Godzilla: Unnatural Disasters

 Godzilla: Unnatural Disasters

If I were to create a Mount Rushmore-esque monument to who I consider the greatest fictional characters so far, I think Godzilla would have to be up there. Godzilla, Superman, Medea and Lieutenant Columbo. I admit it’s a strange collection but to me it encompasses pretty much all of the human experience. 

Godzilla is one of those perfect metaphors: The ever shifting agent of unstoppable force. A force for what? Well originally, of anger and grief of the hibakusha. During Godzilla’s first outing from Tokyo bay, it's a clear stance on the use of atomic weaponry and the destructive forces of man against both fellow man and nature. But throughout Kaiju-Alpha’s history, they’ve been a bit of everything. Sometimes the defender of earth. Sometimes the bringer of ultimate destruction. Sometimes a true neutral, existing as a fact we need to live with and interrupt as we will. Natural, man-made, devine, demonic… Godzilla is more than just a big lizard.

The Big Guy himself though is just the start. Once you’ve got people swallowing the existence of an eighty story high nuclear newt, why stop there? Toho and others have thrown every idea at the wall since 1954. Obviously there are all the other kaijus, but giant robots, alien invasions, literal gods and devils, meta humans, ancient evil societies with end of existence prophecies… no concept is off the table in a Godzilla tale. That also allows for every style and tone of story.

What am I Reading? Godzilla: Unnatural Disasters. Collecting Godzilla Legends, Godzilla In Hell and Godzilla: Rage Across Time.

What’s it about? The three books themselves are anthologies. Godzilla Legends is a collection of modern day stories featuring notable Kaijus, as well as the titular Alpha themself. Godzilla in Hell is as literal as it sounds… we follow Godzilla as it descends through the circles of hell, and what hell might hold for such a beast. Godzilla: Rage Across Time depicts the big guy’s antics back in the day, from the cretaceous through to the fall of rome. 

What’s good about it? Much like Columbo, I think Godzilla is at its best as a procedural: “Turned up, did its thing, went away again.”. We don’t need a through line or character development. We just want to see Godzilla wreck shop, same as we just want Columbo to catch the crook. It’s never not satisfying to me. An anthology is the perfect medium for Godzilla. That way the tone can be whatever for the story at hand. The subject can be whatever. We can have our enormous scaly cake and eat it.

Godzilla in Hell is the clear winner here. What a concept! What could possibly be unending torment for the King of Monsters? What could hell be for rage incarnate? The five parts are all fantastic. I want to talk through Part one, with story and art by James Stokoe.

Godzilla falls. We don’t know where from, but he crashes to the depth of the pit. As he comes too we see the colossal words towering over the beast “ABANDON ALL HOPE YE WHO ENTER HERE”, a clear message. Godzilla destroys the warning with their atomic breath, an even clearer message. Godzilla comes across the facsimile of a nuclear power plant, where it's attacked by an amorphous, almost embryonic sludge. Past that Godzilla is buffeted by a storm cloud made up from unknowable millions of writhing human forms. Waves of people crash against Godzilla, knocking him down. In the eye of the storm, he meets himself. This Hell Godzilla is scarred and waits motionless. As Godzilla approaches, the scars open into gaping fanged mouths, with clawed tentacles that fling Godzilla into the mud. They fight. Godzilla is bested and dragged towards the maw of Hell Godzilla. Godzilla charges headlong into the demon. Once inside, he explodes with an enormous blast that sends gore everywhere and leaves Godzilla standing alone. The floor crumbles. Godzilla falls. 

Awesome. Absolutely awesome. I love the near languageless nature of these Godzilla in Hell stories. Part Four is completely without words, and Part Five only has a quote from Buddha. 

What did I struggle with? Godzilla Legends I would say is the weakest of the three collections. I think I’ve just seen most of the ideas before across the numerous Toho Studios and the recent Legendary movies. It also shows if you can fit a >90 minute film’s plot in an <30 page comic, maybe you aren’t doing something right with the film. The majority of the issues aren’t bad; they have good art, consistent with the tone, and succinct stories, but they are just a bit bland in the most part. Nothing in Legends is as good as the other two books. The action isn’t as bombastic. The themes aren’t as well portrayed. The biggest sin is that two of the issues don’t even feature Godzilla… lost a lot of points there, even if you try to replace it with aliens or Rodan…

Same thing goes for in Rage Across Time, issue three in mediaeval England. No Godzilla! But it does have Mothra, always good.

Would I recommend it? If you like Godzilla, yes. I think it’s as simple as that. If Godzilla makes your eyes roll, this will be a nightmare. Because it's mad, this book is mad. Its glorious Godzilla absurdity.