CREATOR EXCLUSIVE
IDW celebrates Godzilla’s 70th birthday with a special anniversary one-shot
MARKING THE 70TH anniversary of the King of the Monsters’ first appearance in 1954’s Godzilla, IDW is releasing a special 100-page one-shot featuring nine stories by creators such as EJ Su, Danny Lore and Liana Kangas.
James Stokoe previously wrote and drew five-parter Godzilla: The Half-Century War as well as issue one of anthology Godzilla In Hell. His contribution harks back to when he first saw 1964’s Mothra Vs Godzilla as a six-year-old.
“My story owes a lot to the more light-hearted aspects shown in that era of Godzilla films,” he explains.
“It’s set in the same time as The Half-Century War, this time in ‘70s Istanbul. There are some returning familiar faces, but mostly it’s about an Anti-Megalosaurus team that’s been tasked to deal with Hedorah, and what a truly awful job that would be to do.”
Asking what he describes as “the inevitable question: ‘What would you do if a giant monster came crashing through town?’” Adam Gorham explores the devastating impact such a gargantuan beast would have on a heavily populated metropolis.
“It’s the same question we ask ourselves about natural disasters, slasher movies or zombie stories,” he says. “That was the starting point for this particular story, which at the heart is about a man struggling to leave behind everything he values in the wake of destruction. On top of that, I have the great pleasure of creating a new foe for Godzilla to fight, and I am told that its nature is a first for [Japanese film company] Toho, so I’m superexcited about it.”
Teaming up with artist Joëlle Jones, Dan DiDio also tapped into the films, TV shows and toys of his childhood. “In
