Godzilla and his "friends" ... The now little-known series Godzilla Island features two seasons totaling 256 episodes aired over a year from 1997 to 1998. In the story, most of the Toho monsters are gathered on a certain island, over which the G-Guard looks. However, a flying saucer invades the Earth, and all sorts of troubles begin.
Created only for the sale of toys, the TV product demonstrates, in fact, what it sells - figures of Godzilla and his "friends." The three-minute series mainly consist of either conversations between a pair of characters within four walls, or of showing toys, like commercials.
Everyone knows perfectly well how to advertise toys - here they shoot, move, flaunt in the appropriate scenery, depending on the concept that we are - ninja turtles, spider-man, ji-ai-ji team or here, for example, Japanese kaiju.
The company needs to sell as many different toys as possible, so several types of Motra appear on the screen in Godzilla Island: a classic butterfly, a larva and even a Motra-leo in its again dramatic plot. Later, another line begins with the egg and the evil Batra. At least we have to pay tribute to the series, we at least saw this monster again, but Batra is presented only in the form of a butterfly.
The same goes for robots: Mehagodzilla's 1993 version is here, as it should, on the good side of the people and managed by them, and Meger's (M.O.G.E.R.A.) 1994 model. But their Shova-analogues: Meha-Godzilla 70x and Meger 60x, according to their canon, antagonists and on the side of the aliens.
However, monsters fight among themselves for a variety of reasons. From internal conflicts to mental insanity or mind control. Already for two hundred and fifty-odd series of reasons for action in the frame is enough with more than enough, although the logic of events often suffers, and naivety goes off the scale.
Outwardly, toys are like toys. If someone scolds the Kaiju genre itself, for the fact that there are “rubber monsters” – he clearly needs to show this series, and then for comparison include the best samples of the genre from the 90s, where monsters are presented quite alive, believable and real.
By the way, the show does not hesitate to waste time sometimes on the screen showing directly shots from different films of different eras. The attack on King Gidora, Godzilla’s fight with Radon and subsequent communication with Motra the Maggot, and even how the updated Godzilla destroys Tokyo in the 1984 film.
The series is full of nonsense, absurdities and funny humorous moments, as its only target audience is children. Actually, if you as a child loved to play with something like this: robots, soldiers, dragons, figures of superheroes - then you perfectly understand what happens in this series.
It's as if a little kid is given a crew and they do whatever they say and whatever they think. Battles of monsters, from relationships, the human factor of command, if the child likes to include himself in the game, and not only control and pit, in general, a kind of “sandbox game” in the traditions of children’s imagination. The best or worst is a matter of taste.
However, the plot is not necessary for the plot. The series is divided into so-called "sagas" - individual stories, several episodes in each. There are good sagas, and there are wildly delusional, for example, about a flying tape recorder that makes monsters dance.
The appearance of creatures for toys is even good. At least usually, stores sell something that does not really move as shown on the screen, and here monsters even open their mouths, Space-Godzilla has detachable shoulder crystals, although, in general, the mechanics of movements they have, of course, puppet and all the improbability is striking.
Robots do not even look plastic, but rubber, King-Seazar has no hair, Guygan even the circular in his belly does not move, and when Motra flaps her wings, you can see the fishing lines moving her. Sometimes not even the newest toys are shown - there is also shrivelled paint and other defects.
However, only Godzilla Jr. is really poorly made here, resembling some beam-eyed plasticine alien, not similar to either the Chauvet or the Haysay version. With him, the plots are usually the most stupid and ridiculous, but close to children, like an episode where he escapes from an injection.
By the way, probably the most unpopular in sales at Bandai was the robot Jet-Jaguar from the worst movie about Godzilla – “Godzilla vs. Megalon”. To fill the toy popularity, the robot was presented here in a bunch of versions. He is here and silver, and red, and even, oh horror, Jet-Medik with a red cross and a big syringe!
Expect new kaiju from the series is not worth it, although there are a number of interesting exhibits. Mechanical King Hydor is presented in a very hyper-version with all mechanical parts. Hedora in its second appearance grows from mushrooms and has a bluish tint. And those who watched “Yamato Takeru” in 1994 recognize the deity Kumasogami. Also in the series there is a monster-cactus Goorin, clearly demonstrating all the scarcity of imagination of the authors.
Radon, Baragon, and Horosaurus will appear on the island. There will be Angirus with a small storyline (just about the cactus), often the Destroyer participates in the action. Even the mantis Kamakuras gets its screen time, and in one saga appears the submarine Gotengo (Atragon). The authors have forgotten only about the snake Mandu and the spider Kumongu (Spiga). But, with a spider, apparently, of course – children will not want to buy this.
Human characters are generally meaningless. They are caricatured and funny, sometimes moderately cute and may appeal to young audiences. Well, the main character looking after the island is played by Jiro Dan, a member of many Ultraman series, mainly as Ultraman Jack. Characters are helped by sometimes talking mechanisms in the spirit of Alpha-5 from Rangers, and by the second season the heroes become almost twice as many, but this is hardly to be attributed to the pluses of the show.
“Godzilla Island” is what happens in the imagination of a young child when he is on the floor, holding two toys in his hands, arranges some conflict between them and various battles. Who came up with the idea to film this is unclear, but since the series was on the air for a whole year and even had a specific story ending, both for each saga story separately and for the series as a whole in the finale of the second season, apparently it had at least some success.
Naive, primitive, very, very childish, but with a bunch of monsters fighting to the cult music of Akira Ifukube, who even published the soundtrack for the series. Twenty-two stories, stretching into two hundred and fifty-six episodes, are still quite voluminous material, even if each episode here lasts like a commercial. After all, that's what the show does, it advertises toys, it showcases them in all their glory as their capabilities. At least Godzilla Island, like the Motra Trilogy, smoothly closes the gap between the Toho eras, because in 1999 Godzilla: Millennium was already released.
5 out of 10
Original