GMK sort of fucked that up, but we aren't there yet.

I don't ever remember reading any official press release or monster zero (back when that was still a thing) article directly stating that G2K and GXM take place in completely different timelines. The most official source I have that says that is toho kingdom, so right away that should be a red flag. The idea of a series of disconnected films that don't reference the rest of Godzilla canon was a neat idea, for sure, but around GMK it fell apart, and then with GXMG, GMM, and GFW, the notion that the millennium series avoided fitting into any timeline at all was just thrown right out the window.

But GMK, GXMG, GMM, and GFW already have established timelines and continuities. So where does that leave us with the nebulously placed first two millennium films?

Well shit, that's easy, they take place in the same timeline. =/

Let's face it, even if we would have gotten six truly unrelated films, they still would have taken place more or less in the year they were released, and if they stuck to the G2K/GXM formula and reference NONE of the previous movies at all, the natural decision would be to link them up. Without continuity references whatsoever, there's nothing to stop it, and they would be referred to as a group as the "millennium series" anwyas, so fuck it.

They even feature the exact same Godzilla.

So what can we tell about this one true millennium continuity? Not much, obviously, as no other movies fit into it, and any information about past events prior to the ones in the films is limited at best. Here's the entirety of what the millennium continuity tells us:

OMG Orga is the stupidest fucking monster ever. You don't EAT Godzilla. Moreover, if he actually puts his head in your damn mouth... like, that's not a red flag? How many animals crawl into predator's mouths? Honestly, dude, you already know the guy can shoot fucking radioactive beams, how did you think this would end?

-70,000,000: Millennean spaceship crash lands on Earth. Since it's a solar powered ship and it's nighttime, it goes into hibernation for a long ass time.

- between then and 1999 - Godzilla occasionally shows up. GPN and CCI are formed and take two different approaches to the whole issue.

1999: events of Godzilla 2000


aaaaaaand that's it. =/ Now, let's take a look at GXM:

WTF TOHO??? WHY IS HE GREEN???

approx. -320,000,000: A wormhole opens up from 2001, allowing a Meganeura egg to come through and become mutated by the effects of the radiation or something.

1954: Godzilla, looking exactly the same as he does in 1999, and presumably the same in every other way too, destroys Tokyo. The attack mirrors that of the first film, but the events of the first film do not actually take place. For one thing: GODZILLA DOESN'T DIE.

1966: The new capitol is moved to Osaka, and a new diet building is built there. Godzilla reappears after 12 years to feed on energy from the Tokai Nuclear Power Plant. Then runs off again. Nuclear energy is banned, and cleaner alternatives are pursued.

1996: A new type of energy called plasma energy is created in order to deal with the energy crisis the lack of nuclear power has created. Unfortunately, it's essentially the same thing as nuclear energy (omg the government lied to us! D:), and Godzilla comes back and is all "fuck your building" again.

2001: Between 1996 and now, an actual military unit called G-Graspers is formed. They attempt to do all of the things GPN and CCI do, tracking, studying, and attempting to eliminate Godzilla. The rest of Godzilla X Megaguiras occurs here.

We can see that while the GXM continuity is rather sparse and bare, it does establish a universe where the action takes place, like the fact that this is still the first Godzilla, the new capitol is Osaka, and we are told that Godzilla's appearances have been sporadic and, with him seemingly going after any new energy source Japan tries to find, Godzilla tracking and warning systems are probably more important than devising a way to kill him. After all, for over 40 years nothing anyone has ever done has made any sort of dent in the creature.

The two films still tell different, unconnected stories, but combining the two into one timeline gives us a clearer picture of a world where Godzilla's appearance is something that can't be predicted accurately and the problems he creates affect humans for more than simply just making up new mecha to fight him. Also, it's the same fucking Godzilla. Seriously.

the GMK timeline breaks tradition by having a clear continuity:
1954 Godzilla
1998 ZILLA
2001 Godzilla, Mothra, and King Ghidorah


Everything is as in the films, the only thing is that instead of the Showa/Heisei tradition of introducing a second Godzilla, this one is quite literally a Ghost Godzilla, being the body of the original completely regenerated from... idunevenknoe. I'm calling this the Sokougeki timeline. You folks at home can call it the Millennium-2 timeline if you like.

Godzilla's a zombie, Mothra doesn't have any fairies, and King Ghidorah is a GOOD GUY? This movie sucks balls. =/

After that, we get back to more normal references for two films in a row. GXMG and GMM fit into a very specific continuity which includes non-Godzilla films and shows both before and after. Essentially, the Millennium-3 timeline is the Showa timeline but without a second Godzilla. Well, for a while.

Toho Kingdom is nice enough to cite it's sources as far as this is concerned. This is good, because it means we don't have to rely on the dumb things they say, but can check the facts for ourselves.

This was the information provided in the GXMG book:

sorry if blogspot cuts this off. =/ You can view the full thing by right clicking, I believe.

This tells us about the kaiju who have appeared in GXMG canon. It doesn't give us much of a context for it, and I can't read Japanese, so this is pretty much what we have to go on. Just like in Godzilla X Megaguiras itself, the events of War of the Gargantuas and Mothra clearly happened in their entirety. Obviously, the original Godzilla happened as well, but with one itty bitty teensy weeny alteration: the skeleton of the original Godzilla didn't disintegrate. But you knew that. The vibe one would get from this is that the timeline of GXMG looks like this:

1954 Godzilla
1956 Rodan
1958 Varan
1961 Mothra
1962 Gorath
1963 Atragon
1964 Dogora
1965 Frankenstein Conquers the World
1966 War of the Gargantuas
1967 King Kong Escapes
1970 Space Amoeba

Just two things: one, Toho doesn't own King Kong, and you're sort of expected to imply his existence these days, Mechanikong is sort of taboo ever since 1991, and Toho doesn't seem to understand the novel, doctor, and monster Frankenstein are all in the public domain. Also, not all these movies took place the same year they were made:


1954 Godzilla
1956 Rodan
1958 Varan
1960 Frankenstein Conquers the World
1961 Mothra
1963 Atragon
1964 Dogora
1966 War of the Gargantuas
1967 King Kong Escapes
1970 Space Amoeba
1982 Gorath
1999 a second Godzilla appears for no discernible reason
2002 Godzilla X Mechagodzilla

Since we've established that GXM doesn't exactly follow G54 to a T, it's pretty clear showa-era continuity fudging is allowed. The showa era films were rarely consistent with each other, as I've already pointed out, so expecting them all to mesh so many decades later is just asking too much. Gorath is like the last one I haven't seen at this point, and I understand Gorath destroys our moon at some point. Hey, remember how DAM, which was both made after and takes place after Gorath, features a moon base prominently? Yeah, this is not the place to get uber nerdy. We're back in loose interpretation territory. The continuity is only tight when it matters, and the only time it matters is between GXM and GMM. Speaking of which...

Uh oh. This one is in timeline format. Did the guy who made this forget that Gorath took place in 1982 and FCTW in 1960? Gawsh it sure seems like it. But the inclusion of the appearance of the second Godzilla 1999 and the second Kamoebas in 1987 sort of points to the events happening as they are here, rather than in the movies. You're still supposed to be implying the presence of King Kong, Mechanikong, and Frankenstein, by the way.

Oh wait, look at this: the timeline points out 2003 and mentions Mothra's reappearance in 2004... but, wait, it was clearly stated in GXMG that it took three years from 1999 to build Mechagodzilla, which puts the movie in the year 2002, and GMM is one year after that, so...

Oh, duh, the timeline presented here is flawed. So looks like we WERE right, and the Millennium-3 timeline does indeed follow the "fuck it, no one remembers it because home video isn't invented yet" school of showa continuity. Cool, so the timeline goes like:


1954 Godzilla, but the skeleton survives
1956 Rodan
1958 Varan
1960 Frankenstein Conquers the World
1961 Mothra
1963 Atragon
1964 Dogora
1966 War of the Gargantuas
1967 King Kong Escapes
1970 Space Amoeba
1982 Gorath, but the moon isn't destroyed
1987 A second Kamoebas appears. Not sure if this one survives, or if the one from 2003 is a THIRD Kamoebas
1999 a second Godzilla appears for no discernible reason
2002 Godzilla X Mechagodzilla
2003 Godzilla: Tokyo S.O.S.

Done, right? haha no but that's cute you think that. There are more similarities to the show days as well: this continuity isn't Godzilla centric, and it doesn't stop there. Unfortunately, I STILL haven't watched all of even one of the three choseishin series yet, so...

Oh, what? Yeah, Gransazers, Justirisers, and Sazer-X all take place in the Millennium-3 timeline. Masers, Hiroshi Koizumi, and the Gotengo all make appearances, as do expies of monsters not already part of the timeline, like Moguera, Hedorah, Ebirah, Bagan, and King Ghidorah. They call them names like Megarion, Deathball, Zarigan, Reizaus, and Mammoth Bosquito, but they aren't fooling anyone.

You're not fooling anyone "Deathball."

Gransazers establishes that the Warp Monarch destroyed most of the Gransazer civilization 400 MILLION years ago, so obviously we're talking about time traveling humans here. Justirisers is focused on a alien war in the present, and Sazer-X has most of the team come from the year 5000 to defeat the space pirates Descal (it's "de skull," but whatever) right when the invasion begins, as it is quite impossible in 5000 since they're so bonkers powerful. =/

Any other continuity references made in those series I am unaware of. I've seen a handful of episodes (the first 7 or so of gransazers, the pilot of sazer-x) and the movie, but i'll get there. Riseross is the best zord ever, by the way.

But all of this is ignoring the elephant(s) in the room.






Where did the second Godzilla come from? In all the timelines with a second Godzilla, they show up as soon as they possibly can. Why was the M3 second Godzilla so lazy?

Could it be he didn't actually EXIST until 1999? How is that possible? Where did he come from? We know that time travel happens in the M3 universe, but that's from the choseishin series, which occurs after GXMG, so does that really werk? Where else could Godzilla have come from? Where do you get those from?

...I mean, there's plenty of different Godzilla's in the different continuities, but, none of them ever got sucked into a wormhole that transports living creatures through time and space, and then showed empirical evidence (such as a coda) that the Godzilla in question survived such a transportation...

WAIT A MINUTE!!!

Now, I know what you're thinking. "But that's clearly the same kid from GXM, and like, no in the past. And like, not from a different universe."

First of all, that's the implication, yes, but you have no proof of that. Second, we've already established that M3 continuity is not... very tight. Godzilla had to come from somewhere, and this is the only Godzilla that ever traveled through a wormhole.

The implications of this are just awesome. It brings the whole stated goal of having the millennium "series" be standalone to a head by having the same Godzilla actually cross between realities.

Now, of course, this is my personal fan theory. It's not stated or even hinted at. What i'm doing is finding a way to explain several things:

1. Where the second M3 Godzilla came from.
2. Where the M1 Godzilla went.
3. Find a way to connect a series of films that are known for not being very connected without actually contradicting the events of the films themselves.

Having the second M3 Godzilla actually BE the M1 Godzilla makes a hell of a lot of sense in that regard, but to be fair, one could just as easily say that the M1 Godzilla got sent back to 1999 in the G2K universe if it is indeed an entirely separate one, which I seriously doubt.

You, the folks at home, can take it or leave it. All it is is a fan theory. As far as i'm concerned it doesn't hurt anyone and it makes everything a lot cooler. But, just for fun, let's quote something from Toho Kingdom that actually supports my theory:

"At first, producer Shogo Tomiyama was planning for three stand alone films, and from these three Toho would decide which of the movies to dedicate a series about, or if the Heisei series should be revisited. This idea, however, was aborted after a meager box office showing by Godzilla 2000: Millennium (1999) and Godzilla vs. Megaguirus (2000) stumbled out of the gates, and ended up being a box office flop. It was then discussed that the 2001 Godzilla film might mark the closure of what would have been a short lived series."


I actually remember hearing all about this, so it's not really a lie. However, it is really misleading. The initial idea was to give three directors free reign of Godzilla without any pressure to follow an established canon. The first was the Heisei veteran Takao Okawara, then Masaaki Tezuki, then Gamera and Pyrokinesis fan-favorite Shusuke Kaneko.  The thing about GMK looking like the last one for a while was also true, but it didn't actually effect the plan for the millennium series. Tomiyama still looked at the three previous films and made the decision to hand it over to Tezuka. The GFW being a heisei continuation has more to do with it being a 50th anniversary than anything else.

But, going from the quote alone, what Tomiyama was saying was that after GMK, he decided to pick the continuity that Tezuka created, meaning that GXM is somehow connected to GXMG. True story, I read it in Toho Kingdom's articles section, so it MUST be true.

When all is said and done, the millennium series is still, from a larger perspective, pretty disconnected, but also part of a larger universe ala M3. Assuming that the initial two films and the M3 timeline are connected through wormholes as per my crazy fan theory, that means we have:

The Shodakai timeline which is just Godzilla and ALWAYS 2
The Showa timeline which is pretty much every Toho sci-fi flick up until 1977
The Heisei series, which actually focused on continuity, and only contains 9 specific movies
 - The future where Godzilla never recovers from the A.N.E.B. that Emi originally comes from
 - The future where Mecha-King Ghidorah never existed and Godzilla turns Japan into a wasteland, and the one to which Emi returns to in order to build Mecha-King Ghidorah and set in motion the events of the rest of the Heisei series
The Millennium series, which is multiple universes except possibly:
 1. G2K and GXM occur in the same universe
 2. The GXM Godzilla survived the dimension tide and ended up as the second Godzilla from GXMG
The Sokougeki timeline, in which Godzilla is a zombie, Zilla exists, and King Ghidorah is a good guy

And that's it.

What's left to cover? Well, the heisei Mothra series for one. Also, I'd like to talk about the Godzilla Legends/Gangsters and Goliaths continuity since it makes even less internal sense than the showa one. The super godzilla timeline since it's the only canon appearance of Bagan. aaaaaand prolly some more stuff i'll never get to.

Tata for now <3

Let's Play Internet Roulette Page 4 & 5 (FINAL PART! :D)

Once again we have very few pictures of, you know, Godzilla, and most of it is neo stuff. King Kong, Jiras, Manda, Godzuki, Gorosaurus, Anguirus, and and and...

Automatic 20. Unless somepony ships Godzilla with Zilla on the next page, we've already won.

http://dino-master.deviantart.com/art/Godzilla-134511432?q=boost%3Apopular%20Godzilla&qo=72 Green AND spiky! *vomits*

http://bayanghitam.deviantart.com/art/Godzilla-106577074?q=boost%3Apopular%20Godzilla&qo=76 Unless this is supposed to be one of those monsters from The Fairy and the Devil, I'm not sure what the hell this is even supposed to be. It's certainly not Godzilla... which is what it's named. So... I don't understand this at all.

http://banenacent.deviantart.com/art/Godzilla-Rampage-10633217?q=boost%3Apopular%20Godzilla&qo=79 oooooh... so close. Maybe if you were such a big fan, you'd have, I don't know, WATCHED one of the damn movies? Yeah, Godzilla is grey. Try again.

http://tavaresg.deviantart.com/art/Godzilla-159932202?q=boost%3Apopular%20Godzilla&qo=78 I kinda want to give this a point... but it looks waaaay too constipated for me to feel comfortable with. Plus, we're done next page anyways, so it doesn't even matter.

http://pyrasterran.deviantart.com/art/Godzilla-113509888?q=boost%3Apopular%20Godzilla&qo=81 GAAAAAAY. =/

http://art-minion-andrew0.deviantart.com/art/Godzilla-revamp-2-77328317?q=boost%3Apopular%20Godzilla&qo=93 WHAT?! Why is he a fucking zombie?! Let's listen to some creator commentary, shall we?

"Was asked to do a re-design concept of Godzilla for some folks who wanna make a short series of movies. 

I was supposed to make him look seriously evil, and I think it turned out pretty well. ^_^"

Okay, so... "some folks" are going to do a short series of movies. Sounds like a couple of fans want to make some fan films, then? Okay, well, fan films don't usually have much of a budget, and so complete projects in the kaiju world are pretty rare, and when they do pop up, they are either unwatchable, over the top, or both. If he requires a "re-design," I'm guessing this is one of the over-the-top ones.

You can tell that these people won't ever finish their "series." In three years, we should have heard something by now. Also, judging by the notion that he's supposed to make Godzilla look "seriously evil," I'm guessing these people are all 11 years old.

And the Page 4 total brings us to 86. Even just a crossover would spoil our perfect run, so let's look at page 5:

There are only six pictures of Godzilla on this page. The rest are of Megaguiras, Vagnosaurus, Dagarlah, Hedorah, Rodan, Ookondoru, Battra, Megalon, Zilla, Moguera, Ganime, Mecha-King Ghidorah, and on and on.

Of those, only three are really +1 worthy. So that gives us 23 points and a grand total of 109, which means we have won the game in only 5 pages. I dare you to do it faster.

What IS notable is that how this little exercise has exposed how batshit insane the Zilla fandom is. Not only have we been coming across various pieces titled "Godzilla" that have only Zilla in them, but they also showed us, on our last page, exactly what the comic this is a response to was talking about:

Here we have Zilla sleeping next to a gigantic human female, which I'm sure is exactly the kind of sexual fetish that fuels the creepier stuff on dA, who ALSO happens to be from some other pre-existing series, although I'm not going to go out of my way to find out what.

Even if we counted this because it is a part of the greater Tohoverse, it would still be cancelled out by all the GOOD art of GOOD Toho monsters.

aaaaaand that concludes my first lp! Yay!

Ruining Godzilla 29 a Full 2 Years Before Release

When I saw this poster, I squealed like a hysterical schoolgirl. For obvious reasons. It took a whole 5 minutes for me to go from "jonas brothers screaming" to "star wars nerd rage."

Remember Godzilla 29 and how cool it was going to be, and how it was totally going to be the movie Banno has been waiting to make for, like, 40 years? Yeah, well, guess what. Hollywood fucked it up already, and the film isn't due for another 2 years.

Yeah, I know, the poster looks so cool, and it was confirmed (like you NEED a confirmation) that Godzilla will be X-ing at least one other kaiju, but then they had to go and use the c-word.

So that's it then. Nevermind that Godzilla single handedly INVENTED special effects, or that CGI is a discredited trope that hasn't been used in a monster movie since... uh... Peter Jackson's King Kong (and we all know how THAT turned out...), or that the ability to use CGI as an enhancement to existing practical effects creating a whole new field of integrated technology that would have been Eiji Tsuburaya's dream come true and is responsible for some of the most gorgeous monster movies of all time (Silent Hill, GMM, AvP, any recent Werewolf movie, the new Gamera, etc.), and I guess it doesn't really matter that not only does the movie going audience despise the very idea of CGI characters in modern films, but the niche market a Godzilla film occupies hinges, uh... 100% of it's audience based on whether Godzilla is done practically or not, something that YOU'RE NOT EVEN SUPPOSED TO ASK ABOUT!

This is non-negotiable. Fucking fix it or I walk on the franchise. I've been obsessed with Godzilla since I was 2, it was my one insane fanboy thing that I could really call my own, the one thing I got irrationally pissy about when the status quo was nudged a little (remember when they made King Ghidorah a good guy? Those were dangerous times to try and talk to me), and now I can't even have that.

Fuck you, Godzilla. Maybe it isn't too late to change my major. Looks like it's time to quit film school and drop the "armchair" from "armchair paleontologist."

Although, if Satsuma walks, then Godzilla himself is still cool, and we just have another GINO on our hands. That would be a very sad turn of events, but at least it means there is a better future to look forward too.

R.I.P. Godzilla (1954-2007)

P.S. It would be really nice of you to somehow rise from your grave just one more time, and get this "cgi" thing dealt with. Just sayin'.

Exciting announcements

Parabuteo: makes Deinonychus look bad. It can fucking fly.

This is my favorite song (the list)
1. Balaur
2. Sagittarius
3. PARABUTEO*
4. Corvus
5. Kelenken or Argentavis, depending on which day of the week it is

* pushes Corvus down and confuses K&A.

When this dinosaur became my favorite dinosaur, I wrote the list, it sat on top.
For weeks it pushed the others down, down.
But I never reached the bottom of that list.
And I would cry and cry, cause it had lied and lied...

I could literally transcribe Ariel Pink all day (it isn't ACTUALLY hard), but I want to cover this properly, so let me get a good intro going here:

The endless bloodlust earthlings seem to have never ceases to scare the shit out of me. I'm already scared to death of Owls (they need to fucking calm down, that is too much power for such a small animal), but now I'm just finding out that hawks have actually taken it much further.

Let's review: raptors today can fly. Cut and print, they've already won the contest. But wait, they are the BEST at flying. Also, talons. Okay, so basically you've got an animal that doesn't "hunt" anymore, but just sort of goes grocery shopping, and spends the rest of it's life soaring through skies.

And this sort of "I've already won, so I'm just complacent now" attitude is shared with, you know, us. Raptors (not a real thing, I know, but I still use it even though it does not include Cariamae) have done with evolution what we've done with technology, and there are no worries anymore. Understandably, the pack hunting styles that were so popular in the Mesozoic are now dropped in favor of a quiet, reflective lifestyle befitting hermits and poets.

And really, pack hunting is an effort to make up for vulnerability in a long term battle. Deinonychosaurs (except Balaur) are way to frail to put up an extended physical battle with a ceratopsian, so they run in huge groups and take a hit and run approach, dividing the attention of the prey and exponentially increasing the safety of any given individual. Golden Eagles need no such strategy, they simply drop goats off cliffs.

That's why when I heard Parabuteo is a pack hunting, I realized "overkill" doesn't quite get across how ridiculously overpowered these things are.

But at the same time this sort of irritates me (Irritator... heheh) because it makes me realize how little I know about living dinosaurs. I'm ALWAYS finding out shit like this, because they don't tell you this in the schools, you've got to learn it on the streets, man. Like the secretary bird, I'm well aware that birds (see that other post, I'm not doing that again) have the first toe turned into a "perching" sort of deal, but I had no idea that a dinosaur actually used that claw as a weapon. It's like a Bayonettasaurus or something, it's awesome. PLUS it can fly.

But anyways, back to Ariel (R-real). So, to conclude the cliffhanger of a previous post, I asked Ariel what the hell was up with the HG numbering thing.

So, he says that it was just a way to keep track of the albums, which proves my half-jesting claim that even Ariel can't keep track of all his stuff, and also that there was nothing "planned" about it. As far as he's concerned, he says, Before Today (shades... away!) is HG#1, not 9 (although he did say something about there being 9 hg's... so I guess he's counting Thrash & Burn + Pre? Or he lost count, most likely).

So that's that. I want to mention that being in the presence of the one true god is not nerve racking at all. I mean I was so nervous (let's get nervous... groan) that I wouldn't be able to handle it and I'd get embarassingly star struck or something, but after startling the crap out of me by magically showing at the merch stand with any fanfare, everything went fine. It's like he exudes good vibes (10 points for guessing that reference) or something.

And this is the sentiment across the board. It makes me wonder what it would have been like to meet David Bowie in the mid-70's or Ian Curtis in the late 70's, or Peter Murphy in the early 80's... or Boyd Rice ever. I've heard from alot of people that've met Boyd that he's great in person, but I can't imagine meeting Ian in person would be a... fun... experience. With his career essentially being four years of foreshadowing, it sounds kind of depressing. But, I wasn't there, so I don't know. I also have this idea that Dave is probably a prick in real life, but this is probably just a result of the glamorous image he had (has), and as we all know, divas are bitches.

Thinking about being in the same room as Peter Murphy makes my head explode, and in the early 80's... Well, it is probably more significant now than it would've been then. I mean, even knowing that something very important was happening, it would have been hard to guess exactly how far reaching he and what he started would become. It's 2010 now, and he's still the king.

Thats really the best way to describe APHG right now: it isn't clear exactly how much the world is going to change because of this, but being right here in the thick of it while it's happening (okay, so it's middle APHG, and I missed Doldrums when it was new, but still) is... just a completely unbelievable feeling. I just keep comparing it in my head to being a punk/goth in the late 70's.

But, so my birthday is Nov. 10, and here is the schedule for that month:

Nov. 5 - Friday - Ariel Pink's Haunted Grafitti in Dallas
Nov. 6 - Saturday - Austin Fun Fun Fun Fest, WaVVes at 3:30, and Ariel Pink right after them
Nov. 7 - Sunday - Come back to Houston, Ariel Pink (and Tim Koh too!) plays at Fitzgerald's
Nov. 8 - day off, depending on how things go I may be leaving for Dallas (again) on this day because...
Nov. 9 - Tuesday - Legendary Pink Dots in Dallas 2/3 or the pink triad isn't bad
Nov. 10 - Wednesday - my actually birthday. Maybe a party or something if I'm back in Houston then
Nov. 11 - Thursday - have to be back in Houston by now, probably get some sleep
Nov. 12 - Friday - Tim & Eric at warehouse live (where I saw Times New Viking)

Bad ass week, eh? How do I pull this off? I haven't worked everything out in my head yet, but I have some ideas and contingency plans. If nothing else, I HAVE to see Ariel at all three texas dates.

I mean, you don't understand. I HAVE to see Ariel Pink. It's the law. The law of the pinkhead.

What else can I ramble on about?

- on Monday, the coming one (two days from now), I'll meet up at the commons with three other guys after cutting out of acting early and we'll try to figure out why we are there.
- My keyboard might have kicked it, and I'm trying not to think about it. If that asshole acting teacher screws with me again, I'm going all method with this little bit.
- I might be doing more Mr. Shmolen on Tuesday. I'm still having technical problems editing the existing footage.
- DOOM 4 didn't show at QuakeCon this year, so jokes on you, assholes.
- You know how they're playing that old Cake song on that one commercial? I've been inspired to make that outfit happen, but the "long jacket" jacket part of the equation sort of requires it to be cold. So, I might need to come up with another way to do it. Pictures will happen if I'm around a camera.
- Increased activity on social networking sites DOES NOT mean I am officially social networking. I just don't have the ability to concentrate on these little things for extended periods of time, and I'm not going to pretend I can. I could disappear for months in the blink of an eye, because real life (the objective reality kind) is much more interesting.
- Kevin made a book, and now it's selling in the actual bookstore. Did I mention I'm the best writer in the state at the very least? Yeah, he should expect some competition coming soon.
- I'm soooooooooo bored... (la, la la-la la)
- Of all the things I started I would actually like to write out my ideas for an Eddie based Silent Hill and a treatment of my own original idea. If I get around to it.
- On Ramona Gonzalez: I think I have a chance with this girl (oh, wait, she lives in Stupid-ifornia, so fuck it).
- We need pictures.

Francis Bacon painting from 1946... I hope. Does this look familiar? It should. God lives in this painting. True story. You know how even though the face changes, God's body always looks the same? This is where Masahiro got it from.

I can not tell you how many times I've tried to come up with a way to make this work. There are a few unimpressive efforts on the (very specialized) market, but none of them have what I'm really wanting to happen: not heel to flats, but 4" to 5"... to 6". Actually adjucting the height, not removing it. These look really cool though.

Silent Hill again? This is the album cover for the SH4 OST. Fun facts, that monster is quite obviously Conjurer, but do you notice the Sniffer Dogs? And how about those dead bodies? There are 21. Killing Machine is in there, and you can tell that's supposed to be Eileen. Super stylish.

A Space Jockey Alien. It is completely possible for the Jockey Alien to still be alive in the film timeline, as it wouldn't have died in the crash, and there were no other occupants around to kill it. I love that it's so fucking huge, but it doesn't make sense that there isn't a trunk. Of course, Alien 0rigins is bound to fix this. Oh yeah, and I'm already unhappy with the decision to let a director do two alien movies, as it breaks tradition, but as long as I get to see a Jockey Alien, it'll all be cool.

Minilla grows up. Proof that Minilla is not a natural Godzillsaurus, but rather born to already mutated Godzilla parents. That means that in the Heisei timeline, there are at least FOUR Godzillas: GI, GII, Junior, and the female Godzilla which has to exist in order for Minilla to exist in 2032. Yes, this is real concept art.

Bit of a spoiler. This is Mira as seen by Eddie, in his very own, special, non-canon "Dog" ending. The cannon ending, of course, is the UFO one.

Mabus, the third antichrist. Nostradamus is hilarious on his own, but combine him with crazy people and you get a never ending (sodaaaa... woah-o-woah...) source of entertainment. Everyone knows about Hister, but did you know how they got the first antichrist? They took Nay, Pau, and Loron, the names of three french towns, and decided that it was an anagram for NAPAULON ROY. Which, by the way, isn't "Napoleon," but close enough is spot on for these people.

*sigh* Fun fact: Mana not only collects creepy dolls for photo-shoots, but also was a pioneering Hauntologist back in the late 90's. Yep, back then Mana and Julian House used to get together on the weekends and play Atari and drinking copious amounts of alcohol. One thing lead to another... and that's how the Gamecube was concieved. I'm joking, of course, Julian doesn't drink.

Also, Mana's music isn't very good. Hence, no hauntology. Oh, one last thing:

From what I understand, these are honest to goodness glass slippers. This is a fucking terrible idea. Don't these idiots know that glass breaks? The very idea of these makes me feel like that one scene in May where she talks to a group of blind kids and the glass... thing with her doll shatters on the floor and THERE'S BLOOD EVERYWHERE!!!

...this too was all a part of Architeuthis's plan.

All right, I'm sick of this now. Ima go figure out the chords for Ariel Pink songs now.

HEY! That's a good idea, I'll come back later and upload some chords! Huzzah!