Monster / Godzilla

"A city under siege, a populace facing extinction, an evil reborn and more powerful than ever: Gigan."

Mas Selina Salno, Princess of Sergina: Why does no one pay heed to my warning? The entire human race will perish from the Earth. When the monster Ghidorah passes, only flaming ruins are left.
Detective Shindo: Ghidorah?
Salno: Centuries ago, the monster appeared in the skies of Mars. Within a month, the culture of Mars had been wiped out completely. The civilization on my planet had reached a stage of development which you people will not achieve for a long time. Centuries, at least. Today, because of the space monster, it is a dead world. Dead and unpopulated.
Dr. Tsukamoto: It would be a bad situation if that creature came here to Earth.
Salno: It's worse, because he's arrived.

— Ghidorah, the Three-Headed Monster

Toho is famous for its kaiju movies, and Godzilla is perhaps the best known. These films are are more associated with special effects and giant monster battles than with depraved villains. However, there are some villains who manage to cross enough lines to stand out from the crowd as truly, utterly, and irredeemably evil.

All spoilers are unmarked. You Have Been Warned!

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MonsterVerse

Examples

• Godzilla: King of the Monsters (2019) & Godzilla vs. Kong: King Ghidorah, The One Who is Many, is an invasive alien kaiju who fought the kaiju of Earth for control of the planet before being defeated and sealed away in ancient times. Released in the present day, Ghidorah cheerfully kills several humans before and during a fight with Godzilla, displaying a simplistic thirst for blood that clashes horribly with the natural animal instincts that motivate the terrestrial kaiju. After the apparent death of Godzilla, Ghidorah uses his powers to enslave the remaining kaiju of Earth, forcibly awakening them and commanding them to wipe out all life on the planet. When Madison Russell uses a device called the ORCA to disrupt his plans, Ghidorah attempts to kill her in cold blood simply because he can. After being converted into Mechagodzilla by Apex Cybernetics, Ghidorah promptly corrupts Mechagodzilla's AI, slaughters the ones who brought him back, and resumes his rampage, his sadistic tendencies shown in how he targets Godzilla and wipes out swathes of Hong Kong while laughing about it. A sinister analogue to the Devil opposite the benevolent God-like Godzilla, King Ghidorah is just as wicked here as he was at the start of his movie career.
• Godzilla vs. Kong: The Official Movie Novelization, by Greg Keyes: Walter Simmons, CEO of Apex Cybernetics, is notably worse than his film counterpart. When Godzilla was first revealed to the world, Simmons, aggravated that humanity wasn't the dominant species on Earth, sought to take that title back, with his corporate empire on top. It's revealed he was the one who created the Oxygen Destroyer in an attempt to kill Godzilla. Simmons bribed his way out of accountability for the resulting disaster, and when Sara Hayes tries to reveal Apex's involvement, Simmons had her assassinated. Simmons masterminds the creation of Mechagodzilla, intending to use it to kill and usurp Godzilla as Alpha, killing the Titans they can't enslave, testing it by having it slaughter Skullcrawlers that Apex are breeding. When the test for Mechagodzilla's signal results in Godzilla going on a rampage in Pensacola, Simmons sees this as a stepping stone to turn the world against Godzilla. Simmons then deliberately engineers Godzilla's rampage in Hong Kong, putting millions of innocents on Godzilla's warpath. During Godzilla's rampage, Simmons looks on in excitement, admitting he's counting on Godzilla destroying much of the city so that Apex can be "saviors" when they set Mechagodzilla loose.
• Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire has the Skar King:
  • Film: The Skar King is an ancient Great Ape Titan warlord who, untold millennia ago, led his tribe in an attempt to conquer the Surface World, but was imprisoned in a lower layer of the Hollow Earth by Godzilla. Confining his tribe to a volcanic wasteland and ruling through pain and suffering for generations, the Skar King killed those who dared to defy him; gathered a harem of terrorized females to father his children; and enslaved the cryogenic reptilian Titan Shimo through torture with the intent of using her to cause another Ice Age. When he discovered humans from the surface had entered the Hollow Earth, the Skar King slaughtered Monarch's Outpost and led his army in an attempted conquest. Upon reaching the surface with Shimo, he nearly succeeded in accomplishing his goals but was killed by the combined efforts of Kong, Godzilla, the young ape Suko—implied to be the Skar King's own son—and a liberated Shimo.
  • Greg Keyes's novelization: The Skar King is an ancient Great Ape warlord who corrupted his once-peaceful tribe and waged war against Godzilla and his allies in an attempt to conquer the Surface World. Defeated and imprisoned in a lower layer of the Hollow Earth—inspiring various myths of evil gods being imprisoned—the Skar King confined his tribe to a volcanic wasteland; ruled for generations through suffering and fear; took the tribe's females as his personal harem; imposed a mentality on his tribe where only the most cruel and vicious Great Apes were deemed fit for survival; and brutally killed any who dared to defy or fail him. Enslaving and torturing the prehistoric cryogenic Titan called Shimo, the Skar King plotted to use her to wipe out all life on the surface by causing a new Ice Age, while lying to his followers that they would rule together once his conquest was complete. When Suko—one of his sons—betrayed him to rescue Kong, the Skar King ordered his Red-Stripe enforcers to capture them to be executed; even attempting to kill Suko himself before being defeated by the combined efforts of Kong and Godzilla, frozen solid by a liberated Shimo, and smashed to pieces.

Tohoverse Films

Showa Era

• King Ghidorah, Godzilla's Arch-Enemy, is a three-headed alien dragon that travels the cosmos destroying worlds for his own sadistic amusement. Having attacked Venus—Mars in the English dub—thousands of years in the past, Ghidorah annihilated its advanced civilization and rendered the planet uninhabitable. Arriving on Earth intending to do the same, Ghidorah gleefully rampages across Japan before being driven off by the combined efforts of Godzilla, Rodan, and Mothra. Attacking Planet X, Ghidorah is mind-controlled by the Xiliens and used in their attempt to conquer Earth in the year 196X; though once free from their control, he continues rampaging until being driven off by Godzilla and Rodan. Mind-controlled by the M Space Hunter Nebula Aliens' Action Signal Tapes, Ghidorah is partnered with the sadistic Gigan and ordered to wipe out human civilization, but is ultimately driven off by Godzilla and Anguirus after the mind-control is broken. Coming under the control of the Kilaaks, Ghidorah is sent to conquer Earth and holds his own against the combined might of Earth's kaiju, though this proves his final stand.
• Ebirah, Horror of the Deep: The Red Bamboo's unnamed Commander and his second-in-command, Captain Ryuui, run the terror cells operations on Letchi Island, developing nuclear weapons for their cause. To this end, they've taken the people of Infant Island into slavery, with Ryuui as their smug warden. When their operations create the sea monster Ebirah, they utilize Ebirah to sink outsider ships, and keep their captives from escaping. Ryuui is introduced having several escaped slaves gunned down, letting two go to be devoured by Ebirah, using this as a demonstration for the new slaves. When Godzilla rampages against them, the Commander and Ryuui order the nuclear detonation of the island, leaving their slaves and captives to die as they try to escape.
• King Kong Escapes: Dr. Who is an egotistical Mad Scientist working for an unnamed country represented by Madame Piranha. Planning to help make her country a nuclear superpower, he creates the Mechani-Kong to mine for Element X, before deciding to use the real Kong. Attacking and capturing Kong on his island, Who guns down a innocent native for no particular reason, before taking Commander Carl Nelson and his lieutenants hostage, torturing Jiro and Susan by rapidly freezing them, and threatening to personally disfigure Susan's face. When Kong and the crew manage to escape, Who plans to force Kong to fight the Mechani-Kong to fight in the city of Tokyo, not caring that he'd kill thousands of people; when this is protested by Madame Piranha, Who scoffs at her for being a moralist. In Kong and the Mechani-Kong's ensuing fight, Who has Susan taken hostage and threatens to drop her to her death, and when Piranha herself tries to stop his madness, Who shoots her to death in retaliation.
• Space Amoeba (aka Yog, Monster From Space): The titular Space Amoeba, or "Yog", is an alien creature attempting to conquer Earth. Crash landing near Selgio island, Yog takes control of the sea monster Gezora, killing resort workers before it attacks in the island village. After Gezora is burned to death, Yog mutates a rubble crab into Ganimes, and begins attacking surviving islanders. When Ganimes dies, Yog takes over the body of Makoto Obata, gloating to him that it has taken over his mind, and begins exterminating the local bat population so the bats can't interfere with its control over its monsters. Making another Ganimes and another kaiju Komebas, Yog begins attacking islanders until they are saved by some surviving bats. Yog then tries to burn the rest of the bats before using Komebas and Ganimes to kill the people on the island for learning of its weakness.
• Godzilla vs. Gigan: The titular cyborg monstrosity, Gigan, was nearly as vicious as his compatriot Ghidorah, burning most of Tokyo to the ground, laughing all the while. What truly made Gigan stand out, however, was his sadistic love of hurting others. During his and Ghidorah's battle with Godzilla and Anguirus, Gigan repeatedly opted to go for torture rather than finishing an opponent off, dragging the other monsters in close and using his buzzsaw to carve pieces off of them, and showing a distinct preference for targeting those who could not fight back, attacking a severely wounded Godzilla while he lay bleeding on the ground, and later, in Godzilla vs. Megalon, teaming with Megalon to deliver a No-Holds-Barred Beatdown to Jet Jaguar. Prone to abandoning his allies as soon as the going gets tough, and hating a fair fight, Gigan was Toho's reigning king of Kick Them While They Are Down.

Other Eras

• Heisei Era:
  • Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah: Chuck Wilson is the xenophobic leader of the Futurians, time-travelling terrorists who want to stop Japan from becoming a global superpower in the future. Under the pretense of preventing Godzilla's creation to save Japan, Wilson and his subordinates go back in time and leave the dinosaur that would become Godzilla to die at the bottom of the Bering Sea, and in its place they leave behind three creatures that would be mutated by H-bomb testing, fusing them into King Ghidorah. In present-day Japan, Wilson takes control of Ghidorah and uses him to attack Fukuoka, killing hundreds, before sending him to destroy Hokkaido and everything on the way there. When Godzilla is revealed to have survived and arrives to defeat Ghidorah, Wilson attempts to return to his time, gloating that Godzilla will finish the job that he started and finish off the rest of Japan.
  • Godzilla vs. SpaceGodzilla: SpaceGodzilla, upon being created when Godzilla's cells fused with a crystal alien, arrived in a solar system with two thoughts in mind—Take Over the World and kill Godzilla in the process. Butchering the inhabitants of a space station that he flew past, SpaceGodzilla arrived on Monster Island where he assaulted, and then kidnapped, Godzilla's adoptive son, Junior, out of spite. Making his way to Fukuoka, SpaceGodzilla converted the entire city into a series of giant crystal spires that drained life from the Earth and fed it into him, enabling him to become stronger and stronger. Planning to repeat the process in other cities before he was killed by Godzilla and MOGUERA, SpaceGodzilla was described as an abomination, evil even by kaiju standards.
• Rebirth of Mothra 3: King Ghidorah was a spacefaring Draconic Abomination inimical to all life, as well as a Child Hater of truly spectacular proportions. Upon arriving in Japan, Ghidorah not only tried to obliterate major metropolitan centers, but kidnapped every child on the island, intending to eat their souls. Mothra journeyed to the past and slew a weaker version of the dragon who, during his first visit to Earth in the Cretaceous Period, was responsible for the extinction of the dinosaurs, only to discover that in the present, Ghidorah is still alive and well. Returning to Earth again, Ghidorah continues with his plan to leave the planet a lifeless husk, starting with the children.
• Millennium Era's Final Wars: Controller X, or simply X, is a hegemonic alien warlord who wants to rule the Earth, but while his former master wanted to do it peacefully and was well-intentioned, X, after killing him, took the conquering to more extreme levels. Instantly letting his alien henchmen go around and destroy everything in sight after making them his own mindless slaves, and awakening Gigan, X doesn't care at all who gets killed during the attack, and is fully aware of how sadistic Gigan is. Capturing and holding a bunch of humans hostage during the climax, X orders his men to slaughter the crew, except for those he wants to kill for himself, trying to brainwash Ozaki into serving him, only to attempt to kill him when he breaks free. Psychotic and arrogant, X had no problems with causing a massive genocide on humans just so that he could rule Earth, and while multiple other villains have the same goals, it is X's utter sadism that makes him stand out.

IDW comics

Examples

• Kingdom of Monsters continuity:
  • Ongoing & Rulers of Earth: Gigan is a bloodthirsty sadist who is introduced specifically going after humans during his rampage through Hong Kong, using his buzzsaw implements to butcher entire buildings' of citizens. After joining with and being upgraded by the Cryogs, Gigan leads a brutal assault on Area 51 and Las Vegas, killing hundreds while singling out humans to vaporize. Gigan loves killing and fighting so much that he not only disregards orders from the Cryogs to fall back from his murder spree, but Gigan later betrays and slaughters almost the entire Cryog fleet just because he can.
  • Rulers of Earth: Emperor Karkaro of the Cryog likes to present himself as a great warrior for his people, but in truth sacrificed them and his entire world when King Ghidorah attacked. Later arriving on Earth when his former commander Rhizon has been trying to conquer it, Karkaro seizes control of the invasion and deploys the monstrous Trilopods to devastate Earth's cities and kill countless people before having them try to drain the energy of Earth's Kaiju. Psychologically tormenting Rhizon, Karkaro has him imprisoned while vowing a torturous death when Rhizon calls him out for his cowardice and has Rhizon's innocent crew executed out of spite. Karkaro vows to wipe out all life on Earth and raze everything on the planet to ash solely to take it for himself and salve his ego, showing himself as the worst of all the aliens who threatens Earth.
• Gangsters & Goliaths: Ryoto Takahashi is a Yakuza boss and all-around bastard. Murdering Detective Sato's partner, Takahashi has Sato dumped on Monster Island, intending that he should die far from home, while Takahashi frames him for the murder of his partner. When Sato returns home with the Elias and Mothra in tow, Takahashi kidnaps the Elias, resulting in not only Mothra, but Godzilla and most of the population of Monster Island rampaging through Tokyo. Killing the priests of Mothra who come to retrieve the Elias, Takahashi demands that the Prime Minister pay him millions of dollars, or Tokyo will continue to burn. His demands met, Takahashi refuses to end the destruction, and attempts to kill the henchmen who say that he should, insisting that he, and not Godzilla, will go down in history as Japan's greatest monster.
• The Half-Century War: Dr. Deverich is in the running for worst human being in the franchise. Having abandoned the Anti-Megalosaur Force (AMF) when they refused to utilize his designs, Deverich sells his psionic transmitters on the Black Market, enabling terrorists to summon kaiju to any city they want. He levels Hanoi and much of Vietnam when he tests his first device on Godzilla and Anguirus in the sixties, obliterates the city of Accra, Ghana, when he arranges for every kaiju on Earth to arrive there as part of a demonstration to his customers in the seventies, and after perfecting his design in 1987, uses it to reach out into space and summon SpaceGodzilla to Bombay, annihilating it as well. Worse still, the transmitter (accidentally) calls Gigan and King Ghidorah to Earth as well, resulting in the near extinction of the human race in nineties and early 2000s. With a criminal career spanning decades, and a death toll in the billions (millions of which were deliberate), Deverich outdoes every kaiju in the series when it comes to being a monster.
• Monsters & Protectors - All Hail the King!: King Ghidorah is an ancient, malignant space creature who loves killing more than anything, and seeks to be the only thing alive in the universe. Ghidorah landed on Earth in prehistoric times, where he wiped out the dinosaurs and other species before going into hibernation so that new prey would sprout for him to hunt. Awakened in the present by the Xilians, Ghidorah lays waste to several cities on their orders before turning on and trying to wipe them out along with all humankind.
• Godzilla vs. The Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers: Rita Repulsa starts the comic off by massacring a group of monks guarding the timestream. Loosed into the multiverse, Rita happens upon Godzilla's world and allies with the Xilien aliens to help them conquer it with monsters. Realizing the potential they bring, Rita plots to seize control of the monsters and unleash them on the multiverse to destroy and conquer it. Pushed to the wall, she summons King Ghidorah to destroy Godzilla, the Rangers, and the world before trying to flee.

Other Media

Non-MonsterVerse literature

• A Space Godzilla: General Gamoni is the sadistic and psychopathic right hand of the Sunerian Queen. Hating the Godzilla species for their peaceful nature, Gamoni aided the Sunerians in committing genocide on them and attempting to lure the survivors to their doom. Gamoni would brutally torture the newborn Ririn to near-death in an attempt to use his telepathic link to a human girl to unleash the Wave Motion Virus on Earth and drive humanity into self-destructive madness. Gamoni would then gleefully have Ririn's mother Rozan burned to ashes when she comes to help save her son. When the surviving Godzillas rise up, Gamoni would begin slaughtering them and attempt to slowly crush Kunnin to death in their final battle.
• Godzilla vs. the Space Monster, by Scott Ciencin: King Ghidorah, arriving on Earth in the midst of a planet-killing asteroid, aimed to reduce humanity to the Stone Age, on behalf of the Space Hunter Nebula D aliens, who feared humankind might someday catch up with them technologically. Freed early on from The Entity who provided his programming, King Ghidorah continued his rampage nonetheless, burning Monster Island and Infant Island to the ground, attacking cities, and cackling like a loon the entire time. Hated by Godzilla because of the joy he takes in violence, King Ghidorah again earned his title as the King of Terror.

Others

• Godzilla, King of the Monsters, by Hisashi Yasui & Hiroshi Kawamoto: Dr. Mad Oniyama, wanting to Take Over the World, revives and rebuilds numerous kaiju and sics them on Godzilla in an attempt to kill the only one who can thwart his plans. Oniyama also unleashes his kaiju on various populated areas all over the globe, and in one instance, takes advantage of the chaos to kidnap a class and hold them hostage, intending to shoot them all when they're saved. Additionally, Oniyama personally tries to freeze Godzilla to death, then later brainwashes and commands him to destroy a city while assisting by piloting Gigan, attempting to siphon Godzilla of his life energy when the kaiju is freed. In one final attempt to rid himself of the monster, Oniyama integrates himself into a kaiju chimera and drops Godzilla onto a large bed of spikes. With seemingly no one left to stop him, Oniyama lays waste to another city and tries to destroy an intervening mecha by crushing its crew underfoot.
• Godzilla: The Series: Cameron Winter takes control of Godzilla and makes him destroy properties so he can collect insurance money, even making Godzilla attack a military base and endanger the lives of 500 soldiers. Defeated by H.E.A.T., Cameron returns for revenge and creates a giant monster called the Chameleon to have it attack humans and frame Godzilla for the attacks, before having the Chameleon defeat and kill Godzilla so Cameron can be seen as a hero for creating the thing that kills Godzilla. Foiled again, Cameron breaks three men out of prison and equips them with battle mechs to kill Godzilla, ordering them to also attack H.E.A.T. and the military when they get in the way. Though the hunters are defeated, Cameron denies any connection with them and claims they stole his mechs and attacked Godzilla on their own.

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