Longtime readers of SciFiHistory.Net should well know by now, but -- if they've forgotten this single factoid about me I've mentioned countless times -- here it is again: "I grew up in a real small town in the middle of Nowhere, America."
As I've often said, we only had a handful of television stations back in my youth -- three of the major networks along with a few small market syndicated outlets -- so my entertainment choices were incredible limited. Some might say that -- were my generation anything like today's -- we probably could've sued Hollywood and the entire entertainment industry for not providing us with enough choices, but I digress ... The point is these tiny TV stations would end up running the same movies over and over and over again -- several times a year -- so I've lost count of the number of times I've actually seen Godzilla or any number of its early sequels. Let's just say that I came to love the big creature because I truly had no other choice.
Still, most kids in my small town didn't watch the movie, it would seem. They pretty much stuck to the big networks and whatever creative gibberish they had available in timeslots that catered to the youngest among us, but not yours truly. Even as an urchin, I was all about All Things Genre, so, yeah, I was somehow okay with experiencing that lumbering giant and his destructive tendencies over and over and over again because it tickled my fancy. I wanted to see Tokyo and parts of Japan destroyed, and Godzilla never failed me.
Why would I bring this up?
Well, it was on this day all the way back in 1954 -- in the year of our lord Toho -- that the gigantic lizard first sprang to life on screens. Whether you know it or not, it certainly made a lasting impact on the people of Japan, and I think it's safe to suggest that other people around the world eventually caught up with what made the franchise so magical: namely that special effects don't have to be perfect, what matters most is the wondrous killing monster with a decent origins story, and film history can still be made. Undoubtedly, the phenomenon that is Godzilla remains impactful to this day as there are other iterations all set for big and small screen exposure in the months ahead of when I'm posting this humble little blog entry. An incredible 69 years after it first crawled up from the Earth and the oceans, the original 'Big Guy' (screw you, Joe Biden) muscles onto film to the delight of its legion of fans.
Ah ... ain't it a great day to be a genre fan?
Well, well, well ...
Certainly there's a bit more cause to celebrate the day, but take a gander at the Daily Citations Page and I think you'll see that a good number of Godzilla follow-ups also hit screens over the years on this day. The mere fact alone that he's still marching large and tall for folks to discover and re-discover that magic brings joy to my heart.
Here's the link ...
As I've often said, we only had a handful of television stations back in my youth -- three of the major networks along with a few small market syndicated outlets -- so my entertainment choices were incredible limited. Some might say that -- were my generation anything like today's -- we probably could've sued Hollywood and the entire entertainment industry for not providing us with enough choices, but I digress ... The point is these tiny TV stations would end up running the same movies over and over and over again -- several times a year -- so I've lost count of the number of times I've actually seen Godzilla or any number of its early sequels. Let's just say that I came to love the big creature because I truly had no other choice.
Still, most kids in my small town didn't watch the movie, it would seem. They pretty much stuck to the big networks and whatever creative gibberish they had available in timeslots that catered to the youngest among us, but not yours truly. Even as an urchin, I was all about All Things Genre, so, yeah, I was somehow okay with experiencing that lumbering giant and his destructive tendencies over and over and over again because it tickled my fancy. I wanted to see Tokyo and parts of Japan destroyed, and Godzilla never failed me.
Why would I bring this up?
Well, it was on this day all the way back in 1954 -- in the year of our lord Toho -- that the gigantic lizard first sprang to life on screens. Whether you know it or not, it certainly made a lasting impact on the people of Japan, and I think it's safe to suggest that other people around the world eventually caught up with what made the franchise so magical: namely that special effects don't have to be perfect, what matters most is the wondrous killing monster with a decent origins story, and film history can still be made. Undoubtedly, the phenomenon that is Godzilla remains impactful to this day as there are other iterations all set for big and small screen exposure in the months ahead of when I'm posting this humble little blog entry. An incredible 69 years after it first crawled up from the Earth and the oceans, the original 'Big Guy' (screw you, Joe Biden) muscles onto film to the delight of its legion of fans.
Ah ... ain't it a great day to be a genre fan?
Well, well, well ...
Certainly there's a bit more cause to celebrate the day, but take a gander at the Daily Citations Page and I think you'll see that a good number of Godzilla follow-ups also hit screens over the years on this day. The mere fact alone that he's still marching large and tall for folks to discover and re-discover that magic brings joy to my heart.
Here's the link ...
As always, thank you for being a regular reader ... thanks for being a fan ... thanks for sharing my blog around the world ... and live long and prosper!
-- EZ
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