By Eileen McHenry

I know, I know, you think of yourself as a B-movie savant who prides himself on his knowledge of the obscure, the inept, and the ill-conceived. You’re not kidding anyone but yourself, bunkie. Next time you go to the theater, look at the crowd. All of them – the packs of teenagers, the family groups and dating couples – will make a point of sitting a fair distance away from you. They spotted you as soon as you came in, because of the way you settled carefully into a favored seat and focused rather too avidly on the screen, long before the previews started in fact. They know you are not here just to watch a movie. Anyone can see you are working on your issues.

Some folks race to see each frothy romantic comedy that comes out, knowing it will make them feel better about life. Others may find themselves dazed and strangely fufilled by strangled women pleading from beyond the grave that the hard-boiled detective on the case catch the killer. And others – people like you – light up inside as they watch Godzilla wade ashore to flatten Tokyo.

You may ask: Why me? Why Godzilla? The B-film is right for you, bunkie, because of its nonsensical plotlines, distorted characters and fool-nobody special effects. You respond to them because they reflect your life.

Toho Studios, real standouts in the genre, have worked hard to provide a set of subconscious archetypes tailor-made for, well, people like you. The images work for the truly shameless –I mean fearless – seeker of inner wisdom, and you can easily see yourself in these stories. While the self-help set maunders on about getting in touch with their feelings and healing the Inner Child, the Toho fan is looking to find – and nuke – his Inner Kenny. What, you think I’m kidding? I defy you to rent any movie with a Kenny in it – Gamera, say, or Godzilla vs. Megalon – and watch him in action without being struck with horror and loathing. Kenny is Shirley Temple gone radioactive. Kenny is everything you hate about yourself, dressed in disturbingly small pants. Kenny is you. This is the essential problem of the kaiju film and, of course, the central problem in your life. Buck up, there’s good news: Godzilla is you, too.

To read the rest of this article, please order B-Movies Quarterly #2.