Eiji Serizawa

**Eiji Serizawa** is a character who appears in the 2014 graphic novel *Godzilla: Awakening*. A founding member of Monarch, Serizawa dedicated much of his life to tracking and studying Godzilla. He passed this passion onto his son Ishiro, who followed in his footsteps to become a senior member of Monarch. Serizawa passed away in 1981.

## Comics

### *Godzilla: Awakening*

After the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, Eiji Serizawa went looking for his wife and newborn son but only found his son. After finding him, he saw a creature in the air, who flew away, with something in the water observing. Serizawa left Ishiro with his grandparents for his safety and continued working in the Japanese Navy. One year later, he and his fellow sailors were sent to provide aid to an American vessel that sent a distress call from a nearby island. After finding one of the American men, the sailors found the wrecked ship deep inland and are attacked by the creature Serizawa saw back in Hiroshima. They went inside the ship to rescue the men trapped inside, but the creature threw the ship down at the sea, sinking it. No one but Serizawa and the one American they rescued, named Shaw, survived. Shaw, impressed with Serizawa surviving, offered Serizawa the chance go work for the U.S. government, which Serizawa accepted as the creature from the sea looked on at the other creature flying away.

Later, Serizawa became part of the first Japanese-American military unit since Japan's surrender in World War II: Monarch. General MacArthur explained that the job of the Monarch unit was to kill the Massive Unidentified Terrestrial Organisms in secrecy to avoid world-wide panic. The strange creature attacked places all around the Pacific Ocean each year following, starting with Russia and the Philippines in 1946, Western Australia in 1947, Moansta Island in 1948, New Zealand in 1949, Yap in 1950, and Guam in 1950. Every time the monster attacked, eye-witnesses reported both it and a giant crocodile-like creature that chased it away. Serizawa believed that the monster, which one of Guam's people calls "*Gojira*," a combination of the Japanese words for gorilla and whale, actually existed, while the rest of his team didn't. Serizawa got some people to go down in the ocean and to find Gojira using the first nuclear submarine, the USS *Nautilus*, but after weeks of searching, Gojira was not found.

Three years later in 1953, Serizawa was playing with his son Ishiro, as Shaw came and told Ishiro he had to take his father for "shipping company business." At Monarch headquarters, Serizawa met with Doctor Zamalek, who showed him and others a giant cell discovered in the Philippines from the creature. Doctor Zamalek then exposed it to a beam that makes it grow, but it was set on fire and presumably killed. Serizawa came up with the name *shi no mure* ("Swarm of Death") for the super-organism, and Zamalek claimed that they didn't understand why it hasn't taken over the world yet. Serizawa answers this by saying Gojira is the reason. Serizawa pointed to depictions of Gojira throughout history and believed he was from a time when the Earth was ten times more radioactive than today. Serizawa wanted to find Gojira and let him fight the Shinomura, but no one believed Gojira existed.

Serizawa went back to his son who put an injured sea star in his fish tank. Ishiro explained to his father that sea stars could regenerate, even an entire body if they need to, just as the "dead" Shinomura cell at Monarch HQ regenerated. Ishiro and Serizawa heard a sound but Serizawa assured Ishiro it was probably just the wind as the Shinomura flew past the window. Serizawa returned to the now-destroyed Monarch headquarters with Shaw, who believed the Shinomura was destroyed, but Serizawa explained that even with microscopic remnants it could regenerate. Serizawa asked to find Gojira, which Shaw allowed but let him know that he would be alone at sea looking for Gojira. Serizawa said goodbye to his son and went out to live in the ocean alone on a ship, looking for Gojira.

A year later, in March of 1954, both Shinomura combined into one on Monsta Island as Gojira rose from the ocean and engaged it in battle. A boy saw them and tells Papa Brava, who notifies "the monster man", Serizawa, who in turn alerted Shaw and Monarch. Gojira and Shinomura's battle raged on, setting a section of the island aflame as Serizawa reached the island. Gojira separated the two Shinomura with his atomic breath and killed one with another blast. As Navy ships arrived, the other Shinomura escaped, which only Serizawa saw, and Godzilla followed, having been seen by Monarch and therefore now proven to exist.

The next day, the Shinomura carcass was found and shown to Serizawa, who said he saw one fly away. Days later, the military decided to intercept Gojira in Bikini Atoll. Serizawa insisted on letting Godzilla kill the other Shinomura and let him return to where he came from, but they said it was too risky. Just then, General MacArthur arrived on a helicopter and gave them permission to nuke Gojira. Serizawa stopped MacArthur, saying he has some concerns, and MacArthur said that he knew he did--that he's thought of the bombing of Hiroshima every day since 1945, but he also spent those years working to build a modern world which he'd kill to protect. At Bikini Atoll, Serizawa convinced the natives to leave. Later on, the Castle Bravo "test" was conducted, killing the Shinomura and presumably Gojira. In 1980, Serizawa assured Ishiro that Gojira was still alive as he finished telling him the entire story of his time with Monarch. A year passed and Serizawa passed away and was buried in the Yanaka Cemetery. After the burial was over, Ishiro was approached by Shaw, and Ishiro, knowing the truth, told Shaw that he was ready to join Monarch.