Mothra

If you know little about kaiju movies, you probably know the name Mothra. She's the Queen of the Monsters, and this is her first appearance. Not just a support character in Godzilla flicks, this establishes Mothra as a force in the wider Kaiju-verse before she gets subsumed into Godzilla movies. Directed by (the OG) Ishirō Honda like Rodan before it, I think it's intended to see what kind of legs Mothra had on its own before deciding what to do with the character in the future. Let's talk giant flying insects.

If You Haven't Seen it Before

- A Japanese ship is caught in a typhoon and sinks near Infant Island. Impossibly, none of the survivors have died of radiation poisoning.

- An expedition led by fictional nation Rolisican businessman Clark Nelson is set in place to investigate the secrets of Infant Island with just a few reporters in tow.

- While being attacked by a blood sucking planet one of the reporters is rescued by a pair of tiny, identical women, no more than a foot tall.

- Returning back to Japan, the expedition is considered a success.

- Clark Nelson returns to Infant Island separately and kidnaps the women, killing a bunch of the natives in the process. With his dying breaths, one of the natives calls out to Mothra to help them.

- Exploiting the tiny twins for commercial purposes, Clark Nelson has them performing on stage against their will, calling them the Secret Fairies.

- Mothra is revealed to be a protector of the island who will be coming to Japan to rescue the Fairies. They warn that innocent people will be hurt until they are returned to the island and there's nothing they can do to stop it.

- Mothra begins a rampage in a beeline toward the Fairies. The newspaper blames Clark Nelson even as he sues them for libel.

- The military attempts to stop Mothra, to no avail. Even her larval form is too strong to even be slowed by human weapons.

- Despite all this, Clark Nelson refuses to give up the Fairies and the Rolisican government protects his right to maintain possession of the kidnapped women.

- Mothra builds a cocoon which and begins her metamorphosis. In the meantime, the Rolisican government agrees to loan Japan their newest weapon: Atomic Heat Cannons. These set the cocoon on fire but Mothra emerges from it in her new badass moth form unharmed.

- When civilians surround Clark Nelson to insist he return the Fairies before Mothra arrives to kill them all, he whips out a gun and begins to threaten people. He is shot by the police and the Fairies are returned to Mothra as safely as possible, though with some significant collateral damage being done in the process.

- Mothra returns to Infant Island as soon as the Fairies are secured, the threat she poses to those who threaten her Fairies now over.

Kaiju Notes

- Larval mothra is equally gross and cute. Not slimy or otherwise unpleasant like a bug, but definitely an unpleasant creature.

- Mothra's powers are similar to Rodan, mostly powerful winds caused by wings. It's the only thing about Mothra that's not an improvement over the previous flying monster.

- Mothra as a flying creature is a huge improvement over Rodan in a small amount of time. Perhaps because she doesn't use her legs to do a lot of standing or towering, Mothra is a lot more believably moved around then the previous flying kaiju. The wings in particular are much more wing-like, actually flapping.

- Mothra's design really can't be argued against, it's one of the most inspired ones in all of kaiju. Mothra's colors and features reflect that she's less aggressive than her Godzilla counterpart, nothing about her stands out as aggressive or even a weapon as opposed to Godzilla's claws, size, large dorsal fins, and Atomic Breath.

- Mothra's (dope) design is also the first to truly utilize color: the design simply wouldn't work as well in black and white, whereas Godzilla and Rodan are perfectly suitable for the limitations of black and white picture.

This movie is actually quite good. It has more purpose than Godzilla Raids Again, is more coherent than Rodan, and is the best directed movie we've seen so far besides Godzilla (and the argument could be made that Mothra is better). Obviously some of the effects are quite dated by now, but the tiny Twins actually mesh relatively well with the rest of the actors and Mothra herself is a true feat of puppetry. On a pure technical level the first Mothra outing may be what earned her the place as Queen.

Mothra as a creature is distinguished from all other kaiju we've seen so far by being relatively non-violent. While she definitely causes collateral damage, most notably the civilian ship which just happened to cross her path, for the most part Mothra only does damage to people and structures either in her way or trying to stop her. Sequences of civilians falling prey to her are limited to the ship (mostly bad luck) and no one else, every other person targeted by Mothra is someone trying to stop her. Granted, the buildings that are destroyed definitely have people in them as well so it's not as though her kill count is low, but the (relative) pacifism is reflected in everything Mothra does. It's an interesting choice, especially so early in kaiju history.

The Twins are an interesting element to add to the movie, both the driving force of the film because Mothra pursues them relentlessly but also as helpless as anyone else in the movie because they do not control of even truly influence Mothra despite their obvious importance to her. When the other natives of Infant Island are slaughtered by Clark Nelson Mothra remains idle, but once the Twins are taken she awakens and wrecks havoc to get them back. The Twins performances themselves also serve as a really useful backdrop of the storytelling, allowing us to see Mothra move toward her goals while we listen to the forced performances of the Twins. I'm not sure if these scenes are part of the message, but I have to think it is.

Onto that message: this seems pretty obviously a warning against unfettered capitalism. Clark Nelson is described explicitly as a capitalist and nothing else. We don't know if he's an oil baron, businessman, banker, or treasure hunter, but he's a capitalist all the way. He funds an expedition to an uncharted island with the express purpose of exploiting it, and once he captures the twins her forces them to perform so he can profit off of the spectacle. The scenes of Mothra destroying things to rescue them while they seem to perform happily can definitely be read as an allusion to the pain and suffering that is truly in the background of many capitalistic endeavors. As every disingenuous person who reads anything critiquing anything capitalistic will point out: this is often done these days on computers or iPhones, products made by people in some pretty brutal conditions. The performance of the Twins also causes carnage by Mothra, just as the convenience of modern technology causes the exploitation and brutalization of people all over the world. Clark Nelson is even protected by his countries government and uses the legal system against anyone who correctly pins some blame on him, which seems a pretty simply transference. 

The most significant difference between the two examples is that Clark Nelson actually does suffer the consequences in this movie, whereas real world exploiters are almost never punished in any way (let alone meeting a fate similar to Clark Nelson). While his country's government was finally prepared to force him to return the Twins once Mothra had set her sights on Rolisca, he would likely have gotten off scot-free had he not overreacted. The only mistake Clark made was using the same tactics he does around the world on people in his own country, drawing a weapon at home rather than only abroad. Another reason to appreciate Mothra: she makes capitalist face consequences.

Next: King Kong vs Godzilla!