Godzilla Forever ----Fans of USA start

 

Written by Masahiro Kitada
Translated from the original Japanese by Masahiro Kitada 
Paraphrased by Constance A. Goodnow 

When I was surfing the World Wide Web, viewing homepages that many organizations and people from all over the world have composed in order to post messages looking for information about the West Coast of the United States, suddenly Godzilla, breathing forth streams of radioactive fire, popped up on my display.

Godzilla, who had his advent in the land of the Rising Sun, is dead in the twenty-second (22nd) movie of his long-running series, "Godzilla vs. Destroyer" released in January of the new year, but he is alive and well and still wreaking his havoc on the World Wide Web.
It was a homepage that a graduate in California State, who couldn't bear to abandon a strong attachment to his idol, secretly built using the computer in the dorm at the university. I sent him an E-mail asking his about his page. But his reply suggested that he had been reprimanded for using the university's computer for his hobby. He requested anonymity in the newspaper.

After I received his E-mail, I clicked on one of the links at the bottom of his page. This link led me to the page maintained by a suburban housewife, Connie Goodnow, age 22. Godzilla is alive and well in this homepage too. I sent E-mail to her at once; she replied: " I am definitely a woman though, so that would be Mrs." Not all fans of Godzilla are male!

Connie has a three year old daughter and a one year old son. She has a large family with her mother and younger sister; she is very busy with housework and childrearing. However, she has made time to build her Godzilla page in the interim. She has been a fan since she watched a Godzilla movie when she was three years old; and she enlisted the aid of her husband who is a computer consultant. "My husband thinks it's stupid, but I love Godzilla. It brings a sense of familiarity to the upside down world." I thought, " she must always be cheerful". 
I requested a color photograph of her in order to include it in an article about her Godzilla page. She immediately put it on her homepage for me. You can see it in this article. 

At this time, there are seven sites devoted to Godzilla, including the USA, where most of them are located; as far as I can tell. In Europe it is seen in both Netherland and Germany. Connie put in some brief comments and ratings of every Godzilla movie; in other sites, we can enjoy exciting scenes in the movies and hear Godzilla's roar if you have the right equipment. 
Mituhiro Takemura, an associate professor of Kyoto University of Art and Design who is familiar with the status-quo of media in foreign countries, had this to say: "Before most Japanese noticed it, things that are produced, such as animation of Sailor Moon are getting around at terrific speed. The leading figure among them is Godzilla." 
 

----Masahiro Kitada