Volume 12 in this official mook series focuses on Destroy All Monsters (1968). It follows the normal mook format, with a unique perspective at the start trailed by bios for the monsters, then aliens, human characters, an interview, machine bios and finally some images sorted chronologically. It’s topped off with random segments on the Godzilla franchise. While following the same format, I’d say this is one of the less appealing entries in the series. This is due to too many screenshots taken from the movie itself coupled with a lot of common production stills that are available elsewhere, although there are a few rare ones.
Anyway, let’s dive into reviewing this. Off the bat, the publication starts with two text heavy pages talking about Toho going down the unintentional path of a shared universe franchise. While this might have been more appropriate for Ghidorah, the Three-headed Monster (1964), it still makes sense for this film as it draws from even more previously unconnected movies like Varan (1958), Atragon (1963), Frankenstein vs. Baragon (1965) and King Kong Escapes (1967).
For the bios, the monster portion is picture heavy and lasts eight pages. The bios feature some basic stats and a few paragraphs that include both movie details and behind the scenes information. There isn’t anything particularly deep here, although it does list the overall body length for Godzilla and the speed of Manda. It also covers a few interesting behind the scene aspects, like that originally Varan was intended to get a suit, likely by repairing the old one from Varan (1958) as it mentions that it was ultimately too damaged for this plan. However, the book does make the mistake of listing Rodan’s speed as “M5”, which is probably a typo and intended to say mach 1.5 instead.
The interview in the book is with actor Yasuhiko Saijo, who plays the small role of SY-3 astronaut Fujita. It’s a decent interview, but really focuses more on his life and getting into acting, only briefly touching on his science fiction work at the very end. After this is a page account by non-fiction author Asato Izumi on seeing the film in the theaters as a child… which feels random.
For the machinery bios after this, it is worth bringing up that it covers obscure stuff, such as even highlighting the pistol used in the cave confrontation with the Kilaaks.
In terms of the end of the book, which is where Kodansha tends to put random stuff, they have a two page spread featuring stills from other Godzilla films that featured more than two monsters… which is utter filler. The book then concludes with a two page interview from director/writer Takashi Yamazaki on Godzilla Minus One (2023).
Bottom line, not the best entry in the series. It’s pretty cheap, though, so fans of the 1968 film will probably still see a lot of value in it. |
