I realized, as Kong swung his radioactive ax (he gets a radioactive ax) at Godzilla’s tiny lizard head, that I’d missed the sweet simplicity of a popcorn movie. Every bit of dialogue serves only to help explain why a dinosaur with radiation breath must fight an overgrown ape. But it’s been almost two years since the last normal summer-movie season, and if the film’s impressive overseas ticket sales are any indication, viewers returning to theaters crave sensory overload, not careful plotting.Īpart from Jia (Kaylee Hottle), a little girl from Skull Island who can communicate with Kong and becomes distraught when he does, none of the characters’ anxiety and paranoia leave much of an impression. Kong is the sort of loud, mindless blockbuster that Hollywood rolls out in the summer. At this stage of late-pandemic exhaustion, watching a film actively reject relevance and refuse to dwell on human emotion wasn’t an annoyance, but a relief.
Neither Godzilla nor Kong is a metaphor for some greater crisis they’re just two creatures in a mesmerizingly choreographed boxing match, pummeling each other to pieces.
The story isn’t thematically interesting, nor does it offer much to analyze. Pure chaos, of course, but chaos that’s strangely soothing to take in. What could possibly happen when they cross paths?! They transport Kong away from Skull Island so that he can guide them on their quest, but, uh-oh, Kong and Godzilla are ancient rivals, and, oh no, two apex predators can’t exist at the same time. The film follows a team traveling to Hollow Earth-the secret underground home of titans such as Godzilla and Kong-on behalf of a shady corporation seeking to harness its energy source. Kong, the plot is just an excuse to get to the titular brawl.