Hedorah

**Hedorah** (ヘドラ *Hedora*) is an alien pollution kaiju created by Toho that first faced Godzilla in the 1971 *Godzilla* film, *Godzilla vs. Hedorah*.

## Name

Hedorah was named for *hedoro*, the Japanese word for mud. This is especially befitting, due to most of Hedorah's attacks involving releasing acid-rich dirt at his opponent.

## Appearance

In its first form, Hedorah resembled a tadpole. In its second form, it resembled a quadrupedal reptile. Its third form was like a flying saucer, and its final form took on a humanoid shape. Hedorah's forms all share multiple common characteristics - all have green, kelp-like surfaces and large, yellow eyes with red irises. These eyes are positioned so that they blink sideways.

According to an interview with Yoshimitsu Banno by the Japanese magazine *Eiga Hi-Ho*, Hedorah's eyes were modeled after vaginas. In his *Godzilla: Final Wars* design, this allusion is significantly toned down, and his eyes were tilted, thus appearing to have a more 'normal' appearance.

In *Godzilla vs. Hedorah*, Godzilla tears out two white orbs from Hedorah's body. Their role is never explained, and no known source so far explains what they are for.

## Personality

Hedorah seems to be primarily driven by instinct and the will to survive, and the horrific death and destruction he causes are mostly derived from his bizarre biological properties rather than any true malice. However, he does demonstrate aggression and awareness in his encounters with Godzilla. When first confronted by Godzilla, Hedorah answers Godzilla's taunts and seems to even mimic his gestures. During the monsters' final battle, Hedorah even laughs while smothering Godzilla in sludge.

In *Godzilla: Final Wars*, Hedorah was under mind control and did not act independently. His only visible onscreen actions involve him being blasted out of Tokyo Bay, then visibly waving his arms and panicking before Ebirah's claw pierces his eye.

In the comic series *Godzilla: Ongoing*, Hedorah is aligned with the other space monsters, and seems to be intentionally causing destruction.

## Roar

Hedorah's gurgling roar comes from Kemular, a poison gas monster from the original *Ultraman* series. When feeding on toxic fumes, Hedorah makes breathing noises that are recycled from Gezora. In addition, he utters several high-pitched laughter-like sounds, mostly in his final form. In *Godzilla: Final Wars*, his roar mostly remains the same, but he also emits sounds that are similar to an elephant trumpeting that has been lowered in pitch, and his roar now echoes.

## Origins

In the Showa series, Hedorah was an alien life form from the Dark Gas Nebula in the Orion constellation that landed on Earth traveling on a comet for at least 243 light years. In *Godzilla: Final Wars*, Hedorah was one of many monsters under the control of the Xiliens, but his origin and how he came under the Xiliens' control is never explained.

In IDW Publishing's *Godzilla: Ongoing* comic series, Hedorah is an alien monster that came to Earth along with fellow aliens Gigan, Monster X and SpaceGodzilla in order to wreak havoc.

## History

### Showa Series

#### *Godzilla vs. Hedorah*

Hedorah, an alien from the Dark Gas Nebula, landed on Earth began feeding on pollution. Hedorah's actions soon gained the attention of Godzilla, who attacked the Smog Monster as he was feeding off of a smokestack. At the time, Hedorah was still in a young form, and was easily trounced by Godzilla. The two creatures had a series of battles across Japan, and Hedorah continued to grow bigger and stronger, and achieved a flying saucer-like form, allowing him to fly and spread sulfuric acid mist across Japan while destroying many factories. Hedorah and Godzilla had a final showdown near Mount Fuji, in which Hedorah achieved his final form, a humanoid, walking pile of sludge. Thanks to his acidic, poisonous body, as well as his lethal eye bolts, Hedorah very nearly put an end to Godzilla in their struggle. However, mankind had built a pair of gigantic electrodes near the warring monster. Their plan was that, since Hedorah was merely sludge, they would use the electrodes to dry him out. During a period of the fight where Godzilla was knocked out, Hedorah was lured between the electrodes. Unfortunately, a fuse was blown, and the electrodes were useless.

Thankfully, Godzilla quickly came to the rescue again, using his ray to re-energize the electrodes. Badly dehydrated by their electricity, Hedorah tried to escape, but thanks to Godzilla's new-found power of flight, was returned to the electrodes and was dried out completely. Sensing that there was still wet sludge within Hedorah's dried out husk, Godzilla proceeded to rip out Hedorah's innards, then used the electrodes to fry them. Godzilla had finally killed Hedorah, but not without a price; he had lost one of his eyes, and his right hand was burnt down to the bone. At the end of the movie, a picture of another Hedorah is seen in some water, with the caption 'And yet another one?', but no sequel to the film was produced.

The Hedorah in *Godzilla vs. Hedorah* killed thousands of people. Hedorah killed some of the oil tankers' crew mates, most of the swimmers and fish in the sea, about 40 people on the first time he went on land, 1600 people when it was first flying, an unknown number when he was flying to Mount Fuji and about 80 of the people who were partying on Mount Fuji. Also, over 3,000,000 people were affected by Hedorah's smog. Strangely enough, it is not shown in the Millennium series whether Hedorah kills any people at all.

### *Godzilla Island*

Hedorah appeared in the television show *Godzilla Island*. He attacked Mothraand managed to injure her, but was dehydrated by Godzilla.

There was also another Hedorah in *Godzilla Island* called Neo Hedorah.

### Millennium Series

#### *Godzilla: Final Wars*

Hedorah later returned, albeit briefly, under the control of the Xiliens in *Godzilla: Final Wars*. Hedorah, along with Ebirah, was seen being blasted out of Tokyo Harbor by Godzilla and crashing into a building, with Ebirah's claw piercing Hedorah's left eye. The two were then destroyed by a blast of Godzilla's atomic ray, much to X's frustration. During the end credits a few deleted scenes were shown, one of which was Hedorah destroying Tokyo using his sulfuric acid mist emitted from his tube.

## Abilities

Hedorah is one of the strongest opponents Godzilla faced in the Showa series. While Hedorah's attacks were incapable of killing Godzilla, they were still incredibly effective. Hedorah's toxic sludge alone was capable of burning Godzilla's armored flesh, and even cost Godzilla his eye. Hedorah's blood was able to actually burn all of the skin off Godzilla's hand. As a result, Hedorah was the first kaiju to ever visibly penetrate Godzilla's skin.

### Acidic properties

Hedorah's primary form of attack was by squirting chunks of its own acidic body at its opponent.

### Combining abilities

Hedorah can combine with other Hedorahs to become larger, or divide into multiple smaller Hedorahs.

### Eye Laser

It could also fire a red laser beam from its eye, capable of setting objects on fire and burning the flesh off any opponent it strikes.

### Sludge attacks

Hedorah is shown to also be able to release massive quantities of sludge and dirt without this affecting his size in any way, as shown in *Godzilla vs. Hedorah* where he traps Godzilla in a pit and releases so much sludge into the pit that it nearly covers Godzilla.

### Strong defenses

Hedorah has strong defenses, as it was completely immune to Godzilla's atomic breath even in its comparatively weak second stage, and conventional weapons would merely pass straight through its disgusting body. Tearing into Hedorah's body proved to be ineffective as well, and it resulted in the flesh on Godzilla's hand dissolving all the way down to the bone, as Hedorah's blood alone is very toxic. Only his eyes are known to be affected by his own liquid sludge, and when he bleeds over one of his eyes, he has to shut the eyes to prevent it from being damaged.

### Sulfate properties

In its saucer form, it was also able to fly, and spread a mist of sulfuric acid as it went along, and in its final form it could revert back to its flying form at will. Hedorah does not require oxygen to survive, but rather thrives on inhaling toxic pollutants. The byproduct of Hedorah consuming these pollutants is a highly concentrated sulfuric mist, which is capable of corroding any metal and completely disintegrating organic life.

In the ending credits of *Godzilla: Final Wars*, Hedorah is shown spraying sulfuric acid mist from tubes on his body, while stomping through city ruins. In *Godzilla: Final Wars*, Hedorah was also given a whip-like arm, which he may or may not use in battle.

The sulfuric mist given off by Hedorah's flying form was also capable of causing Godzilla to gasp for air and collapse.

## In other languages

* German: Hydrox
* Italian: Hidrax
* Russian: Хедора
* Chinese: Hēi duō lā (黑多拉)

## Trivia

* Hedorah's laser features a sound effect that is actually King Ghidorah's flying sound at a higher pitch.
* In both of Hedorah's film appearances, his left eye is injured in some way.
* In *Godzilla: Final Wars*, Hedorah's tail resembles the Choju King Crab's from *Ultraman Ace*.
* Hedorah's blood is very toxic and acidic, but the only part of his body which is vulnerable to it is his eyes. If Hedorah bleeds over his eyes, he has to close them to prevent them from being damaged. However, in*Godzilla vs. Hedorah*, Hedorah used this to his advantage, after Godzilla punched through one of his eyes, the acidic blood caused the flesh on Godzilla's hand to be burned off down to the bone.
* In the Showa series, Hedorah was the second alien monster to fight Godzilla.
* Hedorah was the last new monster in the Showa era to completely act on its own independence, as the rest were controlled by aliens.
* It is almost impossible to kill Hedorah, as his only weakness is dehydration.
* It is never explained whether Hedorah is on the side of the Xiliens in *Godzilla: Final Wars*, or if he simply arrived on Earth to feed on the pollution given off by Tokyo.
* The end of *Godzilla vs. Hedorah* shows one of Hedorah's tadpole forms is still alive, alluding to a sequel that was never made.
* Due to Hedorah's very brief appearance in *Godzilla: Final Wars*, he carries out the least on-screen destruction in the entire film, as he was only shown feeding on the pollution in Tokyo Bay before Godzilla attacked him. The footage showing him using his sulfuric mist suggests that he was to have more screentime in the film, but that it was cut as a result of time constraints.
	+ Hedorah is also the only monster in the entire film (other than Gigan and Monster X) not to appear before the Xiliens reveal their plans.
* In *Godzilla: Final Wars*, Hedorah's theme was cut from the movie's soundtrack along with his fight with Godzilla.
* Hedorah's debut in *Godzilla vs. Hedorah* coincided with the revival of the *Ultraman* series with *The Return of Ultraman*. Curiously, the first episode of the new series featured a monster called Zazahn, a kelp monster bearing a remarkable likeness to Hedorah who was supposedly attracted to a city by pollution. Curiously, the episode which featured the debut of Zazahn was also directed by Ishiro Honda.
	+ Coincidentally, a monster named Hedoron, a massive sea slug mutated by Earth's polution under Ape Man Gori's command from *Spectreman*, appeared four months before Hedorah even made his on screen debut.
* Hedorah was likely an inspiration for the monster Destoroyah in *Godzilla vs. Destoroyah*. Both monsters possess multiple forms, including microscopic, flying, and gigantic bipedal final forms, are composed of trillions of microorganisms that have merged together, are extremely difficult opponents for Godzilla, and are incredibly deadly to organic life. Both Hedorah and Destoroyah likely influenced the creation of the monster Shinomura from the comic *Godzilla: Awakening*, which also shares many of these similarities.
* In Bandai's 1984 Godzilland merchandise line, Hedorah is depicted as a female monster and one of Godzilla's friends. The Godzilland Hedorah is generally purple in color with long eyelashes above its eyes. This is the only known instance of Hedorah being portrayed as an ally or friend of Godzilla.

## List of appearances

### Films

* *Godzilla vs. Hedorah* (First appearance)
* *Godzilla: Final Wars*

### Video games

* *Monster's Fair*
* *Gojira-kun*
* *Godzilla: Monster of Monsters*
* *Godzilla (Gameboy)*
* *Godzilla: Battle Legends*
* *Godzilla: Heart-Pounding Monster Island!!*
* *Godzilla Movie Studio Tour*
* *Godzilla: Trading Battle*
* *Godzilla Generations*
* *Godzilla: Destroy All Monsters Melee*
* *Godzilla: Save the Earth* and *Godzilla: Unleashed* (Scrapped)
* *Godzilla*(2014 video game)
* *Godzilla: Kaiju Collection*

### Comics

* *Godzilla: Legends*
* *Godzilla: Ongoing*
* *Godzilla: The Half-Century War*
* *Godzilla: Rulers of Earth*
* *Godzilla: Oblivion*