Godzilla has fought many enemies over the years that the monster appears in movies. But there were also friendly monsters to be seen. One of them is his controversial son Minilla.
Who is Minilla? For over 70 years, Godzilla has been battling many other monsters on the big screen. But Godzilla had some allies too. In 1967, even a family member joined in.
In the film Son of Godzilla, which was released under the horrible title Frankenstein’s Monster Hunts Godzilla’s Son in our region, Godzilla becomes a father for the first time. However, Minilla is not a popular character in the franchise.
The Silly Mini-Version of Godzilla
What is Minilla? In the film, Godzilla arrives at Sollgel Island because he receives signals from an egg that contains Minilla, a creature of the same species as Godzilla. Kamacuras, gigantic praying mantises, destroy the egg, but Godzilla saves the newly hatched Minilla and begins to train him. He has essentially adopted him.
After that, Minilla appeared in 3 sequels of Godzilla:
- Godzilla – Destroy All Monsters (Frankenstein and the Monsters from Space) in 1968
- Godzilla: Attack All Monsters in 1969
- Godzilla: Final Wars in 2004 (a film full of cameos), in which Minilla has a different design
Comparing Minilla to his big role model Godzilla, he is much smaller and, due to his silly expression and his almost non-existent teeth, lacks the frightening design of his father. Unlike Godzilla, Minilla does not have a strong laser but can shoot atomic rings.
Overall, the film is more in line with the kind of absurd and silly Godzilla movies. This is already demonstrated by a short clip from the film:
A Controversial Figure Among Fans
How do fans view Minilla? Minilla is not a popular character in the franchise. When you search a bit for Minilla, you’ll quickly find YouTube videos or TikToks that do not cast the little lizard in a positive light. Even his first appearance is not particularly popular. Son of Godzilla has a rating of only 31% based on over 5000 user reviews on Rotten Tomatoes.
On Reddit, there are also several posts where users ask why the lizard is so unpopular among fans.
Why is Minilla hated? The book Godzilla: The Official Guide to the King of Monsters explains that the film Son of Godzilla was meant to appeal to a younger audience, particularly for a Date Night
-target group. For the first time, there were genuine slapstick scenes, and Godzilla was more human
than ever before. This also influenced the films that followed Son of Godzilla, shifting the focus more on humor than on threat.
As a character, Minilla is no comparison to Godzilla, especially since he is mainly portrayed as a clumsy monster. The Reddit user Bcwar compares him to a hated Star Wars character: “He is Jar Jar Binks before Jar Jar was even considered. […] The tone of this film was very different from all other Godzilla films of that time. In my opinion, the kid-friendly story put many off because they felt it was beneath them.”
According to spider_queen13 (source: Reddit), it mainly comes down to the design: I can’t stand his design, it’s simply that this thing is ugly as hell and does not resemble Godzilla in any way. It looks like a rotting E.T. doll that has been lying in a lake for too long.
Most appearances of Minilla were primarily aimed at children, and the adult fans tend to shy away from it especially when they want to see impressive monsters.
But there are also some Minilla fans. Especially in Japan, the monster seems to be popular. In a survey (via godzilla-movies.com), 10,000 Japanese fans voted on the best monsters. There, Minilla ranked 4th, even above Godzilla’s other son, Godzilla Jr.
Even in the West, there are fans who actually like him. For example, the Reddit user JediZillaPrime writes: I find him as cute as a pug. He looks funny, but somehow cute. Seeing him interact with Godzilla is a joy.
The Godzilla universe has produced many different monsters that seem almost forgotten today. Among them were also some specimens that made Godzilla’s life a hell. We have summarized the 10 strongest here: The 10 most powerful opponents of Godzilla in the power ranking
