Godzilla vs Kong — Review Thread

It's clear she's carrying half those scenes, as with Rebecca Hall in hers. 

Skarsgaard might straight up be a terrible actor.

Premise:  Fifty years after Monarch's discovery of Kong and three years after Godzilla's defeat of Ghidorah, Skull Island has become ravaged and Kong is contained by controlled environment that helps keep him hidden from Godzilla, the alpha Titan that would kill him to establish further dominance among the large terrestrial beings.  But increasingly agitated by his manufactured home, Kong grows unhappier by the day and is only kept docile by his emotional connection with a deaf native girl named Jia.  Eventually Dr. Nathan Lind offers Kong a chance to find a new habitat in the Hollow Earth, a unknown lost world lying inside the Earth, which he is eager to explore along with the aid of Apex Cybernetics.  Apex sedates Kong and takes him from Skull Island to Antarctica, where the closest opening to Hollow Earth is.  But with Kong outside of his protective barrier, Godzilla catches Kong's scent and attacks viciously.  Narrowly escaping Godzilla's fury, Kong and the Apex team land in Antarctica and explore Hollow Earth, but Godzilla surfaces in Hong Kong where a secret Apex project lies that is further inflames Godzilla's territorial nature.  In search of the cause, Godzilla uses his atomic breath to drill a hole into Hollow Earth, unearthing Kong for a rematch in the heart of the city.

Whatever the faults of 2019's Godzilla:  King of the Monsters, it must have done something right as throughout the pandemic it became a reliable comfort film for me.  I must have watched that movie a dozen times in the last year, as the theaters closed down and just used it to calm my nerves after a long day.  For that alone, I'd like to see the MonsterVerse continue, because big monster going smashy makes me happy.  Despite that the MonsterVerse might not have continued beyond that point if Legendary hadn't immediately pushed production of Godzilla vs. Kong forward while King of the Monsters was in production.  King of the Monsters was pummelled by lukewarm reviews and the combined Disney tag team of Aladdin and Avengers:  Endgame and failed to meet the box office heights of even The Meg.  MonsterVerse had a lot riding on Godzilla vs. Kong to maybe let the audience speak up "Yeah, we're digging this."  After all, outside of Iron Man, what huge success did Marvel Studios have before Avengers?

Then COVID happened, and that was looking unlikely.

But in the surprise of the century, people seem to be embracing Godzilla vs. Kong, to the point where it's starting to be the battle cry for cinemas to open back up post-pandemic, something Warner has been keen on being with aggressive pushes for both Tenet and Wonder Woman 1984 (both pre-vaccine rollout, mind you).  Who would have thought Godzilla vs. Kong would have been the movie to end up on top here, but it's likely just a case of being the right movie at the right time.  I'm done watching trashy non-movies like Extraction and The Old Guard on Netflix, I've gotten the needle in my arm so I'm so I'm going to go watch a monkey punch a lizard in the FUCKING FACE!

Because of this, there is a certain hype train to Godzilla vs. Kong that can't be ignored.  It's become a social event for movie-goers.  I'm sort of on the outside of that social event, and am looking on the outside in as a Godzilla fan.  I was always going to see this movie.  I've already have four more viewings planned out as we speak, maybe more before it leaves theaters and HBO Max.  I didn't really predict this would happen, mostly because I didn't anticipate IMAX, ScreenX, and 4DX screenings anytime soon.  I used to think it was weird when people went to The Force Awakens or Return of the King on opening weekend and asked "How many times have you seen it so far?"  Is this what it's like to be obsessed with a mediocre movie?

Let's get to the down and dirty, I personally think Godzilla vs. Kong is better than the original King Kong vs. Godzilla.  King Kong vs. Godzilla has charming and enjoyable elements to it, but it never works entirely as a cohesive whole.  I also think it's the best Godzilla film of the MonsterVerse, as I think it has a grander sense of fun that Godzilla 2014 and is more focused with it's wild fantasy elements than King of the Monsters.  But I'd still say the best of the MonsterVerse is still Kong:  Skull Island, which is wildly fun and feels the most like a complete story.  Godzilla vs. Kong has the fun part down pat, but feels fragmented.

The meat and potatoes is and always will be the throwdown between Godzilla and Kong, which is spectacular and well worth the price of admission.  There are two battles between the behemoths, one at sea and one in Hong Kong (lol, King Kong in Hong Kong).  The first is rambunctiously silly, as Kong jumps from ship to ship and both do battle on an aircraft carrier.  Meanwhile, Kong is out of his depth as Godzilla takes home field advantage and drown the ape at every turn.  The latter battle is a lengthy one, with the same setting as a centerpiece fight in Pacific Rim, which brings a lot of neon infused visuals as a backdrop.  The two pull the stops out and go furious and brutal.

Of course, all of this is moot, because much like Batman v Superman:  Dawn of Justice, we can't have the two heroes kill each other.  They have to team up to deal with a bigger threat, which goes into full spoiler territory, so let's count that as the official warning so turn back now if you haven't seen the film.  Who should emerge at the end of the film but the sinister mech Mechagodzilla, which is his first truly villainous role since Terror of Mechagodzilla in 1975 (not including Ready Player One).  The big bad robot, which was created by the Apex company to replace Godzilla as the Alpha and control the Titans how they see fit, has suffered a malfunction and gone full berserker, targeting Godzilla before Kong rushes in and helps tag team the creation into oblivion.  And let's face facts, Kong is a better tag team partner than King Caesar was.

At its heart, Godzilla vs. Kong is more of a Kong movie than a Godzilla movie, as Godzilla's primal instinct acts as an antagonist for Kong's journey in the film.  Godzilla doesn't really have a journey other than "This guy is pissing me off!  I need to break his face!"  One of my main critiques about Kong's cinematic history is that far too often filmmakers find themselves retelling the original movie, what with a good chunk of Kong's filmography being remakes of that movie.  Even films like King Kong vs. Godzilla and Kong:  Skull Island still have that original film in their DNA, despite attempts at doing it differently.  The most wildly original Kong films are King Kong Escapes and King Kong Lives, which are probably the two most lambasted films of his history (though you can pry Escapes out of my cold dead hands, you pricks), so there always seemed to be a fear of using the character outside of story elements that already worked for him.  Kong never really tapped franchise potential, so we never really got a sense of just what kind of stories could be told with the big lug.  Godzilla vs. Kong, if anything, is a leap forward for that character, using him as a chance to explore a fantasy setting called "Hollow Earth."  Surprisingly there are elements of King Kong Escapes at play, as a villainous entrepreneur uses Kong's strength to his own advantage to find an unknown Earth element that will bring him power (also giant robots and hover ships are involved).  But what works for Kong here is using the Hollow Earth concept to allude to Kong's origins and the mysteries of Skull Island, which is more than just a secluded land with dinosaurs but rather an Earthly representation of what lies beneath our surface. Think of it as Journey to the Center of the Earth starring a gorilla.

All of this gives us the Kong we've always dreamed, the one who will tear heads off and DRINK BLOOD FROM THE SKULLS OF HIS ENEMIES!

Enhancing all of the fantasy/sci-fi in this movie is a synth score by Tom "Junkie XL" Holkenborg.  One thing I love about the MonsterVerse films is that the score work has been excellent across the board, from unique and original themes from Alexandre Desplat and the remix of classic tunes from Bear McCreary.  Holkenborg's score doesn't disappoint, mostly feeling unique to the film itself with some grand fantastical cues.  My one letdown about it is that I don't care for his Godzilla theme.  It starts out with notes inspired by Akira Ifukube, then kind of lumbers off in its own direction.  It sounds off-key to a seasoned Godzilla fan's ears and isn't strong enough of a personal stamp to work on its own.

Of course that leave us with the most highly praised element of the MonsterVerse films, the human characters. Yes, indeed. Everyone loves the humans. Why switch to monster action when we can people gawk at them? Yes, I'm being sarcastic. The humans are the most criticized element of these movies, not entirely without good reason. Godzilla films in general can struggle with them, so this is hardly a MonsterVerse issue. In some cases they're a batch of generic planks on a MacGuffin chase, like Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla, or just along for the ride in wildly silly nonsense, like Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah. In their best instances they can be charismatic and fun, maybe selling a plot you might not have been super into otherwise. Movies like Ghidorah, the Three-Headed Monster and Godzilla 2000 being examples that work for me. MonsterVerse has tried wildly different types of characters across the four movies, though the one that might have worked best was watching character actors chew scenery in Kong: Skull Island. King of the Monsters tried to follow suit but it didn't quite pan out that well. I personally don't have much complaints about the characters in Godzilla 2014, because I liked the story of a soldier who was just trying to get home amidst a monster attack.

Godzilla vs. Kong tries two types of stories. One mostly stoic and heartfelt, the other one a bit broader and sillier. But both are intensely scaled back. Whatever you might say about each, I think the complaints about human characters might have resulted in the wrong conclusion here. Interviews surrounding the movie state that they were trying to make the leanest movie possible, and it certainly is the leanest movie possible, but it doesn't always work to the movie's benefit, and I'm mostly convinced it was reactionary to how poorly King of the Monsters' plot was received.

The A-plot involves Alexander Skarsgard and Rebecca Hall taking Kong off of Skull Island to find Hollow Earth. The leanness of the movie probably works to this one's advantage, because there is little time to settle in with these characters before they start chasing the fantasy world. Skarsgard and Hall are not so much characters, but rather a means to an end. And yet a lot of their plot seems a little contrived, as Skull Island is taken over by a storm which has wiped out most of the natives and wildlife, yet Kong and select creatures are preserved in a giant dome. The movie alludes that Monarch's interference caused the forever storm. How? I don't know. Son of Godzilla style weather experiments? Maybe it doesn't matter. What I do know is constructing that dome during a storm like that is some sort of impossible task. Just what in the fuck did they do the Skull Island during that fifty years? Brain breaking.

But the real heart and soul of these scenes revolved around the character Jia, played by Kaylee Hottle, a deaf native girl who communicates with Kong through sign language. Ever since seeing Jia in the commercials for this film, I fully anticipated this storyline to be largely cringe. But I was shocked at how well it works. Jia's relationship with Kong and bridging a communication gap between him and humanity is a strangely compelling idea (It might be borrowed from King Kong 2005, but it features more plot use here). And Jia's genuine affection for Kong and vice versa brings some of the most emotional scenes of the entire MonsterVerse so far. I am shocked that they pulled this character off, and for this alone the movie deserves a high five.

But the good will won over might be lost as we talk about the film's subplot, which is the movie's biggest waste. I like Millie Bobby Brown as an actress. I'm not a huge fan of Stranger Things (It's fine, I just don't give a shit), but I like her performance in King of the Monsters and I was happy to see her back. I even like how they've made her a sort of a ground level character who watches Godzilla's back, and I've even made comparisons between her Madison character and Miki Saegusa from the Heisei series, which I still feel is relevant. However, this is not a good use of her. This story has her tracking down a conspiracy theorist podcaster, played by Brian Tyree Henry, who is trying to reveal the "secrets" (read: Mechagodzilla) of Apex Cybernetics and its connection to Godzilla. So together they sneak into Apex and through some shenanigans accidentally get shipped to Hong Kong so they can conveniently be present for the fight between two Titans and a mech. And that kind of sums up the entire subplot. They stumble around and accidentally do some things right.

Oh yeah, and the kid from Deadpool 2 is here. Be prepared to not care, because he doesn't do anything. He pours whiskey on a computer at one point, but if it did anything productive for the plot, it's not evident, because his intent is to shut Mechagodzilla down and Mechagodzilla is still active after it happens.

It's clear to me that this subplot is well meaning Scooby Doo shenanigans, but it didn't work as filmed, so they whittled it down to the bare minimum necessary to keep the film coherent, because like this plot or not, it's necessary to explain why there is a giant metal lizard at the end of the movie. And by trimming it so hard, it weakens plot elements from relating threads. The mad doctor responsible for Mechagodzilla is Dr. Ren Serizawa, who, according to publicity materials, is the son of Ken Watanabe's Ishiro Serizawa from the previous two Godzilla films. But other than the name, which brought about certain gasps of recognition from the audience from one screening I attended, nothing is spoken of the link between the two characters. And if it was going to be buried in deleted scenes, what is the point of making this character a Serizawa? He doesn't speak of his father and it's never addressed why he feels differently about Godzilla. And considering this name is only mentioned once, by someone off-screen introducing him, it would have been easy to give the character a new name that's noticeably less distracting. And the devil in the details goes further than just a simple name, as Apex's Mechagodzilla plot seemingly contradicts the previous film, in which Ren telepathically links to the mech through the skull of Ghidorah, from the severed head we last saw being "purchased" by Charles Dance and the eco terrorists from King of the Monsters in an end credit tag. If there is a link between Dance and Apex, it's also left on the cutting room floor, but on a surface level any link between the two makes no sense. The two factions have entirely different agendas, as the terrorists was Titans to have free reign on the Earth to help the planet flourish while Apex wants mankind to have control of the Titans so mankind can be the dominant species again. Why does Apex have the skull at all? Did they make a higher bid?

All of this is done to make the movie faster. And it does make the movie faster. Trust me, after watching the Snyder Cut I am definitely keenly aware of the virtues of editing down your goddamn movie. But when ideas are brought up and dropped, it's hard to not notice. The one virtue is that I do like the use of Mechagodzilla as a manmade Titan to be the Alpha (and shows that it's evolved from the Orca from the previous film, through the Alpha frequency sound design). I don't care for the plot point that it grows a mind of its own and gets out of control. I think the stakes would have been much more interesting if the mech was in human control for the final conflict. Otherwise it's just something random that happens that needs to be stopped.

Godzilla vs. Kong sits with its ass in the air as a faulted product, as most big budget spectacles do, and like any you might name response is going to depend on what one reacts to. I do wonder if reception to this movie wouldn't have been as warm as it was if we weren't on the back end of a pandemic.  I mean, that didn't exactly help Wonder Woman 1984's word of mouth (though who knows, maybe people would have hated it even more if COVID never happened), but while I enjoyed it more, I didn't really find Godzilla vs. Kong to be that much better.  Is it a desperation for escapism?  Maybe, maybe not.  But maybe it's the breezy CGI laden good time most people needed after a year of frustration and sorrow.  It's hard to deny I'm hardwired for a positive reaction to this movie, but here's the chaser:  as I walked out to the parking lot on several screenings I attended (Yes, I've done more than one because of fucking course I have) I find myself always passing by separate groups of people debating the fight at the end.  "Kong totally could have had Godzilla on the ropes..."  "Are you kidding?  Godzilla almost CRUSHED his rib cage!"  These groups range from nerds to families to couples, a wide variety of participants.  Godzilla vs. Kong might exist as pure spectacle, but it succeeds at what spectacle always sets its sights on doing:  making one's eyes glow and enjoying the ride.

The movie feels like it was cut to pieces in post, to the point where the story barely makes sense. Thre are way too many sub-plots to juggle in very little time while also making room for action scenes. I certainly don't want a four-hour cut of this or anything but an extra twenty minutes would have given it a lot of breathing room. There were enough decent kaiju action scenes that I mostly appreciated that the film existed, but it's quite the mess.