It Just Hasn't Been the Same Around Here Without Mothra

There’s a lot of talk these days as to where we have gone wrong in the matter of raising our young people, seeing as how they are often in a state of disrespect to their elders, think over-highly of themselves, lack discipline and thoughtfulness, and show a distinct shortfall of critical thinking skills, but a lot of it can be put down to the demise of horror movies starring gigantic insects.

Your average teenage hoodlum, layabout, anarchist, drifter, or no-account has a deficit of motivation in his life. Nothing seems to get the fire started in his belly, nothing seems to drive him onward to achievement.

You may be surprised however when you go to the movies to see the vigor with which a representative of this generation of so-called layabouts runs screaming down the street when he is pursued by a giant walking stick. It can inspire you.

Motivation is no longer an issue in the life of a young person who is dodging the streams of poison juices exuded by a pack of rampaging giant spiders.

Whatever the recommended daily allowance is of pure adrenalized terror, it is exceeded in the young subject when he sees an African bollworm larva, previously cavorting on a pea pod, grow gigantic, and turn its attention and its several hundred eyes in his direction and start rolling down the street towards him.

These are the kind of life events that make a young person straighten up and fly right. 

Well, why wouldn’t it?

As a class, your average insect is not classically handsome, even at ordinary size. The ranks are thin when you search for matinee idol looks among our hard-shelled, antennaed, bug-eyed, stinked-up, feelered, winged, and spindly-legged companions, and it doesn’t get any better when they are blown up to skyscraper size.

It would be the case with all of us. You have some little imperfection that you have always been sensitive about.

Say that you have always felt that your eyes are too close together.

This you can offset by the expressiveness of the rest of your features, by employing your sense of humor, by always wearing a hat pulled down strategically over one of your eyes.

Imagine your chagrin if you were blown up to the height of the Chrysler Building and all of a sudden there simply was no more hiding these too-close-together eyes in anything like a subtle fashion.

You get the feeling that while your potential victims run screaming down the street in mortal terror they are also asking one another, “man, did you get a load of how close together that guy’s eyes are?”

This grates upon any sensitive soul, which is why even the best of our gigantic human beings in the movies starts off the day in a foul humor and goes downhill from there.

The same with our friends in the etymological world.

Your concern regarding your overly-close eyes pales in comparison to the dental shame of the chewing insect who typically has two mandibles, one on each side of the head, positioned between the labrum and maxillae.

They, these mandibles, are the largest mouthparts of chewing insects, being used to masticate (cut, tear, crush, chew) food items. They open outwards (to the sides of the head) and come together medially.

In carnivorous chewing insects, the mandibles can be modified to be more knife-like, whereas in herbivorous chewing insects, they are more typically broad and flat on their opposing faces.

Well.

You see what I mean. When you give a little time towards picturing this image in some detail you conclude that there are some matters best left at the miniature level.

At Empire State Building size it is all too clear that the insect grew up in a home that either lacked the funds for proper orthodontic work, or one that simply couldn’t be bothered.

In either case the insect is mortified and can only be comforted by crushing a few small towns under its feet.

It brings humility to a young person in ordinary life to consider that he or she is only a radioactive spill or stray meteorite impact away from being carried off by a giant scorpion in a foul mood.

It gives a person respect for the great circle of life, particularly as to how that great circle of life had the sense to keep some things small – insects – and some things relatively large – human beings.

A person’s patriotism may be aroused when he realizes that he is being pursued by an American Carrion Beetle, an American Cockroach, an American Dog Tick, an American House Spider, American Oil Beetle, American Pelecinid Wasp, or American Salmonfly, but the sensation of camaraderie quickly fades once the mandibles we were talking about become an important plot element.

Not every insect is cut out for this line of work.

I would say that roly-poly bugs are not especially terrifying at either small or gigantic scale, or those water bugs that skitter over the surface of farm ponds which under gargantuan circumstances would simply sink to the muddy bottom.

There was a time when you couldn’t turn around without seeing a movie poster of a giant dragonfly, beetle, ant, or katydid snacking on a quick handful of humans, but it’s been nigh on decades.

That’s my point. Ever since they started to fade from the scene, young people have become especially troublesome. You may draw your own conclusions.