Large amount of Godzilla fans in the audience. I can tell
because there’s several Godzilla shirts and fans holding the Wondercon
exclusive cover (which I’ll be getting).They begin by showing a list of the Monsters that IDW has
from the Godzilla universe which are: Anguirus, Battra, Destoroyah, Gigan,
Hedorah, King Ghidorah, Kumonga, Mechagodzilla, Mothra, Rodan, Space Godzilla,
Titanosaurous.
Godzilla Kingdom of Monster is the flagship ongoing series
which had a 70,000 print run and sold out in one day and was easily their
fastest and largest print run. Phil Hester is doing the artwork for the first
four issues which is a big deal since he rarely does pencil’s anymore. They had
a reoccurring theme of asking people if they had time and everyone said no due
to scheduling until they found out it was Godzilla.
The second arc will have art by Victor Santos. Cool sample
page by Victor. Awesome cover idea using 9 of the 12 monsters IDW has. There
were suggestions of making a shirt with the design.
They talked about the Store Smash Promotion. 75 Retailers
took part and another 19 are doing the second print. They only had two weeks to
do all of the covers and had to get Toho to approve all of the covers. The
total amount of covers for the first issue is now 100. They asked people to
check out their local comic shop to support retailers for taking a huge chance
on the promotion. Later they’ll be doing an issue collecting all of the covers
to support relief in Japan.
They announced the new mini-series Godzilla – Gangsters
& Goliaths – 5 issues, written by the writer of CHew. Takes place in a
different continuity than the movies or the ongoing series. Artwork by Alberto
Ponticelli. Lot of Mothra involved. A Gangster is on the run and is forced to
go to Monster Island to get help from the other gangsters chasing him.
Future projects for Godzilla include one-shots to spotlight
the other monsters that haven’t been touched on in the main series, after the
mini-series. They then ask if they go back to get back more of the monsters
which ones? They show a montage of pictures followed by clapping. I’m not going
to list every Godzilla monster. But there are some surprising choices.
Baby Godzilla gets a lot of boos and laughs.
The American Godzilla gets tons of boos no laughs.
Q&A
Q - Is the
story going to be localized or global?
It’s going to be global, but it’s starting in Japan. A
different take on how other countries are handling their own monsters.
Q - Is there a Legendary partnership because of the new movie?
It’s in talks but nothing solid or anything they can talk
about. Right now the focus is the ongoing and the mini.
Q - Discuss the process about approaching Toho?
Just submitted to them and sat down to talks. They were
apprehensive at first especially with the extra monsters, but they realized
that if they were going to continue the brand they had to do it eventually. Toho
is very hands on and each artists has a learning curve because they give
feedback on the eyes being bigger or that his arm can lift that high. Lots of
great references like photos of Mothra and such.
Q – Crossover potential like Infection?
Nothing in the works it’s still to fresh and they need to
get the ground work down for the ongoing and mini.
Q – An possibility of having another continuity of the
original movies?
Yes, right now they wanted to establish their own continuity
and not have to worry about it.
Q – Will the series have a lot of the physical fights?
Yes, they’re fans of the movies showing off a new move each
time, so basically yes.
Q – Will Godzilla make friends and allies or will he be
rouge all the time?
Depends on what happens, they might have to team up to
defeat a bigger monster. Basically how intelligent are these monsters and
they’ll be exploring that.
Q – Any characterization of the monster or just smashers?
You will get some qualities of personalities built into
them.
Q – Are you going to create new monsters?
No, for right now. We’ve talked to Toho about it and it’s
still a discussion.
Q – What new monster on monster battles can we expect to see
that aren’t in the movies?
Wants to answer the questions but can because it would be a
big reveal.
Q – How are you going to deal with the more fantasy side?
Exploring the Mothra twins. The ongoing has a line of
totally realistic and fantasy.
Q – Are you going to get the Space races?
Yes, but no and they won’t look like the movie.
Q – Are you going to see the Global Defense forces?
In its own way put not exactly what you’ve seen in the
movie.
Q – How long is the production to get an issue done?
About 9 months. A lot
of it coincided with the events in Japan and it was an unfortunate coincidence.
Decided to go on as scheduled and people trying to make a story of IDW poking
fun at Japan which obviously isn’t true since the book was printed two months
before the events.
Q – King Kong?
No. Safe answer is no. The rights in America are a circus to
go through. He’s the hardest to get.
Q – How did you decide which look to use for the different
version of the monster?
Starts with the creators then gets feedback from Toho.
The panel ends with Godzilla trivia for prizes and this is where the nerds really come out as only a couple of people actually get their questions wrong.