Collectible Time: LIFE's King Kong (The Movies, The Creature, The Message/90 Years)

LIFE continues to unleash commemorative editions on pop-cultural icons, and the latest celebrates that charismatic gargantua, King Kong (with dynamic, dual covers)! 

King Kong: The Movies, The Creature, The Message is written by Steve Rushin, who covers Kong's cinematic, 90-year stretch, commencing with the behemoth's earliest conceptualizations, right up to his Legendary Pictures, MonsterVerse rallies. 

Details overflow on how Merian C. Cooper, Ernest C. Shoedsack, Ruth Rose, Edgar Wallace, Max Steiner and Willis O'Brien ushered the mighty myth to the big screen in 1933, along with assiduous scoops on Dino De Laurentiis and John Guillermin's 1976, polarizing redux and Peter Jackson's 2005, computerized revitalization.  

The likes of Son of Kong, King Kong Lives, King Kong Escapes, King Kong vs Godzilla, Godzilla vs Kong, Kong: Skull Island ... the stage musical (and such variants as Mighty Joe Young and Konga) are also featured, sprinkled by nods to the character in such noted sources as Jurassic Park, Training Day, The Rocky Horror Picture Show, The Simpsons and Jim Croce's "Big Bad Leroy Brown." Sentimental memories and interesting quotes on Kong are shared by Cooper and Jackson, as well as Jessica Lang, Pauline Kael, Bob Newhart, George Foreman, Maurice Sendak and Quentin Tarantino; and a overview of Fay Wray's career offers comprehensive insight not found in most other sources. 

For extra depth, Rushin insinuates the likely reasons behind Kong's powerful and tragic endurance in the magazine's various portions and caps off the edition with "The Real King Kong," regarding a genuine specimen called Gigantopitecus, a creature many believe to be linked to the Abominable Snowman and Bigfoot. 

The text is adorned by sterling, black-and-white and color stills from Kong's movies (with behind-the-scenes clips from the 1933, 1976 and 2005 productions), in what constitutes a veritable, visual feast. 

LIFE's King Kong: The Movies, The Creature, The Message is available now at drugstores and supermarkets across the nation. Snatch a copy of this chest-thumping collectible (with either cover or both) before it's gone!