Kaiju Talk Time: With the word kaiju, I think there is a difference in terminology and genre, and I agree it gets complex. And of course, there are no exact answers. When does a story with cowboys become a Western? (1)

If you tell that exact same story, in almost every detail, but dress them in samurai outfits (As Kurosawa did) does it now become a Samurai story and no longer a Western? And if you do that, then why? (2)

Kaiju simply means "monster" in Japanese. From a folklore perspective, every monster is a kaiju. It doesn't even have anything to do with scale. A chupacabra is a kaiju. So is bigfoot. So is the Loch Ness Monster. Rinse and repeat. (3)

Giant monsters are called daikaiju, which just means... "big monster." So Godzilla, Gamera, King Kong, and the like are all daikaiju. But then there is a separate thing, which is kaiju eiga, or kaiju films. Which are a distinct genre, characterized by a formula and rules.(4)

If you want to make a story with a giant monster, but without the tropes of the kaiju genre, then why call it "kaiju?" Why use the term but not the rest? You don't have to. You could just as easily use another term, like stompers, or gigamonsters, or... anything. (5)

If you are using the term kaiju, but taking none of the background, history, and meaning then you get into that place of "Japan as decoration." You are simply adopting words to give a sense of exoticism. And I'm not a fan of that. (6)

Or in other words, if you asked if the Cloverfield monster was a kaiju, I would say sure, why not? Any monster can be a kaiju. But if you asked in Cloverfield were a kaiju film, I would say... probably not. It is a disaster film that uses a kaiju as its disaster. (7)

In the same way I would say Alien is a horror film and Aliens is not, even though they both use the same monster. Or how not ever story with a ghost is a Ghost Story. Like I wouldn't think of Beetlejuice as a ghost story, per se. (8)

So if you want to tell a story with giant monsters, go to town. If you want to tell a kaiju story, go to town. But if you want to tell a story with giant monsters AND call them kaiju, maybe ask yourself why? What that term?