Secrets Revealed: I’m sure some of you by now have noticed a few interesting easter egs I’ve hidden here and there. Names of characters, some of the callsigns and protocol designations being significant dates and more than likely the titles of each chapter. At this point you’ve probably figured out what theme I was using. Every chapter, save for the final one, is titled after a line from a Universal Monster Movie. The final chapter of course is named after the song that heavily referenced those same films as well as what the crossover films were called by fans. I’m not going to spoil it which titles are from what movie, but if you can correctly name the film each came from as well the character and actor who said them then you’ll have my undying respect. So long as you can figure out the films at least without Googling them.
Ahsoka and Vader: I never intended for the only fight in the final chapter to be just the Zillo-Beast and Godzilla. I wanted to have a few of them ongoing. This was chief among them. I know Rebels intends to eventually lead up to this confrontation. Regardless of how that ends, however, I wanted to do my own. I didn’t want Ahsoka or Vader to reveal themselves to each other yet though. That emotional impact is best reserved for the actual show. I did want them to at least suspect one another as it would be impossible to totally hide one’s identity. But making things dark and cover your face can help. This way Vader can’t be positive, but he still knows.
I tried my best to capture how Ahsoka would fight given her style of combat and from watching her recent appearance on the show itself. Overall I think I did quite well. We don’t really see many Grey Jedi in Star Wars fiction, so it was interesting to see how Ahsoka acts as one. Im hoping we’ll get a few more fights with her in the future. She pretty much wrecked the Inquisitors so I’d like see a few more fights with them, maybe figure out why the Seventh Sister seems to eager to capture her.
It was fun having these two character battle it out in a traditional lightsaber duel. I also liked the touch of having Godzilla’s fight being broadcast in the background and giving Ahsoka some helpful advice in how to battle Vader. I borrowed that idea from Final Wars where they have the scene where the hero and Godzilla’s battles start to mirror one another. Neat little story telling trick there.
Oh and yes, I did put the last line of the Jedi Code in there. Hey, it’s still canon. The Clone Wars referenced the Sith Code in the Maul episodes and the recent episode of Rebels showed Filoni and his crew at least infused the spirit of the line into the episode. And why the hell wouldn’t Ahsoka embrace that last part of the Code? She spent years communing with the Force by herself, on her own, training to become a badass under the nose of the Empire. I think she’d probably look to a lot of Ancient Jedi knowledge and lessons to guide her.
As an aside, I really hope we eventually get information on exactly what happened to her after the Clone Wars. I feel like there’s a really cool story there of an Ex-Jedi in a galaxy without them, trying to forge her way forward. I like to think she went on some kind of spiritual journey like Yoda did during the end of Clone Wars. Maybe that’s just me though.
I think I made the right choice by not having Vader beaten in a straight up fight, only mildly inconvenienced by Ezra’s arrival. I can’t exactly show the greatest Sith Lord in history getting beaten by some kid. Better to drop a bunch of junk on him and then start pursuing his prey in response. Overall, I think the fight turned out pretty well.
Kamo’s Fate: Sad to see him die, but it was the most logical end to his story. His fight with Kanan was more or less about him confronting what he had done, forcing himself to remember the horrors he committed. I know that the new episodes suggested that the whole “Bio-Chips” thing is out in the open, but I like to imagine that’s just some conspiracy theory floating around the holonet. Kanan didn’t sound like he honestly believed it when he spoke up about it. Also, if you’re wondering if this messes up things when I originally had Kanan think about the Clones, well then, Ahsoka only told him about the chips after this mission was over. Not that it matters, this is fanfiction, but still.
Making a fight between a non-Force using soldier and a Jedi is difficult. You’re basically dealing with a situation where someone armed with a sword and telekinetic abilities is battling a dude with a gun. You can do a ton of cool things with the Jedi, but the soldier is still using a gun. You have to be creative in how they battle each other lest you fall into a trap and make the battle mundane. I think for my part I partially succeeded. I was able to keep things interesting until the vibroblade showed up. I guess it helps that the Old Republic has shown how to do fights between Force Users and non-Force Users.
The important part of all this was having Kamo reveal what he blocked out, or what his chip blocked out, it’s still not clear. He killed a bunch of unarmed children regardless, kids who barely knew how to use the Force let alone fight with it. Kamo wasn’t even given the option to hesitate, that’s how much the chip had control of him and others.
But like with the Clones who escaped the pull of Order 66, once the truth was revealed the spell was broken. Of course, still too late for Kamo. He still committed those crimes, still had his free will stolen. Now free, nearing the end of his life and completely disillusioned with the people in charge, he decides to finally take action of his own accord. The only thing that made sense at that point was blowing up the whole facility. It wasn’t really out of malice, but as I had him explain to wipe out any chance of the Empire creating more things like himself. Living weapons to be forced into carrying out whatever their masters please. No one can be allowed to have that kind of power. And his mind, sacrifice is the only way he can truly call himself a soldier again and not die a monster.
It was sad to kill such a cool character I created, but I knew it was his time. It brought everything to a full conclusion and allowed Kamo to redeem himself and complete the final phase of the assault on the facility. I think it all came together nicely enough, although part of me hopes it didn’t come off too sappy. I at least enjoyed completing the arc I set up when I created him.
The Fates of our Villains: Arch and Klusto met different ends here. Arch has lost faith in his cause and in his purpose, saddened by the loss of his hero Kamo who he doesn’t even know caused the explosion. He probably never will. It fits in with the theme of a lot of Godzilla movies, especially the first one. You can fight monsters and probably win, but there will be sacrifice and you will not always come out whole. He did his best to find meaning in a lost cause, but ultimately in his mind failed. It’s not exactly a happy end for him, but there is hope. Perhaps this will make him realize that he’s working for the wrong side and join the Rebellion. Who knows? There’s always hope after all.
Klusto sacrificed everything in contrast. Dying to save the woman he loved from certain death. If Vader knew she was alive and allied with the Rebels she would’ve been hunted down by the Empire. Knowing he can’t bring himself to take Boll in, he decides upon the only other course of action. He knows the Empire is wrong, or at least it’s leadership is, Vader taught him that. He can’t live knowing he’s betrayed his duty though and certainly doesn’t want to risk revealing Boll’s survival under interrogation. So again, he kills himself. I doubt he thought he could kill Vader, but at least he slowed him down. Vader probably doesn’t really believe Klusto’s story, but with little else to go on and the project scrapped anyway, he doesn’t pursue it. Bigger fish to fry and all, better to just accept it at face value and move on.
Klusto is another one of my “doomed romances” stories I guess, which I have a strange affinity for now that I think about it. I guess my feeling is romance can at times lean more on the tragic side. I like a good, actually happy and fun romance, but some of the more tragic ones have a charm to him. Klusto really wanted it to work with Sionver, but it just didn’t. She had no interest in a romantic relationship and, let’s be honest, he probably would’ve been killing his career if he pursued it. This was probably the best outcome. Regardless of the fact Boll never returned Klusto’s feelings though, she was his friend, she did care about him. She just wasn’t in love with him and he couldn’t accept that. But in the end, his love for Boll helped save the Zillo-Beast species and the Ghost crew from being caught by Vader.
It’s as one Grey Jedi who left the order back in the days of the Old Republic once said; Love will save you, not condemn you. I like to think that despite what happened, Klusto saved himself in those last few moments, showing that he truly was the good man Boll believed him to be. Think of it this way, Klusto’s opponent in this scenario was Darth Vader, a man destroyed by his passion for a woman and his selfish desire to keep her for himself at the cost of everyone else. Klusto, in contrast, surrendered everything for love, his reputation and his life. A good contrast between the two men I find. I kinda wish I could’ve done a better job showing that in story, but oh well.
Godzilla vs Cyborg Zillo-Beast: This was the big one. The kaiju battle I was building up to. So I had to pull out all the stops. I needed to show the fight constantly in flux, Godzilla winning one minute, the Zillo-Beast the next. It gave me a new appreciation for writing such battles, as it’s at times difficult to keep things fresh. The appeal of a lot of these fights is the size of the monsters. They’re big enough that everyday big stuff, boats, buildings, bridges and the like can be used as weapons in an all out brawl. It makes for some exciting set pieces. The AT-AT boxer gloves were one of my favorite ideas actually.
There were more than a few references to some of Godzilla’s greatest fights in this one battle. The beams colliding with each other, Godzilla charging through explosions and getting set on fire, humans coming to his aid mid-fight, letting loose a wild shot just as he falls down, using broken pieces of the enemy against him, Godzilla grabbing the three arms and throwing the Zillo-Beast into the air, the spiral beam being introduced at a low point for our monstrous hero and of course the kiss of death from the 2014 movie with an added bit from the 98 cartoon series where Godzilla rips out a similar death ray in the cyborg version of his original father. (Yes, I know that monster was Zilla Jr., but for simplicity’s sake he’s Godzilla Jr. in the cartoon.)
It was a ton of fun living out all my Godzilla kaiju battle fantasies, with a monster who had a ton of kickass weapons at his disposal. It was was like Mecha-King Ghidorah and Mechagodzilla all rolled into one. Some of Godzilla’s best fights seem to be with cyborgs actually, something I hope Legendary considers for any future movies it does. Now there were some things that happened in this battle that are relevant to another topic, so I’ll go over them shortly. This was just to explain a bit of how some of the stuff I did took form. The gist of it is, I took inspiration from the movies and considered the environment the battle took place in. From there, I simply came up with extra bits for the two monsters to battle with one another and made sure that there was a constant push and pull to the fight. The best part of any Godzilla battle is watching him take beating, survive it and then pull himself back up for one last glorious win in the final quarter. Godzilla never surrenders, never gives up, he plays to win and just when you think he’s down and he come up from behind ya, rips your jaws open and burns your fucking throat out point blank! Hail to the King, bitches! (PS Still friggin love the 2014 movie, no one can tell me different.)
The Other Monster Fight: I called this chapter “Monster Mash” for more than just the obvious central battle. There were more than two monsters here. Kamo was Kanan’s monster, a horrifying nightmare from his past. Darth Vader is a monster, in every way shape and form. Kamo obviously wasn’t going to fight Godzilla again, so yeah... Vader takes on Godzilla.
You know, it wasn’t hard writing this scene to show Godzilla couldn’t be killed by the Sith. What was hard was figuring out how to make Vader surviving against him not look stupid. Vader has faced a ton of opponents, both as Anakin and when he turned to the Dark Side. Some of them were pretty big, but none of them were like Godzilla. I basically considered every major feat Vader has done, both from recent comics and the Lords of the Sith book that came out awhile back. It isn’t hard to consider that, with all his power, he could last a decent amount of time against a giant atomic lizard. After that, considering what Vader was capable of, I basically just fell back on every Video Game boss battle in existence that follows this kind of match-up. It was easy to visualize after that.
I think my favorite scenes to write involved Vader trying to force choke Godzilla of all things, only to fail and then the Dark Lord surviving a damn Atomic Blast that should’ve disintegrated him, purely by use of the Force alone. It showed how truly powerful he was and how incredibly powerful Godzilla was. Overall, the fight was a good capstone to the story, showcasing two icons of their respective franchises and genres duking it out for supremacy. A great final battle to write.
Godzilla’s Arc: It’s easy to just write Godzilla off as a mindless monstrous creature. You could even make him out malevolent and vicious. The new Godzilla film from Toho seems to be taking that approach. I’m fine with it overall, maybe a bit disappointed they’re going back to “Godzilla is pure evil” again as that’s ground we’ve tread enough in my opinion to mixed results, but I know it won’t last. Every time they try to bring Godzilla back to his villain roots, he ends up becoming an anti-hero again. Because everyone cheers for him, everyone in the audience kinda wants him to win, regardless of his role and that inevitably leads him to becoming less pure evil, more noble monster.
In a way, I had a different arc here. Godzilla is an anti-hero bordering on villain when the story starts. As time goes on, as he faces the challenges the Empire throws at him, he’s forced to think about himself. He’s forced to think about his old life and what brought him here, what he wants ultimately. When he meets the Jedi, they confront him with all of this and give him a way secure what he wants, to be left alone in peace to rule in isolation.
However, despite his noble efforts, Godzilla cannot defeat the Empire alone. His rage isn’t enough to get him to his final goal. He falls into despair at his failure, which the Jedi help him overcome when they reveal another way. They tell him of the Force and how it connects all life, even him. He searches inside himself, meditating if you will, on the core of his being. He then realizes the mistake he made in seeking vengeance, that his anger blinded him to his true purpose, a defender of nature and a keep of balance. So he rises up with new power and a new purpose, one more outward and altruistic than pure inward satisfaction and personal pleasure. At his lowest point in the newest battle, he tries to reach out to the power in the sky and inadvertently sees the struggle of the Rebels. He now fully understands what his new purpose entails and embraces a new kind of power greater than any rage, that of his own will that he sees reflected in the Rebels themselves, their hope if you may.
A bit Anime perhaps, but he is from Japan so not unexpected. If I’d describe Godzilla as a character it would be as a Ronin Samurai. A lone warrior fighting battles at his leisure, for his own purposes and intent. In most of these stories he has to realize the value of having a cause greater than your own. Godzilla’s journey is one of accepting a purpose greater than himself and letting go of his baser function, not letting them control or fuel him as they once did. That ties a bit in to the journey of many Jedi protagonists in Star Wars, where they discover true power comes from letting go of themselves and embracing a greater calling. In my mind, Godzilla is very much like this, that he needs to let go of his rage and harness his true potential. We see it in many of his movies, how he’s evolved overtime.
In the latest IDW comic, Godzilla is thrown in hell and has to overcome impossible tortures and odds to escape. His final test, not to spoil anything, seems to be along similar lines, a mastery of self and his spirit, willpower overcoming physical limitation and emotional influence. Godzilla’s scene in this story, where he rises once more to grab each of the Zillo-Beast’s arms and then throw him several feet away while ripping one of the limbs off is him mastering his own sense of self. I like to think of the Force Awakens trailer music playing in the background as it happens to be honest, cause I think that music fits the moment the best.
Also it looks really friggin badass so there’s that.
I’m sure you’re tired of me prattling on philosophical like. I don’t wanna look like I’m just sniffing my own farts here. I just want to explain a bit behind my thought process and intent with the scene. In any case, I do hope you enjoyed the conclusion to Godzilla’s arc. And if you’re wondering about his final scene where he basically assembles the Kaiju Avengers, that’s just a neat book end. I’m probably not going to do a sequel to this story. I embarked on a grand experiment with this story and I had a lot of fun writing it. The past year has been one of lows and highs for me and I like to think writing this story helped me deal with them. It got my creative skills flowing again in ways I couldn’t imagine and has been a tremendous help in pushing my writing style forward.
I thank you all for joining me on this adventure and I hope you’re ready to come on me with many more. We will return to Commander Shepard and the Master Chief shortly and see how they can handle the trials and tribulations to come as they make their way back to Earth with a crew that doesn’t full trust each other. Pirates, ancient mysteries, forgotten treasures and political intrigue await us friends. But nonetheless, I hope you enjoyed this excursion with the King of the Monsters long ago in a Galaxy far, far away. May the Force be with you always dear readers, and long live the King.
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