I am a huge fan of all things Godzilla. When I heard IDW was publishing an ongoing Godzilla book, I was ecstatic. Sadly, the ongoing Godzilla couldn't live up to its potential. Luckily for me and all other Godzilla fans, we had Gangsters and Goliaths to feed our appetite for monster mayhem! Now that the series is collected in a trade paperback, I review the series as a whole.
Before I review the actual series I want to praise the paperback itself. It is very high quality. I can't exactly put my finger on what makes this book seem better than other paperbacks; something about the paper feeling nice and heavy, or that the cover is glossy and thick; whatever it is, this book feels much sturdier and higher in quality than the majority of other paperbacks put out by Marvel or DC.
Anyway, now that I have that out of the way, on to the series. First, the art. I really enjoyed the art in this book. Its a little rough and a little sketchy, but it captures the scope of the monsters rampage very well, and all the human drama is conveyed impressively as well. There are several fantastic splash pages featuring monsters destroying cities or roaming Monster Island peppered throughout, and this pages are often the best in the book.
Of course, the art wouldn't mean a lot if the story wasn't worthwhile. The basic plot of Gangsters and Goliaths consists of a detective, Makoto Sato going to war against a Japanese crime lord, Takahashi. The crime lord attempts to have Sato killed, but Sato escapes to Monster Island. To make a long story short, Sato brings Mothra's twin fairies back to Japan to help him use Mothra to bring down Takahashi. Of course, things are never that simple in the world of Godzilla, and Sato's actions have disastrous consequences.
The story feels like it could have actually happened in a Godzilla film (the fairies get kidnapped all the time). The main conflict of this book is between Sato and Takahashi, with the monsters coming in to complicate things and give more weight to the story.
Sato is well-characterized, we're shown his rough relationship with his sons and his coworkers; its a classic cop archetype, too stubborn to be liked at work and too dedicated to his job to be liked at home. I like that he tries to control Mothra to take down a crime boss, he clearly has no idea how uncontrollable the forces of the universe are, but his intentions are still good. There's also a flashback in which we see that Sato has witnessed a Kaiju attack on Tokyo before; this scene gives me a sense that Sato is a little resentful of the monsters, which just serves to add another interesting layer to his character.
Takahashi is also a crazy and imposing villain. When he unleashes the full destructive power of the Kaiju he doesn't have any motive, he just wants, to quote a certain anecdotal butler, to see the world burn. I like that the primary monster of the story is Mothra, we don't get good Mothra stories that often.
The story also does a great job of conveying how large and powerful the monsters are. We generally see them destroying the city through the eyes of a human character who is infinitely smaller and weaker than the monsters. The fact that the army can do nothing to stop them shows that the world is completely at the mercy of forces far greater than man, the fate of humanity is completely out of humanity's control.
My only real complaint is that there might not be enough Godzilla or monster action. Don't get me wrong there are plenty of great scenes with monsters destroying the city, but I wish there had been just one climactic monster fight. MechaGodzilla's fight with Godzilla could have been a little longer, I'm not asking for much just a bit more of a clash for the final issue. I know that the main conflict is between Sato and Takahashi, but even they don't really have enough of a final showdown.
Overall, this is a great mini-series. It takes the classic "cop vs. gangster" story and adds Toho's monsters to the mix, making an interesting, unique, and worthwhile tale that could only be improved by adding a bit more for Godzilla to do.
9/10