11/27/17

Godzilla Greeting Card (Ambassador, 1986)

Here's a greeting card from 1986.  On the surface, we see an airbrushed version of a well-used promotional photo of Godzilla from GODZILLA vs. THE THING.  How well-used? Here are just a few examples I randomly pulled:
U.S. Lobby Card!
UK "Front-of-House" card!
Japanese Lobby card!
The entire series of Mexican lobby cards uses this picture!
Another U.S. Lobby card!
The entire series of Italian "photobustas" uses it too!
And, many more...you get the point.  It's a go-to Godzilla photo, often found in newspaper articles or books about monsters.  Anyhow, here is yet another use of it, albeit in a new way.  Here is the inside of the card:

...which is amusing, but it made me wonder what the occasion would be, where you would actually send this card to somebody.  Besides kaiju attacks, I mean. (It's always good etiquette to send a card after a kaiju attack.) But...people used to send more cards than they do now, it's a fact. Moving to the back, you'd think this was a clear case of unauthorized usage of the Big G's photo, right?
Nope.  At least, there's a 1986 Toho copyright, so that means something.  And since Ambassador is owned by Hallmark, I'd be leaning toward legitimacy on this one.  Also, is it me, or is the cute cartoon on the back by Sergio Aragones, or MAD margin fame? I'd put money on that, too!

3 comments:

Chris Sobieniak said...

At least it's your typical humorous greeting card.

Sampoerna Quatrain said...

...Which are getting harder and harder to find!

Chris Sobieniak said...

I bet. Sometimes I see the ones out nowadays and I shake my head in disbelief.