The prompt here was “yellow.” That was all. This commission was submitted by a father for his son; the only request was that the kaiju be primarily yellow, in accordance with the kid’s favorite color. There was no way for this person to know that the word “yellow,” for me, instantly conjures images one of those tacky rubber chickens you sometimes see used in mediocre prop comedy. I don’t know why, but it does. You can see for yourself how that affected the outcome with this one.

Caracuchra follows in the goofball tradition of early 1970s kaiju-dom, a particularly shaggy era in the genre dominated by television and defined by an ongoing need to generate new monster ideas on a regular basis, no matter how ridiculous. I’m talking programs like Ultraman Leo, Zone Fighter and Go! Greenman, to name but a scant few. Even the cinematic productions of the time were coming down with severe cases of Wackadoo Fever; I don’t think an autumnally-hued mega chicken would have been terribly out of place in, say, Gamera vs. Zigra (1971) or Godzilla vs. Megalon (1973). This, to be clear, should be considered an endorsement of said films.

I had never attempted feathers before. I think the feathers themselves could have been more minutely defined. If I were to re-make Caracuchra now I would probably do at least another bake or two so as to add a finer layer of feather detail over some of the more rough-shod areas you’re seeing now. Still, I like the overall billow of the plumage, as well as how it contrasts with the cranial horns and big, meaty talons. Both of those are vaguely Rodan-inspired, while the thumbless two-digit hands I took off a T-Rex.

The name “Caracuchra” derives from caracara, a genus of predatory bird.