This month sees the multi-platform, media-saturating release of top-notch hugeasaurus-face-off Mega Shark Vs Giant Octopus – so in time-honoured tradition, the staff at STS have taken a quick look around the office, seen the DVD and come up with a list based on it!
Now the rules are easy: The beast should win.
Which means the Kraken is out due to Depp-induced death and Jaws has long since been reduced to chum by Roy Schneider et al. Likewise, these are the big boys, so no room for namby-pamby slashers like Jason or Freddy here – can you seriously see Pinhead taking on Biolanthe?
Of course, that doesn’t mean we mightn’t have missed a few or bent the rules in some cases, so feel free to point out any gaps as we sort the Godzillas from the Godzookies and the Kong from the just plain wrong – matching up the greatest behemoths of the silver screen, watching them hack, claw and occasionally set fire to each other – all for our amusement. We bring you the six finest examples of: Movie Monsters!
1: Godzilla
The hardest of the hard – a nuclear gecko with atomic breath and a 50 year+ pedigree. He’s faced down aliens, rockets, space-beasts, Jet Jaguar and Ferris Bueller alike over the years, but it’s his performance in 1968’s Destroy All Monsters that Gojira finally crowned himself the city-crushingest king of Kaiju, kicking the asses of not one, not two, but 16 separate beasts in a royal smackdown like no other. Up from the deep, 30 storeys high, the best of the best!
2: Mr. Stay Puft
Without doubt the cutest guy on the list, he’s a hundred-foot pile of modified corn starch with an eons-old hunger for Human sacrifice and inter-dimensional mischief. Strictly speaking, he doesn’t face down any other monsters while on screen (Ernie Hudson’s acting aside) but just look at the way those soon-to-be-barbequed hell hounds scatter when he approaches. Stay-Puft may be cute, but he cements his position as Lord of the Sebulei on rep alone, triumphing over inherent softness to come out looking hard.
3: Kong
Even though he’s effectively driven to suicide by Fay Wray, there’s no denying that King Kong is one menacing simian. Specialising in reptile-punching, he’s happy to take on multiple T-Rex’s if they threaten his girlfriend, while even the mighty Godzilla has taken a monkey punch to the head more than once.
Cinema’s toughest Gorilla.
4: Talos – Jason and the Argonauts
From the moment the Argonauts arrive on the island, the huge statue of Talos looming over them, you know exactly what’s going to happen. ‘There’s something wrong about that big bronze bastard’ you find yourself thinking – and you’re right. Making off with their booty, there’s no wonder the tiny Greek fellas let out Willhelm Screams aplenty as his clanking metal eyes set on them. Most monsters go for brute strength or heat vision. Talos is more pragmatic, favouring a bloody great sword. The toughest thing ever to wear sandals and a skirt.
5: The Thing – The Thing/Thing From Another World
The sneakiest beast we’ve come across. Of course, the Bodysnatchers and Children of the Damned attempted to quietly replace us, but The Thing one-ups them by not only replacing us, but doing it in an excellently gory fashion! It’s conniving back-stabbery has clearly seen it in good stead too, as it’s crossed the galaxy, gobbling up more planets than Galactus can imagine, spreading like a rash that no amount of talc will remove, and very nearly conquering the Earth not once but twice! The first time it made the schoolboy error of disguising itself as a giant root vegetable, but the second time round…well…are we REALLY sure that’s Kurt Russell?
6: Shelob. – Lord of the Rings
The Lord of the Rings Trilogy is jam packed with beasts from the depths. While the Cave troll is adorable and the Balrogs score on… erm… horniness – Shelob comes out top due to her sheer unkillability. Hell, if we look at the books we find out that even Sauron’s master Melkor was an arachnophobe of old, and it’s no wonder. We’ve all freaked out when an unexpected eight-legged fiend has crawled up our leg at a picnic, so imagine that little money-spider in the tub is as big as a garage, possessed of an ancient, cold-blooded intellect and is only waiting in a dark place until the sun goes out. Then it won’t even bother to climb up your drainpipe. It’ll just smash through the living room wall.
Winner on sheer creepiness!
28 Comments
1. Godzilla doesn’t always win.
2. The Stay-Puft Man doesn’t win.
3. Kong doesn’t win.
4. Talos doesn’t win.
5. The Thing (probably) doesn’t win.
6. Shelob doesn’t win.
I don’t make the rules …
Does anyone always win? I guess Zombies as a collective moster win pretty much all the time…
I have never seen their films, but I have my suspicions that Mary Kate and Ashley always win.
Did Herbie always win?
BOND! Bond always wins!
Bond isn’t a monster in the conventional sense.. But he does always win, even after a few setbacks…
Yes, but what about Herbie?
What’s your reasoning behind Herbie being a monster? He never ran anyone over who didn’t have it coming…
I’m trying to think of things or people who always win, Vones. You’ve proved you can’t find monsters that win (in direct contravention of your rules), so I was broadening out the topic.
The Bandit always won.
Not my rules – Interceptor wrote this one – hes probably busy watching Ulysses 31 for the 100th time.
Bandit did alwys win. But he’s only been challenged twice and the second one doesn’t really count on the basis that it was a bit crap.
Balls was it crap, it was great. And he was been challenged three times in those films, only it was The Snowman did the donkey work on the third outing, like.
Add that to the two Cannonball Runs (where Burt Reynolds plays The Bandit in all but name, let’s face it), and you have FIVE winning outings for The Bandit.
It WAS crap. A fucking Elephant? Bah.
The third outing was even worse. Diminishing returns.
But he’s the same character in almost *every* movie…
I Have returned from the 31st century! Bandit 1= quite good, extraneous bandits were crap. A FUCKING ELEPHANT! Stay Puift won in the ‘who’s the baddest ass monster’ stakes, all monsters get destroyed/frozen by Steve McQueen in the end, it’s part of their culture.
You’re wrong about The Bandit and his escapades. I would expect nothing better from a couple of hapless yokels in ironic Atari t-shirts with their trousers halfway down their arses showing off infantile Goonies underpants.
And the Stay-Puft marshmallow man didn’t win. He was very easily killed by the Ghostbusters.
Oh, and he was SHIT.
Bond always wins because he never has to fight giant monsters. He restricts his rogues gallery to a collection of disfigured Belgians. And the Bandit only had to outwith that fat sherriff..who Bond also took on/teamed up with in his safari suit days…
Don’t you go informing me about Bond. I’ve forgotten more Bond than you’ll ever know, you rank Bond amateur.
And anyway, the Bonds would have been ridiculous with Godzilla or King Kong in ‘em. It was bad enough when he ended up in space, let alone if he’d had to fight a giant spider or a radioactive moth creature from Japan.
He said he’d bend the rules. And so he did – he bent them on EVERY entry.
That’s a flexible set of rules. Makes you wonder why he had the bloody rules in the first place.
I wish there were places on the Internet you could report this kind of slapdashery.
Ha! My undies have little pictues of skulls on them. You know NOTHING. And my T shirt collection contains zero irony. It’s a jambouree of obscure metal bands and stuff out of comics.
And I own a belt.
Your trolling is a bit shit today Nappers. I expect better.
In the movie Mothra, the king of Pacifica, the ancient, undersea kingdom, is wearing not one, but TWO digital watches! He also has a ‘Marine Corp’ tattoo.
I’d just like to point out, by the way, that Depp had nothing to do with the Kraken’s death in At World’s End. He was dead at the time it bit the bullet, and it’s a bit off of you to go throwing around spurious murder accusations that fly in the face of facts. Bastards.
Vones – What’s this trolling business? I’m responding to this bloody article, you bummer.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Troll_%28Internet%29
I see. So it’s somebody who has the audacity to chat about something else or disagree with somebody when others wish to put on the blinkers and get down to the important business of talking ill-informed waffle about one subject they either love beyond reason or hate beyond measure?
Well that’s an interestingly narrow and slightly authoritarian approach to conversation.
I’m pleased we never thought to limit peoples’ thought processes to such a degree on WWM. I don’t think it would have lasted very long.
I don’t think you did see.
Yes I did! BASTARD!
Ha! Thats more like it!
boys boys boys! Let’s not argue and bicker about who killed who, the point is, Godzilla could have Bond, and the Bond films wouldn’t have been any more ridiculous if he’d been in them…bloody undersea tripod base indeed…
Paris Hilton is a monster FULL of win. Mmmmm, juicy.