Warner Bros. continues its franchise push for what is dubbed the “MonsterVerse”. As the 5th film in the modern take by WB, The New Empire is also the 2nd that will feature both King Kong and Godzilla in the same film. With so much lore to dive into and a rich history for both characters, how does WB and the producers handle the latest film and iconic team-up of these two Titans? Our review after the trailer.
Godzilla and the almighty Kong face a colossal threat hidden deep within the planet, challenging their very existence and the survival of the human race.
Review
As WB’s MonsterVerse enters its fifth film, nothing is off limits from a story perspective. Just the second film in which Godzilla and Kong are featured together, the premise focuses on their team up to fight a larger looming threat to both Hollow Earth and the surface’s survival. This is where things start to take a gravity-twisting turn. The pacing of the story is very heavy-handed in the later 1/3 of the film, with the first 2/3 attempting to create a human element to the story. In the end, we just don’t care because they abandon it halfway through. In that respect, this film only connected to the larger MonsterVerse with the status and location of each of our titans. We are introduced to a bunch of new Titans that were not previously shown in other films with no explanation.
Beyond pacing, the plot of the film was one of the flimsiest we have seen to date in the franchise. The ‘big bad’ was so underwhelming, that you would think the biggest threat to their survival was Godzilla’s confusion on whether Kong is a friend or foe. But hey, they easily solved that with a third party who just bats their eyes and all is good. The best way I can frame up the story is the writers took a box full of shot-down ideas from past films put them into a blender and baked them into a wrestling-style titan slugfest. I felt like I had whiplash coming through the final 30 minutes of the film with the amount of lore and story points that were pulled out of thin air for this movie.
SUKO in Warner Bros. Pictures and Legendary Pictures’ action adventure “GODZILLA x KONG: THE NEW EMPIRE,” a Warner Bros. Pictures release.
Now, all of that being said, it’s all about perspective. The audience in our screening laughed, shouted, cheered, and hollered during the fights as their favorite titans punched it out and fought against their common enemy. Sometimes a turn-off-your-brain, titan-fighting movie is what audiences want. No need for a human story to be shoehorned in and no need for a deeper world-building. If that is all you want out of a MonsterVerse film, Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire will deliver that. We fully expect that audiences will enjoy this film despite the issues on story or pacing and ultimately this little guy right here is our pick for MVP of the film. We won’t spoil why, but you will see once you check it out.
Courtesy of Warner Bros. 2024
