By the early 90s there were two huge crazes running rampant through the minds of the world’s youth. The 80s brought a resurgence of robot obsessions with Transformers and Gundam, but equally if not more enticing was the concept of DINOSAURS. Growing up in the 80s and 90s, I had caught dino fever from an early age. My parents graciously got every Rupert Oliver dinosaur book which detailed the environment and diet of different species, and told a story for each one that made learning engaging. I had a set of about 100 cards with realistic dinosaur illustrations and impossibly small text packed full of information on each one. These are a few of the things that taught me how to read. Movies and TV shows tapped into this interest with Land Before Time, Dino-Riders, and even Barney and Friends. But those were all small potatoes compared to what was to come in 1993. A legendary director would use skillful practical effects to spin a tale of genetic engineering gone wrong. That’s right, 1993 was the year Roger Corman’s Carnosaur came out! Just kidding; while Corman’s low-budget schlocky horror flick did release a few weeks prior, Spielberg’s Jurassic Park mesmerized audiences with some of the best effects ever seen and changed film forever. While Jurassic Park is inarguably a better movie, arguably one of the best films ever made, I still have a soft spot for Carnosaur. It is not good, but it is way off the deep end, the effects are fun, and for an 11 year old kid was excitingly violent and gory. And for anyone who appreciates practical effects on a low budget, Roger Corman was one of the best. It’s worth watching his films if for nothing else than to appreciate how far he could stretch a dollar, and how many greats were graduates from the “Roger Corman Film School.” Not an official organization, but Corman was an independent pioneer who worked with and influenced Francis Ford Coppola, James Cameron, Jack Nicholson, Ron Howard, Martin Scorcese, Joe Dante and many others. Joining Spielberg and Corman in the ’93 dinosaur rampage through the silver screen was returning director Takao Okawara in Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla II.

The title of this entry is pretty misleading because the first was in the Showa Era, and continuity got reset in 1984. Most Heisei adaptations got a rephrased title, but this one opted for the “sequel” format even though they aren’t connected. Others like Mothra vs Godzilla & Ghidorah, The Three-Headed Monster could be rephrased to fit the “Godzilla vs…!” format, but the original was already Godzilla vs Mechagodzilla so it seems like they just gave up and slapped a two on there. Back on musical score is the great Akira Ifukube, and the film was promoted as being his final work with Godzilla. This is because there was a deal with TriStar pictures to produce an American Godzilla film, and this was again supposed to be the last Toho movie. That deal fell through though and both Toho and Ifukube would return. Now veteran Koichi Kawakita would head up the special effects and this seemed like another fun project for him given his propensity for futuristic technology.

Speaking of which, the opening shot is a slow pan over the remains of Mecha-King Ghidorah. We learn that the United Nations has created the United Nations Godzilla Countermeasures Center (UNGCC) as a Godzilla response unit who have created two new weapons: the self-explanatory Mechagodzilla and the aerial assault vehicle Garuda. Yeah, you BET those two things are gonna combine later. While credits roll, we see factory machines welding panels onto Mechagodzilla while an amazing Ifukube motif plays. It’s so solid, with low booming notes mirroring Godzilla’s theme. We meet a UNGCC engineer who helped design the Garuda: Kazuma Aoki played by Masahiro Takashima. He’s being transferred to the UNGCC’s military branch G-Force, and seems surprised at this, can they just do that? Reassign you to the army? I guess so, and his commanding officer isn’t too impressed by the man’s file. In reviewing it, Aoki has listed “Pteranodons” as a hobby. Seeing as he’s a grown ass man, the commander is like “are you serious, dude?” because he’s apparently the only one who’s unaware he’s living in a Godzilla film.

Aoki is put through training which understandably includes tactical lessons detailing the exact radius of Godzilla’s atomic breath and timing between dorsal plate flashes and firing it. Then of course, he has to learn karate! Which he will NEVER use in this film! I’m not sure what kind of enemy territory he would crash down in where knowing how to get away from an 328 foot monster would be more helpful but here we are.

Meanwhile, in another part of the movie, a research team seems to have found a hatched Pteranodon egg. My boy Aoki is already ahead of the curve here. But alongside it is a different kind of egg that hasn’t hatched yet. As they’re chilling out for the night, a revamped Rodan shows up and chases them off. His theme is same, but the Heisei redesign is a nice throwback to the features in the original Rodan film, albeit keeping the brown hue from the Showa era. Godzilla rises from the ocean with little fanfare or ramping up and has a brief fight with Rodan to kick things off. If it’s got one thing going for it, Godzilla vs Mechagodzilla II really packs in the monster action. We see some cool shots from Godzilla’s point of view with Rodan pecking at the camera, with some sharp sound work too. They do a great job at making Rodan a formidable opponent, especially because Rodan is a puppet and model rather than an actor in a suit.

The research team manages to secure the egg during this battle and take it back with them. Aoki sees this on the news and shows up to the lab introducing himself as a Pteranodon enthusiast to Azusa Gojo, played by Ryoko Sano. Aoki hits on her before being kicked out, and steals a sample of a plant from the lab on the way. While eating lunch, Aoki has the plant sample out on the table, and returning favorite Megumi Odaka’s Miki Saegusa picks up some psychic readings from it. To investigate further, it looks like they’ll need the help of psychic children! Because of course. Gotta have some psychic kids in your 90s Godzilla. In a fun nod to audiences, the teachers at the psychic school are played by Keiko Imamura and Sayaka Osawa, the Mothra twins from the last movie, and they speak in unison too!

The kids pick up on a song emanating from the plant and feed it into a computer. Playing this song near the egg causes it to glow and hatch, terrifying Azusa as she realizes it’s not a Pteranodon. The camera work here is impressive and adds a lot of tension to the scene, which is hilariously snapped when Miki recognizes the psychic signature of a Godzillasaurus, an herbivore much more gentle than Godzilla. She did travel back in time to meet one before, so this checks out. It turns out this “Baby” Godzilla has imprinted on Azusa while he was in the egg, and it adds a nice dynamic for the rest of the film. The baby is adorable, in sharp contrast to Minilla, the son of Godzilla in the Showa era. Ideas for bringing Minilla back were floated around but director Takao Okawara said in no uncertain terms: “absolutely not.” Baby was a good compromise, because Minilla is just awful.

But the peace doesn’t last long, because Godzilla’s attacking the city! The matte work is great here, and Mechagodzilla is scrambled in response. They have to find another pilot though, because Aoki is MIA, and going to come back later like “Hey sorry I couldn’t show up for Army today, I had a Pteranodon thing. Didn’t turn out to be a Pteranodon though.” The first Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla battle is pretty fun, lots of lasers, and Mechagodzilla has some wired hooks that impale and shock Godzilla with blood gushing everywhere. You never know what you’re gonna get violence-wise, but this one has some weird graphic moments! Mechagodzilla appears to have the upper hand until Godzilla fires a pulse that fries its circuits. The whole movie has a theme of nature vs technology, and the hubris of man thinking he can contain nature. It’s not quite as cautionary or serious as the original anti-nuclear themes, but it works well enough.

The evacuation scenes are a lot more panicked and frantic than they’ve been in the past too, a result of improvements to composite shot techniques over the years. It seems Godzilla is drawn to the psychic call of Baby, so they bring him to a shielded facility where they set up a cute little zoo habitat for him. While studying Baby, they discover there’s a second brain in its hindquarters and assume that Godzilla will have one too, so that’s the plan moving forward. It’s actually based on a theory that was going around for a long while that dinosaurs were so large with brain cavities so small that there must have been a second one to control their back half. It’s been debunked but was popular for almost a century. At least they were trying to incorporate some of the science as it was understood at the time.

Aoki has an idea for improving the mobility of Mechagodzilla once repairs are done: slap the dang Garuda on it! In a demo of the mobility, the movie breaks out the Star-Fox graphics even going so far as to blow up some random crystal shapes. Everything seems to be going well with Baby until Miki shows up with her psychic children. They’re like “yeah, we’d just like to sing this haunting tune to the Baby Godzilla if that’s ok.” The song sends Baby into a rage, and seems to energize Rodan who’s just been chillin on his island. The military wants to use Baby as a lure to Godzilla and then attack it with the revamped Mecha, with Miki inside to locate that second brain. Hell yeah, psychic targeting system! Neither Azusa or Miki like this plan but grudgingly agree to it.

The revitalized Rodan now has a more red color and fully transformed into a stronger nod to the original design. Azusa and Baby are being transported in a shipping crate, not secured inside at all and is NOBODY worries about massive head trauma in these films? At least the guys in Megalon had an excuse, they were going to kill the people inside but these folks intend to get to their destination safely! But you know what they say about best laid plans. Rodan attacks the helicopter hauling the shipping crate and steals it with Baby and Azusa inside.

Mechagodzilla, the Garuda, and Rodan have it out, with Rodan getting an upgrade from Baby’s psychic scream that allows him to shoot lasers now. If you’re wondering how this actually happened, just take advice from the MST3K theme and don’t worry about it. Radiation! Radiation explains everything! There’s a ton of fights in the last half hour here. Rodan vs Mechagodzilla and Garuda, Godzilla vs each of them too, then the Garuda combines to form Super-Mechagodzilla, and with Miki’s help finds the pseudoscientific weak point in his haunches. Miki is torn because of her past connection with Godzilla, and it’s refreshing to see her actually act in this film. Megumi Odaka is does a swell job; it’s unfortunate that she’s been criminally underused in previous films.

Ok, well if you thought this movie was crazy before, here’s where it goes insane. Super Mechagodzilla has destroyed the butt brain of Godzilla, paralyzing him from the waist down, and SMG is just unloading its full arsenal on him. So Baby cries out to Rodan who just got his ass kicked, and was gurgling on his own brown blood last we saw, and Rodan flies on over to transfer his lifeforce to the dying Godzilla. Rodan glows and turns into glitter before being absorbed by the larger monster. Life, uhhh, finds a way! This revives Godzilla’s butt brain and Team G-Force collectively drops logs in their flightsuits. As well they should! Godzilla is now glowing red, and yeah, that can’t be good… Just being near Mechagodzilla is melting away its armor plating.

Godzilla’s atomic breath is now red too, and erupting in more flames than usual wherever it lands. It’s kind of incredible that the crew actually gets out alive. There’s a little gag where the Mechagodzilla’s onboard computer says there are no survivors, but they’re all just “heh, stupid machine. Nature wins today!” There’s a teary White Fang goodbye between Azusa and Baby before Godzilla leads him out to sea, and our human team waxes philosophical about how life will always in the conflict with technology, surmising that dinosaurs are going regain control of the Earth after humanity goes extinct. In a world where these dinosaurs and monsters pop up regularly, that’s not really a stretch.

Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla II is ultimately a very silly entry, even by kaiju standards, but if you can roll with it, it’s one of the more action heavy movies that anyone can enjoy. It also has one of the best Godzilla movie posters ever made. We’re fortunate that this wasn’t the last Toho Godzilla movie; could you imagine if they ended on a sequel to a movie that was removed from continuity? It’s hard enough to explain that yes this is a sequel, but you don’t need to see the first one, but you should probably see Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah if you want to get the context in the beginning. Now it can just bask in the middle of the Heisei era setting things up for the next two movies. Next up, Baby will return in: Godzilla vs. SPACE GODZILLA. Yeah, you read that right.