[Dr Kain]

With “Godzilla vs. Mecha Godzilla” being so successful one year prior, what better way to bring in another entry into the series than just to rinse and repeat the same monster over? That is exactly what Toho did and with it came the end of an era. This would be the final movie in the series for nearly ten years as the monster’s popularity dwindled.

“Terror of Mecha Godzilla” starts off with a five minute recap of the previous movie, which may have been ideal in the 70s, but when you watch this movie immediately after the first one, it becomes tedious redundancy. The plot removes King Ceasar from the equation and replaces him with another adversary for Godzilla to fight named Titanosaurus. Titanosaurus was discovered by a scientist many years prior and with the help of the alien ape men, Dr. Mafune is finally able to control it. Interpol investigates this monster with the help of an oceanographer named Ichinose and they discover the fishy dinosaur’s weakness and in the process, uncover another alien conquest plot. Mecha Godzilla is repaired and a three way battle ensures between Godzilla, Mecha Godzilla, and Titanosaurus. In the end, this plot is kind of boring. It stars the same type of aliens from the last movie, only this time, they have far more screen time than before, and yet, even less is known about them than previously. It does not help that the entire Mecha Godzilla plot just feels rehashed as if Toho did not want to spend money on doing anything creative, and even the final battle feels that way. There seems to be a lack of energy from the finale and the actors do not seem to be all that enthused by their roles. It feels like they are just going through the motions of these characters because they are being paid to.

In fact, while the last movie focused on several characters and only developed half of them, this movie does even less of that. Katsura is nicely developed, but she seems to be the only one. Her father has a little bit of development while Ichinose seems to be there because they needed someone who was not an officer in the movie. Unfortunately, that does not help matters when the actress playing Katsura seems to have the emotional range of a tree. While it would make sense because she is part robot, it still does not give her an excuse to be so boring in her role, especially when she is the only character movie that is supposed to grow.

It is quite apparent that this movie was made on an extremely low budget because the effects look average, the miniatures look fake, and there is very little in the way of a city in this movie. The final battle starts in a city and then suddenly the trio of monsters are fighting over a vast country side without any warning. For all we know, if the battle had continued on for another few minutes they would have suddenly been fighting in the arctic. Even Mecha Godzilla’s barrage of attacks are boring. Ifukube’s score does not make the final battle any more exciting either.

Speaking of the monsters, there is not too much to say. Godzilla looks like he did in the last one, but with another new face that goes back to being super hero like. Mecha Godzilla is the exact same suit as before as well, just with a 2 on the arms below the MG. On the other hand, Titanosaurus seems to be where the entire budget of the movie went to, as he is unique looking and an interesting idea in concept. It is too bad he was short changed by being in a movie where he had to share screen time with Mecha Godzilla and with a budget too limited to really let him shine.

Overall, this movie is a mess. It is boring, the characters are uninteresting and phone in their performances, the monsters are bland, the music sounds off, and the effects are cheaply done. If there is one thing to learn from this it is that ending an era of Godzilla movies should not be this flat. I give “Terror of Mecha Godzilla” a 4/10 stars.