Godzilla Review - 2½ Stars

“Godzilla” arrives with too much story and not enough monster.  Brian Cranston kicks things off as a nuclear power plant manager who insists on getting to the bottom of a cover up when his wife dies in a plant accident. This begins as a sort of prequel or warm up to what we come to watch.   The culprits are hatching from a batch of underground eggs and turn into flying monsters who plan on mating and creating more.  The two bad birds decimate several cities with the help of state of the art special effects.  Finally Godzilla rises from the sea to save the day and return the world to balance.  Ken Watanabe delivers a lot of lines about the power of nature.  David Straithorn directs the military effort to deal with the monsters.  Aaron Taylor Johnson takes over the heavy lifting as Cranston’s son who also has the talent for dealing with nuclear bombs.  Oh by the way, the monsters all crave radioactive materials — kind of in the manner we crave fresh baked chocolate chip cookies.  So the bombs turn into bait.  “Godzilla” goes way long on talk and story and way short on monster.  Show me the monster.  Does it deliver what it promises?  Talky story but coy about revealing what we wanna see.  Is it entertaining?  Feels long and talky.  Is it worth the price of admission?  Mixed result.