Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire Review: Superficially Fun Entertainment
The Titans have returned in Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire. This is the latest installment in the MonsterVerse, and it sees the King of the Monsters and the King of the Beasts needing to take on a new threat. This film is directed by Adam Wingard, who returns to the series after directing the 2021 movie Godzilla vs. Kong. The MonsterVerse has taken on many different forms under its many directors. But if you saw Godzilla vs. Kong, you probably have a good idea of what to expect from this one: a silly, over-the-top kaiju with one hell of a battle at the end.
It starts out with some more great monster action with Kong. He’s always been a fun character to watch, and these movies humanize him while making him a force to be reckoned with. The movie also brings in Godzilla and lets us know what he’s been up to. Right from the start, this movie takes everything in a direction where all realism is thrown out the window. Godzilla x Kong is a ludicrous movie for many reasons, and the fact that there are all these giant monsters regularly wreaking havoc in the world is just the tip of the iceberg.
Wingard brings a distinctive style to the MonsterVerse. Gareth Edwards’s 2014 Godzilla movie brought a lot of maturity and character to the series, while Kong: Skull Island and Godzilla: King of the Monsters featured a lot more crazy monster action. Wingard’s style appears to be afraid of having a dull moment. From the very beginning, Wingard is always giving you something to look at or hear, even though this script from Terry Rossio, Simon Barrett, and Jeremy Slater does not always warrant it.
There’s a constant stream of music permeating every scene. The score from Junkie XL and Antonio Di Iorio is not bad, but it’s all over every scene to the point where it becomes distracting. The drama of the dialogue rarely gets the chance to land because the music is always trying to tell you how to feel. The editing feels a little too fast-paced. It seems as if Wingard knew the human scenes were not very interesting, and he needed to breeze through them as much as he could. However, there is still an attempt to give some humanity to the people living in this story.
The main attempt is the relationship between Dr. Ilene Andrews (Rebecca Hall) and her adopted daughter Jia (Kaylee Hottle). The movie introduces an idea early on that Jia does not feel at home where she is and Ilene is having trouble connecting with her. That’s the only emotional storyline. Besides that, the humans are just exposition machines who say a few quips. But when we have Dan Stevens entering the franchise as Trapper, it’s not all bad. He’s a very entertaining presence in the movie and he gets to have a lot of fun in this role. Brian Tyree Henry is also an excellent actor, even though his schtick as a paranoid podcaster never really lands from a humor perspective.
A lot of the jokes and dialogue get old pretty quickly, but nevertheless, there are so many wonderful moments that make this movie worth watching. Any time Godzilla x Kong focuses on the monster action, particularly with the stuff Kong does when fighting other monsters, it is extremely enjoyable. The movie knows how to pull big reactions from crowds, which is why watching this film with an audience is probably the best way to see it, particularly on the biggest screen you can find. It can pull the best humor from the stuff with the monsters and how absurd these fights are.
Another thing to note is that the weight of the human characters and their deaths is nonexistent here. The first Godzilla movie had a strong sense of scale with humans running from the terror and at least a character or two where you cared about them if they died. You don’t really care if any of the see characters die. It doesn’t take itself seriously for this to be the case. If you think about the final battle, the death count is likely in the hundreds of thousands of people all getting slaughtered by these monsters. However, this movie never pauses to take in the weight of any of these deaths, nor does it acknowledge it. Because it seems like if we didn’t see it, it never happened.
But that final battle—wow. I’d go back to see the whole movie just to watch all those monsters lay waste to each other. It’s awesome and very enjoyable to watch. Overall, you can’t go wrong with a giant lizard and a giant monkey beating the hell out of monsters. It’s not fair to compare this to Godzilla Minus One because they’re trying to do two very different things. That movie is a mature character-driven war epic. Godzilla x Kong? Silly, superficially fun entertainment.
SCORE: 6/10
As ComingSoon’s review policy explains, a score of 6 equates to “Decent.” It fails to reach its full potential and is a run-of-the-mill experience.
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