Jonathan Millar 
Anil Krishna 
James Oconner 
Godzilla Minus Zero: New IMAX Trailer Teases Explosive Action, King Ghidorah, and the Epic Finale
© TOHO
A few months after TOHO released the first teaser for Godzilla Minus Zero, we finally have another look at Takashi Yamazaki’s follow-up to Godzilla Minus One. The new IMAX trailer gives us a much better idea of what is coming this time around, and it looks like Yamazaki is not exactly planning to make things easier for anyone.
A First Look at the Action
The trailer shows Japan preparing for another devastating encounter with Godzilla, with the scale of the threat looking even bigger than before. There’s also a rather ominous suggestion that “it all ends here,” which has led to plenty of speculation that Minus Zero could be the final chapter of Yamazaki’s story rather than the middle film of a planned trilogy.
And there is a lot more monster action this time. One particularly wild shot shows Godzilla’s blue atomic energy seemingly bending gravity itself, sending houses floating up into the air. But the biggest moment is arguably something you don’t actually see. Just before Godzilla comes crashing down, we hear a very familiar, almost cackling roar that sounds an awful lot like King Ghidorah.
If that really is Ghidorah, then things have gotten considerably more serious. Godzilla has been the overwhelming threat in Minus One, so seeing him apparently face something capable of taking him down would completely change the equation for the sequel.
What Can We Expect From the Sequel?
Ryunosuke Kamiki and Minami Hamabe are returning as Koichi and Noriko, and their story should remain an important part of the movie. One of the biggest strengths of Godzilla Minus One was that it didn’t treat the human characters as people who simply waited around for Godzilla to show up. Their personal stories carried a lot of the movie, and Minus Zero looks like it will continue that approach.
That could be especially painful this time around. Noriko hints that her time may be running out, while the family is once again caught in the middle of a disaster that seems impossible to escape. Koichi, Noriko and their adopted daughter have already been through enough, so watching them get thrown back into another Godzilla nightmare is going to be rough.
Yamazaki has also warned that the new movie will take the Shikishima family and Japan into an even darker situation. During a presentation at CinemaCon, the writer-director said, “In this new film, an even deeper despair will befall Japan and the Shikishima family.” He also teased the question at the heart of the sequel: with an overwhelming force that cannot simply be escaped, how does humanity fight back?
Whatever the answer is, Minus Zero doesn’t look like a simple repeat of Minus One. The trailer suggests a much bigger monster story, while still keeping the human characters at the center of it. And if that really was King Ghidorah we heard at the end, well, Koichi and everyone else may have considerably bigger problems than they did the last time.
Godzilla Minus Zero arrives in Japanese theaters on November 3, followed by releases in the US, UK and Ireland on November 6.
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