Giant monsters just love stomping on my home town.
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The Thing #31 (January 1986) and the Godzilla Marvel Legacy
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!
Iron Man #196 (July 1985)
Cool how Dr. Demonicus didn’t even bother to look for Godzilla! (Jerk!)
Iron Man #196 – (No title) (July 1985)
Writer – Denny O’Neil
Penciler – Rich Buckler
Editor – Mark Gruenwald
All these potential cool monsters we will never see…
We skipped Iron Man #195 because Big G was a no-show. I’m sure exciting things happened. Or not. Jim Rhodes was talking with an Indian spirit guide or some nonsense last issue to cure his migranes. That continues as we start this exciting entry. He left his Iron Man armor behind in the mystical dimension you go to when you get Indian spirit guides to cure your migraines, and now he can’t go back to get it, because you can only go to that dimension once.
Hey, I don’t write this stuff! I just write about this stuff.
Yada yada, the armor somehow has formed up and is seeking something out. Expect something weird to happen.
Godzilla returns to Dr. Demonicus’s base with a mouthful of Stark’s old Iron Man armor that Stark ditched in issue 194. Dr. Demonicus pauses his work on making more mutant monsters to bring about Pax Demonicus in order to play around with the armor for revenge. Someone needs to learn to complete his projects before he begins new ones!
Because the wayward Rhodes Iron Man armor has returned to this plane of existence and is causing trouble, Stark grabs a bunch of parts of spare costumes from the Wes Coast Avengers’ closet and suits up to go investigate. Dr. Demonicus tracks him down and attacks wearing the old Iron Mas costume, but the alternate plane Iron Man suit joins with Stark and soon Demonicus is defeated and will be spending some time in the slammer.
And that’s the end of March of Godzilla 2013, once again I’d like to thank…
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Godzilla: Mastermind!
Iron Man #194 (May 1985)
Godzilla’s just enjoying the ride!
Iron Man #194 – Otherwhere! (May 1985)
Writer – Denny O’Neil
Penciler – Luke McDonnell
Editor – Mark Gruenwald
Whoa!
Godzilla returns for a couple of panels and then goes on vacation again. Unfortunately, Iron Man #194 has a bunch of stuff about Iron Man in it for some reason. Don’t they know the reason this website is reading the comics 28 years later? Get with the program, Marvel!
Stark has been carrying Godzilla over the ocean for an entire minute when his rockets run out of power and he starts to sink to the bottom of the ocean. Whoops! He eventually gets enough of the armor off to get to the surface and breath again, but has no idea where he is as he’s in the middle of no where and a storm is coming. Hawkeye and Mockingbird go looking for him after an hour.
James Rhodes visits Hank Pym, who is currently hip 1970s Owen Wilson Hank Pym. Hank Pym is doing work on other dimensions when suddenly some goober with a gun comes in, demanding Pym make him a few inches shorter so he can evade the cops. Rhodes kicks and punches the guy until he falls into a dimensional portal. Hank Pym is also pulled in as well. Rhodes suits up as Iron Man and goes in after them.
Some even more boring sideplots happen with characters unimportant in the giant monster scheme of things. One thing is important in the grand scheme of comic history, as the original Scourge makes his first appearance here in what was at the time something innovative (a mysterious assassin offs a bunch of b-level supervillains randomly in various comics) but has become used a lot and now is not novel. I’ve lost count on what number Scourge we’re up to.
Hawkeye and Mockingbird used the Quinjet to search for Stark, but are unable to find him. They go back to the vessel that was downed in the ocean last issue, and are shocked to find Stark has swum there. Even more shocking, Tigra has disappeared from this story line and I have no idea where she went! Probably off to flirt with another giant monster.
While Rhodes rescues Pym and the weirdo guy with a gun, but the guy with the gun decides the trippy alternate dimension beats jail and jumps back into it!
Until next time. Actually, until the time after next, because Godzilla skips an issue before reappearing in Iron Man #196!
The East German Judge gives him a 4.3!
Iron Man #193 (April 1985)
Run! Godzilla is mad at our awful hairstyles!
Iron Man #193 – The Choice and the Challenge! (April 1985)
Writer – Denny O’Neil
Penciler – Luke McDonnell
Editor – Mark Gruenwald
These are some of the best panels in comics history. I am completely serious.
Hey, it’s true, March of Godzilla 2013 continues past the cancellation of the Marvel Godzilla series (due to increased Godzilla licensing costs from Toho, not because of low sales!) and Godzilla shows up in issues of Iron Man 6 years later, strangely mutated and not referred to as Godzilla by any character on screen. But we all know who he is. Dr. Demonicus returns as well, he actually was running around the Shogun Warriors comic series and had a whole new batch of monsters from there. None of them (nor his original monsters) are around here, and the only monster fighting is between Godzilla and several West Coast Avengers. But read on for this strange continuing chapter in the life of Godzilla…
West Coast Avenger Tigra (that would be the chick who is a tiger that wears a black bikini all the time because of course she does) is flying a Quinjet when a mysterious green giant monster mutant swats her craft, damaging it and she’s forced to make an emergency landing. That mutant is strangely familiar…
Iron Man is recovering from his alcoholism and blames his Iron Man suit for part of it (the whole feeling invincible thing that made him push boundaries even more) so he doesn’t want his suit back from Rhodes. Rhodes also has his own problems, and wants a break from the Avengers. So Stark dons his old silver suit and delivers this message to Hawkeye and Mockingbird, though he does it in a dumb way that wastes three pages.
Dr. Demonicus is back! And he also has a bunch of goons, though they’ve changed their costumes and look more like purple rejects from Hydra than his old goofy tokusatsu goons. We learned he’s captured and mutated Godzilla, just because he can! What a dick! Also he can’t refer to Godzilla by name, because of copyright stuff. There is even a reference to Shogun Warriors #14, where Dr. Demonicus was last seen.
Hawkeye and Mockingbird go to try to save Tigra (after Stark refuses to help because of all his doubts. Stark finally decides he’ll go help and flies to where Tigra’s distress call came from. Tigra wanders around the island meeting natives who are stereotypical straw hut dwellers that don’t speak English nor have any technology/radios.
Jurassic Park 2 stole everything from this issue!
Hawkeye and Mockingbird get attacked by missiles, the shock waves damage their Quinjet and it lands in the water. They’re soon rescued by Tony Stark. Meanwhile, Dr. Demonicus sics Godzilla on the village and Tigra, who starts doing gymnastics against the big green dinosaur.
She’s no match, and Godzilla grabs her. But Hawkeye, Mockingbird, and Stark arrive and join the battle. Godzilla gets an exploding arrow to the mouth – which just gives him bad breath. Stark decides the best way to help is to pick up Godzilla using his suit and fly far far away. So far he doesn’t even finish flying there by the end of the comic. Hawkeye, Mockingbird, and Tigra catch Dr. Demonicus’s two goons, but the bad doctor himself escapes to his undersea fortress.
What will happen? Will Godzilla get healed? Is Godzilla now evil, or just mind controlled? My theory is he isn’t evil, his swatting of the Quinjet (that damaged it just enough to force it to land) was his way of getting help. We’ll see something in Iron Man #196 that makes Godzilla look like a conspiratorial mastermind. You never want to see your favorite monster being controlled by evil, so let’s all root for Dr. Demonicus to get his! We got some more Iron Man appearances to go, as March of Godzilla 2013 continues beyond the obvious endpoint!
This not only happens, but it works!
Godzilla #24 (July 1979)
Godzilla leaves…never to be seen again until he’s seen again!
Godzilla #24 – And Lo, a Child Shall Lead Them (July 1979)
Writer – Doug Moench
Penciler – Herb Trimpe
Editor – Archie Goodwin
Climb, climb, CLIMB!!!
This is it, the final issue of the Marvel Godzilla series! It’s the story the prior two years was all building towards! Okay, maybe the prior 5 months or so. But close enough!
The Avengers and Fantastic Four are battling Big G, who is wandering towards the Empire State Building (because that’s expected of a New York Monster!)
J. Jonah Jameson is upset that Peter Parker ain’t answering his phones and they need a photographer on this stat! Robert Takiguchi keeps going on the bridge of the helicarrier and yelling at Dum Dum, so Robert gets confined to quarters!
Godzilla and Thor each push the Empire state building, while everyone else attacks Godzilla in a cool two-page spread. I have a feeling the artists like drawing huge spreads of Godzilla attacking things.
Finally, Robert escapes his room and goes on deck of the helicarrier to talk to Godzilla. His tears soften Big G, who picks him up and listens to Rob’s heartfelt plea for Godzilla to go away from people so he won’t be in trouble any more.
So he does.
Spiderman shows up to take one photo, the cover drawing of Godzilla leaving.
Godzilla walks away and everyone is sad. The tears flow like the river they were battling over. It’s the end….forever!
And that brings March of Godzilla 2013 to a close, I’d like to thank–
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I could look at these battle scenes all day