I finally got to see this last night. SPOILERS!!!
It was exactly what I was expecting after reading the reviews, which is ok but it left me wanting so much more. They could have done some tightening up on the political drama side of things and still gotten the point across, maybe even more so because it wouldn't have become so monotonous as it did in the movie. How many scenes with meetings do you need to have to get the point across that their government is too caught up in procedure and red tape and that it is costing lives? How about some back and forth with these scenes actually showing the destruction first hand while this stuff is going on? They did that for small snippets when Godzilla first appears on land but then it just grinds down into meeting fest. And him just freezing when he powers down is horrible. After his first time when he uses his atomic breath and he powers down, why in the hell didn't they hit him with more bunker busters? They worked!! It was killing him and after he went into "sleep mode" you could have hit him with more and destroyed him before he could even reanimate and attack. There was no need to use nuclear weapons except to give a reason for the Japanese government to tell the US to shove it, which is fine, they should be able to run their own country at this point, but it was a lame plot device. Godzilla himself was cool but horribly underused. I love the design now and the evolution but out of a two hour movie we see him for maybe ten minutes? What the serious F? The computer effects were very Sci Fi channel in certain spots (first transformation, when he "freezes). It's weird how slow he moves most of the time, which actually makes sense but then when he gets pissed and starts moving faster his movements look too jerky and fake. His atomic breath rules though, it's the best thing about this new version. I do think the back rays are taking it a little too far though, they could have done without that. And that final scene at the end... well that could go either way. They could just jump off the deep end and make the next movie all about those things coming off of his tail and do something totally new and different but I don't think many of the fans would like that. Although, what if each one evolved differently and kept getting getting larger and larger? Well, anyway, that's my two cents. Long live Godzilla!