User blog comment:Titanollante/Zilla 1998 is Godzilla/@comment-24572700-20141129042050/@comment-25285745-20141129044600

That sounds pretty accurate. I think Keith Aiken is speaking strictly legally. As far as Toho is concerned, Zilla 1998 and 2004 may be the exact same character in every way and fall under the same copyright. But to TriStar, their creature is and always will be Godzilla because they bought the rights and utilized them. In a strictly legal sense, the 1998 creature is copyrighted as "Godzilla," while Toho later trademarked its design and character as "Zilla." Toho reabsorbed its copyrights and later trademarked them as a separate monster from Godzilla. TriStar and Toho will never enter a legal battle over the character's name, TriStar will just continue to distribute the movie under the name Godzilla and include Godzilla's copyright with it, while Toho will continue to use the character but under the name and copyright of "Zilla."

Man, this is conplicated!