Godzilla Evolved Inflatable Costume Review - Toho Kingdom (original) (raw)

Ripped straight from this year’s smash hit Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire, Godzilla in his Evolved form is here to become the King of the Halloween Party. Just like the monster from the movies, this Godzilla is massive, and perhaps a bit too much to handle for mankind.

Design

The suit is comprised primarily of a jumpsuit with Godzilla’s scale pattern printed on it. There are also soft dorsal fins attached to the back, of course. One detail that might come as a shock is the bright orange fan on Godzilla’s right flank. Combined with the printed texture, I couldn’t help thinking of hunters in camouflage gear and safety vests. The tail is a reasonable length, but sadly the thing drags along the ground, even with the included air pump blasting. The feet only cover the tops of the wearer, so it’s probably best to grab some shoes to go along the costume. There are slender, stretchy straps that you can wrap around your shoes to keep the foot-coverings attached snugly, but the flimsy materials don’t instill much confidence that they’d last a night of trick-or-treating or partying. Overall, it’s a handsome suit marred by a large, unsightly Nerf-or-nothing-orange fan and a tail that would be lucky to last ten minutes dragging on the sidewalk.

Package to Person

InSpirit Designs has done a nice job squeezing this massive costume into a shockingly small plastic pouch. Taking it out is no problem, and then it’s just a matter of unraveling the thing and finding the zipper on the back. I’m a tall guy, standing at 6’4”, so it was a little hard for me to angle my neck right so that I could get the head and arms on at the same time. I doubt someone an inch or two taller would have much more trouble, but I don’t see anyone taller than 6’6” being able to squeeze into this costume.

Wearability

Once in the suit, you’ll need someone to zip you into it. Unless someone has a sophisticated system of levers and pulleys, I can’t see them zipping up on their own. With that in mind, you’re going to want to turn the provided fan on ASAP. The screen that you see out of—Godzilla’s mouth—is a solid window of soft plastic. You cannot breathe without using that pump, and the costume doesn’t look right without it anyway. Just make sure to load the fan with four AA batteries before you put this beast on. Godzilla’s massive, clawed hands offer zero dexterity, but thankfully the creators of this suit added a Velcro opening in the palms of Godzilla’s hands to push your little human hands through to grab a drink, make a call, or take some delicious candy from a witch’s cauldron and stuff it in your pillowcase.

As stated before, you see out of Godzilla’s mouth. The window provided is perfectly fine for looking straight ahead, but I had to pull down on the lower jaw of the suit to be able to see anything below my collarbone. I would’ve preferred a greater range of visibility, even if it meant making the costume less pleasing to the eye. Another big problem is perhaps inevitable, that being the huge size of the suit. Without proper clearance, it’s hard to navigate with any level of confidence that you won’t bump into the environment around you or smack other people. The tail is the worst part, jutting out nice and low so that it can get snagged on bushes or trampled on by others.

Overall

I really wanted to like the suit, and I need to give InSpirit Designs credit for making a (mostly) attractive costume of the Evolved King of the Monsters. The detail is a tad murky, but it still looks great in action. The shortcomings are with the user experience. This thing made me feel claustrophobic at times, I was afraid I was going to crash into or trip over things, and I was concerned I was going to damage the costume. If you have a controlled environment where these things wouldn’t be a concern, I’d recommend getting the costume (and maybe painting the bright orange fan black or dark green). If you want to be the life of the party, or accompany your own little Minilla on a trick-or-treating adventure, I’d consider looking into a different option.

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