I embraced some of these fandoms whole-heartedly (others I replaced with my own less mainstream interests, such as Dan Fouts Chargers, Dan Majerle’s Suns, The Fixx, etc., ), and I see exposing my son to these as both a parenting duty and a reward.  Of the pop-culture passions from my youth, one of the most fun to share has been Godzilla.

Godzilla, the Japanese man in a rubber suit with all the glorious toy tank smashing, Kaiju wrestling, and fantastic music, has become one of my son’s favorites, and I have happily watched him share the phenomenon with his friends.

Let me clarify that we are not speaking of the Godzilla-creature from the 1998 Matthew Broderick film (aka GINO – Godzilla in Name Only or ‘zilla), we are talking about the original TOHO monster.

My son is a fan of all the classic films, but he tends to share Destroy All Monsters or Final Wars with his friends as a gateway film, just because the target audience is so desperate for action these days. I’m not worried, though, because he will just as happily sit and watch Godzilla vs. Mothra, Godzilla vs. Destoroyah, or any of the older films.  Where I used to have to wait to watch them weekends on Channel 11 or Channel 9, he can simply hit a button on his Zune – but the passion for the films is still there.

We own all the Godzilla video games for Nintendo systems and have a couple of Godzilla toys and shirts from various sources.  One of the best things we’ve discovered was Kaiju Big Battel. We first found Kaiju Big Battel as part of Monkey Bar TV’s Action Blast! But when that show ended, we continued to follow the mayhem, and last year we attended our first live Kaiju Big Battel match.

(Someone else took this video, not me – I just found it on youtube… but you can see me in the upper right corner, wearing a red shirt, at the 6:15 mark) It was one of the greatest experiences we’ve shared to date, and I can’t wait to go back again.

That’s pretty much been my whole vibe on sharing Godzilla with my son. Sharing Star Wars has been awesome. Being San Diego Charger fans together is incredible. But there’s something about Godzilla and watching my boy sell others on the fandom that shoots it right up to the top of the list.