Marvel Publishing, Inc., commonly referred to as Marvel Comics, is an American company that publishes comic books and related media. Marvel Comics is the second-most dominant comic book publisher in the United States, after DC Comics. They are most known for their superheroes, such as the Avengers, Fantastic Four, and the X-Men. Aside from their superheroes, they expanded into other IPs, such as Transformers, Godzilla, Shogun Warriors (Mazinger Z, Getter Robo, etc.), Doctor Who, Muppet Babies, and Ultraman. It has since been bought by Disney.
From 1977 to 1979, Marvel Comics published Godzilla, King of the Monsters, a comic series that integrated Godzilla into the Earth-616 Marvel Universe.
Also, from 1979 to 1980, Marvel Comics published the "Shogun Warriors" comics that integrated Raydeen, Combatra, and Dangard Ace into the Earth-616 Marvel Universe. Despite Mattel holding the rights to both Godzilla and the Shogun Warriors simultaneously, they never crossed over. However, Herb Trimpe created promotional art for Mattel featuring Godzilla and Rodan, alongside Daimos, Great Mazinger, Raydeen, and Gaiking.
Trivia[]
- Marvel is known for numerous co-productions associated with the tokusatsu and kaiju genre.
- Stan Lee and his Marvel Comics company partnered with Toei Company to create the Japanese Spider-Man, that also popularized the giant robot in Tokusatsu media and would serve as the basis for Super Sentai.
- Marvel also co-produced Battle Fever J, Denshi Sentai Denjiman, and Taiyo Sentai Sun Vulcan, which are part of Toei's Super Sentai series.
- In 2020, Marvel Comics began publishing Ultraman comics in the United States.