Does ‘Godzilla vs Kong’ Deliver the Gigantic Monster Fight of Your Dreams?
Hollywood always seems to struggle when it comes to Godzilla movies. There was the 1998 movie with the oversized Jurassic Park creature that lacked all the charm of the guy-in-a-suit movies from the 1950s. Then there was 2014’s Godzilla, which infamously contained very few shots of the titular monster. Then came 2019’s Godzilla: King of the Monsters, which was sold to audiences as a big, loud, monster battle royale but ended up feeling bogged down and bloated with a convoluted and uninteresting human storyline. And now here we are at Godzilla vs Kong, which pits two of the most famous movie monsters against each other. Thankfully, this movie delivers on its promise of giant CGI creatures fighting each other, and most importantly of all, it’s actually fun.
My kaiju movie knowledge isn’t exactly encyclopedic, but big-budget disaster schlock has always been a guilty pleasure of mine, so I tend to enjoy CGI monster battles. Thus far, nothing in this current MonsterVerse had really scratched that itch for me. We always have to have a human story, but so often that human story is filled with really boring with wafer-thin characters and cliche dialogue. Now, I have nothing against cliches in my popcorn movies, in fact, in the right context, cliches can work like a charm. The issue is really how seriously the film takes itself when it’s dealing with giant monsters as its subject matter. Family drama and a whole subplot about monsters “balancing out” all the damage humans have done to the environment just feels so out of place when your movie features a lizard the size of a mountain using atomic fire breath on a three-headed space hydra who shoots lightning. But Godzilla vs Kong is able to walk the tightrope between a cliche human story and the promised monster fight far better than the other entries in the franchise because this is a movie that knows what it is, what it’s supposed to deliver for audiences, and it just sets out to do that.
In this film, we have two human stories. In the first, Dr. Nathan Lind (Alexander Skarsgård) teams up with Dr. Ilene Andrews (Rebecca Hall) and a little orphan girl (Kaylee Hottle) whose people worshipped Kong. In the second, Madison Russell (Millie Bobby Brown) and her friend Josh (Julian Dennison) seek out Titan conspiracy podcaster Bernie (Brian Tyree Henry) as they attempt to solve the mystery of why Godzilla has suddenly turned on humanity. Cutting between both of these groups saves the human parts from outstaying their welcome and, while they still spout cliche dialogue, the overall tone isn’t as serious, so it doesn’t feel tedious and boring. Just because the tone is more fun doesn’t mean that the film leans too heavily on comic relief. Here, comedy is used more sparingly and to much better effect here than in King of the Monsters. This movie knows you’re here to watch a couple of monster boys punch for a bit and then be friends, so that’s precisely what they give you.
And man, the monster fights are fun. I feel like we see so many massive CGI battles these days that it’s easy to feel burned out. When audiences are bombarded with crumbling buildings and explosions in every huge blockbuster, it’s hard to bring something new to the table. That was my main issue with King of the Monsters, which sold us on non-stop, epic monster action, but seemed almost shy about actually letting us see the fights outside of the final battle. So often, the creatures were almost entirely shrouded in CG smoke, which made it hard to get a real sense of their shapes and scale. Thankfully, we’re allowed to actually see the creatures this time and there are some really creative and dynamic shots that make the fights feel fresh and exciting.
Godzilla vs Kong has the benefit of coming out after Pacific Rim, Batman vs Superman, and Aquaman—all of which feel like the direct predecessors to this film—and that hindsight means you can pick the parts that work from those movies and deliver something fun. At this point, we know what people like in loud, CGI popcorn movies and it makes sense to just do that. The action should be dynamic, the crashing buildings should have weight to them, and there shouldn’t be so much smoke and debris that we can’t even see the creatures. Previously, the only giant monster movie to really embrace that was Pacific Rim, which has some of the most inventive and impressive visuals you could ask for in a movie about ginormous robots fighting inter-dimensional monsters. Godzilla vs Kong seems to tilt much more in that direction than the other movies in this franchise, and it’s a very welcome change.
So, if you have HBO Max and a sound system that’s decently immersive, this could be just the big, giant explosion movie that makes your house feel like a cinema. And if you’re in a place where movie theaters are available and safe, this would be a really fun one to see on the big screen.
