Members of the crypto-zoological agency Monarch face off against a battery of god-sized monsters, including the mighty Godzilla, who collides with Mothra, Rodan, and his ultimate nemesis, the three-headed King Ghidorah. When these ancient super-species-thought to be mere myths-rise again, they all vie for supremacy, leaving humanity's very existence hanging in the balance.
Godzilla returns again for the latest film of the series, but this time there are plenty of other enormous giant monsters too, and they all collide together to make a really interesting sceptical full of surprises and excitement from start to end. Now, I must admit I’m a fan of the series, therefore my opinion may be representative of a huge (like the pun?) Godzilla fan! So now, the main question... is this film a sea wreck or will it destroy all of its opponents and end up with an awesome film? Here are my thoughts.
As usual, I’ll start with what I liked. The latest film set five years after the 2014 film, the crypto-zoological organization Monarch is still out there, though fighting to maintain their independence and ability to study these monsters. In the shadows though, a group of eco-terrorists have hatched a plan to unleash the Titans on Earth to restore balance to the world. What I really liked about this film was that it immediately throws us into the action, by doing this not only does it help to get us engaged right from the very beginning but it also just helps to introduce us to the plot of the film and the characters. The way that the film then progresses is really good, I liked how there was a distinct separation of monsters and characters, there seemed to be two storylines which coincided and kept us involved with what both sets of characters were doing - this I thought was really well done because we actually understood and got excited and engaged with the characters because we saw their personal relationships, as well as how these adapted and changed when they were introduced to the monsters too. The monsters though were amazing, not only did they excite but they created some of the most intense and exciting battle scenes in the series, seeing buildings and cities torn apart by their fights is an awesome and really exciting spectacle which I loved! Director Michael Dougherty clearly has a love and reverence for these characters, delivering on the things he knows we all love about them too (with some Mothra-sized Easter eggs throughout). The creature design for the movie really is a thing of beauty, delivering updated versions of the icons we know and even bringing in some new monsters to the fold. All of the kaiju combat delivers the earthquake-inducing punches one expects and even flips the script in surprising ways more than once. The energy was palpable in that 2014 movie when Godzilla finally lit up his fins and breathed his atomic breath into the world, and this film has multiple moments that feel like that. Dougherty builds on our anticipation for specific moments and delivers. They’re honestly breathtaking at times, at least when the entire screen is not being obfuscated by lightning, flashing lights, fire, or an otherwise screen-sharing distraction, a facet of the film that grows more annoying the more it occurs.
So they let them fight, and it’s the kind of wanton destruction and battling that we all thought we were seeing when we watch previous Godzilla films as children. But there’s a hollowness to the movie that it is only able to overcome because of the third act, and it’s all because of the people. Though one may think going in that they do not care about the humans, the truly great Godzilla movies make you care about them. They are essential to every great Godzilla story because of Godzilla’s successes and failures mirror the human side of the narrative. King of the Monsters does its best to make the human scenes necessary, and some certainly are, but they almost always feel like filler rather than a fundamental bridge. Godzilla 2014 was a solid film, but this movie blows it out of the water in the "monsters" section. Yes, the script and human characters may not be great, but this is Godzilla King Of The Monsters, not Godzilla King Of The Humans. Besides, the movie made up for the humans with beautifully framed, ground-breaking VFX monster fight scenes. Which is what a monster movie should have and is what a Godzilla fan want. The amount of in throughout this film was amazing too, seeing each of the giants around the world colliding together was amazing and really provided some of the best scenes in the film.
One of the things that surprised me though was how solid the plot was, it was kept exciting and enthralling all the way through by seeing the mix of characters and monsters, I thought that the way in which the plot was laid out also helped this really nicely too - because with typical monster films, we are introduced to the threat first which gets us engaged and then we see the battle and the showdown, this is perfectly done here though because it ensures that we can keep up with the emotions and storyline of the film perfectly and just allows us to really become immersed in the awesome fights that this film holds!
The human side of the story has always been the beating heart of the Godzilla movies and Godzilla himself is the blood in the veins. The heart exists to pump the blood, and the blood exists to flow through the heart, each giving the other purpose because of its presence. You need both things to work, and unfortunately, it doesn’t always in this film. The big issue with the film is the character roster. There're just too many characters to keep track of and to get invested in. Vera Farmiga and Milly Bobby Brown do their job in carrying the plot but the talent on display can't distract you from the absurd plot of the flick. The need to include such a convoluted and far-fetched narrative baffles me. There's no need to stretch a plot so very thin in a Godzilla film. The human characters already explain too much and honestly, I was getting tired of the military stuff. Go for some other perspectives. If you're gonna have the humans be so central, then spend more time with their development. And also I thought that the jokes were just so unnecessary and definitely interrupted the intensity and excitement that the rest of the film brought.
The characters are also very clearly used as story points, and they feel so unrealistic. They also make very dumb decisions, and many things happened that just didn't make any sense or couldn't be possible. For instance, one of the characters had their hand smashed onto by a huge stone building and then used their hand perfectly fine afterwards. The way in which the plot was relayed was in a solid way because it was easy to understand, but the actual storyline wasn’t as good in terms of realism and character involvement although it was enthralling.
Overall, I would give this film a 9 out of 10. I think that the monsters are easily the best part of the film without a doubt, they're also taken very seriously. It doesn't make the common monster movie mistake by using the monsters for dumb humour or anything like that, you can feel the power of these monsters, and when there's action, is when this movie shines the most. They were really exciting and definitely helped to make the film both thrilling and exciting throughout, I loved how they tried to incorporate a human storyline into the film too - even though the human character models weren’t executed very well. I definitely feel that these were the letdown of the film, and dragged it down because they didn’t feel realistic or enthralling - I understand it’s difficult to make human characters realistic in these types of films but it just wasn’t done at all here which let me down. I also thought that not enough was experimented with here, the plot of the film felt very typical and standard of the genre which means that it stands out in the series because of the battles, but to new fans, it probably won’t seem special at all really. Would I recommend this film? Depends on whether you want to see huge monsters treating Earth like their battlefield or not? Of course, if you like action then you’ll love this film, but if not then definitely stay away.
Thank you for reading my review, I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I did watching the film. I hope you had a great day! :)
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