Justice League vs. Godzilla vs. Kong is an ongoing comic book series made as a collaboration between DC Comics and Legendary Pictures through their comics wing, Legendary Comics, written by Brian Buccellato with art by Christian Duce and Luis Guerrer. The first issue was released in October of 2023.
As the Justice League continues their heroic quest to safeguard humanity, Clark Kent, known to his comrades as Superman, grapples with the personal anxieties of proposing Lois Lane to marry him with support from his teammates. However, all is not well despite their best efforts.
The Legion of Doom had managed to infiltrate Superman's Fortress of Solitude before the League could stop them, and made off with a projector to the Phantom Zone dimension. However, due to interference, the villains instead accidentally are teleported to a mysterious island ruled by an ape-like titan named Kong. Finding themselves at a MONARCH outpost in a new universe ruled by giant monsters, Toyman decides to make use of the local powerhouses in a bid to rid themselves of the League once and for all. A mysterious gemstone he recovered from the Fortress was all he needed.
Back in Metropolis, as Clark and Lois enjoy their moment, the ground suddenly begins to shake and a towering monstrosity shadows the city. As Superman quickly flies into action to protect the city, the threat he faces is like none he has seen before. Godzilla.
Justice League vs. Godzilla vs. Kong provides examples of:
- Bat Out of Hell: Camazotz sets his eyes on Gotham City, leading to a desperate battle between the Bat Family and the bat Titan.
- Beam-O-War: In #2 between Superman's Eye Beams and Godzilla's atomic breath. They're evenly matched, so Shazam tries to tip the scales in Superman’s favor by hitting Godzilla with his magic lightning.
- Behemoth Battle: A three way battle takes place at the end of Issue 4 and for most of Issue 5 between Tiamat, Godzilla and Kraken. At first, it's only Godzilla and Tiamat fighting each other, but Aquaman releases the Kraken as a last defense for Atlantis, and the kaiju joins the fight immediately.
- Broad Strokes: Both the DC universe and MonsterVerse are slightly different from their typical canon. The DC universe resembles the Superfriends cartoon with more mature sensibilities, with very similar team compositions for the Justice League and Legion of Doom and the former operating out of the Hall of Justice. The Monster'verse closely resembles the films.
- C-List Fodder: When Superman is struck down, Atom-Smasher, a member of the Justice Society, steps up to protect him and Billy from Godzilla; bravely engaging the kaiju in a brawl. Sadly, Godzilla eventually overpowers and kills him, being just a normal human with growing powers.
- Cool Versus Awesome: Issue #6 ramps up the coolness factor by setting up a mecha battle between Luthor's mecha-Godzilla, Batman's giant robot, and the Green Lanterns' Megazord-like Green Latern Robo.
- Combining Mecha: In issue #6, five Green Lanterns (Jessica Cruz, John Stewart, Guy Gardner, Simon Baz and Kyle Rayner) each control a member of their Megazord.
- Crossover: It's a crossover between DC comics and Godzilla and King Kong.
- Even Evil Has Standards: Penguin seems somewhat concerned when Giganta seemingly kills Blockbuster while punching Shazam in Issue 5. Scarecrow, not so much.
- Expy Coexistence: Titano the Super-Ape, DC's notorious Expy of King Kong, shows up in the first issue. Later, Kong himself appears and gets transported to the DC universe as well.
- From Bad to Worse: Just when the Justice League have Godzilla chained within an ocean trench at tremendous cost to themselves, Lex Luthor activates a newly built Mecha-Godzilla to fight the other kaiju while Ra's al Ghul is about to drop the skull of The Skulldevil into a large Lazarus Pit. With one of Godzilla's deadliest foes about to appear, it's only a matter of time before an actual Godzilla Threshold is crossed.
- Godzilla Threshold: One caused by Godzilla. When he and Tiamat being fighting dangerously close to Atlantis, Aquaman has no choice but to release the kingdom's last and most dangerous line of defense: the Kraken.
- Humongous Mecha: Not only does Batman haul out his own Bat-Mecha, but the Green Lanterns use their powers to create their own willpower-formed machine to battle the threats.
- It's All My Fault: Billy's devastated that Superman is possibly killed and blames himself since his actions lead to it.
- "Jaws" Attack Parody: One of the panels of Issue 5 references the cover of Jaws, showing Tiamut rising up from below a swimming Flash with its mouth open in an attempt to eat him.
- Killer Gorilla: Resident giant-ape monster of the DC Universe, Titano, makes an appearance. Gorilla Grodd also features as a member of the Legion of Doom, and is immediately in awe at Kong and tries to communicate with him (which doesn't work).
- Kraken and Leviathan: Tiamat, a draconic sea serpent Titan, threatens Atlantis. When Godzilla arrives to battle her, Aquaman releases The Kraken against them both.
- Locked Out of the Loop: When Shazam tells everyone of Superman's supposed death, Batman refuses to believe it and tells everyone not to tell Lois until he can confirm it.
- Make a Wish: The crossover is initiated by a disgruntled Toyman wishing on the Dreamstone. This first brings the Legion to the MonsterVerse, and then brings the Titans over to the DC Universe.
- Mech vs. Beast: In Issue 6, Batman uses his giant robot to fight the Titans attacking Metropolis off. He is joined in the fight by the Lantern Green Corps, who construct a giant robot around themselves with the rings.
- My Significance Sense Is Tingling: When Supergirl attempts to aid Hal and Flash with Iron Heights' breakout/Titan invasion, she suddenly stops when she realizes she can't hear Superman's heartbeat.
- Mythology Gag:
- To the Superfriends series:
- Cheetah derisively calls the Justice League's tight teamwork as them being "Superfriends".
- The Legion of Dooms lineup are the same core members (with a few absences) from the Challenge of the Superfriends incarnation.
- The big battle has the fully-gathered League and Legion groups Zerg Rush at each other, reminiscent of the Challenge of... title sequence.
- From long tradition with King Kong, a blonde woman draws his fascination.
- Grodd takes mental control of Kong instead of forming a cooperative relation with him. Grodd did the same on Kong-expy Titano one time.
- To the Superfriends series:
- Names The Same: This is the third time a Kraken has appears in the Monsterverse setting, though this one is DC's last line of Atlantis' defense, not to be confused with the Monsterverse's Na Kika or the Titan that tried to usurp Kong's rule over Skull Island.
- Nice Job Breaking It, Hero:
- Jason Todd shoots Camazotz in the eye with an Anti-Tank rifle. It hurts him, but Camazotz' reprisal against the building he was on nearly kills several people when Batman was trying to keep his attention on the Batwings in the sky.
- Shazam's lightning trick works, But since Superman has to catch Billy, he's left open to taking a full atomic blast from Godzilla.
- Staring Contest: Supergirl gets in one with Kong in Issue 4, with neither of them willing to give in. Green Arrow, on the other hand, knows better than to try to do the same.
- Strong as They Need to Be: One moment, Shazam is powerful enough to topple Godzilla with Supergirl's help. A few issues later, he's seemingly killed by single blow from Giganta, who's not nearly as large or as strong.
- Thinking Out Loud: Subverted in Issue 5. Green Arrow sneaks onto a League of Assassins boat and thinks he should be able to take down his enemies one by one thanks to the cover of the night, only for him to realize that a large group of League members has spotted him. He wonders if he's been thinking out loud, but a League member tells him he hasn't.
- Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny: Superman vs Godzilla. They even clash their iconic powers, the atomic breath vs the heat vision, which are shown to nullify each other. Godzilla wins against Superman, fatally injuring him with the atomic breath while Superman was trying to protect Billy from him. Everyone except for Batman believes Superman might be dead.
- Wham Shot:
- Issue 3 ends with Lex Luthor discovering the source of the signal summoning the other Titans: Mechagodzilla's eye.
- Issue 4 ends with the revelation that Luthor has the rest of Mechagodzilla.
- Worf Effect:
- Titano, despite being a large monster in his own right, is utterly dwarfed by the Titans and Superman easily handling him shows a huge difference between them.
- Issue #2 ends with Superman downed after taking a full blast from Godzilla.
