GODZILLA: VERSUS NEO

[DaiKamonohashi]

As you may or may not know, I have been good friends with the illustrious Matt Frank for a fair few years now. Though I ultimately find myself more of a filmmaker than an artist, I am still intensely passionate about art and Matt is among the most supportive of my artistic endeavors, as well as one of my closest confidants in these and many other matters. Awhile back I hatched upon a rather crazy idea for a Toho kaiju redesign and ever since Matt has been pushing me to do a series of redesigns akin to his own GODZILLA NEO. I've pondered this for a long time now and I've concluded that a redesign series as comprehensive as that is virtually impossible for me to wrap my head around - I'm simply too married to the classic Toho kaiju aesthetic to deliver anything as radical as what Matt has produced. I believe I have, however, discovered a suitable alternative.

Anyone who has known me for even a small amount of time will probably know of my profound loathing and intense criticism of the nineties Godzilla films. For me, the Toho of old that I love so dearly died with the box office failure of Godzilla Vs. Biollante and I find that every Godzilla film produced since has been rife with mediocrity and missed opportunities. This extends even to the Millennium series, which, apart from the abhorrent Final Wars, I like - particularly GMK and the 2002 Mechagodzilla film. So when Matt started encouraging me to take on a redesign series I figured my first radical and (in my most humble opinion) incredibly cool concept that I came up with was a monster unique to the nineties films and that concept made for some very, very interesting revisions to the plot of the film in question. From there the decision was fairly obvious to me: rework the VERSUS series (Return of Godzilla through Godzilla VS Destoroyah) into a new, more cohesive and daring canon - into something I actually like as a whole.

So I'm pleased to announce the start of my very own Godzilla-inspired redesign series: GODZILLA: VERSUS NEO. The name was agreed upon by Matt and myself as a playful ribbing of all the other G-NEO knockoffs out there. Plus, it means that VERSUS NEO is the first G-NEO knockoff officially endorsed by Matt Frank himself! But don't get the wrong idea! Apart from the name, this will be a fairly different project. Rather than a simple series of concept art pieces with accompanying bios for each monster, this will be more fluid - some concept art here, some scene illustrations there and, well, some other stuff I'm not really ready to talk about yet. Overall the focus of this project is more upon altering the story of the VERSUS series as opposed to the monster designs. You may not like everything change I have in mind but hopefully you will enjoy the ride regardless.

In the meantime, please look forward to the first piece, going up later today. I'm not going in chronological order, so anyone is fair game here. Who could it be?

Cheers!

- Jared P. Foust

[Original Post on deviantArt]

I'll be posting the images in this thread as well as on deviantArt and several other places. I started this thread to keep it separate from my other catch-all art thread. Hope no one minds.

[TokyoVigilante]

Sounds exciting! Can't wait to see what you come up with and hopefully do something interesting with a roster of monsters that seems to be almost exclusively clones.

[DaiKamonohashi]

BEHOLD! CRYSTAL GODZILLA!



Yeah, you read that name right.

This is what started VERSUS NEO in the first place. I was doodling Spacegodzilla one day and in the process he evolved from what the original movie put forth into, well, an infection. Basically, Spacegodzilla as we knew him before - spacefaring G-cells of questionable origin combined with a crystalline lifeform - has been taken out of the equation entirely. Now this more parasitic crystalline lifeform comes to Earth on its own accord, impacting and merging with Godzilla himself and corrupting him into a new creature not unlike Spacegodzilla. Think of it as Spacegodzilla doing his best Matango impression. If we think of it as, say, a five-stage disease, this would be Stage I and I imagine Stage IV would be closer to the classic Spacegodzilla design.

So what does this all mean for the actual plot? Well, that's for another time. For now, I hope you enjoy this piece!

[zilla103192]

Brilliant!

I love this. Great job!! I will be following you. I would add it to my favorites, but I am on a cell phone. I will add it later tonight!

[omgitsgodzilla]

This is great! I can't wait to see what you come out with next

[DaiKamonohashi]

Glad you guys like it!

So who's next? I won't repost the entire entry but I'm running an informal guessing game over on dA if anyone wants to take a stab at it. Hint: Even though I'm staying as faithful as possible to the original monster roster of the VERSUS series, I will be adding in a single Showa monster and they're the subject of the next VERSUS NEO piece. [Original dA Post] Any guesses? 8D

[TokyoVigilante]

Gigan. it's totally Gigan.

[DaiKamonohashi]

It's totally not.

[Lord Gappa]

Gabara!

[anguirusnut94]

Anguirus!
This stuff is the awesome sauce, by the way!

[GodzillavsZilla]

Titanosaurus!

[DaiKamonohashi]

No, no, and no. 8D

[anguirusnut94]

Dogora?
Frankenstien?
Megalon! Yeah, let's take a guess at Megalon (cause I halfway remember you mentioning something about wanting to see him redone, but I'm to lazy to check if you actually did or not...)
I'm just like Fox News!

[DaiKamonohashi]

No, no, no, and I like him just the way he is already, thank you.

[Lord Gappa]

Mothra or MOGUERA.

[MothraRocks]

I was gonna say Mothra

Anyway, Hedorah or Rodan or King Caesar?

[DaiKamonohashi]

Mothra, Mogera, and Rodan are already IN the VERSUS series, guys! Come on!

But Hedorah and King Caesar? Nope. Anguirus was the best guess so far, simply because concept art for a Heisei Anguirus exists. Were it me guessing, he'd be my first pick.

But it's still not Anguirus. XD

[Lord Gappa]

MINYA!!!!!

[DaiKamonohashi]

Nope, Godzilla's adoptive son is still Junior, don't worry. XD

[MothraRocks]

Grrr... How a bouts, um, uh, ee, KONG!