10 Remakes That Should Never Have Happened

The original Godzilla was a masterpiece. Based on director Ishirō Honda's thoughts on hydrogen bomb testing, it never shied away from displaying the destruction wrought by the beast, often drawing comparisons to the bombing of Nagasaki and Hiroshima at the end of the second world war. The script portrays Godzilla as something akin to a god, consistently present without always physically being there.

Godzilla represented a sobering commentary on nuclear weapons in postwar Japan, even making some in the film question if they deserved to be in their situation due to the nuclear tests that had caused Godzilla's appearance. The emotional and moral undertones of the film certainly go a long way towards explaining its 93% fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes.

The 1998 remake of Godzilla was a $120 million ripoff that removed everything in Godzilla that symbolised the core issue of nuclear weapons, and made only passing attempts to adhere to Godzilla's nature as something of a tragic character, not completely understanding what he's doing. It relied on its visuals to shield the terrible plot, shoddy scripting, and implausible science.

Despite being a commercial success, the Godzilla remake was a critical bomb, and even writers of the script have admitted that it was poorly executed. The film also found criticism from Kenpachiro Satsuma, the man who played Godzilla in most of the Japanese sequels, who walked out of a screening of the film, stating that "it's not Godzilla, it doesn't have his spirit."