King Ghidorah is a big part of the Godzilla lore, and it was fantastic seeing your vision of this character. What was it like for you to bring this character to life in your film?

When Ghidorah made its silver screen debut in “Ghidorah, the Three-Headed Monster,” it was the first kaiju to appear in Matsumoto City, the same city where I was born and raised. I was very excited to go to the movie theater and see Ghidorah smash up my hometown. But when I got to the theater and saw the film, Ghidorah flies over Matsumoto Castle, and that was it. So I was disappointed.

With “Godzilla Minus One,” I was able to make the movie I wanted to see as a child. King Ghidorah appears in Matsumoto City, which is the same city where I set that scene, and it smashes it up. It’s really a dream come true for me. At the same time, I really love King Ghidorah as a kaiju because the design is amazing.

Hitting 3,254 North American theaters from GKids and Toho, Godzilla Minus Zero conquered $14.5 million on Friday, including Thursday previews, as it heads toward an estimated $32 million for the weekend. This is being touted as the highest-grossing live-action foreign-language opening at the box office since 2004’s Hero launched with $17.8 million. (It’s behind the debut of last year’s

Casting for the Kaiju x Cold War spy thriller Monsterverse spinoff television series has amped up again with announcements of Tim Robbins (Silo) and Giancarlo Esposito.

Interesting perspective on the creative process for Minus One in addition to teasing a third film.

“It would’ve been very easy to ride that wave, and I was very tempted to at certain moments. But we didn’t set out to capture a worldwide audience [with Minus One], and that was what made it quite unique,” Yamazaki says. “So I wanted to cherish that origin point, and instead of selling out, for lack of a better phrase, by making a film tailored toward the U.S. or American fans of Minus One, I wanted to tell a story that felt important [at home] right now.”

Despite the global streaming success of Monarch: Legacy of Monsters, and the Wyatt Russell Cold War prequel spinoff now in production in Prague, Czechia and London, UK (working title‘Birdwatcher’), it’s third season renewal remains uncertain.

Apple and Legendary Television are reportedly in discussions about a significant reworking of the show with a new creative team and showrunners and promises of more new titans.

For those of us, especially in the international audience, who really liked how Monarch was more grounded and leaned back into the original grounded and character-driven narratives that we saw in the 2014 film and in Skull Island, this is not great news.

For the younger audience (mainly in the US) who have been so vocally critical of Monarch, this seems to be a reset to change their narrative.

The reports say that any new direction for Monarch will not affect the prequel show with Wyatt Russell.

More news on premieres and media events as Godzilla Minus Zero hits theatrical release this week.

Toho has announced that, to celebrate Godzilla Day November 3rd (and to coincide with the release in Japan), some/select IMAX theatres will run a single 7:00 pm early special showing of Godzilla Minus Zero ahead of the broader international release on November 6, 2026.

It’s unclear if this will happen beyond the US market.

So, this link to a 12 year old posting on YouTube of an even older Japanese language ad for Hitachi just showed up in my feed.

For all who would like a copy for posterity, now we know whet to find it.

Enjoy!

Most of the major review sites have filed at least a ‘first look’ review of Godzilla Minus Zero following the world premiere at the New York Film Festival last weekend.

It’s mostly enthusiastic, with the exception of the odd one that criticizes any focus on ‘boring human characters’ vs Kaiju bashing one another. There’s even early musing that the film is in the hunt for a Best Picture Oscar nomination.

Here’s a round up of the reviews:

Hollywood Reporter

Polygon

IGN

Den of Geek

The Guardian (previously posted)

Roger Ebert

Screen Daily

Joblo

The Wrap

The Daily Beast

Reviews for Godzilla Minus Zero are being posted following its world premiere at the New York Film Festival.

The. Guardian review is posted but feel welcome to add links to others in this thread.

4/5 stars for an a genre film is extraordinary from The Guardian.

the movie’s extended climax features some of the most majestic CG monster action put to film; if the fun American MonsterVerse series tends toward pro-wrestling kaiju, Godzilla Minus Zero cross-breeds its fight-to-the-death grappling with disaster-movie scope and horror-movie teeth.

More on the R rating, and some information about the blew the roof off premiere at the New York Film Festival…

The long-awaited sequel to 2023’s “Godzilla Minus One” earned rave first reactions from the press earlier in the day, and that adoration rolled right into the world premiere. The movie was met with multiple mid-screening applauses as the crowd went wild for all the kaiju mayhem on screen.

“Logically, as a studio — and even as a director — you want as many people from the general public to be able to see your film,” Yamazaki told Variety at the premiere Saturday afternoon. “So, an R-rating might seem like a barrier to entry, and conversations about, ‘Hey, could we have not gotten this down to PG-13?’ of course are going to happen. In spite of that, though, there were certain scenes that, for me as a director, were so essential to the film. Censoring it or cutting it was just not an option for me.”

This report from Bloody Disgusting that Godzilla Minus Zero has received an R rating for excessive blood and violence is being cited elsewhere.

Unfortunately, the piece doesn’t say which rating authority in what country gave this rating. Since Bloody Disgusting is a US-based horror site, it’s likely to be the US rating.

As we know, the regulators vary on classification so it will be interesting to see how the film is evaluated and rated across jurisdictions.

For those of us looking to populate our holiday gift lists, the IMAX collection of movie collectibles has already been posted ahead of the upcoming premiere of Godzilla Minus Zero.

My partner seems to have received the memo — at least based on the “Oh no” accompanied by laughter from the lower floor.

cross-posted from: https://startrek.website/post/44201153

As the US financial markets, politicians and entertainment media obsess about mergers and moving production of US scripted shows back to the United States, this seems like an enormous reality check. The United States provides less and less of the scripted entertainment globally.

It squashes the long held beliefs that the world watches/prefers American popular entertainment exports over those made at home or in other countries and regions.

There’s a new global leader in greenlights.

Over the first half of 2026, Asia surpassed both North America and Europe to become the world’s leader in streaming scripted orders, the researchers at Ampere Analysis have found. From January through June, 36 percent of “first-run scripted TV orders from the leading global streamers” (Prime Video, Apple TV+, Disney+, HBO Max, Netflix and Paramount+) originated in the APAC (Asia-Pacific, which encompasses countries in East Asia, South Asia, Southeast Asia, and Oceania) region.

What’s unfortunate for members of this instance is that, in this process, it’s science fiction and fantasy that are being crowded out on the major streamers. (Perhaps that’s because English speaking science fiction and fantasy viewers are less willing to give scripted shows in and films in other languages a try…? )

Here’s a chart of the trends :

As a Canadian, who sees many of our Canadian productions obscure that they are set in Canada or even outright pretend to be in the USA even when based on Canadian source material, I hope that this means that we can tell our own stories without having to obscure our identity for distribution to international audiences.

As another example of Asian live-action and animated screen productions’ rapid and accelerating growth globally, Toho is increasing its footprint in Europe.

Toho Europe, the regional arm of Tokyo-based entertainment group Toho Co., Ltd. – founded in 1932 and best known internationally for the “Godzilla” franchise – announced a new branch in France. The company has been expanding across the European market since acquiring Anime Ltd. earlier this year, and said the French office would serve as a foundation for deeper engagement with the country’s film and animation industries.

Test screenings appear to have been completed for the upcoming Legendary Pictures Monsterverse cinematic release (expected in 2027 as opposed to the upcoming *Godzilla Minus Zero from Toho).

The buzz is coming from ‘anonymous screener reports’ to fan sites and IMDb.

Seems positive. Reportedly, the cartoonish extremes have been dialed back somewhat but still not as grounded as Godzilla (2014) and *Kong: Skull Island or Monarch: Legacy of Monsters.

New teaser with behind the scenes footage from Toho Official.

Just posted today on the creator’s Mastodon account.

Local media in Prague, Czech Republic, are continuing to provide updates on early production for Birdwatcher — working title for the new Monsterverse Monarch: Legacy of Monsters spinoff show focused on Lee Shaw during the Cold War in the 1980s.

The Prague Reporter can reveal exclusive photos from the production, showing star Wyatt Russell on location alongside an array of period props and vehicles. The imagery points to a story set in the Soviet Union during the Cold War, with Russell’s Lee Shaw apparently operating undercover and under pursuit by the KGB…

…The Prague Reporter’s exclusive set photos offer the clearest look yet at Birdwatcher‘s Cold War setting. Several images show period props featuring Cyrillic lettering, while others capture Russell in scenes that appear to depict his character moving covertly behind the Iron Curtain...

…e Cyrillic markings on props strongly suggest that Birdwatcher is portraying the Soviet Union, although the specific locations represented by the scenes have not been officially identified. Previous reports have placed the story in 1984, when Shaw is sent on a secret mission behind enemy lines to prevent the Soviet Union from unleashing a Titan capable of changing the course of the Cold War.

Here a couple of the large number of behind the scenes photos from the article.

Note: the lower photo for bread store #61 🍞— хлеб is Russian for bread.