It’s been forty-eight years after Kong was discovered on Kong Island and five years after Godzilla defeated King Ghidorah. Godzilla has disappeared and Kong is being held in a giant domed area on Skull Island. He is being monitored by Monarch. Kong’s only friend is Jia (Kaylee Hottle). Jia is a five year old deaf orphan. She communicates with Kong using sign language. Jia is the last member of the Iwi tribe, the native people of Skull Island. Jia is the ward of Ilene Andrews (Rebecca Hall). Ilene works for Monarch and is responsible for Kong. Kong is aware that he is in a giant dome and unable to have free access of the island. His depression at being contained has given him an attitude. King Kong with an attitude is not a good thing.
Meanwhile, Bernie Hayes (Brian Tyree Henry) is a conspiracy nut with a podcast. He also works for Apex Cybernetics. He took the job so he could surreptitiously investigate, what he believes are, sinister activities by the owners Walter Simmons (Demian Bichir) and his daughter Maia Simmons (Eiza Gonzalez). Sometimes conspiracy nuts stumble on real conspiracies. When Bernie meets Madison Russell (Millie Bobby Brown) and Madison’s buddy Josh Valentine (Julian Dennison) the trio end up uncovering a plot to create and use a superweapon to defeat Godzilla. The problem with Apex’s plan is that it attracts Godzilla to their doorstep.
While that mess is happening Simmons hires Nathan Lind (Alexander Skarsgard) to follow up on his Hollow Earth theory. Simmons believes that there is a power source in the middle of the Earth that he can use to amplify the power used to operate his secret weapon, a Mechagodzilla that is powered telepathically using the brain waves of Ishiro Serizawa’s son Ren Serizawa (Shun Oguri) and the neural networks of Ghidorah’s skull. Simmons also believes that Hollow Earth is the home of the titans. He wants to use Kong to get to it and the power source.
When Simmons activates Mechagodzilla using the new and improved power signature it attracts Godzilla. Godzilla is also sensing Kong is in Hollow Earth. Since they are mortal enemies Godzilla drills a hole down into the planet with his atomic breath. Kong in turn climbs up back to the Earth’s surface to engage in a fight to the death.
“Godzilla vs Kong” was released in 2021 and was directed by Adam Wingard. It is an American monster film made in conjunction with TOHO, owners of the Godzilla franchise and Legendary Pictures owners of the MonsterVerse franchise. The movie is the 36th film in the Godzilla franchise, the twelfth film in the King Kong franchise, and the fourth Godzilla film to be completely produced by a Hollywood studio. It is also a sequel to “Godzilla: King of the Monsters” 2019 and “Kong: Skull Island” 2017. . In addition it is the first film in 59 years to feature both King Kong and Godzilla. The last was “King Kong vs. Godzilla” 1963. The film was originally to be released in November 2020; however, due to the Covid-19 pandemic its theatrical release was delayed until March 2021. At one hour and fifty-tree minutes it is the shortest film in the MonsterVerse franchise.
The movie by itself is a fun and wild ride but can be a bit confusing at times. It is a multifaceted plot that’s packed into that hour and fifty-three minutes. It helps if you’ve seen at least “Godzilla: King of the Monsters” 2019. Some of the same actors appear in “Godzilla vs Kong” but in smaller roles. As for “Kong: Skull Island” 2017, it’s not totally necessary to see it first but it does flesh out a few points referred to in “Godzilla vs Kong”. There are a lot of people in the film so character development is going to be a little sparse. Regardless of whether or not you can follow the parallel plots the movie is full of special effects, lots of CGI and some decent monster on monster fight scenes. Whether or not the movie is good is going to be in the eye of the beholder.
Godzilla stands at 393 feet (120 meters.) It’s the same height he was in “Godzilla: King of the Monsters”. Kong stands at 336 feet (102 meters). This is much larger than he was in any other movie. Kong is still growing. The giant snake-bat creatures seen in the Hollow Earth are called 'Titanus Warbats'. The vulture-like creatures are Hellhawks.