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This chapter discusses the film sequel from its origins in cinema's early years throughout the developments of the twentieth century. It concentrates on cultural forces at two historical junctures: namely modernity and postmodernity. Georges Méliès' contribution to cinema is still marked today in terms of his development of a rather sophisticated form of narrative spectacle. His ‘sequel’ arguably departs from a very successful earlier work to showcase his improvements both technologically and artistically within an increasingly progressive and competitive market. Ishirô Honda's Gojira (Godzilla) and its sequels play an important role in charting cross-cultural relations between the USA and Japan after the US attack on Hiroshima. Roland Emmerich's film represents a model of filmmaking unique to a specific era of Hollywood history. The sequel's long catalogue of historical interactions with the serial continues to grow in the twenty-first century, but arguably in ways that have not previously been realised.

Pop heroes and anti-heroes like Astro Boy and Godzilla represent not only our technological consequences but also the mythological unconscious. For example, one of the origins of Godzilla could well be discovered in a pseudo-scientific and pseudo-religious theory championed by a nineteenth century new shintoist Masumi Ohishigori, who was so aware of the limit of Shintoism as to re-locate the origins of man in dinosaurs born of Japanese gods. Therefore, it is his syncretic and creationistic theory of dinosaurs that doubtlessly helped Meiji Japan modernize itself, and even survived the postwar junkyard in the form of Godzilla. Thus, a decade after Godzilla (1954), Ghidorah the Three-headed Monster (1964), which re-appropriates Audrey Hepburn’s Roman Holiday (1954) and dramatizes the way Godzilla, Rodan and Mothra join forces to defeat Ghidorah from outer space, skillfully allegorizes a critical point from the U.S. Occupation period to the High Growth period in Japanese history. The chapter also discusses the influences of Ray Bradbury, Edgar Allan Poe, and Herman Melville on the dinosaur imaginary.

This chapter is about Levine’s career in the late 1950s—the period when he first became famous. It was at this time that Levine achieved success with saturation in selling Godzilla: King of the Monsters, Attila, and Hercules. The chapter provides many overlooked details about the success of these films, such as the colleagues who were an integral part of promoting them and the importance of gaining the backing of the film industry as a whole—movie exhibitors in particular—to create a sympathetic climate. This chapter also details Levine’s journey from movie promoter to self-promoting celebrity—from a largely anonymous member of the team that promoted Godzilla to the nationally famous focal point for the Hercules promotional campaign.