Godzilla x Kong:
The New Empire

3 outta 5

Godzilla x Kong: A New Empire does offer Godzilla and King Kong brawling each other and various monsters. It kind of skimps on the Godzilla portion, he’s basically a special guest star although the reason he’s held back is probably because as the King of the Monsters he can stomp just about anyone. Just about anything could be improved with more Godzilla (take Maestro and put Godzilla in it and it would have won Best Picture). This is more Kong’s movie as there are even multiple scenes of giant-sized apes growling at each other (without any subtitles) where the audience just must intuitively know what they’re talking about. Anyway, when the monsters start smashing it’s neat but there’s human subplots nobody really cares about foisted upon the narrative.

Titan Monster King Kong is living in the centre of the Hollow Earth and keeping various monsters under control while on the surface the gigantic Godzilla takes out whatever monsters may appear to terrorize humans. A scientist at the Titan research agency Monarch, Ilene (Rebecca Hall), discovers a mysterious signal coming from Hollow Earth so she gathers up an eclectic group featuring conspiracy podcaster Bernie (Bryan Tyree Henry), monster veterinarian Trapper (Dan Stevens) and her adoptive daughter, Jia (Kaylee Hottle). Jia is the only surviving member of her tribe and she is going into weird trances and doodling monster teeth. When Kong and the crew reach Hollow Earth, Kong discovers a race of giant apes just like him, complete with a smaller mini-Kong, and they are led by the nasty Skar King. Meanwhile, above ground, Godzilla is absorbing radiation to become even more powerful and is stomping towards Hollow Earth leading the two Titans to clash once again.

The last few Godzilla and Kong movies had a primary human antagonist who is manipulating people and monsters. There isn’t a human bad here, the main bad guy is a giant evil Kong, Skar King. However, the film has no way to communicate their antagonistic intentions, they just grunt and use ape body language. It gets irritating. Also, the design of Skar King looks very much like Koba from Planet of the Apes series which seems a little lazy. He does have a pretty cool hench-creature which is an albino deformed version of Godzilla’s species. Skar King controls it with a glowing large knife that he points in a direction and then the enslaved frost breathing Godzilla attacks. It is a nifty twist that there’s another Godzilla creature out there.

The film adds Mothra, friend of Godzilla and it’s fun to see the giant butterfly. Finding Mothra is tied into Jai’s storyline about her being tormented by visions. Making her more integral to the story, like her finding a long-lost psychic version of her tribe, doesn’t make her more interesting. Hollow Earth just seems like a weightless CGI jungle space and the battles have a lot more scope when it takes place in cities. Hollow Earth is never that interesting which is a shame as most of the movie is set down there, even when a man-eating plant chomps a guy it should be more important but never happens again. Apparently, the one plant on Hollow Earth just didn’t like this guy.

Hall as Ilene gets a bit more to do as she’s trying to care for her adoptive daughter but she is mostly just relegated to saying what is happening on screen and the plot with Jai and her found native family is just a lot of nodding and glances as they communicate telepathically. Henry as the crazy podcaster returning from the previous film still has some funny reactions. Stevens as the Monster Vet has a manic energy that is endearing. Also, whenever he does anything involving tech there’s always a blasting classic rock track, like when he amps up Kong with a power glove and KISS starts blaring. It’s corny but fun.

The main monster character is Kong, which is a bit of a mislead as Godzilla comes first in the title and is just as prominent in the advertising. A lot of this movie is Kong running around Hollow Earth and he tags along with a smaller version of his same species (probably a reference to Son of Kong). The best part is when the little version fakes out Kong to get him jumped by other giant apes and then Kong picks up the little guy and bashes the bad apes with him, which is amusingly chaotic. Godzilla is almost relegated to a cameo, although there are a few scenes of him smashing random monsters which is enjoyable. Now Godzilla nests at the Roman Coliseum which is a funny visual of him curled up in the iconic space. The movie holds back on Godzilla and Kong teaming up until the very end where there is a four-way brawl between Godzilla, Kong, Skar King and the ice monster albino Godzilla. It takes place in a city with lots of the requisite buildings collapsing.

Overall, Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire does have some goofy monster smashing, although once again, most of the human stuff is a drag. This is very disheartening after how compelling the human stuff was in Godzilla Minus One which proves that the human drama in Godzilla movies can still good. Still, if one doesn’t mind slogging through some dull chatty bits, eventually Godzilla X Kong will deliver.