You ll just have time
WHEN TWO TRIBES go to war. one is all that you can score. Fair point. Frankie. but what happens when eight ruddy great monsters have a punch—up‘.’ Would civilisation crumble'.’ Would the fate of the planet hang in the balance'.’ Would Barney The Dinosaur give King Kong a Glasgow kiss‘.’
Such questions. prompted by the impending release of blockbusting monster movie Godzilla. are dividing The List office. ‘King Kong could take Godzillal' bellows the editor. ‘Bollocks he could!’ respond outraged hacks. There’s only one thing for it: stick the names of eight of the film world's scariest monsters in a hat and let's work this thing out scientifically in the Movie Monsters World Cup.
The first bout pits Godzilla against Mothra — an encounter played out many times in unintentionally hilarious Japanese creature features. Godzilla. a skyscraping reptillian throwback with radioactive breath (basically the Vinnie Jones of this tournament). has always triumphed over this massive. friendly insect and so it proves here —
a swift kick to the moth balls and it’s all over. Next up. Barney (fat. purple.
loves children) takes on one of Jurassic Park's Velociraptors (lean.
green. eats children). Barney can carry a tune. but the raptor soon turns him to jelly.
Down to the water for the next fight — Jaws versus The Creature From The Black Lagoon. Jaws wins points for having the best signature tune. but at the end of the day it‘s
just a big fish. whereas The Creature
is. like. a creature. Put it this way: you wouldn‘t eat The Creature with a portion of chips. would you‘.’ Well. then.
The first round ends with King Kong. basically Ian Brown's grandad. taking on cult 80s flying
snake. Q - The Winged Serpent.
This is a tricky one as both favour
showdowns at the tops of extremely tall buildings. It‘s a close call. but Q never pulled Fay Wray. did he‘.’ Kong is da bomb.
The semis are pretty much a foregone conclusion. with Godzilla sinking The Creature. while the raptor hits the skids against an angry
Godzilla is quick to retaliate, blasting Kong with his Dounreay breath, but a little atomic halitosis
ain't gonna faze monkey boy.
The Monster mash:
1. King Kong 2.0
3. Godzilla 4. The Creature From The Black Lagoon
5. Velociraptors 6. Jaws
7. Barney (with Baby Bop and Bi) 8. Mothra
MONSTER MAYHEM
Kong armed with a fearsome bunch of bananas.
The curtain rises. the fanfare sounds. the ref scatters his red cards and runs away. Yes. it's the final and it's an old skool derby — Godzilla versus King Kong. Neither is likely to win the fair play award. but Kong proves particularly prone to wiping his hairy ass with the rule book and wastes no time in grabbing the lizard king by his scaly bits till he weeps like a big iguana‘s blouse.
Godzilla is quick to retaliate. however. blasting Kong with his Dounreay breath. but a little atomic halitosis ain't gonna faze monkey boy. Kong finishes off his slimy opponent with a well—aimed sucker- punch. which just goes to show that you might spend a squillion dollars on a movie monster. but when it comes to square gos. this is still the planet of the apes. Gorilla. you've been missed.
Godzilla the movie goes on general release on Fri 17 Jul. See preview and review, pages 26 and 28.
9—23 Jul 1998 THEUST11