The last time we saw Godzilla and King Kong share the screen together was after the two went head-to-head with one another, right before teaming up to take down Mecha Godzilla. In this installment, the two are once again teaming up to take down the newest threat to the monster verse: The Scar King.
These monster verse movies have always been sort of hit or miss for me. They all have their moments, but nothing really makes them rise above other action movies releasing around the same time as them. Unfortunately, this installment is no different.
Easily, the worst thing about this movie, along with all the other installments of this franchise, are the human characters. This series simply does not know how to make the human aspect interesting or engaging in anyway. If I’m being honest, the only thing these characters really do is put themselves in harm’s way, while commentating on what the monsters are doing. If I had to pick a few standouts of the human cast they would be Brian Tyree Henry, and Dan Stevens. This isn’t to say that their parts are great, but they are at least a little engaging, and you can tell that those two are trying with the material that they were given.
There really isn’t too much you can say about the plot here. In a narrative sense this movie does not do anything to reinvent the wheel so to speak, and in all honesty, I found a lot of the human characters’ side plots to be quite jumbled up, and unfocused. What does work a bit more in terms of the story is once we get to the “Hollow Earth” portion of the movie. Things begin to become a little more interesting once the movie starts to unpack the biology and the ecosystems that King Kong has been living amongst.
Now, what absolutely does work throughout this series are the monsters and the fight sequences throughout, and once again this movie is no different. The fights sequences in this movie are so engaging and thrilling to watch. Personally, I find Godzilla, and King Kong to be so much more interesting when they team up as opposed to when they fight each other, and. this movie delivers on that aspect. I found a lot of the sequences to be rather creative, choreography of a lot of these fights felt brutal and realistic (if you can call two giant monkeys, and a radioactive lizard realistic).
I also think it’s worth noting just how much destruction, and damage is done to the cities these fights take place in. My god. I understand that Godzilla and King Kong movies are no stranger to city destruction, but in this movie, you really watch these monsters just lay waste to these places. If you struggled with the destruction of Metropolis in the Man of Steel movie, look away now!
Overall, I found this movie to be serviceable. It’s quite good when it’s in its element of watching these massive titans’ brawl with one another. But when those human characters are on screen, boy does it turn into a snooze fest. This series really needs to take a page out of Godzilla: Minus One’s book and find a way to have engaging monster sequences intermixed with engaging human characters. I’m giving Godzilla x Kong: A New Empire a 6/10. Let’s hope the next installment of this series…titans…up its storytelling a little better!