FA+
Shop
On the use of "Kaiju" as a label
9 years ago
General
If this is too much to read there's a TL;DR at the bottom.
Recently I've seen a few people who submit artwork here misusing the Japanese term "Kaiju" to mean "Macro" or "Giant". This is so far from the original use of the word that it's like calling a spoon a car.
If you'll forgive me I'd like to explain what Kaiju actually means. Kaiju, translated, means "strange creature" or as one might say in English "monster". It means nothing about size.
Let me please repeat that... it says nothing about size. Nothing.
Now I can already hear people thinking "Oh, but people call Godzilla a kaiju and he's a giant monster" and they are right, people do call him a kaiju and it's not wrong. A giant monster is still a monster.
However, if you look properly you'll find that in the fiction where both giant and human sized monsters exist the terms "kaiju" and "daikaiju" will be used, the "dai" prefix meaning "large".
So we've established the correct use of the term now, so why am I so incensed about this? Well some using "kaiju" on macro art are not using it right because the characters depicted are not monsters, they are just giant anthros.
If you've got a giant anthro, that is not a monster, then it's a giant anthro and not a kaiju.
TL;DR - "Kaiju" does not mean "Macro".
Recently I've seen a few people who submit artwork here misusing the Japanese term "Kaiju" to mean "Macro" or "Giant". This is so far from the original use of the word that it's like calling a spoon a car.
If you'll forgive me I'd like to explain what Kaiju actually means. Kaiju, translated, means "strange creature" or as one might say in English "monster". It means nothing about size.
Let me please repeat that... it says nothing about size. Nothing.
Now I can already hear people thinking "Oh, but people call Godzilla a kaiju and he's a giant monster" and they are right, people do call him a kaiju and it's not wrong. A giant monster is still a monster.
However, if you look properly you'll find that in the fiction where both giant and human sized monsters exist the terms "kaiju" and "daikaiju" will be used, the "dai" prefix meaning "large".
So we've established the correct use of the term now, so why am I so incensed about this? Well some using "kaiju" on macro art are not using it right because the characters depicted are not monsters, they are just giant anthros.
If you've got a giant anthro, that is not a monster, then it's a giant anthro and not a kaiju.
TL;DR - "Kaiju" does not mean "Macro".
Youma are generally demons, witches, etc.
Kaibatsu are more realistic monsters; werewolves would be a good example. It's also a loan word from Chinese.
Bakemono is similar to Kaibatsu, with some emphasis on transformation.
Kaiju, more inhuman and less realistic monsters. Generally referring to the monsters from many Toho films, the Ultra series, and the many sentai series.
The terms "kaijin" and "seijin" are also used in similar contexts but don't neccessarily mean "monster".