Chapter 253: Shinji: "It's all Fake News" (shrugs)
In response to Type-Moon's aggressive media offensive, Toho naturally made efforts to turn the tide of negative opinion about Godzilla's design, while also using other promotional tactics to divert fans' attention.
Their North American distributor was Paramount Pictures—you know, the one with the snowy mountain logo. Toho hoped Paramount would use its media network to launch an effective counterattack.
And the target they set their sights on was none other than Shinji Matou himself.
Ever since Super 8 started dominating the box office, Shinji had become the center of media and fan attention.
Next in line might've been Hiroshi Nagano, but he was under Johnny & Associates. And while Johnny's agency wasn't as domineering or ruthless as it had been back in the 80s and 90s, you still couldn't just dig up dirt on one of their talents out of thin air.
If you tried to manufacture a scandal out of nothing, Old Man Johnny Kitagawa himself might come out of retirement just to personally give you a beatdown.
That wasn't a joke—the man had been known to throw hands in his younger days.
Besides, Western audiences didn't really care about a Japanese actor. No matter how handsome Hiroshi Nagano was, to them he was just some guy—he didn't even have the recognizability of his character, Ultraman Tiga.
Compared to actors, director Shinji Matou was far more recognizable in the West, and a far easier target.
In recent years, Shinji had made a fortune in Europe and the U.S., but at the same time, he'd also made plenty of enemies.
Especially among filmmakers whose movies got utterly crushed at the box office when they went up against his two Fate films.
Of course, none of them ever stopped to ask if maybe their own movies just weren't good enough. Instead, they obsessed over one thing:
"If it weren't for Shinji Matou, my film would've been a hit!"
These people might not have had real influence, but they could certainly shout from the sidelines and stir the pot.
Toho figured that attacking Shinji wouldn't just distract fans—it could also help dampen the hype around Super 8. A double win.
What they didn't expect was how much more aggressive Paramount would be.
They thought Paramount might just stir up a few rumors, maybe some mild gossip.
But instead, the snowy mountain erupted into a full-blown avalanche—intent on burying Shinji alive.
Soon, both online platforms and print media were flooded with hit pieces about Shinji.
Titles like:
"Shinji Matou: A Con Artist Director, A Criminal Disguised as a Filmmaker!"
Under these clickbait headlines were long articles full of questionable and unverifiable claims.
Paramount had hired ghostwriters to launch a coordinated smear campaign, using that article as a launchpad to attack Shinji from every possible angle.
They started with his age, which many believed was suspiciously young given his achievements, and used that to question the validity of his credentials.
For instance, Shinji's Oxford diploma—already sketchy as hell—was put under the spotlight. They even found several so-called Oxford "classmates" who had theoretically graduated the same year as him.
Through their "interviews," they tried to plant this idea in readers' heads:
"There's something fishy about Shinji Matou's Oxford degree."
Of course, that part was actually true.
Shinji spent those years in Britain studying at the Clock Tower (the magical institution), and barely knew anything about Oxford.
Sure, he might know where the gates were, but if you asked him how many entrances Oxford even had, he'd be screwed.
And it didn't stop at his diploma.
Toho also dug up some minor infractions from Shinji's student days in the U.S, Like how he had driven a car around Los Angeles as a minor, or how he had suspicious ties to the Times Group, even hinting at inappropriate business dealings between Type-Moon and Times.
To really drown him in dirt, they even went so far as to imply that Shinji used his good looks to seduce high-level executives at Times Group.
And of course, they intentionally left the executive's gender vague—just to make things even more scandalous.
If Shinji hadn't realized that the events described in the article had absolutely nothing in common with his actual life, he might've even suspected that one of the female executives at Times Group had secretly commissioned the hit piece herself.
Ordinarily, if Shinji really had dated a Times Group executive, it wouldn't have been a big deal.
But the real problem was Shinji's age.
If he really had engaged in some kind of "transactional" relationship with a high-level exec and if that relationship had happened two years earlier…
Yeah. That would've been a legal and reputational nightmare.
Frankly, the way Paramount's ghostwriters crafted that story—every jab was a calculated attempt to utterly ruin Shinji.
Not that he was shocked.
Shinji was already used to this kind of nasty smear tactic from Paramount.
After all, this wasn't their first time pulling such stunts.
Back in his last life, remember when Tom Cruise's divorce drama and religious controversies were all over the headlines?
That all exploded right when he was locked in a legal battle with Paramount over the rights to the Mission: Impossible franchise.
Then, miraculously, the moment they reached a deal and needed to promote the next M:I film…
All the scandals just—poof—vanished.
So yeah, anyone who believed there was no connection between the smear and the business feud must've been living under a rock.
That's why Shinji and Type-Moon had already anticipated Paramount's tactics.
With Times Group's media empire backing him, Shinji wasn't afraid of these "within-the-rules" maneuvers. He even hit back—hard.
And his counterattack?
Laser-focused.
Just one message, hammered over and over again:
"Godzilla is just a giant lizard!!"
Sure, the controversy might attract curious onlookers or casual moviegoers, but Shinji was counting on something else.
He wanted to plant doubt in the minds of hardcore Godzilla fans.
If he could damage the film's core reception, reviews would tank, word-of-mouth would stall—and ultimately, Godzilla would bleed viewers.
So the two sides went to war—across entertainment tabloids, online forums, social media feeds—just weeks before Godzilla's premiere.
"Shinji Matou caught leaving a luxury Tokyo hotel with a Times Group exec—suspected illicit affair?"
Paramount was going full scorched-earth, casting a wide net regardless of whether the dirt was real or not.
Anything that could be twisted to sound scandalous was fair game.
But Shinji?
He never budged from his one-liner assault:
"Godzilla is just a giant lizard!!"
"Shinji Matou accused of underage driving during his U.S. student years…"
"Godzilla is just a giant lizard!!"
"Shinji Matou suspected of faking his degree…"
"Godzilla is just a giant lizard!!"
"Inside Shinji Matou and Type-Moon: Recruiting high-attractiveness actors—cover for shady personal fetishes?"
"Godzilla is just a giant lizard!!"
Unlike Paramount's wide-scope mudslinging, Shinji's campaign was a tightly focused precision strike.
His water army (online agents) constantly reminded viewers that Godzilla's design was the real problem.
Of course, it's not like Paramount didn't want to focus on just one solid accusation against Shinji.
But here's the catch:
Most of Shinji's so-called "dark secrets" were either unprovable or dangerously close to defamation.
Dig too deep, and they risked a lawsuit from Shinji's team.
The only one that might have had a shred of substance was the degree scandal—because, yeah, Shinji's diploma was kinda sketchy.
Unfortunately for Paramount, they couldn't press that angle either, because Oxford University itself stepped in and issued a warning:
"If you keep questioning the legitimacy of Shinji Matou's degree, we'll make sure you understand just how powerful Oxford alumni can be."
Under normal circumstances, an American corporation like Paramount wouldn't give a damn about a British university's threats.
But Oxford?
Its name carried weight—a lot of it.
Even in the U.S., many elites were either Oxford graduates or honorary alumni.
Messing with Oxford could get real messy.
Paramount's top brass had a quick internal discussion and decided—hey, it's not like the president of Oxford had personally harassed their dear old mothers or anything. No need to start World War III with a prestigious British university. Not worth it. So, they dropped the "fake diploma" angle.
But that didn't mean they were giving up.
They just shifted gears and kept looking for other ways to socially destroy Shinji Matou.
Honestly, Shinji couldn't figure out why Paramount was acting like such a rabid dog.
What did he ever do—steal their lunch money?
All he'd done was block them from cashing in on Godzilla.
Was that really a reason to go full scorched-earth?
Did they have some personal vendetta? Like—seriously—did he accidentally cast a curse at their family or something?
No matter what Paramount's motivations were, Shinji had already added them to his blacklist.
He wouldn't start a public fight now—he still had movies to promote and press junkets to get through.
But once the dust settled?
Oh, they were absolutely getting payback.
Meanwhile, even though Shinji wasn't hitting back publicly, that didn't mean he was letting Paramount gloat unchecked.
Thanks to the relentless online army from Type-Moon, the public opinion around Godzilla had started to nosedive before the movie even hit theaters.
It only had a few test screenings, but that was enough.
IMDB audience scores?
Started off at 8.1—which, for a massive-budget blockbuster, was barely passing.
In stark contrast, Super 8's online reputation remained rock solid.
Even after the first weekend's hype faded, the reviews held strong.
And IMDB score? cough cough —if you know, you know.
That stellar reception led to an incredibly stable box office performance.
Even the five weekdays after the premiere—usually a slower period—brought in almost as much as the initial weekend.
Before its second weekend even started, Super 8 had already raked in nearly $150 million in North America alone—exactly what Type-Moon had projected.
Naturally, the execs at Type-Moon and Times Group were thrilled.
This was starting to look like another Fate/Zero-level success.
With that kind of money rolling in, their attitudes toward Shinji and Super 8 shifted dramatically.
At first, their marketing support had been half-hearted—just enough to say they tried.
Now?
They were actively backing him in the media war, fighting to clear his name and boost his public image.
And it wasn't just ticket sales—merchandise was blowing up too.
Especially anything related to Ultraman—from cheap rubbery transformation toys to high-end DX and UR models by Bandai. These had become must-have items for fans.
Even though Shinji and Bandai hadn't nailed down a deal for Fate-related merchandise, Bandai didn't waste a second when it came to Ultraman.
Since early this year, Bandai had been selling out of various transformation devices.
And after Super 8's first-weekend numbers dropped, Bandai doubled down—launching a fresh wave of Ultraman and kaiju soft vinyl figures that were equally popular.
Just one week in, Ultraman-related toys had generated nearly $17 million in revenue.
And when you added all the other character-based merch?
The total ancillary income blew past $30 million.
In the movie biz, nothing boosts a director's value faster than box office returns and merch sales.
Forget all that "for the art" talk—no money, no art.
Which is why the phrase "seeing Shinji Matou is like seeing cold hard cash" began spreading like wildfire inside Type-Moon's inner circles.
It started at IMAX, then spread company to company like a very profitable virus.
And now, Super 8 entered its second weekend.
What happened next wouldn't just depend on its own momentum—It would also depend on the strength of its new competition.
If the new releases were too strong, Super 8 would take a hit.
And right on cue—its most anticipated and controversial rival arrived on the scene:
"Godzilla" had finally arrived.
Let the real battle begin.
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