Gareth Edwards’ feature debut Monsters was hailed for its ingenious way of working around its low-budget restrictions to create a clever giant-monster movie—so naturally, he’s now been handed the reins of the new big-budget Godzilla reboot from Legendary Pictures.
Will success spoil Gareth Edwards? Well, the fact that Legendary Pictures seems to be painfully aware that Roland Emmerich’s previous, money-hemorrhaging Godzilla outing wasn’t a case of bigger is always better is certainly promising, as is the producer’s earlier characterizing of the new film as a “Batman Begins approach” to Godzilla’s origins, even if that sounds sort of ridiculous. (Godzilla training montages!) And given that Edwards made Monsters with the explicit goal of achieving just this sort of career jump, it seems likely that he’s ready and willing to take on the burden of reviving the franchise, even one that’s still suffering from Matthew Broderick jokes and blog articles that insist on adding Puff Daddy’s video for “Come With Me” at the end of anything Godzilla-related. So this has the potential to put a stop to all that. Except the Puff Daddy videos.