Further Reading About Kaiju Movies and the Pacific War

A few recommended follow up texts to explore more about Japanese monster movies, Godzilla and their relationship with the Pacific War.

Broderick, M. (Ed.). (1996). Hibakusha Cinema: Hiroshima, Nagasaki and the Nuclear Image in Japanese Film. Abingdon and New York: Routledge.

Excellent collection of chapters looking at how Japanese cinema engaged with the taboo topic of hibakushu onscreen. Includes a focus on Godzilla.

Kayama, S. (2023). Godzilla and Godzilla Raids Again. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.

The first time the novellas written by screenwriter and science fiction author Shigeru Kayama have been translated in English by Jeffrey Angles. This book includes both the first and second movies novelised by their original writer. Both include more detail about the stories and give us further insight into the anti-nuclear and environmental themes of both films.

Rawle, S. (2022). Transnational Kaiju: Exploitation, Globalisation and Cult Monster Movies. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.

This is my book on kaiju movies. It surveys the genre quite widely and explores how it originates with monsters attacking London and New York, but really takes shape in Godzilla. The films then become a major part of a Japanese export culture as part of a soft power strategy and influence films across Asia and the rest of the world.

Rhoads, S., & McCorkle, B. (2018). Japan's Green Monsters: Environmental Commentary in Kaiju Cinema. Jefferson: McFarland.

A really readable academic take on the kaiju movie (and one of my favourite ever books on the subject). This explores how monster movies developed in context in Japan, considering how the nuclear nightmare led to the development of a particular kind of environmental politics in the movies, especially as the distance from the war grew.

Ryfle, S., & Godziszewski. (2017). Ishiro Honda: A Life in Film, from Godzilla to Kurosawa. Middletown: Wesleyan University Press.

Excellent biography of Honda, the main director behind the Godzilla movies and many of the monster films made by Toho. Explores his military service and how it shaped his worldview.

Ryfle, S., & Godziszewski, E. (2025). Godzilla, The First 70 Years: The Official Illustrated History of the Japanese Productions. New York: Abrams.

A thorough overview of the 70 year history of the Godzilla series written by two of the most prominent G-historians.

Tsutsui, W. (2004). Godzilla on My Mind: Fifty Years of the King of Monsters. New York: Palgrave MacMillan.

One of the first academic books about Godzilla movies. Written as a kind of personal memoir about growing up with Godzilla, it made Tsutsui one of the main academic voices about these films. While Tsutsui doesn't always take the movies seriously (this got him in trouble with Godzilla fans), he explores what is so special and vital about this big monster.

Tsutsui, W.M. (2024) Is Your War over Now? Nationalism, Nostalgia, and Japan’s Long Postwar from Gojira (1954) to Godzilla Minus One (2023). Humanities 2024, 13, 158. https://doi.org/10.3390/h13060158

This more recent article by Tsutsui in a special journal issue that I edited  (it also features articles by me, Rhoads & McCorkle and scholars from multiple fields) considers the controversy around Godzilla Minus One and how it engages with the long postwar suffered by Japan and captured so significantly by Japanese monsters.

Or, maybe you just want to enjoy the earlier adevntures of Godzilla, in the recently re-issued Marvel run from the 1970s, or maybe look ahead to the next installment of Justice League vs. Godzilla vs. Kong, coming soon.

There's still Godziban, the puppet Godzilla show.