World Comic Book Review

19th March 2024

The Eleven Most Fearsome Giant Monsters in Comic Books

World Comic Book Review proudly has a section dedicated to “kaiju”. Kaiju is a Japanese word meaning “strange beast” (怪獣), and refers to giant fantastic monsters. The motion picture “Pacific Rim” (2013) (see the image introducing this article) featured kaiju fighting giant robots piloted by humans. “Pacific Rim” is described as director Guillermo del Toro’s … Read more

Monsters Unleashed #1 (Review)

Monsters Unleashed #1 (Review)
Marvel Comics, January 18, 2017
Writer: Cullen Bunn

“Monsters Unleashed” is a new crossover miniseries from American comic book publisher Marvel Comics. This story brings together majority of its mainstream character properties in a single story, and gives them the unenviable task of dealing with the onset of a prophesized apocalyptic event. The prophesy is grim: gigantic monsters attack the Earth en masse and rid it of human beings.

Perhaps we are jaded, but the first issue feels unique for a superhero crossover event, as it does not involve the heroes fighting each other on some artificial pretext. This is clearly a premise from which American superhero comic books should take a break. Instead, the story starts with the Avengers fighting a giant tentacled monster, and then greeted by yet another giant monster falling from the sky.

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Project Nemesis #1-6 (review)

Project Nemesis #1-6 (review)
(American Gothic Press, October 2015 – June 2016)
Writer: Jeremy Robinson

American Gothic Press’ “Project Nemesis” is a comic book adaptation of the same-titled novel. “Project Nemesis” starts with two plot springboards:

a. the murder of a young Japanese girl named Maigo; and
b. the discovery of what seems like the fossilized remains of an ancient giant reptile (fans of the Japanese “kaiju” genre, discussed further below, will recognize the fossil as being similar to Hollywood’s first attempt to adapt the “Godzilla” franchise) by a character named General Lance Gordon and two accomplices, one of which is killed onsite in order to keep the whole thing under wraps.

The comic then segues to introducing the protagonist, Jon Hudson. Hudson is a lead investigator for the United States Department of Homeland Security’s “Fusion Center-P”. This unit is considered by other agents as a joke because it handles paranormal threats to national security (recalling shades of the television series “The X-Files”). The story finds Hudson and a sheriff named Collins reluctantly hunting down a sasquatch.

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