Godzilla X Kong: The New Empire

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Hollywood has given us more than a fair share of crossover movies that include a "vs" in their title, including this particular franchise. But I have to give it up to the MonsterVerse here for not only having the big, epic wrestling match between two celebrity monsters, but also bringing them together as a tag team. I've said it before and I'll say it again; these movies just work better if you watch the monsters' story lines unfold as though it was something Vince McMahon dreamed up.

As far as this series has gone, it has been a fun ride so far. But considering how this movie unfolds, and the films that preceded it, this franchise kinda blew its wad already. Godzilla has already fought a good chunk of his big monster enemies, including the main event that was 'Godzilla vs Kong'. So for as cool as it is to see these guys team up, the truth of the matter is, the "villain" they go up against left a lot to be desired, and it sort of feels like things have taken a monstrous step backwards. But don't worry, this title doesn't come bereft of any solid monster-on-monster action.

Picking things up three years after the last film took place (bringing us up to circa 2027 here), the concept of Hollow Earth has been revealed as fact, and Kong has been spending his time down there in search of more of his kind; Hollow Earth being the old home to many "Titans" or "MUTOs" (Massive Unidentified Terrestrial Organisms). Meanwhile, Godzilla stays on Earth's surface, fending off other big baddies like a giant crab named Scylla, and maintaining order between monsters and humans. These fights probably kill thousands in the process, but more on that later.

A Monarch outpost within Hollow Earth picks up on a mysterious signal, which seems to be affecting Jia (Kaylee Hottle) on the surface with creepy dreams and hallucinations. Just to recap, Jia is the sole survivor of Skull Island's Iwi tribe after a natural disaster wiped them out. She lives with her adopted mother, Monarch researcher, Dr. Ilene Andrews (Rebecca Hall) and is able to communicate with Kong, using sign language. Jia's visions begin to worry Ilene, so she begins to assemble a crew including Titan veterinarian, Trapper (Dan Stevens) and podcaster for the conspiracy-minded, Bernie Hayes (Brian Tyree Henry) to head to Hollow Earth to figure out what this signals all about.

Godzilla soon begins to act almost irratic because of this signal, attempting to absorb all the radiation he can for whatever threat may be coming. Meanwhile, within Hollow Earth, Kong discovers a secret that suggest that he may have found the rest of his kind, with the help of a young ape who was probably put in the movie just for cutesiness, Suko. And yeah, Suko's cute and all, but he's also a bit of an asshole. Kong has to keep him in line quite a bit, and it's often pretty funny to see how it plays out. One paritcular fight scene had me laughing out loud, and it's something you'll know when you see it.

What the signal ends up coming from, however, is fairly anticlimactic, and it leads us to the big baddie of the film, Skar King, another giant ape who uses a reptile-like Titan named Shimo as both a weapon and a mode of transportation. I have to admit that this irks me just a little bit, while other much cooler monsters are briefly glimpsed, but quickly tossed aside, like the aforementioned Scylla and another named Tiamat, who is essentially an underwater Chinese dragon and should have made for a much bigger adversary than it was presented as.

Going back to what I mentioned about destruction probably killing thousands, I've said it before, but one should probably just treat it as the old game 'Rampage'. Destruction is just a part of it. Something like a superhero movie feels different in that they're "heroes" who come across as careless. Titans, on the other hand, are giant animals who act like giant animals, so to me, it's more forgiving here. This chapter was definitely not the best of the franchise, but I still had fun with it, and I have to appreciate that they kinda go all-out here with some of the silliness. It's no 'Godzilla vs. Kong' with a cool big reveal, but it's fine for what it is.

3/5

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