Godzilla 1998’s never-made sequel was originally supposed to put the franchise back on track. The film, which was the first American attempt to mount a film featuring the titular irradiated monster after he debuted in the 1954 Japanese classic Gojira and appeared in 21 Japanese sequels up to that point. However, the American version (which starred Matthew Broderick) turned out a lukewarm box office performance while being largely lambasted by critics and audiences.
Yahoo! Entertainment recently sat down with Godzilla 1998 producer and co-screenwriter Dean Devlin to discuss some projects of his that never made it off the ground. One of these was the canceled sequel to Godzilla 1998, which would have led to an aborted Godzilla trilogy. He revealed that Godzilla 2 would have starred Broderick and followed him to Monster Island, where a Godzilla hatchling teased by the original film would encounter Mothra and Rodan, eventually “converting Godzilla into a hero” rather than an amoral force of nature. Read his full quote below:
We made an intellectual decision that sounds good in the room, but is really terrible for making a movie.We decided that Godzilla was neither good nor evil — it was just an animal looking to reproduce. It was a threat to us because it puts us at risk in order to survive. That’s an interesting way to approach it, but it doesn’t tell the audience how they’re supposed to feel about the title character.
We really wanted to go to Monster Island. In the original Godzilla movies, Godzilla started off as a monster, but became a hero by the time Monster Island was introduced. The [1998] animated series and our sequel lived separately. But they did have the same idea of converting Godzilla into a hero so that when we got to the next movie, Godzilla would be the one who is going to save us, not kill us. It was all part of us going, “We knew we screwed up, but we can make this right!”
I have so much PTSD from my experience with Godzilla, I could never bring myself to watch the new version. That chapter of my life is closed.
Entirely Rebooting Godzilla Was the Best Idea
From this quote, it’s clear that Devlin knew that he and writer-director Roland Emmerich would have to do some damage control with Godzilla 2. However, the franchise would need more than just a new script to allow its public image to recuperate. The film became a lightning rod of bad movie discourse, to the point that the Japanese studio Toho featured the 1998 version of Godzilla perishing violently during the events of their 2004 film Godzilla: Final Wars.
To this day, Godzilla 1998 carries its reputation as a bomb. On Rotten Tomatoes, its critic score of 19 percent is only barely outstripped by the audience score of 28 percent. Even if Godzilla 2 had completely turned the franchise around, a sequel that came out within just a few years of the 1998 film might not have garnered the audience interest it deserved.
Godzilla would eventually become the lead of a major American franchise, but it took until 2014 for that idea to come to fruition. Gareth Edwards’ 2014 film Godzilla became a critical and commercial success, launching the MonsterVerse, which is still running including an upcoming series and the Godzilla vs. Kong sequel Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire. If Godzilla 2 had come out and also flopped, this new franchise likely would never have existed.
Source: Yahoo! Entertainment
Key Release Dates
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Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire
