Godzilla Goes Green: Eco-Kaiju at the Barbican

Are kaiju our friends? It’s comforting to hope so, but it’s also naïve to assume that ostensibly benevolent kaiju like Mothra, Gamera, and even Godzilla itself (at certain times) personify mankind’s best interests. Throughout their 70 year and counting history, Japan’s silver screen giants have more steadily been portrayed as protectors of land – the mountains, the sky, rivers, forests, and fields – rather than the very human concepts of a homeland, nation, or borders. Humanity is therefore protected more by proxy rather than intent, with we ourselves often representing a threat. The upcoming Barbican season All Kaiju Attack: Earth SOS! explores these sentiments through five ferocious films spanning forty years of the genre, charting the Earth’s environmental relationship with the giant creatures and comparatively tiny monsters that inhabit it.

Kazuki Omori’s Godzilla vs. Biollante (1989, screening 20 September) readied Toho’s Godzilla series for the 1990s with a slick bio-corporate espionage plot dressed in the trappings of a hard sci-fi shocker, exploring the ethics (or lack thereof) of genetic engineering (a whole four years before Jurassic Park stomped similar ground). Biollante herself is unwillingly brought into existence through exploitation of the natural world. Dr. Shiragami (Koji Takahashi) attempts to recover the soul of his deceased daughter by infusing her remaining DNA with that of a rosebush, peppered with a dash of Godzilla cells to ensure regenerative longevity. Connected to both humanity and nature via unethical bioengineering, Biollante notably never goes on a city rampage and is instead drawn to natural environments. The strangely sad creature first appears as an enormous, toothed rose in Lake Ashi. Later, her spores gently cascade from the skies above Wakasa Bay, manifesting as a colossal, crocodilian plant creature. She faces off with Godzilla, itself in a weakened state from being injected with Anti-Nuclear Energy Bacteria, a superweapon conceived of the nuclear leviathan’s own biology that threatens to kickstart a new arms race.

In Jun Fukuda’s Godzilla vs. Megalon (1973, screening 21 September), the Atlantis-esque undersea Kingdom of Seatopia declares war upon our surface world. Our incessant nuclear testing and unrelenting devastation of the environment is brining ruin to Seatopia. In retaliation, the subterranean empire dispatches the giant monster Megalon, intent on wiping out humanity to ensure Seatopia’s survival. While their methods lack nuance, it’s difficult to fault Seatopia’s motivation. The early 1970s saw a devastating peak in industrial pollution across Japan, with thick smog coating entire cities, towns, and neighbourhoods. Just three years before the release of Godzilla vs. Megalon, the National Diet (Japan’s national legislature) convened in a session dubbed “the Pollution Diet”, where a total of fourteen anti-pollution laws were passed in a single session. In the film, it is left to a product of man’s technological advancement – the size-shifting robot Jet Jaguar – and Godzilla, itself once representing the nuclear threat, to fend off the underground onslaught.

Godzilla’s adopted offspring Minilla made its auspicious debut in Jun Fukuda’s earlier Son of Godzilla (1967, screening 25 October), an island adventure fable of mankind’s attempts to harness the elements and the dire consequences that follow. On the remote Solgell Island in the Pacific, a group of UN scientists led by Dr. Kusumi (genre stalwart Tadao Takashima) attempt to manipulate the Earth’s weather patterns to allow food to abundantly grow in harsh, uninhabited corners of the planet. In classic kaiju fashion, their (admittedly well-intended) meddling has unforeseen consequences: soon enough, the mammoth mantises Kamacuras appear, laying siege to the scientists’ base of operations. Soon, they’re joined by the oversized arachnid Kumonga, the newly hatched Minilla, and Godzilla itself, drawn to Solgell by the distant brainwaves of its brethren. Ultimately, the Godzilla, Minilla, and the scientists – once again manipulating the island’s weather – must combine their forces to repel the environmental mutants.

The King of the Monsters finds itself up against terrorist organisation Red Bamboo in Ebirah, Horror of the Deep (1966, screening 18 November), another Jun Fukuda joint. From their remote base on Letchi Island, the Red Bamboo routinely enslave citizens of the neighbouring Infant Island, known for their symbiotic relationship with the island’s guardian deity, Mothra. The Red Bamboo exploit Letchi’s environment and resources to brew a mysterious “yellow liquid” – distilled by the enslaved Infant Islanders – to ward off the giant crustacean Ebirah, who patrols the coastal waters surrounding the island. Ebirah, ostensibly defending its natural habitat, inadvertently acts as the Red Bamboo’s guard dog, dispatching interlopers and enemies who enter its waters without the yellow deterrent. Ultimately, dual forces of nature – Godzilla, slumbering in a cavern deep within the island and revived by a thunderous lightning storm, and Mothra, summoned by her people both at home and in captivity – must intervene in their own ways to punish the environmental exploiters.

Flashing forward to 2006 and a different franchise, Ryuta Tasaki’s Gamera the Brave (screening 10 December in its UK theatrical debut) takes a delightfully back-to-basics and enchantingly Spielbergian approach to the titular titanic tortoise. The final Gamera feature film as of 2025, Gamera the Brave is a simple story of a boy and his pet, albeit one that grows to an immense superpowered size to battle new kaiju threats. In the electrifying opening sequence set in 1973, the threat is a flock of Gyaos, Gamera’s vampire-like archenemy. In the present, a newly hatched Gamera takes on the monstrous man-eater Zedus, theorised to be a marine organism mutated and corrupted by the uncleanliness of its habitat. In a heart-warming reversal of franchise tradition, it’s Gamera’s turn to be protected by children. Ignoring misunderstanding adults, Japan’s children deliver natural environment energy to Gamera in the form of a mysterious red stone, ultimately allowing it to survive and fight another day.

So, are kaiju our friends? Through Godzilla, Gamera, and their kaiju cohorts, these five films at the Barbican will help you find the answer. With kaiju – like any natural force outside of mankind’s control – we’re better erring on the side of scientific and environmental caution, lest we ourselves become the threat requiring elimination.



Steven Sloss is a lifelong fan and scholar of kaiju cinema who has written and presented on the subject for the BFI, BBC, Arrow Films, Glasgow Film Festival, and more. He is the former co-host of the AV Club-featured Kaijusaurus Podcast and is currently writing a book on the original Godzilla (1954) for Bloomsbury Publishing and the BFI.



Feature image: Godzilla vs. Megalon (1973, dir. Jun Fukuda)