First trailer for the Godzilla anime comes roaring in!

Usually when it comes to news about the Big G – that’s Godzilla, not, y’know, other stuff – Darryn is the one to handle it. He’s our resident “Kaiju” fanboy after all. What he isn’t a fan of though, is the latest trend in big budget anime productions ditching traditionally animated visuals to instead use CG 3D visuals that emulate those traditional methods. Except they don’t really. Well, not well enough that you don’t notice it.

This is why Darryn’s initial frothy excitement at the news on Friday about the release of the first trailer for a new Godzilla anime feature film was very quickly snuffed out when he actually watched the preview. Yes, Godzilla: Kaiju Wakusei (aka Godzilla: Monster Planet for those of you who don’t speak Japanese), makes use of CG animation. Luckily for you folks (and probably also some dodgy life decisions in my past) my standards are a lot more pliable, which is why I’m showing off the first trailer to you today.

Well, that and the fact that I’m actually digging the premise for this feature film, which you can read all about in the sometimes iffy translated official story introduction below:

The last summer of the 20th Century. That day, the human beings learn that they are not the only ruler of the planet Earth.

The appearance of the giant living creatures “Kaiju’s” and the ultimate existence that destroys all monsters: Godzilla. Through the battle against kaiju’s that lasted for half a century, human beings has experienced continuous defeat, and finally plans to escape from the Earth. And in 2048, only those who were selected by the A.I. managed under the central government boarded the inter-sidereal emigrant spaceship “Aratrum” to head for “Tau Cetus e”, the planet beyond the distance of 11.9 light-year. However, the environmental condition differences between that of the Earth and Tau e, which they finally arrived after 20 years were far beyond the predicted numbers, and was not an environment considered to be habitable by human beings.

The young man on the emigrant ship: Haruo, who saw his parents killed by Godzilla in front of his eyes when he was 4 years old, had only one thing in his mind for 20 years: to return to the Earth and defeat Godzilla. Shut out from the possibility of emigration, as the living environment in the ship deteriorates, the group of “Earth Returnists” led by Haruo became the majority, and determines to head back to Earth through a dangerous long-distance hyperspace navigation. However, the Earth they have returned has already passed the time of 20,000 years, and has become an unknown world with the ecosystem reigned by Godzilla.

At the end, will human beings win back the Earth? And what will Haruo see beyond his fate?

That actually sounds pretty cool, in a jilted, broken way. And this is what it looks like

Godzilla: Kaijū Wakusei will be co-directed by Kobun Shizuno – who helmed several Detective Conan and Fist of the North Star movies – and Hiroyuki Seshita – who directed Ajin, as well as Knights of Sidonia, the anime that arguably started this most recent CG visuals trend. Godzilla: Kaijū Wakusei is scheduled to debut in cinemas in Japan in November, but producer TOHO has signed a deal with Netflix to also make the film available globally on their streaming service.

Last Updated: July 10, 2017