Revisting Godzilla: King of the Monsters

Yep, he's still king.

Godzilla, King of the Monsters is here. As a lover of zoology and giant monster films, I had to weigh in.  Zoology and giant monsters, of course, don't really mix: Godzilla's first step would break his legs, topple him, and leave a giant puddle of dying green gunk on the ground.  But everyone agrees to believe: if you can't, you're at the wrong movie. 

My initial list of likes:
Amazing monster effects and action. Seriously amazing.  Think about how hard it is to make a giant three-headed dragon look like it's actually there, not as a video-game creature but with the seeming weight and movement of a real animal. (Three different motion-capture performers played the heads.)  
There were some good performances (Kyle Chandler, Ken Wantanabe). There were Easter eggs for cryptozoologists and some good one-liners. 
My initial dislikes: Unremittingly dark, thematically and visually, with none of the fun such movies should have, lots of errors about the military operations, and Vera Farmiga (a talented actress giving a bad performance in a hideously written role). 
Not rated: Logistics, physics, plot - you don't expect them to make any sense in a monster movie. (Although they REALLY pushed it with planes including short-ranged fighters flying fast and easily all over the planet.)
Special dislike: Naming a base Castle Bravo (after the nuclear test that poisoned Japanese fishermen and gave the original Godzilla its serious theme) is in stunningly bad taste, especially in an American film. I know that in these movies Castle Bravo was really an attempt to kill Godzilla, but that doesn't make it any better. 

Thinking back on it a day later, I found a few other things worth mentioning:
1. The best shot might have been Ghidorah frozen in ice: it offered a real sense of awe as the humans/cameras looked up at the monster.
2. Ken Wantanabe's last scene with Godzilla (the idea for which might have been swiped from The Abyss) was touching in a way you don't expect in a monster film. 
3. It's not clear why the two extra monsters that showed up near the end were fighting each other. 
4. The filmmakers seemed to throw in extra PG-13 cursing just because they could: Jesus is named more often in this film than he is in the Book of John. 
5. There's a clever homage to the Japanese version of Mothra and its two priestesses that I didn't even catch until I read a review. 

So, a mixed bag, but some fun to be had.  Grade B-.  Let's hope Godzilla v Kong next year keeps the great animation and adds a bit of humor - and daylight.