Alan Jonah

I've seen human nature firsthand, and I'm here to tell you that it doesn't get any better. It just gets worse.

― Jonah to Emma

Template:Tabber2Legendary Template:Infobox Characters Alan Jonah is a character who first appeared in the 2019 MonsterVerse Godzilla graphic comic, Godzilla: Aftershock, before appearing in the 2019 Godzilla film, Godzilla: King of the Monsters, as the main human antagonist.

Profile

Appearance

Alan Jonah is a tall, fairly elderly man with green eyes and white hair, which he keeps slicked back. He also has a light stubble covering his face and generally keeps a very stoic expression.

Personality

I'm sure all your friends will be very happy to see you again.

― Jonah to Emma

From his time in the military, a profile on Jonah with information from psych evaluations and revolutionary propaganda describes him as "a man disillusioned by governments and obsessed with leveling the global playing field through stolen weapon technology", financing his operations through trafficking Titan DNA. After the tragic loss of his daughter and seeing the worst in humanity firsthand, Jonah took on a misanthropic mentality and now believes that humans don't deserve to live because of their escalating destructive tendencies. He is a stoic individual with a dry wit who doesn't mince his words whether he is talking to an adult or a child. Thinking of himself as a well-intentioned extremist, Jonah is unaffected by death and has no qualms in furthering his goals regardless of billions of people getting killed in the process as he considers them necessary sacrifices for the greater good of the planet. Jonah also has a dry sense of humor but displays only a few moments of sarcasm.

Relationships

Emma Russell

Man does not control the laws of nature, and neither do you.

― Jonah commenting on Emma’s departure

Monarch scientist Dr. Emma Russell is a person of interest to Jonah. Having previously stalked Emma and attempted to raid her labs in various locations like Cairo and Tokyo, Jonah takes her hostage to gain control of the ORCA, a device Emma has invented capable of potentially communicating with Titans and controlling them. However, it is revealed that Emma orchestrated the kidnapping and that she and Jonah are working together to awaken the Titans and give the world a clean slate. As Madison begins to question their methods, Jonah is quick to call Emma out on her questionable parenting for sugarcoating the cold hard facts to her daughter and getting her involved. When Emma finally decides to abandon Jonah's cause to go and look for her daughter, Jonah allows his men to let her leave, stating that she has already served her purpose. By doing this, it would seem that Jonah had some sort of respect or sympathy for Emma for trying to save her daughter, or simply presumed that she would perish while attempting to do so.

Madison Russell

Madison, tell me, what exactly did Mommy sell you on? Some grand utopia? Man and monster living together in blissful harmony?

― Jonah berates Madison

Jonah briefly shows his playful side to Madison by smiling to help her relax, but she is unamused and Jonah is slightly amused by her response. Overall, Jonah has little actual concern for Madison's well-being and he only views her as leverage to get Emma to do his bidding. When speaking to her, he is just as stern and straightforward as he is to adults while condescending her naiveté.

History

Jonah was previously a colonel in the British Army and a special agent in the Secret Intelligence Service (MI6) from 1990 to 2004 with tours in Kosovo, Bosnia. However, after living through many tours of duty in the service and the subsequent death of his daughter, Lindy, he became disenchanted by mankind so he defected and went rogue, obsessed with restoring the natural order. Since then, Jonah had been connected to a team of armed mercenary units working behind a mask of sociopolitical deceit, financed by trafficking samples of Titan DNA. In 2005, Monarch became aware of Jonah when he and a team of accomplice mercenaries were caught attempting to trespass onto a subterranean MUTO dig site, after which Jonah was jailed in a Pakistani prison. Sometime later, he presumably escaped or was broken out of confinement. Labeled a Class-1 eco-terror threat, his current whereabouts remain unknown.

Godzilla: Aftershock

Hello, Doctor Russell. That was a warning shot. I suggest you come along with me now.

― Jonah to Emma

In 2014, a few months after Godzilla's return and his defeat of the MUTOs in San Francisco, Jonah is being held and interrogated at the American military base of Joint Region Marianas in Guam. He's questioned for having an Australian passport, and he claims to have dual citizenship. Just then, the MUTO Prime appears, unleashing devastation upon the base and giving Jonah a chance to escape. When Emma Russel arrives to assess the damage, he stows away on her plane. As she boards, he ambushes and holds her at gunpoint, ordering her to signal the plane's pilot for take-off. Emma's colleague, Tarkan Cavusgolu, appears and draws his gun, but Jonah tackles him and escapes. He later stalks Emma to Siberia, where he once again attempts to take her hostage. However, Tarkan anticipated this and manages to capture Jonah after using Emma as bait. He then sends his men to hand Jonah over to Russian authorities. When questioned about his fascination with monsters and what he's trying to prove, Jonah replies that mankind is the real monster in the world. Then he tells Emma that he will see her again soon. Emma is later informed that he had escaped Russian custody.

Godzilla: King of the Monsters

I seem to remember you telling me that the world always belonged to them. Well, maybe it's time we give it back.

― Jonah to Emma

In the year 2019, Jonah and his group raid the Monarch facility in China's Yunnan province, which holds the larva of an insect-like Titan dubbed Mothra. The eco-terrorists swiftly clear out the facility of all Monarch personnel, with Jonah personally executing the head scientist himself. Jonah and his men proceed to capture Monarch paleobiologist Dr. Emma Russell and her daughter Madison, but fail to capture the Titan as she retreats behind a waterfall and seals herself in a cocoon.

Wasting no time, Jonah and his men travel to Antarctica along with their new hostages. They arrive at a Monarch containment facility holding the Titan, "Monster Zero", and proceed to kill all Monarch personnel stationed there. After securing the area, Jonah, Emma, and Madison marvel at the sight of Monster Zero, who is frozen solid under hundreds of feet of ice. Jonah orders his soldiers to begin drilling holes and placing charges to help free the Titan. They work for several hours before Monarch begins sending more troops to take back the facility. Jonah's men hold off the Monarch operatives long enough for the charges to be placed. During a standoff with Dr. Mark Russell, Emma's ex-husband and Madison's father, Emma detonates the charges herself. Jonah, Emma, and Madison quickly escape through an elevator, leaving Mark to be crushed by falling ice and debris. They board an Osprey, and once at a reasonable distance, Jonah demands that Emma wake up Monster Zero. Using the ORCA, which gives off sonar pulses only understood by Titans, Emma wakes up the three-headed beast. The trio watches as Monster Zero terrorizes the trapped Monarch personnel below, with Madison having to be restrained by Jonah and Emma after becoming upset for leaving her father for dead.

Jonah takes Emma and Madison to a secret Monarch bunker occupied by his organization just outside of Boston, Massachusetts. From there, after Emma gives her manifesto to Monarch via video feed, Jonah requests her to wake up another Titan, Rodan, all the way in Mexico. The death and destruction created by Monster Zero's awakening cause Madison to heavily question Jonah and Emma's beliefs. She tries to talk Emma out of awaking Rodan, only for a frustrated Jonah to chastise Emma for getting Madison involved by telling her a sugarcoated version of the facts and Madison for believing them. Using the ORCA, Emma blasts sonar pulses from speakers located at Rodan's containment site, which wake him. Rodan proceeds to destroy a nearby town by simply flying over it, wipes out an entire squadron of military jets, before being defeated in a dogfight with Monster Zero, who was flying in the area after escaping Antarctica. Godzilla suddenly appears and tackles Monster Zero into the ocean, ripping off one of his heads before being nearly killed by the Oxygen Destroyer, a prototype bomb that destroys all oxygen in its blast radius. Monster Zero survives the blast and regenerates his severed head. Then he proceeds to wake up all the Titans around the planet from their dormancy and orders them to "hunt" humans by destroying cities and settlements.

It's later revealed that Monster Zero is an alien known as Ghidorah seeking to terraform the planet to make a suitable habitat for himself, in which Jonah seems fine with the idea of fewer humans being around. When Emma tries to reason with Jonah that Monster Zero should be stopped, Jonah expresses his belief that humans are the most destructive species on the planet, and since the Titans pre-date humanity, the planet is rightfully theirs and should be given back to them. Seeing the destruction all around her, Madison sneaks out of the bunker, taking the ORCA device with her to Fenway Park in hopes of stopping Monster Zero. When Emma realizes that Madison has run away, she prepares to go and find her before being confronted by Jonah, who questions her loyalty to their cause and demands her to stay inside the bunker. When Emma pulls a gun on him, an unfazed Jonah simply smirks and allows his men to let Emma go, stating that they have already achieved their goal and no longer need her.

Jonah appears in a post-credit scene, walking alongside a fisherman who complains that the waters in the surrounding area are devoid of fish due to the Oxygen Destroyer. The fisherman brings Jonah to a large warehouse, where he reveals Monster Zero's severed head. Jonah smirks and purchases the head from the fisherman.

Trivia

• Alan Jonah's quote "Long live the king", is a nod to Charles Dance's role as Tywin Lannister in Game of Thrones.
  • The novelization takes it further, where he has a soldier under him who is so large Madison calls him "The Mountain", a reference to Tywin Lannister's chief enforcer Gregor Clegane, who is known as "The Mountain that Rides" or simply "The Mountain".
• Alan Jonah is the second human villain in the MonsterVerse, with the first being Preston Packard.
  • Coincidentally, both characters have military backgrounds.
• His name is inverted as "Jonah Alan" on the Monarch timeline.
• The film's novelization goes deeper into Jonah's character as it's revealed he had a daughter named Lindy who was kidnapped on her way home from school, killed, and left to rot in a storm drain for six days before her body was found while he was away fighting in a war. It is also shown Alan had a father-son relationship with Asher and his humanity was extinguished when his companion was killed by Diane Foster. The book also portrays Jonah as a more evil character. He threatens Madison after she tells him off for patronizing her. Later, when Emma tries to take the ORCA to stop Ghidorah, Jonah holds her at gunpoint, calls humanity a disease, and says that they will "live like kings" once the dust settles and there are fewer humans in the world. Then he tells Sergeant Travis to slit Madison's throat if Emma goes near the ORCA again.

List of appearances

Films

• Godzilla: King of the Monsters

Comics

• Godzilla: Aftershock (First appearance)

Novels

• Godzilla: King of the Monsters - The Official Movie Novelization