The creature was initially created by Tomoyuki Tanaka, Eiji Tsuburaya, and Shinichi Sekizawa as an homage to the eight-headed mythological Japanese dragon Yamata no Orochi.

[24][1][25] According to special effects director Eiji Tsuburaya's protégé Teruyoshi Nakano, the initial idea for Ghidorah, the Three-Headed Monster, came from Tomoyuki Tanaka, who also created Godzilla.

King Ghidorah has sometimes shown control over gravity in general, allowing the monster to fly even after losing a wing, crush and destroy thousands of planets (as well as spacefaring craft) sacrificed to it, and cause nearby objects in the environment to float due to its mere presence.

[41] Aside from this, it can use its wings to shield itself from enemy attacks (even Godzilla's atomic breath),[42][43] project lightning strikes similar to its gravity beams,[33][44] and generate supersonic shockwaves and strong winds.

[34][44] The resulting unnatural hurricane can tear through the stratosphere, raise tornadoes and waterspouts, and reach sustained wind speeds of 349 kilometers (217 miles) per hour, strengthening overtime, breaking the Saffir–Simpson scale and exceeding the strength of any known storm on Earth.

As hinted by several scenes in the film and stated in the novelization, Ghidorah's hurricane furthermore disrupts and alters worldwide weather patterns to cause even more storm systems around the world.

[46] In physical combat, King Ghidorah rapidly attacks with kicks and stomps from the air, constriction with one or more necks, electrocuting bites, and even by grabbing enemies to drop them from the sky.

[42] In Rebirth of Mothra III, King Ghidorah can construct a corrosive dome to drain the life force of captured victims for the monster to absorb.

[47] In Godzilla: The Planet Eater, the third part of an animated trilogy, Ghidorah is depicted as an evolved entity from a universe with different physical laws that are worshiped by the Exif, who it influenced to become nihilists upon mastering advanced Gematron mathematics.

Its necks extend to infinite lengths, nigh-invisible to machines save for the gravitational energy it emanates, strong enough to distort Godzilla's heat ray by deflecting it or actually bending the concept of space.

As long as someone native to the dimension it invades acts as its guiding anchor and witness, Ghidorah can defy that universe's physics, able to render itself intangible to enemy attacks whilst still capable of assaulting foes normally.

In order to prevent these circumstances from reoccurring, efforts had to be made to eliminate sources of anger, hate, despair, and revenge (achieved by the main character committing suicide with all of Earth's remaining machinery).

Its scales are capable of running bioelectrical currents through its body, aided by traces of gold in its dermal layer, allowing it to raise unnaturally strong storms that gradually increase in power.

The first is the durability to withstand the Oxygen Destroyer, emerging unscathed from the same detonation which severely injured Godzilla and killed all Earth-based lifeforms within a two-mile radius.

The second is the possession of highly accelerated regenerative properties, having regrown the left head minutes after Godzilla tore it off, retaining the memories and personality since Ghidorah's neurons are spread throughout its body like in an octopus.

Once Mechagodzilla received an energy source sufficient to power it properly, Ghidorah's mind suddenly transferred itself to this new body, frying the pilot to death as it seized total control of the robot.

[51][52][40] King Ghidorah appears in the fifth and sixth episodes of the television series Zone Fighter, where it is revealed that it is supposedly a creation of the Garoga aliens, though it is left unclear as to whether this statement is true or not.

[3] Hirose walked hunched over inside the Ghidorah costume, holding a metal bar for balance, while puppeteers would control its heads, tails and wings off-camera like a marionette.

[58] Performing as Ghidorah proved challenging to Hirose, as he had to time his movements in a way that would not conflict with the separately operated heads and wings, as doing so would have resulted in the overhead wires tangling.

[58] Special effects were added as the creature is capable emitting destructive, lightning-like "gravity beams" from its mouths and generating hurricane-force winds from its wings.

In Rebirth of Mothra III (1998), King Ghidorah is depicted as an extraterrestrial that landed on earth during the Cretaceous Period of the Mesozoic Era and wiped out the dinosaurs by draining them of their life energies.

[67] In the post-credits scene of Godzilla: City on the Edge of Battle, Metphies, a priest of the Exif alien race, reveals to the main character, Haruo Sakaki, the name of the god his people worship: Ghidorah.

The anime incarnation of Ghidorah is markedly different from its original portrayal, having evolved to the point of discarding its physical body in favor of a form of pure astral energy with two tails, two wings, and three necks that extend infinitely (at least 20 kilometers or 12 miles in length in the film),[69] stretching out of three black hole-like portals to devour planets sacrificed to him by the Exif cult with its gravitational powers while its torso remains within an alternate dimension.

Some time later, Haruo receives a vision from Metphies, telling him that his lingering anger and desire to defeat Godzilla will ensure that Ghidorah will eventually be summoned again.

For a brief moment, the creature seems defeated, only for Ghidorah to rise completely unharmed from the rubble and turns its attention to the frozen Shin Godzilla to shoot at it with gravity beams.

Caught in the blast's center; the weapon almost kills Godzilla but is revealed to have no effect on Ghidorah, who flies back to land and within minutes, fully regenerates his severed head, which would eventually allow the humans to deduce that it is in fact an alien with a completely different biology than any known lifeform on Earth.

[78] When Ghidorah comes to Boston to destroy the Orca device that is negating its hold over the Titans, it battles a revived Godzilla while Mothra fights Rodan.

In the 2021 sequel, Godzilla vs. Kong, set five years after the events of King of the Monsters, Ghidorah's severed head is being used by Apex Cybernetics' Ren Serizawa (portrayed by Shun Oguri) to telepathically interface with Mechagodzilla's body.

Eventually, what's left of Ghidorah's consciousness takes control of the cybernetic Titan, killing Apex CEO Walter Simmons and electrocuting Ren Serizawa, before battling Godzilla in Hong Kong.

[81] Although presented with its Heisei appearance, King Ghidorah also includes traits from its Showa and Monsterverse counterparts in attacks, taunts, and backstory (as it is stated to be an alien invader).