EARLY KAIJU FANDOM, VOLUME THREE Is in the House

Last year, writer/editor/kaiju fan Bradford Grant Boyle put together anomnibus of the fanzines he had published in the 1970s, titled Early Kaiju Fandom, Volume One . A great big book, it included reproductions of the original pages of his projects, includingissue #s 2, 3, and 4 of Japanese Giants , the fanzine I created in 1974 and that he took over in 1975. He published Early Kaiju Fandom, Volume Two a few months ago, which included several fanzines he published that predated JG . And now, Early Kaiju Fandom, Volume Three is in the house, with reproductions of essentially all the rest of the1970s/80s-era kaiju-themed fanzines, including JG issue #1, and aforeword by the Old Dude. Excerpt as follows:

“As far back as earlychildhood and as recently as just now, anyone who’s made my acquaintance, evenbriefly, would know me as a diehard daikaiju nut. I caught both Godzilla – King of the Monsters (1956) and Gigantis – The Fire Monster (a.k.a. Godzilla Raids Again , 1959) when I was around kindergarten age, and if ever a kid were smitten withcity-stomping monsters, that kid was me. I was already keen on dinosaurs, andGodzilla elevated my fondness for oversized reptilian critters to a whole newlevel.”

These volumes by Mr. Boyle are the culmination of countlesshours of tracking down copies of literally every page of every fanzine fromthose glory days (excepting Greg Shoemaker’s Japanese Fantasy Film Journal, which kicked off this whole shebang and will be featured in yet another volume), and compiling them in a series of high-quality publications. In addition to Japanese Giants #1, the fanzines in this one include Richard Campbell’s Godzilla Mania , Barry Kaufman’s Monsters of Japan , Damon Foster’s Japanese Movie Sci-Fi , and Mike Martin’s Giants From Japan . Granted, afterso many years, some of the old pages were in a condition barely fit to read,and the reproductions reflect that fact — not to mention that many of theoriginal page designs scarcely reached the level of “crude.” But for those ofus who were active in those days (and whose devotion to all things kaijucontinues to this day), these volumes represent a most welcome labor of love onMr. Boyle's part. To be sure, this endeavor isn't one to make anyone rich, but to their target audience, the contents of these are enriching beyond words.