I won’t lie; when I found out that a new Godzilla movie was coming out, I laughed. All I could think of was a giant dinosaur puppet romping through a black-and-white Tokyo. They’ve made so many movies about Godzilla, how can there be anything new and exciting about this one? I decided to go, just to see the destruction and realistic graphics. I walked into the theater hoping to be at least mildly entertained, but what I got was beyond my expectations.

The story revolves around Ford Brody (Aaron Taylor-Johnson), a naval lieutenant whose mother, Sandra Brody (Juliette Binoche), was killed at a nuclear power plant when he was a young boy. The government’s cover story is that it was a natural disaster, but Ford’s father, Joe (Bryan Cranston), thinks otherwise and it turns out he’s right. A giant nuclear parasite had destroyed the power plant and burrowed beneath it and now, 15 years later, it’s active again.

Now Ford must do what he can to protect his family and save as many lives as possible, but he won’t be able to do it alone. The scientists say that nature has a way of balancing itself and humanity’s only hope is – you guessed it – Godzilla.

I expected it to be a film about a giant monster that we stopped to save our homes and I was only half right. I was pleasantly surprised to find myself rooting for this King of Kaiju through the whole movie.

Although Godzilla didn’t make his grand entrance immediately, we get to see glimpses of his scales and spikes as he swims from place to place, tracking down the parasites. He finally emerges near the end of the film when a final showdown between all three nuclear beasts is unavoidable, and it was well worth the wait.

He is massive, he is fierce, and he quite frankly kicked some nuclear butt. I was a bit disappointed that Godzilla’s scenes weren’t as long as I had hoped for, but they definitely leave the audience with a promise of more movies to come in the future.

The acting was amazing, the fight scenes were top notch, the graphics were incredible, and the whole theater burst into applause and laughter at frequent intervals during the film. It made me jump in my seat, it made me cry, and it made me laugh. This is definitely a movie for anybody and everybody, Godzilla fan or not.

Rating: 5 out of 5 stars