When it comes to actors who double as nerds, none are more authentic than Patton Oswalt. The comedian was showing off his nerd credentials long before it was cool, and now that the rest of the world has come around to liking what nerds like, Oswalt is basically a god. Or, at the very least, he’s a giant rampaging monster like his the new short Monster Challenge.
OK, so Oswalt’s not a real Kaiju in the short — he’s playing a fictionalized version of himself who takes a job on a show in Japan and almost immediately gets fired. He then takes a new job on a Japanese game show in an attempt to win back some of his dignity, but things don’t go exactly as planned. Oswalt soon finds himself dressed in a rubber Godzilla-like costume as he tries to destroy a small city while fending off increasingly-sadistic attacks from the show’s contestants. It escalates into an all-out Kaiju brawl with fellow comedic actor Ben Schwartz, who is apparently a seasoned veteran of the show.
The short was written and directed by Michael Giacchino, an acclaimed composer who’s known for scoring such films as Up, Jurassic World, Rogue One, and many other blockbusters (he also composed the music for Monster Challenge, naturally). The short is one of only two director credits on his IMDb page, along with an episode of Star Trek: Short Treks, and we definitely think more gigs are likely to be coming his way based on this.
If you’re a fan of Kaiju movies, Japanese game shows, or Patton Oswalt, then you owe it to yourself to check out Monster Challenge below.
