Kong’s god on the island, but the devils live below us
So even though I am posting this first I actually watched it last of the three Monsteverse films. In April of this year I went to visit my niece in Georgia and she wanted to go to the recently opened movie theater and watch King Kong Versus Godzilla. I didn’t really want to watch it as one is a large mammal (Kong) and the other a giant radioactive lizard that shoots fire out of its mouth (Godzilla), so it SUPER obvious to me as to who has the real advantage here, but I love my niece and we did what she wanted to do. What can I say? I love my nieces.
When I was flying home to CA, I was planning on watching Emma (2020), but they didn’t have subtitles for the film and there was no way I would be able to hear what was going on with the air system, the engine, and all other plane sounds, so I kept scrolling. I spotted Godzilla: King of the Monsters, and decided to check it out and fill in the blanks that I had from the other film.
I wasn’t really planning on watching the Kong film, as I love the original and nothing can hold a candle to it, but when Redbox sent me a free rental I decided to complete the trilogy of the Monsterverse.
Here we go:
So we start with logos and planes shooting at something . What’s going on? Is this supposed to be the end of the original film?
Oh, it is the South Pacific 1944, this must be WWII fighting noises. Planes fall, crash, and burn but one man survives by parachute. But not for long as he is on Skull Island.
Looks like an enemy has also survived and the two continue to fight. But I am wondering why they are in the South pacific? I always thought Kong was in the Atlantic, toward Africa on the Madagascar side?
We then see the footage like in the horrible Godzilla (2014) but Kong was already big before the radiation? So that doesn’t really make ay sense to me, but they also say that they are putting up satellites and seeing parts of the world never seen before, so I’m guessing that means finding Skull Island.
We are now in 1973, but why doesn’t this take place in present time? Why would they set in the 1970s when the previous 1970s Kong sucked?
So Monarch is not doing well with the war going on, as they want to go out and do an expedition. John Goodman is the Monarch employee pushing the expedition as he really wants to go to Skull Island. He shows all these pictures of destroyed ships and all I can think is why would you want to go to an island that destroys ships and they were unable to kill whatever is out there with bombs? What do you think you will find that will really help humankind?
But they convince the senator to let them when they dangle that the Russians will want to go there and of course the senator wants to beat them They piggy back on an already planned operation and manage to scoop up a military escort to help them get there.
Army troops are chilling as they wait for transport to go home and we see the leader of this platoon is Samuel L. Jackson; he is the only guy I recognize, who are all these young guys? I must be getting old.
The Lt. Commander is having a hard time fought against the Taliban and then see that it was all for naught with all that is happening in the middle east. He gets the call to see if he will help lead them, and he readily agrees.
Meanwhile, John Goodman and his second are in Saigon looking for a tracker in a brothel. Weird choice, but whatever.
The guide is Tom Hiddleston who shows he is a worthy teammate as he fights off the guys he is pool sharking. He agrees for the right price, like always seen in movies. This film so far has been like a 100 others
And they play every ‘70s period drama soundtrack with war film/war tendencies issues.
Then we have Brie Larsen photographer, ugh I’m not a fan of the actress. She’s joining the crew as she senses there is something up. Conrad (Tom Hiddleston) and photographer Brie Larson have a moment when they know everything about each other why?
So far this feels like a mix between King Kong (2005), any treasure hunter movie ever, and King Kong (1976)
So far the only character I like is Chapman and I know he’s going to die soon. He has talked about his wie and son, he has a job all lined up for Delta after the war, he is the only one memorable
Samuel L. Jackson does the usual hold on to your butts line as they head out in the storm. Of course there is a storm, as what would the movie be without a storm?
This whole thing feels very Jurassic Park as they come down the helicopters amazed at the beauty.
So far all the animals are regular ones, nothing “monsterverse-y” The scientists do something with seimic charges, they didn’t really explain why or what for but they see something special and important, what we don’t know. Again this film is really boring.
One helicopter is taken the down with a tree, the other a giant ape hand. The destruction has begun. I wonder if he is going to be obsessed with Brie Larsen or the biologist?
Kong be tossing the copters around like children’s toys, while everyone is trying to make sense of what they are seeing. They shoot at him, but that just makes him madder.
They are split into two groups-Hiddleston, Larsen, numbr 2 scientist, John Goodman, and an army guy. The other group has Jackson, Chapman, Cole, and Goodman.
John Goodman’s character is insane. Samuel L. Jackson’s character figures out that he knows more than what he is saying and question him. It turns out that Goodman is like Quint from Jaws, he was the only survivor of a ship and knows it wasn’t destroyed in war but by a creature. He’s only there to get info, proof, and hunt it.
The group with Hidleston passes by a pond and sees a guant water Buffalo, finally some intresting creatures.
I think it is interesting that one group has all the military and the other has only one with all the civilians. Seems rather impractical.
Hiddleston and co come upon some kind of monumnt, and discover the natives. The guy from the beginning (now played by John C. Reilly) is still alive and hanging out with the natives. He’s kind of crazy. He’s basically like Allen from Jumanji but not as cool.
Chapman goes to the river to clean up and get water, when Kong sees him. Chapman hides behind a rock, but Kong lets it pass as he is trying to take care of his own wounds. I guess this will be a bonding moment of some kind?
This movie is actually really boring, like what is even the point. There isn’t anything new or that different. We see Kong fight some squid like thing, which is weird that this giant creature could survive in the river. But like why did they bother making this? It isn’t interesting and there is nothing we haven’t seen in a previous adaption.
John C. Reilly’s character tells the others that on the island they live in a perfect world where they live forever and have no crime. But I’m like yeah, but you also live on a desertd isld with prehistoric creatures that has no modern ok so I don’t know if it is really a strong trade off.
Again, this movie is boring. I mean the 2005 adaption wasn’t good but it had a interesting world and there was stuff happenig. Nothing happens here but Brie Larson taking pictures and Samuel L. Jackson’s character is slowly losing it.
How much longer if this movie? It’s boring.
Oh no, poor Chapman was resting on a log and it turned into a killer walking stick, don’t die Chapman, don’t die. He shoots at the beast but it runs off as there are these other creatures here, Skullcrushers. OOOOOOOOOOOOOO he’s dead.
Brie Larsen wants to take a long exposure photo but her flashlight broke, Why are you wasting up your batteries on a photo when you have to cross a crazy island? This character is annoying and useless, I hope she gets eaten, but unlike Chapman I know she won’t. Hiddleston shares about his family and I think the two are supposed to be together, but they have zero chemistry.
Whatever I’m already checked out of this film. I mean Godzilla (2014) sucked because they didn’t put Godzulla in as much as they should have, but at least they tried something new.
This movie is two hours but feels longer.
So the both groups met up with each other and are reunited (minus a few that died along the way). Jackson doesn’t want to go to the meet up point because Chapman never returned from his, but isn’t it obvious-he dead.
One of the skullcrushers vomits dog tags and we learn that Chapman is dead (knew it). John Goodman character is dumb enough to try and take photos and gets eaten. Everyone is trying to shoot and sniper except Reilly who uses the katana, yeah that seems to be a better weapon.
The army decides to go look for him, ignoring Reilly even though he’s been on the island for the last 30 years and a soldier, you think they would listen to what he says. They find the Elephant graveyard, oops I mean Skullcrusher graveyard/boneyard. It is not only a dangerous place but full of gaseous material as it is hazy and red. Of course, the Skull Crashers are alerted (by a cigarette causing a blowup) and now we enter the trailer material.
All of a sudden we have flam throwers, why didn’t they use those earlier?
Reilly is like we need to get out of here, but Jackson won’t leave without Chapman, Hiddleston tells him he’s dead but Jackson won’t listem, he wants to get the weapons from the crash site and kill all the creatures on the island.
I’m like why are they even fighting, just leave and head for the pickup point. If Jackson wants to die he can. Like I’m not getting the conflict here.
So Hiddleston and Brie run into Kong and Kong and Brie have a “connection”. Why? It doesn’t explain.
Instead of going to the pickup place they all decide to go back and try and save Kong from Jackson’s plan.
Kong and the army fight, but then mama skullcrusher comes and Kong fights her. I’m like too little too late. This is why every other Kong film has a cool epic fight earlier in the film instead if wasting time.
Kong wins. the remaining few leave on the boat and Kong goes back to his Kong duties.
But what about all that happened in the third film? How did the doctor find the island? What about the little girl from the island who could speak to Kong in sign language? How they build that giant enclosure for Kong where they watch him all day as if he was on The Truman show? What the heck guys? This movie was dumb and didn’t answer any of my questions! Ugh.What kind of stupid universe is this?
I’m so glad this was a free rental because if I had paid for this I would have been really, really mad.
For more on King Kong, go to Oh No, It Wasn’t the Airplanes. It Was Beauty Killed the Beast.: King Kong (1933)
For more monster movies, go to Zombie Pirates and Werecats: Scooby-Doo on Zombie Island (1998)
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