Giant Condor

Not to be confused with Condor.

The Giant Condor or Ookondoru (Japanese: 大コンドル, Hepburn: Ōkondoru) is a Japanese monster, or kaiju, featured very briefly in the 1966 Godzilla film Ebirah, Horror of the Deep.

Giant Condor
Godzilla character
First appearance	Ebirah, Horror of the Deep (1966)
Last appearance	All Monsters Attack (1969)
Created by	Shinichi Sekizawa
Modelled by	Teizo Toshimitsu
In-universe information
Species	Giant mutated bird

Overview

Development

The Giant Condor batting Godzilla in a behind the scenes shot during the making of Ebirah, Horror of the Deep.

Shinichi Sekizawa created the Giant Condor as a reference to the Pteranodon seen in the original 1933 film King Kong.^[1] Originally for a film that originally was Operation Robinson Crusoe: King Kong vs. Ebirah, Rankin-Bass had rejected the script and walked off the project, but since Toho had already started making the sets and props for the film, they swapped Kong with Godzilla as the opponent to face off against for the Giant Condor and Ebirah, and Toho carried on with production of the film, which would later evolve into Godzilla, Ebirah, Mothra: Big Duel in the South Seas, and then later into Ebirah, Horror of the Deep.^[2]

Design

The making of the Giant Condor during production of Ebirah, Horror of the Deep.

The Giant Condor was portrayed using a remodeled Rodan prop which first appeared in Ghidorah, the Three-Headed Monster (1964) and Invasion of Astro-Monster (1965), and would be used for Ebirah, Horror of the Deep following its use to depict the monster Litra in Tsuburaya Productions' 1966 TV series Ultra Q.^[3][4]

Reception

The Giant Condor has been considered by fans to be an extremely weak monster.^[5]

Film history

Showa era (1966-1969)

Originally, the Giant Condor was meant to be an opponent for King Kong, as he originally featured in the script for Ebirah, Horror of the Deep, but was replaced with Godzilla during production.^[6]

In Ebirah, Horror of the Deep, as Dayo made her escape from Godzilla, the Giant Condor soared overhead. She cried out to alert Godzilla just before the bird descended on him. After a fierce scuffle, Godzilla sets it ablaze with his atomic breath, sending its charred corpse plummeting into the ocean.^{[7][8][9][10]}

In All Monsters Attack, the Giant Condor appeared as the Giant Eagle where it is killed by Godzilla again, but this time while Godzilla was wandering around his home of Monster Island.^[9][11]

Millennium era (2004)

The Giant Condor was proposed to appear in the 2004 film Godzilla: Final Wars, but the plans were discarded from the film.

Appearances

Films

• Ebirah, Horror of the Deep (1966)^[6][12][13]
• All Monsters Attack (1969, stock footage)^[6][11]

Video games

• Godzilla Defense Force (2019)

Books

• GODZILLA: Project Mechagodzilla