The fifth film in Legendary Pictures’ “Monsterverse” franchise, Adam Wingard’s “Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire,” has hit theaters and delivers more of the high-octane, low-thought thrills that audiences have come to expect from the series.
My buddies and I yell like this in the parking lot at Phillies games. Photo courtesy of Legendary Pictures
In “Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire,” the two Titans have settled into their own territories with an uneasy truce. Godzilla is on the surface, and Kong is underground in the newly-discovered Hollow Earth. But when a new threat hails from deep within the Hollow Earth that threatens both of their worlds, the duo must team up once more to take down the villainous Skar King.
“Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire” is perhaps the first film in the now decade-old franchise that is outright silly. Its predecessors all had their fair share of wink-and-nod silly moments, but this film, with its title inspired by sneaker collaborations, slides comfortably into the realm of camp for much of its runtime.
Kong, with the second most shocking weapon he uses in this scene. Photo courtesy of Legendary Pictures
While some may find this development disappointing, especially considering how the recent “Godzilla Minus One” showed exactly how much emotional weight a kaiju film could, and perhaps should, carry, it is nice to have the option for both the silly and the serious being released nearly concurrently.
The silliness also does not distract from the fact that there is some serious craft on display here- large swaths of the film are told without any dialogue, relying entirely on the visual effects and animation to tell the story, and it is all top-notch. The action, while it lacks the weight and raw thrills of other similar films, is never boring and frequently creative in how it utilizes the creatures’ size.
The film's villain, Skar King, who looks suspiciously like my buddy Connor. Photo courtesy of Legendary Pictures
Truth be told, the sequences that are nearly silent are the best the film has to offer, because the human storyline has unfortunately lost the plot. While films like Gareth Edwards’ “Godzilla” explored humanity’s first exposure to such an incomprehensible threat, and Jordan Vogt-Roberts’ “Kong: Skull Island” drew parallels to the Vietnam War, “The New Empire” is populated by characters who talk too much while saying nothing at all. Their only purpose in the story is to put words to the more abstract concepts of the films that the big punchy monkey cannot act out.
The cast assembled does the best they can, at least. Rebecca Hall is ostensibly the lead actress of the film, which unfortunately relegates her talent to being an exposition machine. But the most charming actor is easily Brian Tyree Henry. Henry is the kind of actor that can elevate any material he is given, and his character Bernie would probably be little more than a kooky conspiracy theorist if not for the earnestness and heart Henry brings to the role.
Warner Bros. saw "Barbie" make a billion dollars and instantly knew what Godzilla had to look like. Photo courtesy of Legendary Pictures
The pitfalls of the human storyline are a shame, because Kong’s storyline actually carries some weight. It shows Kong, previously believed to be the last of his kind, bonding with others like him for the first time. He even finds a surrogate son by the film’s end. It is a fairly compelling story that could have carried the film by itself, especially if the somewhat thin Godzilla subplot was expanded upon, which mostly amounts to explaining why he is pink now. (Editor’s Note: Godzilla looks absolutely fabulous in this film.)
All in all, “Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire” is far from the best “Monsterverse” film, let alone Godzilla or King Kong film, but it is a perfectly serviceable creature feature that delivers on its premise of giant monsters clocking the hell out of each other. Its human characters are as thin as the paper they were written on, but the charm of the Titans makes up for it more than enough to buy a large popcorn and an ICEE.
