There have been many versions of Godzilla over the years but which one is the biggest? Here's a look at every Godzilla, ranked by size.
Since his inception nearly seventy years ago, Godzilla has gone through many changes. He’s been depicted as a hero and a villain, a force of nature and a big, dumb brute. He’s sparred with the Japanese Self-Defense Force so many times that he might as well be their mascot. And his visual appearance has changed so much that the Godzilla of the past is practically a different creature than the one we have now.
One aspect of Godzilla’s design that refuses to stay the same is his height. Just like his appearance, Godzilla has grown and shrunk, depending on who’s sitting in the director’s chair.Here are all of Godzilla’s cinematic incarnations, including the American ones, arranged by height.
Updated on July 8th, 2021 by Melody MacReady: Godzilla is the definitive giant monster, also known as a kaiju. He was not the first but ever since his introduction in 1954, he has become an icon of cinema with countless amounts of movies, shows, and video games featuring him. He has been a hero, a villain, a force of nature, and even been the manifestation of Japanese souls. Since Godzilla remains one of the most financially successful brands of all time, it's difficult to keep a good monster down. From Legendary's MonsterVerse to the new Godzilla: Singular Point anime, Godzilla continues to be rebooted and revamped thus he is given new heights to add to compare to the many Godzilla incarnations of the past.
11 Showa Era Godzilla (1954-1975) - 50 Meters
Before he fought Mothra and Ghidorah and became a household name across the world, Godzilla was a towering metaphor for the destructive power of nuclear weapons. His original design, while simple, was nonetheless effective in driving the film’s point home. The goal was to make a monster who was mangled and grotesque, like the victim of a radioactive bomb.
Throughout the original series, Godzilla’s look underwent a metamorphosis, beginning with King Kong vs Godzilla in 1962. In the late ‘60s and early ‘70s, Toho capitalized on Godzilla’s popularity with children by softening his features to make him less scary. But throughout it all, Godzilla stood at a consistent 50 meters.
10 Millennium Godzilla (1999-2003) - 55 Meters
At the turn of the century, Godzilla underwent his biggest facelift in almost forty years. This new creature, who first appeared Godzilla 2000, was given a more reptilian look, with a large mouth, narrow head, jagged dorsal spines, and a sleeker, leaner build. He was also the first Godzilla to be green in color, forgoing the dark charcoal shades of years past.
This design also went back to basics, shrinking Godzilla to close to his original size. This represented the first size reduction in the franchise, and the resulting design was actually slightly shorter than TriStar’s Zilla. Nevertheless, Millennium Godzilla was a hit with fans and was Godzilla’s de-facto look for much of the early 21st century. The design heavily inspired Godzilla’s appearance in Godzilla Against Mechagodzilla and Godzilla Tokyo S.O.S, and the two designs are almost identical save for a few subtle differences.
