Was the childish obsession with dinosaurs a product of “Godzilla (Gojira”) in 1954? Am I trying to avoid recognizing Disney’s “Fantasia” as the trigger for this trend?

When I think about the dinosaurs that Walt Disney placed on the big screen, it was sort of traumatic when I saw a tyrannosaurus destroy a triceratops. Big reptiles finally seemed fun to me when the King of the Monsters succumbed to New World Pictures making him pitch Dr. Pepper for “Godzilla 1985”. The important thing about the big guy’s influence is that those who pay attention to the feature, will understand the historical context and will reflect upon the implications of American’s global influence.

Kaiju movies are a gateway to environmentalism. The silly models and suits may distract from that…as well as confuse when you have the actor from a “Star Wars” sequel or Guy Ritchie’s King Arthur speak with a different accent. But because of these elements, creators have gotten wise enough to the point that these features are art. They inspire other forms of sci-fi and take back elements from those to improve upon themselves.

As for putting giant robots in this category, as an eighties child, Godzilla and Voltron essentially walked hand-in-hand. How else were we going to keep that lizard in line before we trained a monkey to do so?