Jason Reviews: Godzilla Cataclysm #1

It has certainly been quite sometime since I last did a review. I’ve been wanting to one for awhile and every time I want to do one, I have some lame excuse for not doing it and go about my daily life. Well, I hope that do more in 2015.

But anywho, enough of the dilly-dallying here, let’s get onto what this post is about: Reviewing the first issue of IDW’s latest Godzilla mini-comic series, Godzilla: Cataclysm. Justto let you know, this review will contain spoilers.

The issue simply begins with a narration from a person with panels of a city basically being swallowed by plumes of smoke and ash, with many people running and fearing for their lives. We then turn to the second and third page, which turns out to be a one-page spread, of all giant monsters in a melee fight in the middle of the city. The monsters that were present here were King Ghidorah, Mothra, Manda, Anguirus, and, of course, Godzilla himself. The narration and the kaiju fighting keeps going until we’re abruptly come in contact by an extreme close-up of an older gentleman’s face.

Apparently, the first few pages were scenes from the senior’s nightmare that took place in Tokyo 20 years in the past. The older man then looks outside as we’re taken to an overlook of a demolished Tokyo.

The older man appears to be the grandfather of what could be the main character of the mini-comic series, Arata. Arata and what appears to be his friend, Shiori, goes to see Arata’s grandfather and tell him that they’re going on another trip to find things for people in the village that would be useful for them. Arata’s grandfather has a bad feeling of what the two might encounter, but that notion apparently doesn’t surprise Arata, as his grandfather kept thinking that way every time he went on a trip outside of the village.

Both Arata and Shiori do quite a bit of exploring, trying to find certain things for the village until they and a few other people stumble upon an mutilated carcass of a big bear out in the open. They questioned on what killed the bear, until they hear some strange noise. All of a sudden, something swoops in and grabs a person, leaving only their shoe on the ground. Arata, Shiroi and the others freak out and start to run for their lives from what was a swarm of Kamacuras’. The Kamacurases chase after the people as Arata and Shiori find shelter to hide until the danger is gone – however, the danger was just in its beginning phase as plant vines grabs one of the Kamacurases and rips it apart. Arata and Shiroi wanted to know where the plant vines are coming from, until they are confronted by Biollante.

The two keep running, until we see a blueish ray hit Biollante. Both Arata and Shiori look up and see Godzilla, the King of the Monsters, squaring off against Biollante as Issue 1 of Godzilla: Cataclysm comes to an end there.

The first issue to this mini-comic series seems like that we don’t get much of an introduction to the main characters; plus, it seems that the comic is short (though, it’s only 20 pages) and that it goes really fast. However, at the same time, it seems to get straight to the point, though. The set-up to the overall story is quite fast in the first few pages alone, which I think is what we needed to know of what happened. Even though the issue does that, it seems as though it picked random characters to get the story moving without reason – although, this is just the first issue, and we might get some reasons on why we’re following these characters in the next few issues of this mini-comic series.

The artwork of the issue is pretty good, nonetheless, although I’d say that it’s not as great as the artwork in Godzilla: Half-Century War. The color scheme throughout the issue is very grayish with a lot of brown tones. I know this kind of color scheme is suppose to paint a picture of an apocalyptic world that this comic is set in, but to me, it makes the comic a bit bland. Although, there are a few pages within the issue that have some vibrant colors in it.

One of the things that made me felt that this issue was short and went really fast was simply that there were very few word bubbles to read throughout the entire issue. Hell, if you didn’t bother with reading the word bubbles and just simply looked at the pictures in the issue, you basically knew what was going on anyways.

After finishing the issue, I started to question whether or not if this mini-comic series even need to be created, as it seems like it was sort of rehashing the same thing Godzilla: Half-Century War did a couple years ago, which could get old fast; however, the series is going about it from a different angle. Just hope that this doesn’t bother me as I read further into this little series.

Overall, the first issue has potential and was pretty good, but at the same time, not quite as great as I thought it’d be. The story and artwork, and probably the characters, is what holds up the issue and possibly the entire mini series. The issue is still a recommended read, but something that doesn’t need to be re-read over and over again.