Films: Reptilicus (1961)
Alias: Reptilicus Martensious
Type: Ancient
Location: Civilized Area/Ocean
Height/Weight: 28 meters long, and about as big as a battleship.
Affiliation: Neutral
Summary: Despite having a smorgasbord of mythical Scandinavian beasts to choose from, the filmmakers in Denmark decided that they wanted to start from scratch, ride a few coattails from Godzilla, and have their own kaiju. Enter Reptilicus, the first and only Danish giant movie monster. He...well, he's remembered a bit. Mostly by losers like us.
History: Somewhere in Lapland, Finland, the greatest paleontological discovery has been uncovered. Bloody, fresh skin and tissue have been found underground during a mining operation, and the remains are quickly taken to get stuffed in the fridge in the Danish Aquarium in Copenhagen, Denmark. Even more galling, the tail was regenerating, slowly but surely. One absent-minded lack of freezing later, and the tail grew legs, and every other body part before retreating into the countryside. This new creature, dubbed Reptilicus, grew at an accelerated rate, and its destructive rampage had only begun...
Notable Kills: Not necessarily by his own hands, but the panic Reptilicus causes results in a bridge being lifted...as hundreds run over it. Cue a bunch of civilians and bikers falling into the water. Whoops.
Final Fate: Can't blow it up, can't fire at it with guns. How about a poison missile! It works, and Reptilicus immediately drops dead upon coming into contact with it. Except, someone forgot that one of his arms got blown off in the ocean, and it's starting to move...
Powers/Abilities: Reptilicus has a healing factor that's almost on par with the X-Men's own Wolverine, capable of regenerating completely from any given part of separated flesh. He can also spit acidic ooze at foes, and fly...if you're watching the Danish version. Also, cut a piece from him and you risk more of him going on the rise.
Weakness: Reptilicus HATES fire, but hates poison even more. No amount of regenerating can undo the latter.
Scariness Factor: 3.5-Had Reptilicus not been a goofy-looking puppet that moves with all the grace of a drunken 4-year old, he would have been a VERY credible threat. Godzilla's bad, but he couldn't regenerate from a mere tail, or fly, or spit acid.
Trivia: -As mentioned above, Reptilicus only flies in the Danish version. Likewise, he only spits acid in the U.S. version. Needless to say, there was some conflict with the executives about what scenes they cut (oh sure, remove the "unrealistic" flying, but keep the phoned-in acid spit).
-Reptilicus' legacy didn't die with this movie. He got his own short-lived comic series, which needed to change his name to quot;Reptisaurusquot; after Issue #2 due to copyright problems. He even settled down with a gorgeous mate! Only, during that issue, we learned his kind was really into sadomasochism courtship rituals. Jeez. Also, eventually, he, his mate, and their offspring got sick of dealing with humanity's problems (up to including ALIENS) and packed their bags and left. Could they return one day?
