I recently had the opportunity to sit down with “Godzilla”mMovie and graphic novel writer Max Borenstein to discuss his thoughts on the upcoming projects. First of all It was amazing to talk to such an excited and friendly guy about something he obviously cares a ton about. The “Godzilla” graphic novel releases May 7, 2014 and the film hits theaters May 16, 2014. We will have a full review of the graphic novel available for you on May 7. Without further ado here is our interview with Mr. Borenstein.
BSR!: How did you become involved in this, and what is your Godzilla background?
Max Borenstein: My first introduction was through Power Rangers as a kid actually; I saw their robots and was like “I’ve seen this.” I then went back and looked into it. Watching the classic shows and I loved the camp factor. When I was approached by Legendary with whom I’d done other work about the Godzilla movie, and they said it was being directed by Gareth Edwards I was very excited. I had seen “Monsters” and I thought it was brilliant how it used a genre film or monster movie to tell this very human story. I thought the fact that they would pick him as a director for a Godzilla movie spoke to the tone they wanted to deliver. I had been a fan of the old movies as a kid, but when the 1998 movie came out I wasn’t very interested in its take on the character. So Gareth felt like the perfect person to reinvent that. I rewatched the old films starting with the Japanese cut of the original, and that blew me away. There was none of the camp factor; in fact it was an incredibly harrowing allegory for pure annihilation. I think it still resonates very powerfully today and that got me very excited, to talk to Gareth to get on the same page. We hit it off and we both had a very similar desire to use this character and this franchise to explore some contemporary themes but in a way that felt grounded and plausible as much as you can, given that your basic premise is a giant lizard emerging from the water.
BSR!: When you were writing the parts did you have any specific actors in mind? Or do you try to avoid that during the creative process?
MB: As it happens the character that Bryan Cranston plays and the character that Ken Watanabe plays, both of those characters had Gareth and I talking about Bryan and Ken from very early days as a wish list, not even thinking, maybe we’ll get them maybe we won’t. But we felt like that’s who the characters are and they would nail it. It was literally a dream come true that they agreed to it. And the rest of the cast is just phenomenal as well, it is such a kick to watch when I see the film, just incredible actors. I know it’s cliché but it’s absolutely amazing.
BSR!: Is this your first go at comics?
MB: This is the first graphic novel that I’ve written. There is one that I had been collaborating with my cousin Greg on, whom I ended up collaborating on with this. Which is kind of a background thing, since he’s an academic and technologist at the MIT lab and writes more in line with that. We have been collaborating on a book together, which hopefully we can finish and release to the universe in short order. But when this opportunity came about during the Godzilla production, the people from Legendary’s comic wing approached me about expanding the universe of the film. I have wanted to write a graphic novel for quite a while, and I thought immediately of working on this with Greg since we had developed a sort of short hand while working together. My mind immediately went to all the little back stories that I have thought about and talked about with characters in the film but haven’t had a chance to fully explore because of the confines of a 2 hour film.
BSR!: Does this set the tone for the movie as a prequel or more of a tie in?
MB: I would say it is in a sense a prequel, but it isn’t the kind of prequel that sets up all of the events of the film. It is more of an appetizer; it serves as an origin story for an organization that is involved in the film, as well as a character that is important. But it isn’t explicitly an act 1 of the film. And that is intentional because we want it to stand alone on its own merits as a story within the same universe that touched the film, but wasn’t required reading going in and also wasn’t the kind of thing that would only be interesting in the context of the film. For example: the adversary Godzilla faces in the comic is different from the film but tonally the ideas and the treatment of our Godzilla is the same as in the film.
BSR!: So more of a predator prey relationship between the monsters?
MB: Yeah, without spoiling anything Gareth and I made sure the creatures in the film the M.U.T.O.S were plausibly related to Godzilla in a way that didn’t feel like an external additional set up. We have this one major buy in we are asking the audience to give us which is a 350 foot lizard is emerging from the ocean, come with us. But we didn’t want to say oh and there is this other thing, and this other thing. We wanted everything to flow organically from the premise, and hopefully we met that in the film, and we wanted to take that same challenge in the comic. We wanted the idea that these creatures could exist in the same universe without an additional setup that everyone would have to again suspend their disbelief for.
BSR!: What are you working on next?
MB: Well, I am working on a few different things, none of which am I allowed to mention yet, but all of which I’m incredibly excited about. A few are for Legendary as well whom I love working for. So, hopefully soon there will be more to say, but there is some stuff I’m stoked about.
BSR!: Final question, in all of the research you did, do you have a favorite rendition of Godzilla thus far?
MB: My favorite will always be the original. Sensibility wise and where I am now in my life I appreciate its seriousness and the gravity that it has. I still do love the campier films of which there are several; they have a place in my heart. But the cool thing about Godzilla is there is no one Godzilla, and that is true for the monsters that he fights, they inform him. There is a Godzilla for our fear of nuclear annihilation, or environmental catastrophe, bioengineering, natural disaster, or even alien invasion, you name it. And all of those Godzillas mean the creature is a vessel more than a single character, and that is what I love most.