Review: Justice League Vs Godzilla Vs Kong #5

Justice League vs. Godzilla vs. Kong #5 came out last week and had, as usual, some real fun moments. But this is also the moment where I worry that the scope of this story has become so big (one might say kaiju-sized) that it might be tough to wrap up all the plot threads with only two issues remaining.

Writer Brian Buccellato has a lot of things going on this issue. Superman is still dying. Some of the League are protecting Atlantis. Supergirl is back on Kong Island. The Legion of Doom is still scheming. Luthor is close to activating mecha-Godzilla. Ra's Al Ghul has entered the mix. And Toyman and basically most of the monsters are nowhere to be found.

That is a lot of stuff going on! As a reader I kind of feel all over the place. And when a subplot I don't really care about (in this case protecting Atlantis) takes up a lot of the book, it sort of feels like wasted pages.

The art is an interesting mix. Christian Duce brings this gorgeous, fine-lined art to his pages which shine. Tom Derenick does the non-kaiju plot pages where the hero teams are strategizing their next steps. His is a thicker line. The two styles are quite distinct but given the discrete scenes it isn't too distracting.

I want to love this book and I have loved it. But this issue was the first one which felt a little bit of pause and a little bit scattered. On to the book.

We start out with Mercy giving Lois some information about the kaiju, information Lex stole from the Monarch world. Now it is known that Godzilla is an agent to balance nature. On our world, metahumans are an aberration that must be cleansed. Okay, that is a little fascinating.

We also learn that Superman is still slowly dying.

It is interesting that Buccellato took Superman off the board and kept him off. Even more, so much of the first issue focused around Superman's story and his proposal to Lois. So keeping him off is sort of bold. 

There is a rather long scene in with the Justice Leaguers trying to protect the dome of Atlantis from the skirmish between Godzilla, the Kraken, and the leviathan sea serpent from Monarch-world.

To lure the monsters away, the Flash finds the kaiju-beacon the villains placed there and tries to super-speed away.

It is panels like this, clearly a riff on the classic Jaws poster, that make me smile with this book. This comic is like a summer blockbuster movie. Why not tease a fun summer classic movie. 

The scene is wonderfully rendered by Duce.

Meanwhile, Green Arrow has stowed away on the League of Assassin boat and is discovered leading to a brief battle. 

What I did like was that Buccellato did not let Ollie singlehandedly defeat a tanker ship full of ninjas. He abandons ship. 

Then the one part that sort of made me frown.

With Superman on the sidelines, Supergirl has really shined in this book. She has taken the lead of the team and really been formidable.

In this issue, she is mind-controlled by a K-boosted Grodd. And to trick Kong into thinking the super-heroes are the bad guys, Grodd has Kara punch out the giant ape.

Supergirl punching out a giant monster gorilla? Cool.

Supergirl mind-controlled by the bad guy? Bummer.

Here is another scene I liked but I don't know if I needed it.

Feeling guilty that Superman's defeat is his fault, Captain Marvel decides to fight the LoD on his own. 

Now it doesn't make sense that Giganta can knock out Shazam but here we are.

As a Giganta fan, I like this. And I can only hope that we get a Giganta facing off against Kong moment with Kong completely smitten. 

As I said, the Atlantis scene seems to go on a long time.

You'd think that Lois might communicate the knowledge she gleaned from Mercy to the League. After all, she is manning the monitor. 

Instead, Aquaman chains up Godzilla with the same fetters he had used on the Kraken. It's an Nth metal chain! That's a lot of Nth metal!!!

Plus, Godzilla is the good kaiju!

As if things weren't busy enough in this book, after seeing Luthor gloating over his built mechagodzilla, we see that Al Ghul has entered the fray. I don't know if I need another plotline! What is he going to do with that dinosaur skull??

Well that just means we have to wrap all this up in just two more issues.

It's a lot of fun for sure. But I don't know if we advanced the overall book much this time. And brainwashed Supergirl is always a sad sight for me.

Overall grade: B-