From the early 1960s, when I became acquainted with Godzilla and so many other
giant Japanese monsters, I found myself not just enamored of the beasties but
addicted to them and the movies they rode in on. I've written at length on
this blog about my numerous memorable experiences with daikaiju, and it's
probably common knowledge among my friends and acquaintances that, in 1974,
inspired by the late Greg Shoemaker's legendary The Japanese Fantasy Film Journal, I launched a fanzine of my own: Japanese Giants, an 18-page offset-printed labor of love that featured a filmbook of the
Toho blockbuster, Destroy All Monsters, articles on Ultraman and Johnny Sokko & His Flying Robot, a couple of editorials, and a bunch of photos and artwork. My intention was
to continue the magazine for as long as I was able, and...as things turned
out...that first issue was as long as I was able.
In stepped the right honorable Bradford Grant Boyle (known then as just Brad Boyle), who wanted to produce a
daikaiju-themed fanzine of his own. Since I was no longer using it, he asked
if he might carry the Japanese Giants brand forward, and I excitedly agreed. He published three issues before he,
too, gave it up to go stomp on bigger cities. By then, I was in college and
had made the acquaintance of Ed Godziszewski and
Bill Gudmundson, both of Chicago, both of the daikaiju-loving
persuasion. With the Japanese Giants title once again floating free, the three of us grabbed it and began
producing it again as a collaborative effort.
After college, I moved to Chicago myself, where Ed, Bill, and I became
officially known as "The Japanese Giants Guys." We collaborated on
several more issues, though eventually, Ed became its sole proprietor (and got
by with a little help from his friends). In 2001, Ed produced
Japanese Giants #10, the final issue. (Ed has gone on to write several scholarly books about
Godzilla, kith & kin, as well as provided commentaries on numerous
Japanese film DVDs/BluRays.)
During the 1970s and early 1980s, fanzines devoted to giant Japanese monsters
proliferated, running the gamut from the most primitive rags to professionally
produced periodicals. In the years following, the world has seen no shortage
of daikaiju-themed publications, but the products from those early, pioneering
days pretty much went the way of the dinosaurs. Some of us who had collected
them held on to as many of the old, decaying paper zines as we could (I've
still got bins full of them) but a whole new generation of fans, writers, and
artists had taken over the scene, and few remembered the glory days of
typewritten (and sometimes even handwritten) text, oftentimes crude pen &
ink illustrations, poorly reproduced photos, and the magic of pre-video age
filmbooks, which told the stories of the movies, including dialogue, usually
transcribed from tape-recorded soundtracks.
Again, enter Brad Boyle (yes, now known as Bradford Grant Boyle). A
while back, Brad undertook the Herculean task of collecting every early
Japanese monster movie fanzine that ever existed and publishing each in its
entirety in a set of volumes titled Early Kaiju Fandom. To date, he has produced four volumes, the fourth having just been released (and it features one of my pen & ink monster renderings from forty-some years ago on the cover: Gaila, the green gargantua from War of the Gargantuas; see the last image in the row at the top of the page). In these volumes, you'll find complete reproductions of dozens of those old fanzines, so true to the originals that their visual flaws appear (again) in all their lack of glory. Of course, you'll find Japanese Giants, but also The Japanese Giants Fanletter, an almost, sort-of monthly publication that Brad produced. which offered the best and most comprehensive daikaiju-related material of its day; Monsters of Japan; Japanese Movie Sci-Fi; Giants From Japan; Godzillamania; Oriental Cinema; Giant Japanese Monsters; Giantdom; Japan's Giant Monsters (by now you may have noticed a theme); and many more.
I am in awe of the work that Brad has done with these volumes, and I've been happy to contribute to them with both articles and art. This may be a niche market, but hey, it's devoted to the BIGGEST niche monster that ever walked. You may just want to check these critters out.
