Okey, I know this is something that only a VERY small fraction of people would even think about, but one of my BIGGEST movie pet peeves is when the show gets taxonomy or biology wrong. Don’t get me wrong, if it’s just a silly bit (like in Wile E Coyote) it won’t ruffle my feathers. What I’m talking about is when something that is trying to take itself seriously is trying to give taxonomy/biology and fails utterly miserably.
Case in point: Godzilla: King of the Monsters. It’s trying to give a realistic depiction of the kaiju, down to giving scientific names. The problem? Every stinkin’ kaiju has the genus name Titanus (Titanus gojira, Titanus behemoth, etc). Cool sounding name, but COMPLETELY WRONG if you’re trying to go for realism.
The term Genus is supposed to be reserved for organisms that are EXTREMELY CLOSELY related to each other (but not enough to be able to produce offspring together for the most part). A good examples for this is the Canis genus; Coyotes and Wolves both are in this genus. They look and behave ALMOST identically to each other, and in rare cases can cross breed.
now tell me, how closely related do THESE GUYS LOOK.
The ONLY thing connected these three critters together is size. Size should NOT be the main factor in lumping creatures together into genii. If that were the case, orca whales (Orcinus), whale sharks (Rhincodon) and giant squid (Architeuthis) could EASILY be in the same genus.
If they wanted to be scientifically accurate, they should’ve gone with Titanus being a subkingdom, NOT a genus. Don’t even get me started on the fact that an ALIEN life form was put in this “genus”.
Maybe I’m over analyzing this thing (it’s an otherwise pretty good movie if you can get past the taxonomy and the unneeded “reasoning” behind why the kaiju have a leader-we don’t need dumb wolf pack parallels, just say that the strongest
critter is boss critter) but I just think whoever MONARCH hired as a taxonomist should have their license revoked. If you’re reading the end of this thank you for putting up with a rambly world-builder who loves biology.
