‘Godzilla vs. Kong’ Director Takes Shot at Michael Bay

Godzilla vs. Kong is dominating the box office and director Adam Wingard has to be feeling good. The former indie darling has translated his success to the world of blockbusters. One of the biggest moments in Godzilla vs. Kong was the reveal of Mechagodzilla. It’s not the first time we’ve seen the character but it’s the first time it’s been portrayed in a big-budget Hollywood blockbuster.

Wingard recently revealed where he got the influence for the design of Mechagodzilla.

“I just always loved the simplicity of the Transformers designs,” Wingard told Inverse. “So I tried to create a look to the character that was punchy and just had a bit more simplicity. There’s an immediacy to his shape and outline.”

The design for Mechagodzilla did come out pretty simple. Wingard intentionally wanted it that way because of Michael Bay’s Transformer movies.

“I remember watching the third Transformers movie in the theater,” Wingard recalls. “It was one of those things where I was with a date, and we got there late, and the only seats that were available were literally in the front row. And so I’m sitting there watching Transformers 3 in the front row, and I couldn’t tell what the hell was going on.”

Bay’s Transformers movies are among the most maligned by critics.

“The Transformers, they just looked like metal,” he continued. “They looked like a plane crash. So I thought, that’s the thing I wanted to avoid. They were too complex. There are too many moving parts, and I couldn’t latch on to anything. Nothing felt iconic with that Transformers design.”

While some of the visual effects were impressive in the Transformers movies, Bay doesn’t understand subtlety which seems to be a reason why Wingard wasn’t a fan.