“They don’t care where they kick, just as long as they hurt you”
Godzilla: Heist is written by Van Jensen, drawn by Kelsey Ramsay, colored by Heather Breckel, lettered by Sandy Tanaka, and edited by Bixie Mathieu. 
It costs $21.99, is 110 pages long, and is published by IDW.
IDW does these fun Godzilla mini-series, many of which I ignore because they seem to be focused more on the monster, while anything they do that doesn’t necessarily focus on Godzilla, but just has him hanging around, interests me a bit more. And, as you might know, I dig me some heist stories, and so a guy using Godzilla in a heist is something I can get behind. I was a bit worried this would be like Kaiju Score, but it’s different enough to work. In this comic, Jai, our hero, has figured out a way to lure Godzilla where he wants, instead of just tracking kaiju attacks like in Kaiju Score. Jai also has a scheme that fits well into the Godzilla-verse — I don’t want to give it away, but it’s not bad. Jai’s grandfather was killed in a Godzilla attack on India years before, and Jai’s mother figured out a way to get Godzilla to come to her and she developed a weapon to kill the monster. The government got wind of it and took it away and ruined her life. Jai devotes his life to getting the weapon back and getting revenge for his mom, which drives the plot.
It’s a clever plot to a degree, as Jai doesn’t quite know how to control Godzilla but he gets by on confidence, so there’s an edge of danger in the plot as he brazenly lures Godzilla to London, which even commentators in the comic are surprised about because the monster rarely leaves Asian waters. 
At the beginning of the book, he uses Godzilla to rob a casino in Manila because he needs money for his big scheme. He gets nabbed by a group of tough guys and gals who need him (and Godzilla, of course) to break into … a vault beneath Whitehall in London. Oh dear. Of course, there’s a lot more going on, as Jensen throws some obvious and maybe not-so-obvious twists at us that lead us through the story. Jai is an interesting character — it’s always fun, to me, when characters are aware of pop culture tropes and mention them, as some plot points fall into tropes and Jai is there to lampshade them. Godzilla shows up a lot, of course, and we do get some big monster destruction, so there’s that, but it’s still a more interesting idea about a guy who has revenge on his mind. As I’ve noted before, I love stories set in a superhero universe that feature non-super-powered people living their lives, and while this isn’t superheroes, it’s still a story set in a world where Godzilla exists and rampages but featuring a dude who’s just trying to live his life. I’m a sucker for these things!
Ramsay does a decent job with the art. She doesn’t nail all of the smaller action stuff, as some of her figure work is a bit stiff, but she does a really nice job with some of the “grandeur” shots of Godzilla wreaking havoc, and that’s what you need in a Godzilla comic, after all. 
She has a thick, rough line that works well with Godzilla — it should look like it’s been through the wars — and, of course, the destruction it leaves in its wake. Ramsay does a decent job with the places, too — sometimes in Big Destruction Stories, the places kind of look just like generic places, but Ramsay does a pretty good job making Manila, India, and London look like distinct spots, even though a lot of each place has been reduced to rubble. It’s not the greatest art in the world, but it gets the job done pretty well on this book.
This is an enjoyable monster story, and Jensen leaves the door open for more if it does well, I guess. It’s not a great comic, but it’s pretty keen!
Rating: ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ½ ☆ ☆ ☆
