Zigra Sketch Study

Hello everyone. Since the contest is getting off to a great start and I was motivated, I've decided to upload the Zigra sketch study a bit early.

Zigra is a monster that is awesome if you know what your looking at. A silver armored alien goblin shark with the ability to turn into a space shape, hypnotize people, paralyze just about anything, and slice you up with his fins and spear like head. He's also one of the only two Gamera monsters that talk to humans so he's quite a deal smarter than most monsters as well. Its too bad he's a man eating tyrannical terror that apparently wiped out the food source on his home planet and then came to earth to take advantage of ours. He's quite the manipulator too as evidenced from his brainwashing of a astronaut and using her to act on his behalf. Not only did he get an astronaut, he got a hot astronaut. Shark is playah , he takes your womenz and ain't afraid of nuth'n. Big guy doesn't like bright lights and high frequency sound waves though, they blind him and throw him off his pimp chair. Giant balls of fire aren't too good for him either. Anyway, this study has six Zigras total, which was surprising since there are so few Zigra drawings period. One was helpfully crafted for the cause by DinoHunter2, props to you man. So lets get this show started shall we?

Showa Zigra 'Xylophone Tyrant'
by Daihei
Showa Zigra is the basic zigra. The one you see through most of the movie. In the film he starts out as a head inside a space ship which then turns into his full form here. When he's on land they have a suit which really throws the perportions and anatomy of Zigra off so I basically chose this as Zigra's primary Showa incarnation. All the elements of the design are here; from the anvil shaped head, to the beak, to the armored ridges, and striped belly. Zigra combines odd elements of bird, goblin sharp, and the T-2 unit from Terminator. Colors are silver with an orange or red cat's eye and some cobalt tinges on the edges of himself. The real issue with Zigra is that he's too short. Being a puppet forced him to have a really short tail, he looks more like a trout than a shark. Nicknamed Xylophone Tyrant for his evil villain agenda of awesomeness and for his humilating defeat at Gamera's hands. Gamera literally plays his theme song on Zigra's back with a rock. Like the movie wasn't tropical enough.

Tyrant Zigra 'Boot Fuehrer' by Trend Masters
Tyrant Zigra is what Trend Masters cooked up for an action figure. That horn in the front of his head is a projectile that is supposed to act in the place of his beam weapon (of which effects I'm still not entirely certain of). The beak for Tyrant is round and blunt with tiny teeth. Tyrant Zigra's primary difference from his Showa counter part is that he is bidpedal. He has legs which end in big hurking spikes. His form is upright and has the banded belly pattern meshed in with his armor to create this odd Geiger effect. His fins are large and look to be rather lethal blades providing he could find a way to use them. I imagine he'd be rather good at clotheslining people. I refer to Tyrant Zigra as 'Boot Fuehrer' because he's as rigid as a Nazi general and he's got spiked feet of death. You do not want to be kicked by those things, it would freaking hurt. My complaint about this one is that with the tail that tiny and his build, he wouldn't make an all to great swimmer. That kind defeats the purpose when everything else points to Zigra being a lethally fast and powerful swimmer. Head isn't too tiltable for seeing straight ahead either.

WOG Zigra 'War God' by The-Great-MM
Abreaviated from 'World of Godzilla' WOG Zigra is much like the Tyrant Zigra except more stylized and organic. Its the other bipedial build in this study though I don't feel so uncomfortably about it as I do the Tyrant since it has a big strong tail and what appears to be a more tiltable head. This Zigra sports more spikes, stronger limbs, three gems on each side of his head by the eye and some on its tail. The defining feature is the hair. I know some of you are going "what! Zigra with hair!". Allow me to explain: in the begining of the film when we first meet Zigra, he's a space ship. His head is inside the ship near the roof of it and there is this cobweb like white substance surrounding him and the covering the entire roof. This gives the impression of hair or in my case a biomechanical nervous system. Either way WOG has dark gray hair. I decided to have a little fun with him and have an 'interesting' exchange taking place between his captive astronaut and himself. With all that armor it would be hard to feel anything so he's using his tongue...and we have gone full steam ahead into the the gutter. Just so you know its difficult drawing people that tiny, either way I had to make a reference to Zigra's personal love sl-I mean, loyal minion and her tripp'n body suit. I've dubbed him 'War God' since out of the Zigra's he's built for battle anywhere at any time...and he's dramatic locks of awesomeness.

Goblin Zigra 'Torpedo Lord' by Soriun
By request I added this odd specimen to the study and he certainly has an angle to provide. This Zigra is so named because it looks the most like Zigra's inspiration, the goblin shark. A strange bottom feeding shark with a huge spear like blade protruding from its head and its jaws below it. Being that Zigra is technically an armored goblin shark, this creates this interesting look we have here. A huge shark spear head, a spiked toothy underbite, big predatory eyes and dark grey armored shoots down its back. My only complaint is that it doesn't address Zigra's iconic beak in any form, it simply does away with it in favor of a pair of shark jaws. While thats more effective, it drops down his alieness a quite a bit. Otherwise its a fairly solid take on him. I've nick named him 'Torpedo Lord' as he's iron gray and designed like an organic missile which in oceantic terms means torpedo. Gives Viras a run for his money.

'Heisei' Zigra 'Razor King' by DinoHunter2
A donation from DinoHunter2, this Zigra is what I imagine to be Zigra's Heisei equivilent should he have been made in that era. Bigger, longer, stronger, more ferocious and carrying slightly more natural elements to his design. Even the beak is intact with shark locking teeth peaking out. I think the red orb that is at the front of almost all zigras is further carried down the entire body, like WOG after a fashion. Heisei has a bit of a sword fish vibe to him and has a minature sail coming off his back. The horn is perhaps the most impressive part. It keeps the overall shape of the Showa while adding extra points to catch victims and a bottom contour that helps create Zigra's tradmark leer. A little humor went into this as the way I was setting this drawings up was a little more artistic this time. Heisei has a whole body shot to himself and is shown comically zipping by that stupid little yellow submersible that trys to wake Gamera up...and decking for a loop in the process just like in the film. Got to find a way to torture those little kids you know . I nicknamed this one 'Razor King' as he's more blade like than the others and I've been using every type of ruler I could think of and I was running low on terms to use. That and 'king' rings with 'Sea King' and that has sword fish all over it.

AOM Zigra 'Sea Emperor' by TyrantisTerror
Finally this another design by TT who took a stab at all the Gamera Kaiju, creating this prehistoric looking Zigra that solves the old issue of Zigra's improbable beak. AOM is huge and serpentine, an improvement over Showa in that regard. In the original art he is posed like an upright serpent and that my friends is how we explain the upright Zigra climax at the end of the film without resorting to feet. AOM has grand flippers and fins and spines so the Gamera marimba solo at the end of the film is still possible. AOM also sports gills which make sense. Now the fun part is AOM's head which is frankly kick ass. Its steam lined, deadly, and has ridged jaws that resemble a beak but work more like the predatory fish that he is. TT always had an issue with beak and teeth at the same time so he found a solution that covers both angles of Zigra's design. The major difference between this Zigra and the others is that it is very much more organic looking. Its chest and head are armored but nothing else. The color scheme is also radically different, using blues in place of silver and grey. This can all be a win or loss for the AOM depending on how you look at it. I figure that Zigra was pretty armored and should probably remain that way. Though the combination of elements really pays off here and with just more armor down the entire back and a color swap I'd say you'd have something here for just about every occasion. I nicknamed this one 'Sea Emperor' as its the biggest size wise and built for power and speed in the water. Only WOG and Heisei could take it in a fight. Tyrant would be floundering around spamming beams and Showa would get smashed very very hard. Goblin would be sort of a dark horse, you'd never know how he'd be doing as he'd blend in better with the ocean depths until he surfaced to impale you. Someone should write a monster battle based on that concept...not me, I'm still writing that first chapter to the Shimakuverse lol.

So Zigra has a couple key features that should come to mind:
-he's got a pointy anvil like head
-he's got a beak
-he's armored from head to tail
-he has cat's eyes
-he has five spines at least going down his back for theme song playing purposes
-he has an orb just below the head point that fires his beam
-he's based on a goblin shark
-he has ridges under his eyes
-his eyes a shaped in a permenant leer
-he may or may not have hair
-he may or may not turn into a space ship
-he may or may not be some biomechanical organism that is much like a predacon from the transformers series.
-he may or may not because of the last two be some sort of multi stage creature like Destoroyah that evolves with his enviroment, space traveling incubator -> aquatic form for combat -> bidpedal or serpentine form for land combat.

Well its late, so I leave you with the usual task of telling me what features you like and don't like about the various zigras and persumably why. All so I can fashion a hybrid zigra from them and then use it to make a final funny SD Zigra. Oh, and if your wondering what that tiny thing on AOM's nose is, thats the little kid's sail boat after they escape from the space ship. This scene is when Zigra takes matters into his own fins and decides to obliterate them himself, almost capsizing the little shits before Chris Han-I mean Gamera tells him to have a seat.

-RenDragonClaw