New films, Old Monsters

Recently, two announcements have popped up on various news-related websites concerning a couple of upcoming giant monster projects: Guilala’s Counterattack: The Touyaku Summit One-Shot Crisis is a sequel to, or possibly a remake of, the X From Outer Space from Shochiku in Japan starring the infamous chicken/lizard alien. The second is a straight-to-DVD, re-imagining of an old Charlton comic book called Reptisaurus, which actually started out as a tie-in book to the Danish monster movie Reptilicus; that is, before the publisher decided to change the name and design of creature after the second issue so as to circumvent the licensing fees.

While it’s great that these new movies are being made, there is a part of me kinda wishes that somebody would take the opportunity to come up with some new creations verses revisiting older ones. Say what you will about Cloverfield, but it at least deserves props for introducing an all-new monster into the genre- particularly in this current age when most film companies would rather stick with endless remakes.

Reptisaurus is an odd duck in this regard however- while it is based on a preexisting character, it’s one that hails from a rather obscure comic book from the early sixties which ran for all of nine issues total (if you count the two issues when it was still called “Reptilicus”, plus a one-shot special edition). I might be mistaken, but isn’t the whole idea of brand recognition singularly dependent on the actual “recognition” part? And check out this comparison- first, the comic:

And the upcoming movie version:

Not much in the way of similarity between the two, is there? Of course they’re both winged, dragon-like beasts, but you’d never guess for a minute that they’re actually the same monster by any stretch (the comic version’s design would change even further near the end of the book’s run). I guess the point I’m trying to make here is this: if the production company behind this new movie paid anything above one dollar to secure the legal use of a little-known character in order to make a film reinterpretation that bears almost no relation to the source material, then it’s a baffling decision at best. Did they just want the name? It’s not as if there aren’t a bunch of alternate titles that could be used which are not only befitting of a straight-to-DVD monster flick, but don’t cost a dime to use. Here are some that I came up with off the top of my head:

Horrorsaurus Rex
Wyvern Isle
Reptiliax
Dragonraptor 3000
Wingy the Thingy

I like that last one the best.