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The Legend |
First appearing in the 1961 film, Mothra, Mothra has become a world-renowned movie icon. Seen frequently throughout the Godzilla franchise, Mothra is depicted as a gigantic moth-like creature with large, exaggerated compound eyes and brightly-colored patterned wings. Hailing from Infant Island, Mothra is worshipped by the island natives as a beautiful goddess. She is portrayed as a peaceful benevolent creature who only fights if antagonized. Mothra will fight until death to protect herself, her allies, and the Earth itself. When faced with conflict, Mothra has demonstrated a wide variety of special abilities. Such abilities include supersonic flight, shooting laser beams from her antennae, firing stingers from her thorax, and immortality. Over the decades, Mothra has been featured in countless works of art including movies, television shows, video games, and literature, making her one of the most popular Godzilla monsters.
The Life Cycle
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Throughout her career, Mothra has been depicted in various stages of the life cycle of Lepidoptera. From her enormous yellow and blue egg hatches her larva which is shown as a large brown silkworm with luminescent blue eyes. This caterpillar soon forms a cocoon, the pupa stage, which evolves into the adult Mothra, or imago. With Mothra having immortality, her life cycle is comparable to that of the Phoenix in that she is continuously regenerated after death.
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The Creators
Tomoyuki Tanaka
Born 1910 in Osaka, Japan, Tanaka was a major film producer for Toho Co. Ltd. In his 60 years with Toho, Tanaka produced more than 200 films. He is credited with the production of every Toho kaiju film including the 1961 film, Mothra. Tanaka unfortunately passed in 1997 but his legacy continues to live on through his films. The 1998 American revision of Godzilla staring Matthew Broderick was dedicated to his memory.
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