‘No Gods, No Masters #1’ is Another Exemplary Entry of Modern Kaiju Fiction

Writer: Julio Anta / Illustrator: Jacob Salcedo / Colors: Francesco Segala with color assistance by Agnese Pozza / Letterer: Becca Carey Back in high school English class (or maybe middle school English class even? Both are several lifetimes away at this point), I was taught about all of the different forms of conflict in a story: Character vs. Character, Character vs. Self, Character vs. Society. There are more, but rather than continue to list them out, I will skip to the most pertinent one: Character vs. Nature. Kaiju stories are the platonic ideal of a Character vs. Nature story. I spend an unreasonable amount of time thinking about the opening narration of Pacific Rim, and how the giant monsters get categorized as the scale of storms and natural disasters. It speaks so clearly to the resiliency and endurance inherent to the story. And while kaiju stories have traditionally focused on the direct combat of towering behemoths, a lot of modern kaiju fiction has begun to interrogate the smaller scale stuff, whether that be Love and Monsters, Godzilla Minus One, and very, very briefly in Kaiju No. 8 before it dovetailed into more conventional kaiju combat affairs. But the point stands, there is a lot of interesting ground when it comes to the individuals on the ground floor when the monsters come. Survival looks very different when you don’t have the armory or armor to back it up. Enter No Gods, No Masters. From the minds of Julio Anta and Jacoby Salcedo comes the latest entry…