Twisted Kaiju Theater
was a webcomic, created by Sean "Shin-Goji" McGuinness, a fan of action figures and clix. It is primarily created by arranging action figures of Kaiju and others, with bugged-out eyes and speech bubbles superimposed. This one is quite the Long Runner, having put out over 1500 strips since 2001, so beware going on too long an Archive Binge.
Another major draw for TKT was its large collection of Cute Monster Girl art, also known as the Kaiju Girls (or K-Girls more commonly), which was later deleted from the servers in an attempt to make the site more respectable.
Currently the comic itself is on an indefinite hiatus as the writer wishes to focus on his career and art.
The comic returned in 2019, with a handful of comics loosely based on the new Legendary kaiju-verse. Shortly afterwards, old strips were removed from the archive and the newer ones were relabeled as Season 1, effectively rebooting the comic.
Tropes:
- And I Must Scream: Leviathan's final fate involves him being trapped for all eternity in King Kong's corpse, perpetually begging for someone to let him out.
- Arch-Enemy: Deconstructed with Tyrant, who's arch-enemy relationship with Shin-Goji is practically a mental disorder. The rivalry between him and Shin is pretty one-sided as most of the time Shin just ignores him. His repeated battles with the Toxic Pirates result in him losing his job, his mooks abandoning him, and getting the crap kicked out of him time and time again. A part of the ''Final Invasion'' revolves around explaining why Tyrant keeps up with this self-destructive behaivior and why he hates Shin so much. He seems to have finally gotten better.
- Author Avatar: Shin-Goji and most of his friends have one of these.
- Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking: Shin-Goji has no problem with his girlfriend Murugu being a psychotic nymphomaniac or Murugu at one point working for mystic opponents attempting to steal Shin's dark powers. What horrifies Shin-Goji is that Murugu is a Republican... and a fan of The Twilight Saga.
- Badass Crew: The Toxic Pirates, as outlined here.
- Black Comedy Rape: Everytime you turn around some dude is always getting it.
- Butt-Monkey: GINO, aka Zilla the western Gojira.
- Catchphrase: "Sweet Monkey Jesus!"
- Cerebus Syndrome: The comic as a whole tends to go into deadly serious phases of continuity every 40 strips or so - the most recent having resulted in Shin-Goji being booted from Neo-Monster Island just so Tyrant could prove a point about loyalty to family and the strip being renamed "The Once And Future Tyrant," with a focus shift from Kaiju to Super Robots.
- Lampshaded. Shin-Goji claims to have a standing prescription for it.
- Cloud Cuckoo Lander: Most of the Toxic Pirates but Marius really takes the cake.
- Dangerous Forbidden Technique: Shin-Goji's Vengeance Seal.
- Dark Is Not Evil: Space Hojo. He's literally an elder god in mortal form, but is actually one of the more sensible Toxic Pirates and genuinely views the others as his friends.
- The Dragon: Gigan and Monster X to King Kong.
- Dysfunction Junction
- Eldritch Abomination: Space Hojo. He's actually Nyarlathotep. Also, Leviathan.
- Murugu is later revealed to be one as well. More specifically, she's a powerful demonic entity that will, eventually, kick start the apocalypse.
- The Mass-Production EVA, constructed from various discarded MacGuffins, powered by a Manitou spirit, and meant to represent the genocide of the Native Americans. It's every bit as horrifying as it sounds.
- Heroic Sacrifice: Vorahk II sacrifices himself to save the original Vorahk. Attempted by Shin in his fight against King Kong and Leviathan, but fortunately subverted.
- Heterosexual Life-Partners: Shin-Goji and Space Hojo. Later GMK-Zilla and Vorahk develop into this.
- Hostile Show Takeover: "The Once and Future Tyrant".
- Ironic Echo: "Naught but a motherfucking distraction." First said by the spirit of Shin-Goji's mother during the last battle with Leviathan, then later said by Tyrant, as he outlines how he set up the Final Invasion arc as part of a plan to take over Neo-Monster Island.
- Light Is Not Good: Murugu's bright, cute little bird form is actually just form she chooses to have. She's actually a murderous demon that will eventually devour all of humanity when the apocalypse comes.
- Long Runner
- Killed Off for Real: Vorahk II and King Kong.
- Mike Nelson, Destroyer of Worlds: Shin-Goji, as he's unknowingly the vessel for the monstrous Leviathan.
- Monster of the Aesop: The villains "Final Invasion" invoke this this. Since the various Kaiju are attached to some sort of message (Godzilla and the horrors of nuclear war, King Kong and racism, etc.), their plan is to create a monster based on the genocide of the Native Americans in order to destroy Neo-Monster Island.
- Motive Decay: Tyrant starts out with the sensible goal of taking over Neo-Monster Island, but as his schemes keep getting foiled, his mental state worsens and he becomes obsessed with killing the Toxic Pirates, completely forgetting his prior job.
- MookâFace Turn: Vorahk starts out as a minion of Tyrant's before getting sick of his boss's incompetence and defecting to help the Toxic Pirates.
- My Girl Is a Slut: Murugu, and Shin-Goji knows it. In fact, when he finds his illegal Mexican bootleg kaiju figure poolboys gangbanging her, his main concern is that the pool doesn't exist in his backyard yet.
- N-Word Privileges: Shin-Goji's real life roommate, Howard Williams, is African-American himself, and has co-written many of the comics involving race. Space Hojo is his Author Avatar, and has stated that his reason for being in the comic is this.
- Only Sane Man: Space Hojo and Son Goharotto are the only Toxic Pirates that aren't out of their minds in one way or another.
- Replacement Goldfish: Big Will was this for Space Hojo during a period when Hojo had left Neo-Monster Island. Unlike most examples, he stuck around after Hojo came back.
- Self-Deprecation: There are many jokes made at the creator Shin-Goji's expense, such as calling him "talentless" and making quips about how unsuccessful he is at getting laid.
- Shout-Out: King of the monsters? I didn't vote for you.
- Take That!: In this comic, one character asks another "Didn't you see Pacific Rim: Uprising?" "No." "Well, neither did anyone else!"
- Toilet Humor: A master of it.
- Road Lemon Sours: The tradition began in the very first episode, wherein the Lemon Sours packaged with Godzilla gashapon toys were revealed to be King Ghidorah's poop. Ever since, Lemon Sours have become Neo-Monster Island's chief export and Ghidorah's canon Villain Decay has been accelerated to the point that the three-headed dragon is mainly a homage to Beavis And Butthead.
- Took a Level in Badass: Tyrant during the "Once and Future Tyrant" arc.
- TV Tropes Will Ruin Your Life: In-Universe. The Toxic Pirates' absence during the "Once And Future Tyrant" arc is explained by them having had to chase Murugu as she got click-happy here. No word yet on whether they visited this very page.
- UltimateGamer386: Sean McGuinness is one of these in Billy vs. SNAKEMAN, for reasons he lists in Strip 1656note .
- Verbal Tic: Bidibidibidibidi!
- Vitriolic Best Buds: All of the Toxic Pirates treat each other this way.
- The War on Straw: Shin-Goji engages in this sorta thing quite often.
- This gets Lampshaded and Parodied in the "Legends of the Dark Mask" arc, where the villains are required to fill out forms stating what issue they're representing.
- This gets Lampshaded and Parodied in the "Legends of the Dark Mask" arc, where the villains are required to
- Wham Episode: The entirety of "Final Invasion".
- "Restless Dreams".One of the (if not the) darkest and most serious story arcs in the comic, a six-parter with many revelations about Shin-Goji's Vengeance Seal, the nature of several of Shin's friends, and the origins of Neo-Monster Island itself, and ends with Space Hojo deciding to leave the comic.
- Zombie Apocalypse: The "28 Minutes Later" story arc, which involves the Toxic Pirates trying to survive a zombie outbreak at Nashi-Con.
