Godzilla, man, you got a drooling problem! It needs to be said…
The Thing #31 – Devil Dinosaur: The movie! (January 1986)
Writer – Mike Carlin
Penciler – Ron Wilson
Editor – Mark Gruenwald
Godzilla just wants to be friend with his old metal pal!
Godzilla made one last official appearance in Marvel comics canon before disappearing into the ether. There have been several Godzilla-like creatures that will be discussed below, but as far as I can tell, they’ve never been officially counted as Godzilla. So let us tackle The Thing #31. The Thing is among the first comic books I ever bought. I bought two of those “comic book 3-packs”, one containing 3 issues of The Transformers and one with 3 issues of The Thing. While The Transformers became the series I would get every month and subscribed, The Thing became a series I would get in the quarter bins at comic shops, but it was still a good read (hence my buying them.) I was never that into the Fantastic Four, because Spiderman ruled all, but I often had extra money for cheap comics that would be good. Several images here are take from the Marvel Chronology’s entry of The Thing #31.
Ben Grimm (aka The Thing) goes to visit his friend, stuntwoman Sharon Ventura, who is working on a movie about Moon Boy and Devil Dinosaur. Ben likes Sharon because she reminds him of a lost love, Tarianna. Sharon Ventura would eventually become Ms. Marvel, be a hero for a bit, be a villain for a bit, and then get replaced by a Skrull. Welcome to Marvel continuity!
Ben arrives and starts attacking Devil Dinosaur, because he doesn’t realize it’s a robot! But he’s not the only one to make the mistake, as out of the sea arises the reason we’re writing this entry: Godzilla!
Yes, he’s actually called Godzilla! Looks like someone forgot or thought that The Thing would be too under the radar for Toho’s lawyers.. .Godzilla has escaped from captured jerkoff Dr. Demonicus, thanks to Godzilla’s cunning plan of distracting the evil Dr. with Iron Man’s suit so he could get captured, at which point Godzilla probably just wandered out of the undersea headquarters. Or maybe SHIELD got off their lazy duffs and raided the compound and Godzilla got set loose that way.
How dare that coward Godzilla not mindlessly destroy the robot and instead leave when he realized his mistake!
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