Clover (creature)

Clover
Cloverfield character
The giant monster is seen destroying New York City
First appearance	Cloverfield
Created by	J. J. Abrams
Information
Aliases	Cloverfield Monster
Type	Giant monster

Clover is the production name given to the giant monster and the main antagonist in the 2008 film Cloverfield. The creature was originally conceived by producer J. J. Abrams and was designed by artist Neville Page. In the film, the monster's name is never mentioned; the name "Cloverfield" is only given to the US Department of Defense case file of the incidents depicted in the film. The Department of Defense names the creature "LSA" for Large-Scale Aggressor in the film's Blu-ray special feature called "Cloverfield Special Investigation Mode". The name Clover was the nickname affectionately given to the monster among the production staff.

The monster was first referred to in the viral marketing campaign for the 2008 film including a recording of its roar, foreign news clips about a monster attack and sonar images.

A similar monster appears in a four-part manga series Cloverfield/Kishin by Yoshiki Togawa, which serves as a spin-off to the film. The monster made a first full appearance in Cloverfield, where it was seen rampaging through New York City and being attacked by the United States military.

J. J. Abrams conceived of a new monster after he and his son visited a toy store in Japan while promoting Mission: Impossible III. He explained, "We saw all these Godzilla toys, and I thought, we need our own [American] monster, and not like King Kong, King Kong's adorable. But I wanted something that was just insane and intense".

The monster was designed by artist Neville Page. He sought a biological rationale for the creature, though many of his ideas would not show up on screen. Page designed the creature as immature and suffering from "separation anxiety". He compared the creature to a rampaging elephant, saying "there's nothing scarier than something huge that's spooked". Page said of the creature's backstory, "For me, one of the most key moments in our collective brainstorming was the choice to make the creature be something that we would empathize with. It is not out there just killing. It is confused, lost, scared. It's a newborn. Having this be a story point (one that the audience does not know), it allowed for some purposeful choices about its anatomy, movement and, yes, motivations". The creature was developed by visual effects supervisor Kevin Blank and Phil Tippett's company Tippett Studio. Blank described the intended goal of the creature, "Rather than the monster having a personality [like Godzilla or King Kong], it's more of an entity or an event".