Marvel Monsters: Devil Dinosaur

(Marvel, 2005)
™ and © 2005 Marvel Characters, Inc.

Fans of the short-lived “Devil Dinosaur” series in the 1970s might have occasionally wondered how a battle between the Incredible Hulk and the bright red monster might have gone. That encounter remained purely speculative at the time, since the two creatures lived in entirely different eras. Here, though, a pair of meddlesome Celestials create just such a battle, plucking the Hulk out of the timestream to champion one group of primitives, and then making Devil Dinosaur even more savage to make the Hulk’s task more difficult. How will the future be affected by these actions?

This one-shot is part of Marvel’s brief foray into a “Marvel Monsters Group” line of comic, and features the kind of action and humor that made those books so much fun in the first place. Tom Sniegoski and Eric Powell (The Goon) collaborate.

— Andy Richardson

From Comics Buyer’s Guide:

We all know that Jack Kirby created some of the coolest monsters ever seen in comics. But it was always hard to take Devil Dinosaur seriously. Readers may wonder why, for example, if his teeth are white, his claws are red? So, with tongue firmly in cheek, the red-skinned (and red-clawed) King of Lizards faces the green-skinned Incredible Hulk in the battle of the century! Which century isn’t clear.

Eric Powell’s art on this quirky special would have made Kirby proud as a pair of Celestials-in-training is caught up in a game of one-upmanship during their evolutionary experiments. The Celestial Gamiel considers it deviant that Devil Dinosaur protects a peaceful small folk from a brutish killer folk and brings the Hulk back in time to defeat him. So the Celestial Devron enhances the Lizard King dramatically. From there, events escalate out of control.

Yep. These aren’t the brightest Celestials ever.

This special also features a bonus reprint of the classic prototype Hulk story from Journey into Mystery #62 by Kirby and Ayers.

— Michael Tierney

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Notes

Writer

Artist

#1

December, 2005
Cover Price: $3.99
2 copies available from $5.00

Tom Sniegoski, Eric Powell

Eric Powell, Jack Kirby