Godzilla vs. Kong is taking the box office, but there are a few gaps filled in by the graphic novel series by Legendary Comics. Godzilla: Dominon picks up after Godzilla: King of the Monsters (2019) where spoiler alert, Big G defeats King Ghidorah, and becomes King of the Monsters. It is written by Greg Keyes who is a fantasy author, writes spin-off novels, and also the Godzilla: King of the Monsters - The Movie Novelization. The art is by Drew Edward Johnson, who has worked on Wonder Woman with Greg Rucka, and his own series, Midnight Society: The Black Lake for Dark Horse, It features an Arthur Adams cover, it pairs with his cover for Kingdom Kong, they have Kong facing Godzilla. This cover has Godzilla over a burning city. It opens with a prehistoric sea creature swimming past the massive head of Godzilla. The text is the intepretation of Godzilla’s thoughts about finding new territory.
Then, there is a two page spread of Godzilla walking underwater disrupting schools of fish, impressive. He surfaces as the navy is attacking a Kaiju, a six-legge crustacean with a mass of tendrils, identified Titanus Scylla. The Kaiju is named after the sea monster from Greek mythology, Odysseus encounters her across from the whirlpool, Charybdis. Godzilla battles Scylla, near a populated beach, and they collide with a tanker ship. There is an explosion in hellish fire and the Kaiju is driven off. He doesn’t kill his opponents, just asserts his title. The text reveals that Godzilla is a part of the world, he understands the tides and every life in the ocean. Godzilla heads up river and then encounters two Kaiju, a demonic Titanus Amhuluk and a Titanus Behemoth, a large, tusked hairy beast that was seen in G: KotM. He defeats them, but the sound effects are kinda confusing; “Yeeaaahkggh.” Another splash page, very cinematic, several humpback whales swimming past Godzilla.
As he rests on the ocean currents, we get a split page of Godzilla, one half Godzilla’s back and scales, the other has his nervous system and brain, with all manner of prehistoric sea creatures. Then, a page of all of the ages that Big G witnessed, prehistoric and ancient, including the city that appears to be the one in G: KotM. He sees the remains of the city and also glimpses of Dr. Serizawa. His peace is disrupted by swarms of prehistoric fish “with nasty, big, pointy teeth.” Godzilla takes them on with his atomic breath including a large version of the fish. He closes his eyes and detects Kaiju? This leads to him imagining a world that respected him with monks in robes bowing to him. Except a rival cast him out, Kong? Godzilla walks out to a cliff and looks out to the sea, imagining the Titan that revived him, Mothra, in yet another splash page. He senses his rival, shadowy on a jungle island with huts. Godzilla moves past corpses of whales, very gorey, in a splash page.
Then, faces a tentacled Titan covered in a net, Titanus Na Kika. The name is based on an octopus god in Australian mythology. It poisons Godzilla and traps him in the net. Titanus Na Kika covers Godzilla with the net and electifies it, but it is torn apart by Big G. As Godzilla goes after the Kaiju with his atomic breath, the military attacks with a torpedo, “Fam, Gluduung, Thafam”, I wish there was text to explain what is happening. While the military attacks for no apparent reason, Godzilla tracks the killer of the sea creatures. A Monach base like an oil rig suspended over the sea. Godzilla destroys it with his atomic and then roars in victory. He swims on and then thinks again of Serizawa and there is a panel with his glowing eyes, very cool. He ends up at polar ice, shatters through it, disturbing a polar bear. Godzilla continues on past people and a submarine. He lets out a roar and then confronts underwater a serpent-like Kaiju, Titanus Tiamat. She is named after the Mesopotamian goddess representing chaos. There are a number of Kaiju battles and some of his world in Godzilla: Dominion.
Four Titans out of Five!
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