Metacritic reviews

Godzilla Minus One is the throwback movie that longtime Godzilla fans have been waiting for.

Despite a few lapses into lumpy melodrama, Yamazki’s thoughtful script holds firm and is dotted with delightful humor at just the right moments.

Much like the movie that started it all, Godzilla Minus One cements itself among the best entries in the series by successfully operating as both an evocative disaster flick and a more human-oriented drama, using each half to bolster the other.

As Toho Studios’ new Godzilla Minus One proves, the Japanese know how to get the iconic radioactive behemoth right.

Godzilla Minus One more than carves out its place among the best entries of this long-running series.

Godzilla Minus One is one of the rare Godzilla pictures about the indomitability of the human spirit.

A rousing, spectacle-filled blockbuster, Godzilla: Minus One takes the king of the monsters back to his roots in post-WWII Japan. The story is character-driven, but the monster scenes are exciting and effective.

Nearly 70 years after the release of the original film, Godzilla Minus One returns the titular beast to its roots as a metaphor for Japan’s postwar anxiety and grief, in the process delivering a stirring spectacle that also contains a palpable emotional undercurrent.

There's as much of Akira Kurosawa's Ikiru here as there is the rubber-suit genius of Godzilla creator Ishirō Honda (himself never shy of political subtext), and that's a pairing as powerful as any monster mash-up.

For all the unbridled destruction, Godzilla Minus One remains perversely light and fun, a Roland Emmerich-like disaster flick helmed by an actual talent.