GODZILLA was meant to be an alien fighting dinosaur in 1998 film

The original script and Godzilla design were going to be very different to what had made it into the film. The script had Godzilla as a reptilian monster that had hibernated for millennia, which upon its awakening encountered and fought a shape-shifting alien monster, which was called "The Gryphon". At the withdrawal of Director De Bont (who left to direct Twister), Roland Emmerich and 'Dean Devlin (I)' were hired. In the end, Godzilla turned out to be an enormous, radioactively mutated lizard. Despite the less-than-expected box office performance, this film still made more money worldwide than any other American movie based on a foreign film. The original Japanese film by the same name 'Godzilla' was made in 1954 by Ishirô Honda, and the 2014 film will be the film's second American remake, and is set for release on 16 May 2014.