G-FEST XXIII was held from July 15th to July 17th at the Crowne Plaza Chicago O’Hare.
With not so much of an interest in Godzilla or other monster movies I doubted I’d find much to explore at G-Fest, which is a Godzilla fest running since 2013. You can never count anything out though, and you’ll never guess what I got into. All I can say is I just started another bad habit for sure.
I was surprised by the amount of Tokusatsu shows and movies out there. Tokusatsu shows are any requiring a lot of effects. Many of them are similar to Power Rangers, but of course came out way before that show. The genre also includes Kaiju movies, which are giant monster movies like Godzilla. I didn’t realize the history so luckily I sat in on a panel about a 50 year history on Tokusatsu superheroes. Who knew there was a Metal Hero Series period of superhero shows where the characters were like metallic android versions of Power Rangers. It started with a character who had more kicks than the Power Rangers, Space Sheriff Gavan. By the videos seen, fight choreographers today could learn things from watching that show. Other shows even way before that like Denjin Zaboga also seem super creative overall. It’s basically the same overload of creativity seen in anime. There is so much creatively different than our real world that you have to have an open mind to watch some of it, and if you do you’ll be rewarded.
After hearing Monster Zero being talked about in panels and after watching a short documentary, Hail ToThe King, I watched Godzilla vs Monster Zero.”Creatively it’s really awesome, and it’s just a fun alien invasion and monster flick all wrapped into one movie. The costumes and effects are hilarious to see because they are great yet due to film quality of the time they didn’t look as good as they could have. I can say after going to this fest I’ll start watching a lot more Kaiju movies.
Now as a comic collector it’s hard to get me to buy anything unless it’s pretty high quality creatively and in good shape. When I walked the floor room some of the coolest busts and models I’ve ever seen were there from a Gremlin to awesome classic monster busts like The Mummy and The Wolf Man. There were definitely a lot of toys also. Even though I’m super picky on t shirts I ended up buying a few that where creative based on Ultraman and a mix of Pokemon and The Power Rangers.I also ended up buying this Little Gozilla toy. It’s super cute and funny compared to the other monsters in Kaiju so I hope there’s not a lot of them or this may be a collecting trend for me. He’ll fit in real nice with my Fallout memorabilia because Godzilla after all is the result of nuclear fallout. I give this convention a 7 out of 10 as it didn't have alot of panels or vendors, but there were things to see and learn about for sure. G-Fest was a fest any Otaku could enjoy, you’ll find something new for you to geek out on.
