During Saturday afternoons or mornings growing up TBS Superstation (as it was called back then) would play Godzilla movies on occasion. I remember taping King Kong Vs Godzilla off TBS during the mid 1980's with my VCR. Then shortly after they aired Ghidrah: The Three Headed Monster (it was years later that I found out they had misspelled Ghidorah's name). I taped that one too and watched them over and over. To this day those two films are some of my favorite Godzilla movies.
My parents could see how much I liked the big radioactive beast. They bought me Son of Godzilla on VHS (the classic Video Treasures release) for Christmas one year. At some point I realized that there were more movies than what I knew about. It became an obsession with me to see them all. I went to my local video rental store (remember those?) and scoured their shelves. I found a few here and there, Godzilla Vs Mechagodzilla, Godzilla 1985, Godzilla Vs the Smog Monster, and that was about all I could find in my small midwestern town.
Jeff Rovin's Encyclopedia of Monsters was by far the greatest book I had ever discovered! It is huge! Loaded with pictures and filled with data. It covered monsters from ancient mythologies to comic books to cartoons to motion pictures. The book was perhaps the greatest feast for the brain my young mind had ever experienced... and there were three whole pages devoted to my hero Godzilla. Every monster he ever encountered each had their own sections too! I learned so much from that book including the complete list of Godzilla films.
My search expanded. I discovered that Blockbuster Video did special orders. I saved up my allowance and paper route money and every time we went into the big city of Lincoln I begged my parents to take me to Blockbuster. They had a list of Godzilla movies available for order and the first order I placed was for Godzilla Vs Monster Zero (It sounded cool and mysterious). Through a series of special orders and lucky finds I collected the entire series save one...
Destroy All Monsters sounded like the coolest monster movie ever! Eleven monsters in one movie?! Three of which I had never even seen in a movie before (Manda, Varan, and Baragon). I was ravenous for more monsters and an expansion of the Godzilla Kaiju roster. I had to find this movie no matter the cost. But it was nowhere to be found. I couldn't special order it. It wasn't available to rent anywhere. And it never seemed to air on television. Then, one day while skimming through the TV Guide there it was! The Sci-Fi channel was going to be airing Destroy All Monsters!!!!
Growing up we only had basic cable. Originally the Sci-Fi channel (spelled correctly, none of that SyFy crap) was a premium station and we only had basic. By God I would not be denied the greatest Godzilla film ever (at least that's what I built it up as in my mind). I talked to my Uncle Dan about my dilemma. He said a co-worker of his had the Sci-Fi channel. I asked if he could ask his co-worker to tape it for me. And he did! I finally got to see this legendary film and between recorded tapes and purchased VHS tapes my collection was complete!
Of course this is only part of the story. At this point my collection consisted of Godzilla: King of the Monsters through Godzilla 1985. I had no idea that there were more being made in Japan at that moment! But we'll get into part 2 of my G-Quest another time. As fate would have it my obsession with the King of the monsters would only increase from here. Every subsequent year of my life I feel my love for this movie monster grow. He's a part of my BIG 3, the heroes of my life. Here's to the monster of the hour! Here! Here!
HAPPY BIRTHDAY GODZILLA!!!
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