Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire

This series has come a long way since its relatively grounded beginnings, and this latest instalment wholehearted embraces its sense of ridiculousness, delivering something akin to a Kaiju version of a theatrically over-the-top, pantomime WWE wrestling match.

Premise:  With Godzilla “ruling” the surface world, and Kong exploring the Hollow Earth, a peaceful coexistence between the two Titans has remained since their last confrontation.  But when Dr Ilene Andrews (Rebecca Hall) picks up a mysterious signal coming from the Hollow Earth, she enlists the help of Bernie (Brian Tyree Henry), the Titan conspiracy theorist, and Trapper (Dan Stevens), a Titan veterinarian, to help her find the source of the signal.

Review:

Whereas the first three films in the “MonsterVerse” series (2014’s Godzilla, 2017’s Kong: Skull Island and 2019’s Godzilla: King of the Monsters) were relatively grounded and serious films in comparison, 2021’s Godzilla vs. Kong embraced an altogether more campy, over-the-top tone that focused on action and spectacle over suspense or drama.  Your millage may vary in terms of which approach you prefer (personally, I preferred the earlier films over the later ones), but it’s fair to say that Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire has doubled down on its predecessor’s sense of ridiculousness (even the title and poster feel more than a little tongue in cheek).

When watching this film, I couldn’t help but feel that the mystery and majesty of the Titans has now been all but forgotten – without getting into spoilers, Godzilla is introduced while battling a new Titan in Rome, and it feels like such an everyday occurrence that it’s effectively just a throwaway reference glimpsed through news footage rather than a major set-piece (which is perhaps the point the film is trying to make).  Similarly, Kong is introduced while suffering from a toothache, and after the change in the filmmakers’ approach to mo-cap in Godzilla vs Kong meant that Kong now just moves like a man pretending to be an ape, the character’s introduction here just further anthropomorphises the giant ape, to the extent that he feels like a completely different creature from the one introduced in Kong: Skull Island.

“…this film lacks any subtlety, but equally, it never promised any in the first place…”

The human characters at least give it their all, and although none of them get as much to do as, say, Bryan Cranston, Samuel L. Jackson or Vera Farmiga had to do in Godzilla, Kong: Skull Island and Godzilla: King of the Monsters, Rebecca Hall still adds some gravitas as returning character Dr Ilene Andrews, while Brian Tyree Henry gets a bit more to do in this film than he did in Godzilla vs Kong.  Meanwhile, Dan Stevens joins the cast as Trapper – a Titan veterinarian and former collegemate of Ilene’s – but his laidback, Hawaiian-shirt wearing character is there primarily for comic relief, and isn’t given any real character depth.  Kaylee Hottle is also back from Godzilla vs Kong as the last surviving member of Skull Island’s Iwi tribe, and to give credit where it’s due, the writers have found a pretty decent way of involving her in the main plot, which is something that some of the other films have struggled with.

But ultimately, everything is building towards the epic CGI-fuelled final act, and the climatic showdown pretty much sums up the whole movie: it has all the depth and nuance that you would expect from a CGI smackdown between a bunch of giant animated monsters, but equally, you could argue that there’s never been a better executed CGI smackdown between a bunch of giant animated monsters.  This film lacks any subtlety, but equally, it never promised any in the first place.  Some of the monster battles are genuinely very impressively staged, and try things not seen before, even if the movie’s main villains are a little underwhelming compared to those that have come before.

“…a theatrical, over-the-top, ridiculous pantomime…”

It feels harsh to criticise Godzilla x Kong for being what it clearly set out to be, which is a theatrical, over-the-top, ridiculous pantomime in which giant monsters fight each other across exotic backdrops.  In that respect, it does exactly what it says on the tin, and it appears to have found an audience, so it must be doing something right.  And there’s no denying that its sense of fun is contagious – I laughed out loud at one particular improvised weapon that Kong uses during his first encounter with the lost ape tribe.  But there’s also no denying that Godzilla is very shortchanged in Godzilla x Kong (one report said he only has 8 minutes of screentime in the whole film), and for me personally, the franchise worked better when Godzilla and Kong were the stars of their own movies, rather than frenemies in a Kaiju tag-team match.