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Godzilla Heist #1-5

Godzilla: Heist

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Get ready for an all-out crime adventure in this graphic novel that combines the kaiju action of Godzilla with the intrigue of a classic heist movie.

What if you could predict when and where Godzilla would appear? What if you knew of the perfect opportunity to pull off the heist of the century?

Jai is a young man who knows two things: A heist needs a good distraction, and there’s no distraction like Godzilla. So, when Jai discovers Godzilla responds to specific energy signals he can send into the atmosphere, he creates the perfect opportunity to stage high-profile heists in the middle of Godzilla attacks. But these heists put Jai on the radar of some very dangerous people—people who want Jai to work with them to pull off the most dangerous job the world has ever seen.

128 pages, Paperback

Published January 13, 2026

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22 people want to read

About the author

Van Jensen

173 books97 followers
Van Jensen is the acclaimed author of the award-winning GODFALL trilogy (Grand Central). The sci-fi/thriller genre mashup series is in development for TV with Academy Award winner Ron Howard attached to direct and Jensen serving as executive producer.

Jensen was born and raised in the farm country of Western Nebraska where he wrote and drew stories as soon as he could hold a pencil. He became a newspaper crime reporter, then a magazine editor, and eventually an author of comic books and graphic novels. He has written some of the world’s biggest characters, including James Bond, Godzilla, and The Flash, Superman, Wonder Woman, and Green Lantern for DC Comics. His original graphic novels include ARCA (IDW), Two Dead (Simon & Schuster/Gallery 13), Two Dead (Dark Horse), and Pinocchio, Vampire Slayer (Top Shelf/IDW).

He also writes and produces for film and TV.

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Displaying 1 - 24 of 24 reviews
Profile Image for James DeSantis.
Author 17 books1,205 followers
November 24, 2025
Got a review copy but can't see the pictures...all blurry. But even then I tried getting into the story but by issue 3 it was so dull.
Profile Image for Ben A.
530 reviews9 followers
December 6, 2025
Godzilla: Heist is a very entertaining caper story that sees a team of professional thieves working together with the Big G pull off the ultimate burglary. As per the genre, it's filled with as many twists and turns as possible. I do wish the characters had been a little more fleshed out and I think one more issue would have been the trick. Nevertheless, it was a fun read and I'll definitely be checking out the next series should we get one.

Special Thanks to IDW Publishing and Netgalley for the digital ARC. This was given to me for an honest review.
Profile Image for Rod Brown.
7,449 reviews287 followers
November 15, 2025
I love the concept of shoehorning Godzilla into a crime book, and the first chapter actually works fairly well, but then the story gets bogged down with byzantine twists, turns, reveals, and betrayals as our initial smash-and-grab robber gets drafted into a larger heist by a group with its own mysterious agenda. Despite the large lizard looming in the background, the plot is surprisingly conventional, with a MacGuffin and a team of bickering one-note characters, each with a particular skill and silly code-name.

It would have been better if the central characters were more appealing and better developed so Godzilla could have been kept more to the edges instead of raging into the spotlight for a climactic kaiju battle.


Disclosure: I received access to a copy of this book from the publisher through NetGalley.com.


FOR REFERENCE:

Contains material originally published in single magazine form as Godzilla: Heist #1-5.
Profile Image for Jessica Bellemore.
237 reviews3 followers
December 5, 2025
Godzilla meets a heist? Count me in!

Jai has discovered a way to use Godzilla to his advantage; he summons him as a distraction so that he can pull off heists. When his method gets discovered, Jai finds himself in danger from more than just Godzilla.

As a Godzilla fan (the 1998 movie is a masterpiece and I won't hear any different), this graphic novel gripped me from the first page. The action is seat-gripping and the artwork beautifully matches the Ocean's Eleven-noir vibe.

Once I started the story, I couldn't stop. The plot was a thrill ride, and I genuinely hope that there will be more in this series.

Thank you to NetGalley and IDW Publishing for the opportunity to read this book for free in exchange for my honest review.
Profile Image for Brian Shevory.
359 reviews13 followers
December 10, 2025
Many thanks to IDW Publishing and NetGalley for sharing an advanced copy of Godzilla Heist by Van Jensen and illustrated by Kelsey Ramsay. I was excited to find this graphic novel since I love a good Godzilla story, and I haven’t come across too many Godzilla graphic novels. This one particularly piqued my interest since it situates Godzilla in a crime caper. I wondered how exactly the author might synthesize two different genres of film- Kaiju monster movies and crime/heist stories, into one graphic novel series. This edition is a digital version that collects 5 issues of the story into one volume. The story follows Jai, a thief who primarily works alone and has developed a system of drones and has harnessed the power of neutrinos to capture Godzilla’s attention and might, allowing Jai to create distractions and destruction while he makes off with the loot. It’s a little far-fetched since it doesn’t seem like Godzilla can really be controlled, and Jai doesn’t seem to be in complete control of Godzilla, but nevertheless, he uses the King of Monsters to his advantage. Word gets around the criminal underground, and Jai is abducted by a mysterious group of mercenaries who only refer to one another by Greek alphabet names like Kappa, Pi, and Alpha. They have a plan to attack a highly secure and secretive site using Jai’s methods. This is where the story breaks down a little. For one, we don’t learn too much about this crew, and I found it somewhat hard to differentiate them. I wish there was more time to learn about their backstory or their motivations or at least have some of the characters stand out a little more than others. We do learn a little more about how Jai came to understand the power of Godzilla, but it also seems a little far-fetched and this backstory is not developed in depth. In fact, one of the issues starts with this backstory, although we aren’t told about its connection until later in the story. I found that kind of narrative disruption a little confusing. As other reviewers have mentioned, the story gets a little muddled with betrayals and crossings, but I ultimately wondered why the crew wanted to rob this site. Their motivations were unclear. It didn’t seem like it was monetary, but it also didn’t seem political. I wish there was more explanation and development of the crew to better understand their motivations for this heist. Although the story elements were underdeveloped, it’s still a fun read to envision Godzilla partnering with a thief to travel around the world, robbing lucrative sites. The artwork by Kelsey Ramsay is pretty good too, especially the panels that detail Godzilla attacking. I hope that there will be some more adventures or issues featuring Godzilla working with Jai. I wondered whether they will continue their collaborations, or if this is it for the big guy. The end of this edition includes some cool imagined Godzilla movie posters by Pablo Tunica, including some that look like a take on Reservoir Dogs, The Fast and the Furious, and Mission: Impossible.
Profile Image for Nicolas.
160 reviews
November 14, 2025
Quelle lecture surprenante ! Pour être honnête, j'avais très peu d'attente en voyant la couverture : une histoire de braquage avec Godzilla ? On sait que ça va être n'importe quoi et finalement, pas tant que ça.

Un homme nommé Jai commet seul un casse grâce à des drônes qui lui permettent à peu près d'attirer Godzilla, ce qui va lui permettre de rentrer dans la cour des grands et se faire recruter dans une équipe d'experts pour faire le braquage du siècle en Angleterre...

Pour une histoire complète en un tome, je ne m'attendais pas à ce que ce personnage principal soit aussi développé, que ça soit sur ses motivations ou son développement, mais on s'attache vraiment à lui.

Sans spoiler, même si la révélation arrive vite, il y a un véritable intérêt au braquage des all-stars, ce n'est pas juste pour l'argent.

L'affrontement final est particulièrement jouissif, franchement, le livre est une belle surprise et laisse entendre qu'une suite pourrait être prévue...

Très belle découverte (bon évidemment il faut aimer un minimum Godzilla 🦖).

Merci à Netgalley et IDW pour l'envoi d'une version numérique 🙏
__
What a surprise ! To be honest, I had very low expectations when I saw the cover: a heist story featuring Godzilla? You know it's going to be ridiculous, but in the end, it's more than decent.

A man named Jai pulls off a heist on his own using drones that allow him to lure Godzilla, which puts him in the big leagues and gets him recruited into a team of experts to pull off the heist of the century in England...

For a complete story in one volume, I didn't expect the main character to be so well developed, both in terms of motivations and development, but you really grow attached to him.

Without spoiling, even if the revelation comes quickly, there's a real interest in the all-star heist; it's not just about the money.

The final confrontation is particularly enjoyable. Frankly, the book is a nice surprise and hints about a sequel...

A very nice discovery (of course, you have to like Godzilla at least a little bit 🦖).

Thanks to Netgalley and IDW for the ARC 🙏
Profile Image for Peter Baran.
882 reviews64 followers
January 13, 2026
IDW's explosion in Godzilla comics means that there have been some bizarre pairings, and stories where Godzilla is often not really the focus. This isn't a problem; some of the best monster stories have the creature as a third wheel, as a way of spicing up an otherwise normal genre story. Initially, it seems that is what Godzilla: Heist will be, a story of hi-tech thievery with Godzilla complicating the getaway. But it soon turns out that Godzilla is an integral part of the heist itself, an unwitting but devastating force of destruction that enables the actual heist, And the whole success of the story hangs on whether you believe that the Godzilla you know and love can be manipulated this precisely and yet still be a force of nature. I have to admit, as the heist crew get together, fall out and double-cross each other, I wasn't convinced that even with drones snapping at his head that you could predict to this degree where his energy breath would hit.

So I had a narrative problem with Godzilla:Heist and I also had a bit of an art problem. Kelsey Ramsey's art is very scratch, very impressionistic - which can work quite well for the action sequences, But a lack of backgrounds and sense of place really harms it in the London based sequences (and there seems to have been a lack of research on what British soldiers guarding a top secret installation would wear). There's also an issue with scale, both written into the story and with the art. By the time we get to the final cathartic fight scene the only thing that saved the storytelling was knowing that the two kaiju protagonists were apparently speeding across Kent at about 150 mph whilst fighting. The central ida of Godzilla: Heist works well, but the heist is in itself too generic, the mastermind too masterful, and the motives unconvincing.
Profile Image for Adam Sorensen.
42 reviews1 follower
December 5, 2025
Godzilla Heist is an extremely appetising story setup for a Kaiju comic. The protagonist Jai is a young man who discovers a way to call Godzilla to any location, a technology he uses to pull off risky heists. Things suddenly change when he's approached by a dangerous crew who bring him aboard for his riskiest job yet.

Jai is an extremely well-drawn main character. We get a sense of his background and why he does what he does, which makes his story very compelling. Sadly the rest of the main cast don't feel similarly fleshed out. A good heist story often hinges on knowing the cast of characters and what makes them all unique, but I didn't get a great sense of the crew outside of initial introductions. It makes the "Heist" part of Godzilla: Heist feel less essential than initially expected.

A a Kaiju fan though? I thought the art of this collection was very special. Godzilla itself is lovingly porrayed with some fantastic compositions, with some other fan favourites making appearances that made this a fun and breezy read. Anytime the frame is dominated by giant monsters I was super impressed by the way they were portrayed. The Kaiju elements and the Kaiju elements intersect in occasional and fun ways, though maybe not as frequently as I'd have hoped.

Overall I had a fun time with this one, while feeling that it didn't reach the heights of its premise that I was anticipating. Huge thanks to IDW Publishing for providing a digital review copy in return for an honest review!
Profile Image for Molly.
371 reviews3 followers
January 26, 2026
Godzilla: Heist is one of those graphic novels that gathers individual comic issues into a single volume, and it works beautifully as a quick but satisfying read.

It really does feel like Godzilla is having a bit of a mainstream resurgence. Not that he ever truly disappeared, but it’s been fun running into more Godzilla-focused titles lately, and this one stood out for me. I enjoy reading comics in general, but this story went in directions I honestly did not expect.

As the title suggests, this isn’t your typical smash-everything kaiju story. It’s full of surprises, and that sense of unpredictability kept me turning pages. Despite being a relatively short read, it manages to pack in some genuinely emotional moments, which caught me off guard in the best way.

Overall, this was a fun, fast, and surprisingly heartfelt graphic novel. If you like comics, enjoy creative twists on familiar icons, or are just happy to see more Godzilla stories stomping around, this one is worth picking up.
Profile Image for Dan Holland.
428 reviews3 followers
November 23, 2025
Well, that's an interesting use for being able to lure Godzilla places. Would be a shame if another crew was visiting a certain museum during "Godzilla: Heist." Available from IDW on 13 January 2026.

From the team of:
Story - Van Jensen
Art - Kelsey Ramsay
Colors - Heather Breckel
Letters - Sandy Tanaka

Jai can make Godzilla appear, eventually, by making a specific energy signal. Of course he uses it as the ultimate distraction for petty crime. Unfortunately this garner the attention of some real psychos who want to break into a top secret military installation in London. I'm sure a story with the heist starting in the second chapter goes smoothly.

Reasons to read:
-Never thought of adding theft to Godzilla's crimes
-Kaiju fighting
-Good design for (spoilers)
-Of course the ******* stole that

Cons:
-Unfortunately the art was a bit messed up on the eReader but the full release won't have that problem
Profile Image for Jeremy Fowler.
Author 1 book31 followers
November 18, 2025
Ocean’s Eleven mixed with Godzilla!

Godzilla: Heist is exactly the kind of wild, high-concept chaos I adore. It features a bonkers premise, with some sharp writing guiding the adventure. Jensen takes a premise that should feel impossible (a heist… during a kaiju rampage? almost unthinkable, and yet leads a way to figure it all out! This is a fun, scrappy, character-driven crime story. It moves fast, hits hard, and never forgets to have a good time while entire city blocks are getting flattened. It’s clever, cinematic, and just unhinged enough to keep you grinning as you flip pages. And there is a surprise twist with another Kaiju favorite that comes into play. If you want a classic creature feature with a clever twist, this one absolutely delivers.
Profile Image for Christine LaBatt.
1,135 reviews9 followers
November 16, 2025
Jai has figured out a way to control Godzilla's signals and plan heists during the attacks. He has a larger goal and gets recruited by a group going to London for a huge heist.

I thought this was going to be more of a heist where somehow Godzilla was in on it, or at least not the enemy of the protagonist. Like Godzilla saved the day. I didn't really get as much heist movie vibes either because there was not a lot of the planning phase I think of with a heist movie. It was still a good read, but wasn't what I thought it would be.

I received my copy from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.
310 reviews
December 5, 2025
Being about to lure Godzilla into a bit player of a heist is a brilliant pitch and it’s entertainingly executed. But there is slightly more depth to this story than you expect. It was a fun stomp around a blending of genres with stunning artwork of a kaiju, wrecking a city and getting into an epic fight. And really, what’s not to like about that!

This story was an unconventional escapade that provided a delightful distraction.

I received an early copy from the publishers via NetGalley in exchange for a review.
Profile Image for Alejandro.
182 reviews3 followers
February 2, 2026
A heist in the middle of Godzilla attacking the city? My interest is definitely piqued.

This was just okay. It wasn't terrible but it wasn't great either. It's a quick 5 issue limited series that was very paint by numbers heist story with Godzilla shoehorned in. Maybe if the series ran a little longer than 5 issues would have allowed enough breathing space to fully flesh out some of the characters in the story.

It was a nice quick read.
276 reviews3 followers
February 7, 2026
Solid action heist with enjoyable twists and reveals, and a character who does have an ego that just about matches his genius capabilities. Don't want to say too much more without revealing the plot but this was very cinematic in its scope.

If like me, a lot of your familiarity is with Monster-verse, know that Godzilla isn't a good guy in this. He's not much of a character, just a force to be overcome, like in Godzilla Minus One.
Profile Image for Jarrett Connolly.
46 reviews5 followers
January 18, 2026
Other than the fact the ARC itself was blurry, the story itself just was not very interesting. I love heist stories and Godzilla but even early on i was painfully bored. It had a good concept and could have been great but the execution was just eh for me

Profile Image for Rick G.
1 review
January 31, 2026
2 1/2 stars but I guess that’s not an option here. Very good pitch but just doesn’t have enough faith in its readers to not overexplain every little detail or twist. It ends up coming off as patronizing and dreadfully generic. But the art is great, and I liked a lot of the ideas
Profile Image for Alexis Berman.
122 reviews9 followers
February 6, 2026
Thank you to NetGalley for my Advanced Reader's Copy of this book.

I love Godzilla. I love books about heists. I did not like this book. I did not like the art. I found the dialogue to be awkward. 2 stars because I only give 1 star to books I actually hate.
Profile Image for Lauren.
49 reviews
December 7, 2025
It’s got Godzilla in it so it can’t be awful but this one just missed the mark for me. It was filled with a lot of tropes that just felt a bit corny/too far fetched.
Profile Image for Sam Perez.
91 reviews
February 1, 2026
I wanted to like everything about this, but it was just so cliche.
Profile Image for Ron.
4,089 reviews11 followers
December 11, 2025
Jai has a plan to rob a casino using Godzilla as a distraction. It works so well that he gets roped into a planned heist to use Godzilla as a cover to breach Whitehall and steal a super weapon hidden there. However, Jai is part of another conspiracy already aiming for the same target. So who will get the device? And what will the winner do with it? Plus, do not forget that Godzilla has its own part to play. As the saying goes - "No plan survives contact with the enemy!" If you like high stakes crime capers and/or kaiju adventures, pick up this title and enjoy!

Thanks Netgalley and IDW Publishing for the chance to read this title!
Profile Image for Sarospice.
1,219 reviews13 followers
July 9, 2025
The concept is great - guy figures out how to "direct" Godzilla to crazy ends - and the script has some brilliant moments but the art is AWFUL! And they end it like anyone would want to read more? No ma'am.
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