Godzilla Viral Marketing Campaign Begins!
This article is more than 2 years old
With the start of San Diego Comic-Con next week, Legendary Pictures and Warner Bros. are kicking off their viral marketing campaign for the new Godzilla reboot. The film will hit theaters in less than a year, but so far the marketing campaign hasn’t really kicked into full gear. Legendary will change that at Comic-Con, having recently converted a San Diego warehouse to look like it had been through a Godzilla attack. And with the release of Pacific Rim this weekend, it’s the perfect time for Legendary Pictures and Warner Bros. to launch Godzilla‘s viral marketing campaign with GodzillaEncounter.com.
Godzilla Encounter is a tumblr. page Legendary Pictures set up to feature mysterious encounters with the giant, radioactive sea monster. With the headline “The Encounter Is Coming” and a forum field to sign up for a Godzilla newsletter, it seems like Legendary Pictures is counting down to something they might be revealing in Hall H during San Diego Comic Con, perhaps the film’s first teaser trailer. It would be good to see some actual footage from the Godzilla reboot, and Comic-Con is just about the perfect place to do so.
While Legendary Pictures and Warner Bros. have yet to release an official plot synopsis for the Godzilla reboot, the San Diego Comic-Con schedule offers up some insight on what we can expect from the new film from Monsters director Gareth Edwards. It reads, “An epic rebirth to Toho’s iconic Godzilla, this spectacular adventure pits the world’s most famous monster against malevolent creatures who, bolstered by humanity’s scientific arrogance, threaten our very existence.” So it looks like the new film might feature Godzilla going up against other monsters, just like in Pacific Rim.
Godzilla will be part of Legendary Pictures and Warner Bros.’ Comic-Con panel on Saturday, July 20, along with Alfonso Cuarón’s Gravity, Seventh Son, 300: Rise of an Empire, and The Lego Movie. While it’s unclear who from Godzilla with participate in the panel, Gareth Edwards, Bryan Cranston (who will also be at Comic-Con for the final Breaking Bad panel), and Aaron Taylor-Johnson (also at Comic-Con for Kick-Ass 2) are expected to attend.
Godzilla features an world-class cast including Elisabeth Olsen, Ken Watanabe, Juliette Binoche, David Strathairn, Bryan Cranston, and Sally Hawkins, with original Godzilla actor Akira Takarada putting in a special cameo appearance. The Godzilla screenplay has gone through a lot of hands so far, with rewrites, passes, and polishes from screenwriters Max Borenstein, Drew Pearce, David S. Goyer, David Callaham, and former Walking Dead showrunner Frank Darabont, who revised the final version of the screenplay.
Darabont once called the giant radioactive monster movie “a force of nature,” so it will be very interesting to see how Gareth Edwards mixes that element with a more realistic approach to the source material. Edwards made his directorial debut with the indie sci-fi film Monsters in 2010, which is available for streaming on Netflix Instant. The Godzilla reboot will be his sophomore effort.
Godzilla will stomp into theaters everywhere on May 16, 2014, in 3D and IMAX.
