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In a direct sequel to Godzilla:
Planet of Monsters, our human refugees who have just returned to
earth find themselves facing an even bigger Godzilla than before, and on
the run, they discover that humankind has survived, if seemingly regressed
to an early stage of civilisation - basically they live in caves and most
of our cultural and technological achievements are lost to them. But they
have mastered the art of telepathy, and they carry spears of nanometal,
some sort of living metal, which helps them ward off all kinds of
monsters, including Godzilla. This leads our heroes, led by Haruo, to the
conclusion that whatever became of Mechagodzilla back then earth was lost
to us humans 20,000 years ago must still be around - as nanometal was
developed to build Mechagodzilla. Especially two alien humanoids, the
Bilusaludo, are very keen on finding what became of Mechagodzilla ... and
they're all in for a big surprise, as in the last 20,000 years since
Mechagodzilla has been destroyed, it has naturally evolved into a big
industrial complex thanks to the nanometal and Mechagodzilla's still
functioning brain, a complex that has developed all kinds of weaponry. So
soon a plan is hatched to defeat Godzilla using what's at hand, led by
Haruo and his love interest Yuko, who are to fly robotic
"Vultures" to lure Godzilla into the complex to destroy him once
and for all. Now that part of the plan actually goes pretty well, and in
the finale Godzilla's bombarded with nanometal and dies ... but it's the
Bilusaludo that are really the problem, as they want for all of humankind
- and themselves - to become one with the Mechagodzilla complex, as a sort
of evolutional step that ... not too many humans like. And while the
Bilusaludo ultimately fail in their plans, supposedly dead Godzilla opens
his eyes yet again ... Building on the premise of the rather
disappointing Godzilla:
Planet of Monsters, Godzilla: City on the Edge of Battle
actually manages to bring a lot more to the table than the earlier movie
did: While the first in the trilogy wasted way too much time in telling a
very basic plot (humans try to defeat Godzilla), this one with its robot
city, its evolved humankind, and some interesting subplots actually
manages to tell a highly original story. Far fetched maybe, but if you can
suspend your disbelief enough you'll really get drawn into the narrative.
Sure, the characters are still paper-thin (maybe even more so than in Godzilla:
Planet of Monsters), and we get to see very little of the titular
monster - in fact, the big G is hardly featured before the finale -, but
what the film's really good at is world buidling, as it really manages to
make its inherent logic palpable, no matter how ridiculous it might be
objectively. All that said, this is by no means a perfect movie, as
mentioned its characters are pale, and some of the situations they get in
horribly generic, but it's oddly fascinating still.
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