10 Great Sci-Fi Villains Trapped In Terrible Movies

After directing most of the franchise’s prior movies, Ishirō Honda passed the Godzilla mantle to Yoshimitsu Banno, a decision he would come to regret, saying he “ruined Godzilla”. This film is full to the brim with bizarre scenes, from a weird hallucinogenic fish party (which Honda apparently happened to walk in on, and promptly walk out on without saying a word), a pre-apocalypse festival on Mt. Fuji and, most infamously, a flying Godzilla.

Godzilla himself is at his most pathetic in this flick. He does little-to-nothing of worth in the film, save for the last ten minutes when he rips some nondescript orbs out of the smog monster's body, seemingly putting it to rest for good, but otherwise he’s less mighty kaiju and more big dozey lizard. This isn’t helped by the goofy theme music – which sounds more like the comedy theme for a bloated Komodo dragon. You half expect him to slip over a banana peel as he marches on-screen to confront the smog monster.

The smog monster itself, however, is a much more menacing beast, who feeds off the Earth’s pollution. Watching Hedorah huff the fumes from a power-plant chimney is disturbingly vile. This freak of nature can transform between sea and land-based forms and is packing poisonous gas and lasers for good measure. It had the capacity to be a brilliant baddie for an eco-parrable. Unfortunately, the films environmental message is flimsy at best, as the JSDF never once think to try and reduce pollution, instead opting to dry Hedorah out with 3 million volts of electricity. Not exactly how Captain Planet would do things, I reckon.