By Owen Quinn author of the Time Warriors and Zombie Blues
Photos copyright Warner bros
We hit the ground running this episode as Shaw, the Randas and May flee the Monarch compound as fugitves.
Again we are teased with droplets of backstory. Monarch once stood for good as was inended by Shaw and mon and dad Randa. But something went wrong leaving Shaw a prisoner and with few allies, one of which helps him and the others escape from Tokyo. A nice touch that the audience might miss is that he has been a prisoner so long he does not know how to start a modern car.
Jumping back to the fifties we see young Shaw and Bill and Keiko Randa try to get funding and back up from the government via the military. And this leads nicely into the much anticipated appearance of our favourite lizard, Godzilla. Those shots of him ploughing through the ocean and rising from the water in all his glory are great, attracted to the radiation from the nuclear bomb. Even when it goes off in his face seemingly killing him is a shock even though we know he will survive or is this just another member of the Godzilla species?
Immediately we see the conflict start between the Randas and the immediate military as they trip the trap to kill Godzilla with a nuclear bomb much to Keiko;s anger. She wants to tell the world about these creatures but the brass want it kept secret. We get mention of the hollow world and a surprising new mystery as to Shaw’s age which he dismisses as good genes. But in the wake of Godzilla’s apparent death, Shaw and the Rands get a blank cheque to do whatever they want to find others like Godzilla but even then they intend to be selective about what to tell their benefactors.
The Randa siblings conflict is becoming a bit tiring now especially Cate’s bad attitude towards the others. While it is good to have conflict between allies, it needs some softening or it becomes eye rolling. Come on Cate, your dad screwed everyone not just you and all for Monarch. Shaw knows their father so well, he knows where he was really going where the mystery deepens. A crashed plane and camp with documents with their father’s handwriting lead Cate and Kentaro to embrace for the first time. Their father did indeed survive his fake death and ended up here in Barrow, Alaska.
But the road leads them to deep trouble as a new monster bursts from the snow and ice, a monster that can kill you in a heartbeat. Their plane andally destroyed and dead, stuck in the open, our heroes watch in horror as the beast swings in their direction.
The Time Warriors and Beyond 