Shin Godzilla

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Director: Shinji Higuchi Year: 2025 Runtime: 120 min IMDb: ⭐ 6.9
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Synopsis

When a massive, gilled monster emerges from the deep and tears through the city, the government scrambles to save its citizens. A rag-tag team of volunteers cuts through a web of red tape to uncover the monster's weakness and its mysterious ties to a foreign superpower. But time is not on their side - the greatest catastrophe to ever befall the world is about to evolve right before their very eyes.

Plot[edit | edit source] In 2016, the Japan Coast Guard investigates an abandoned yacht in Tokyo Bay. The boat is soon destroyed, and the Tokyo Bay Aqua-Line is flooded with blood. After seeing a viral video of the incident, Deputy Chief Cabinet Secretary Rando Yaguchi believes it was caused by a living creature, which is confirmed as news reports reveal its tail emerging from the ocean. Shortly thereafter, the creature moves inland, crawling through the Kamata district and the Shinagawa area of Tokyo, leaving a path of death and destruction during a disorganized and chaotic evacuation. The creature quickly evolves into a bipedal form, but overheats and returns to the sea. The government officials focus on military strategy and civilian safety; Yaguchi is put in charge of a task force researching the creature. With high radiation readings from the creature's path, the task force realizes that it is energized by nuclear fission. The U.S. sends a special envoy, Kayoco Anne Patterson, who reveals that Goro Maki, a disgraced, anti-nuclear zoology professor, studied mutations caused by radioactive contamination, predicting the appearance of the creature. Both American and Japanese scientific circles disbelieved Maki. The U.S. then prevented him from publicly disclosing his conclusions. The abandoned yacht in Tokyo Bay belonged to Maki, who left his research notes, jumbled into a code, on the boat before disappearing. The creature—named "Godzilla" after Maki's research—reappears in its fourth form, twice its original size, making landfall near Kamakura. The Japan Self-Defense Forces mobilize but prove ineffective as Godzilla breaks through their defenses into Tokyo. The U.S. intervenes with a massively destructive airstrike plan, prompting the evacuation of civilians and government personnel. Godzilla is wounded with MOP "bunker-buster" bombs but responds with destructive atomic rays fired from its mouth and dorsal plates, destroying a helicopter carrying the prime minister, along with top government officials, and incinerating large swaths of Tokyo. Depleted of its energy, Godzilla goes into hibernation. Yaguchi's team discovers that Godzilla's plates and blood work as a cooling system, theorizing that it could use a coagulating agent to freeze Godzilla. Analyzing tissue samples reveals that Godzilla is an ever-evolving creature capable of reproducing asexually. The United Nations, aware of this, informs Japan that thermonuclear weapons will be used against Godzilla should the Japanese fail to subdue it in a few days; evacuations are ordered in multiple prefectures in preparation. Unwilling to see nuclear weapons detonated in Japan again, Patterson uses her political connections to buy time for Yaguchi's team, in which the interim government has little faith. Yaguchi's team manages to decipher Goro Maki's encoded research using origami. The team adjusts its plan and procures the means to conduct its deep-freeze plan with international support. Hours before the planned nuclear attack, Japan enacts the deep-freeze plan. Godzilla is provoked into expelling its atomic breath and energy against Predator and Reaper drones. The team then detonates nearby buildings and sends unmanned trains loaded with explosives toward Godzilla's feet, subduing it, and enabling tankers full of coagulant to inject it into Godzilla's mouth. Many are killed, but Godzilla is eventually frozen solid. In the aftermath, scientists discover that Godzilla's isotope has a half-life of twenty days, and that Tokyo can soon be rebuilt. The international community agrees to cancel the nuclear attack on the condition that, should Godzilla reawaken, an immediate thermonuclear strike will be executed. On Godzilla's tail, humanoid creatures appear frozen in the process of emerging.

Summary adapted from TMDb and Wikipedia sources.

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Content Warnings

⭐ IMDb Parents Guide 🛡️ Common Sense Media

a dog dies
Yes
the abused becomes the abuser
spoiler Only if you count Godzilla
a cat dies
spoiler A cat very briefly is shown in a shelter. At the end of the movie, what seems to be the same shelter is shown again as people celebrate - it's safe to assume the cat made it out unharmed, as well.
animals are abused
spoiler Radioactive waste is tossed into the ocean.
an animal is sad
spoiler Godzilla is all but confirmed in the movie to be in immense pain, and the lyrics of "Who Will Know" are mournful and from Godzilla's perspective
there are sharks
Yes
there's an alligator or crocodile
spoiler No, but if you are uncomfortable with large reptiles this is probably not a great movie for you.
someone is restrained
Yes
a kid dies
spoiler We see a woman and her children slide across their apartment as Godzilla destroys the building
a major character dies
spoiler If the Japanese Prime Minister counts as a major character, then yes. Although this is very much an ensemble cast. There isn't a particular single main character.
someone dies
Yes
a family member dies
spoiler We see two parents and a child in a building that Godzilla, in its second armless form, tries to scale, but its weight causes the building to collapse, killing the family inside.
a parent dies
spoiler We see a woman and her children slide across their apartment as Godzilla destroys the building
there are jump scares
Yes
there's a claustrophobic scene
spoiler Some scenes show the japanese populace being evacuated to cramped underground shelters, one camera shot is from inside a cabinet.
there's natural bodies of water
spoiler Many scenes show the ocean.
someone vomits
spoiler No, unless you count Godzilla's atomic breath, or the deleted scene of Godzilla vomiting blood
There's audio gore
spoiler There is no audio of injuries happening (bones breaking etc) but there are some wet sounds not associated with on or off-screen gore.
teeth are damaged
spoiler Godzilla’s teeth are a mess
there are 9/11 depictions
spoiler The film is a metaphor for the Fukushima Nuclear Disaster
a priceless artifact is destroyed
spoiler Many buildings, some of which appear to be historical, are destroyed.
there's misophonia
Yes
someone has a meltdown
Yes
there are sudden loud noises
Yes
there's flashing lights or images
spoiler Godzilla steps on an electrical plant and the screen strobes for a moment. It's very brief.
shaky cam is used
spoiler There's a lot of scenes with a shakey cam that can be disorienting, particularly those where Godzilla attacks. I don't know why people are voting "no"
there's screaming
Yes
the fourth wall is broken
spoiler There are several scenes where the characters look directly at the camera, even tho they never talk to the spectator
religion is discussed
spoiler Godzilla is referred to as God/a God, but otherwise no
there's suicide
spoiler Happens before the film begins. The act is not shown, but is heavily implied.
existentialism is debated
Yes
the ending is sad
spoiler it’s not sad but it’s ominous
a car crashes
spoiler Several cars are seen being destroyed as Godzilla walks through a seaside town. These scenes were directly inspired by the 2011 Tsunami and were made to look like it, if that helps.
a plane crashes
spoiler No visible crashes but planes do get lasered and destroyed (in the dark)
a car honks or tires screech
Yes
there's blood/gore
spoiler There's a scene with red fluid coming out of Godzilla's 2nd form gills, it's easily mistaken for blood but is confirmed not to be. There is a single brief scene where blood spurts from Godzilla (but it's not graphic)
there's gun violence
spoiler They shoot Godzilla with every kind of gun they have.
someone drowns
spoiler It’s left somewhat ambiguous— someone is implied to have committed suicide in the ocean before the events of the film.
there's a nuclear explosion
spoiler There is no explosion, however a nuke being used is considered a possibility, and Nuclear Radiation unrelated to a nuke is discussed quite often. This aspect of the movie was inspired by the Fukushima Nuclear Disaster, if that helps.
there's body horror
spoiler Godzilla's various forms might gross some people out. His second form pulsates blood through his neck gills.
someone is burned alive
spoiler Politicians die in a fiery helicopter crash (we see from the outside). Godzilla’s beams burn/kill many people (we don’t see details).
someone is crushed to death
Yes
someone is buried alive
spoiler People are still inside a building that collapses.

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