Gareth Owen Edwards (born 1 June 1975) is a Welsh film and television director. His first works in the world of cinema were as a visual effects team member for the documentary In the Shadow of the Moon and an episode of the television series Heroes and Villains.

Edwards went on to direct his first feature film, Monsters. The crew consisted of himself as director, 5 other crew members, and the two lead actors (not counting the numerous amateur, volunteer non-actors he convinced to play minor characters). He then edited all the special effects shots himself using off-the-shelf computer software. The special effects budget was a mere $15,000, with the total cost of the film coming well under its max cost of $500,000. The final product premiered at the South by Southwest Film Festival on March 13, 2010, then premiered at several other international film festivals before seeing a wide release later in the year.

Impressed by what the young director achieved with such a small budget, Warner Bros. and Legendary Pictures decided to let him tackle, as just his second foray as director, a much bigger project. Having already made a film about his own original monsters, Gareth Edwards would now handle the King of the Monsters himself: Godzilla. Made on a much bigger budget of $160 million, the film takes a Revisiting the Roots approach to the franchise, hewing more closely to the dark tone of the very first film. Despite the big budget and grand scale, the film crew has stated that the film is still essentially an indie film at heart. Shortly afterwards, he was hired by Disney and its subsidary, Lucasflim, to direct the first Star Wars spin-off film, Rogue One. While he was originally intended to direct a sequel to Godzilla, he opted to take a break instead after completing his work on Rogue One, and was replaced by Michael Dougherty (X2: X-Men United, Superman Returns, Krampus, Godzilla: King of the Monsters).

To date, he's the only person to have directed both a Godzilla and a Star Wars movie.

Not to be confused with fellow Welsh director Gareth Evans.

Works of Gareth Edwards:

• In the Shadow of the Moon (2007)
• Heroes and Villains, episode "Attila the Hun" (2008)
• Monsters (2010)
• Godzilla (2014)
• Rogue One (2016)
• The Creator (2023)
• Jurassic World Rebirth (2025)

Provides examples of:

• Author Appeal:
  • Giant monsters and forces of destruction, be they organic (his first two films) or mechanical (his third).
  • A newsreel-style opening shows up in both Godzilla and The Creator.
  • He seems to have some admiration for Asian cultures of various sorts. Godzilla is of course an American remake of a Japanese film, Rogue One has one of canon's first major Asian characters in Chirrut Imwe, and The Creator features a war between a Western and an Asian superstate, with the latter portrayed more sympathetically.
• Action Film, Quiet Drama Scene: Loves these as much as he loves epic, large-scale destruction, and even provides the page quote.
• The Cameo: He appears in The Last Jedi as a Resistance soldier during the battle on Crait.
• Creator Thumbprint: Scale. Both Godzilla (2014) and Rogue One really love to utilize foreshortening to show off just how small and almost insignificant everything in the foreground is compared to what's in the back. Both also feature very similar shots of enormous leviathans (Godzilla and the AT-ACTs) dramatically emerging from the fog, and images of their massive feet smashing into the ground to show off just how huge they are in comparison to the protagonists. The Creator continues this trend with several giant American war machines and another deadly killer space station.
  • Tentacled monsters appear in all of his works except Godzilla (2014), and even then, several pieces of scrapped concept art toy with the idea.
• Promoted Fanboy:
  • Edwards was a fan of Godzilla, having first been exposed to the franchise through the Godzilla Power Hour and eventually watching the actual films. He went on record stating that directing the reboot was a dream come true.
  • He also grew up re-watching A New Hope on VHS (and wearing out the player). He got to film said movie's prequel and had a cameo in The Last Jedi.
• Scenery Porn and Gorn: All three of his films so far feature incredibly gorgeous scenery and locations, which remain gorgeous even after, or while, they're being smashed to bits by giant monsters or blown to ashes in massive explosions.