The Real-World Horror That Inspired Godzilla

For more than 70 years, Godzilla has taken on many forms, from a terrifying force of destruction to a defender of humanity and global pop culture icon. But the monster’s first appearance carried a much darker meaning. In the 1954 Japanese film Gojira, Godzilla embodied a fear that audiences knew all too well: the threat of nuclear destruction.

Less than a decade earlier, Allied forces had dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki during World War II, killing about 120,000 people instantly and causing horrific casualties and injuries to thousands more. Defeat, which had seemed unthinkable for Japan, came suddenly.

By 1954, Japan had made significant progress in rebuilding, but ongoing U.S. nuclear tests at Bikini Atoll in the Marshall Islands meant the wounds of Hiroshima and Nagasaki stayed fresh in the nation’s mind. Additionally, the Korean War and Cold War tensions kept the threat of nuclear warfare in the public consciousness.

Then, just months before Gojira reached theaters, a nuclear disaster in the Pacific brought those fears even closer to home.

Fears intensified in March 1954, when the United States detonated Castle Bravo, a 15-megaton hydrogen bomb—more than 750 times more powerful than the bombs that destroyed Hiroshima and Nagasaki—at Bikini Atoll. A massive plume of radioactive dust and debris floated over some 7,000 square miles of the Pacific Ocean, and the Japanese fishing trawler Daigo Fukuryū Maru (Lucky Dragon No. 5) was caught in the fallout.

The 23 crew members, who suffered skin burns and other symptoms of radiation exposure, were quarantined when they reached port. Six months later, the boat’s chief radio operator developed liver complications and died at age 40. In 1955, the U.S. government paid Japan $2 million in a settlement related to the fallout without admitting legal liability. For many Japanese, the incident was a chilling reminder that the dangers of nuclear weapons had not ended, and the event helped spur a nationwide antinuclear movement.

Gojira is a radioactive monster who emerges from the waves to go on a rampage through the Japanese countryside. In the opening scene of the film, directed by Ishirō Honda, a Japanese fishing vessel is destroyed by a mysterious flash and explosion. The Lucky Dragon incident and Japan’s memories of the atomic bombings helped shape Gojira’s nuclear themes, along with Hollywood monster movies like King Kong (1933).

“Most of the visual images I got were from my war experience,” Honda recalled. “After the war, all of Japan, as well as Tokyo, was left in ashes. The atomic bomb had emerged and completely destroyed Hiroshima… I took the characteristics of an atomic bomb and applied them to Godzilla.”

Although King Kong used stop-motion animation, special-effects director Eiji Tsuburaya knew the technique would take too long for Gojira’s tight production schedule. Instead, his team built a monster suit, combining features of dinosaurs such as Tyrannosaurus, Iguanodon and Stegosaurus. Haruo Nakajima, who wore the suit, based Gojira’s movements on animals he observed at the zoo, including bears and elephants.

The creature is finally defeated by a superweapon called an Oxygen Destroyer. Notably, its inventor, Dr. Daisuke Serizawa, wears an eye patch over an injury he suffered during World War II. The weapon saves Japan from annihilation, but Godzilla remains a surprisingly sympathetic victim of nuclear technology. To defeat the monster, humanity must turn to another potentially devastating weapon.

“Godzilla himself was awakened by nuclear tests, so he can be considered a victim of bombings,” Yuki Miyamoto, professor of religious studies at DePaul University, said in an interview. “The scales themselves look like radiation burns that victims suffered from.”

About 9.6 million moviegoers in Japan saw Gojira during its original theatrical run. Although the film initially received mixed reviews, it would go down in history as one of Japan’s greatest movies.

Produced near the beginning of a golden age in Japanese film—a decade that also saw the release of classics like Seven Samurai, Ikiru and Rashomon—Gojira’s success reflected Japan’s broader postwar cultural resurgence, as the country rebuilt and reemerged on the international stage.

The film reached American audiences in a heavily edited version released in 1956 as Godzilla, King of the Monsters! New scenes featuring an American reporter played by Raymond Burr softened parts of the original film’s antinuclear message. Meanwhile, the Japanese original spawned a lengthy series of sequels. Nakajima would play Godzilla in 12 films.

Today, the franchise continues to put the character in new historical and cinematic contexts. Godzilla Minus One (2023), set in postwar Japan, returned to the devastation and trauma at the heart of the original and won an Academy Award for visual effects in 2024.