After the smash success of Godzilla, Toho studios and producer Tomoyuki Tanaka wanted to cash in on that sweet sweet G-money, so with a quick turnaround they put together Godzilla Raids Again the following year. With the legendary Ishiro Honda who brought such intense gravity to the first outing committed to other projects, Motoyoshi Oda was tapped to follow in those gigantic train-car sized footsteps. Tsubaraya & team, along with Akira Watanabe returned to helm special effects and aimed to set the bar higher having learned lessons from their first foray into suitmation. This is the first time we see Godzilla battling another monster, and the introduction of the recurring kaiju Anguirus. The tone of this film is a distinct departure from the original, but has yet to really find a distinct voice. It’s a mixed bag that doesn’t quite hit the batshit insane notes of the rest of the franchise. Godzilla Raids Again feels like it’s got a foot in two worlds, showcasing the economic impact of devastated cities, and the more lighthearted jovial banter of our human cast paired with some goofball rubber monster suit wrestling.

The story centers around two pilots Soichi Tsukioka (played by Hiroshi Koizumi) and Koji Kobayashi (played by Minoru Chiaki, an Akira Kurosawa regular). They’re spotters for a tuna cannery and the chemistry of their genuine friendship eclipses that of Soichi and his romantic interest Hidemi Yamaji, the boss’s daughter ooh la la. When Kobayashi’s plane crashes on an island, Tsukioka comes to the rescue and they discover Godzilla battling Anguirus. There’s a fun POV shot of the on-ground perspective looking up through a crevasse as the two monsters duke it out above. But wait, Godzilla was obliterated by he Oxygen Destroyer, how can this be? No worries, it’s just “another one of the same species.”

Dr. Yamane makes a return appearance to explain this, but doesn’t really touch upon his main driving character trait: being concerned and intrigued about Godzilla being the last of its kind. Turns out that wasn’t the case and Yamane’s just like “huh, look at that.” They also discuss the other monster being an Ankylosaurus, also known as “Anguirus,” and as any 5 year old boy can tell you, it was absolutely not also known as “Anguirus,” but here we are. They also discuss how Anguirus had a 2nd brain in his butt which made him super-agile, and this was a prevailing theory at the time, but has since been debunked. (I will always love the dinosaur butt-brain theory though). The bigwigs theorize that Godzilla is sensitive to light because, and I shit you not, “it reminds him of the Hydrogen Bomb tests.” So the big plan is to use flares to lure Godzilla out to sea if he should come ashore. This fails in spectacular fashion as we’ll soon see.

Where 1954’s Godzilla focuses on the direct horrors of nuclear war, Godzilla Raids Again wants to demonstrate the economic impacts of war and destruction. Our human-plot follows employees of a Tuna cannery, and we get to see glimpses of day-to-day life as Soichi and Hidemi hang out at a swank night club. We see the integral parts of the company all working in tandem: fishing boats, spotters, and dispatch. The worries they discuss go beyond just nightmarish radiation poisoning. Even if they survive, their business and way of life will be in jeopardy. We see the wreckage of their main office and folks undergoing the monumental task of cleaning up and rebuilding.

When the action starts, the city is asked to go into a full blackout to avoid setting Godzilla into a rage with the light that reminds him of that one time a Hydrogen bomb exploded. A band of criminals are being evacuated and disarm their guards, making an escape. It’s their selfish act in the face of communal solidarity that draws Godzilla towards Osaka when they crash their getaway car into an oil refinery which causes a massive explosion. The movie says clearly to the viewer: we are trying to get our shit together in post-war Japan, and you damn criminals are fucking it all up. It makes no effort to address the potential root causes of poverty and crime. Eventually the criminals flee into a subway station and see their comeuppance; the station is flooded during a battle between the two behemoths above.

Hilariously, the flares that were supposed to lure Godzilla AWAY from Osaka, lure our boy Anguirus INTO the city. Tsubaraya and Watanabe’s new costumes allowed the actors a wider range of motion, and didn’t cause them to pass out of heat strokes after three minutes. In order to show off the new suits, larger and more intricate sets were built, just to be destroyed in the filming process, including a recreation of Osaka Castle. As the monsters shake the earth beneath it and crash into its sides, they use a cute effect of animating cracks over the model before its ultimate collapse. The radio man calling the news describes Godzilla as “THE BASTARD-SPAWN OF THE HYDROGEN BOMB” during this bout and honestly that moniker kicks ass and should have been brought back in every subsequent movie.

There’s one scene in particular during the fighting that due to a cameraman’s mistake, the footage is sped up to about 1.5x speed. Time and budget wouldn’t allow the team to rebuild the set for reshoots, so it’s kept in the film. Godzilla Raids Again isn’t the best entry of the franchise, but little things like that make it endearing to revisit. It’s also one of the few films with such mixed tones that we get to see the monsters draw blood on each other and Godzilla completely wrecks Aguirus’s shit and *sets him on fire.* Like the world of comics though, Anguirus will return. The rest of the film centers around containing and burying Godzilla in an avalanche, where Kobayashi sacrifices his life to kick off the flood of ice and rocks. There’s an emotional note where his best bud thanks him posthumously and says “We did it, we finally defeated Godzilla.”

Did you though? Nah. He’ll raid yet again 7 year later as things start to get Real Weird with King Kong vs Godzilla.