Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire features a metric ton of outlandish monster-on-monster motion, which is clearly the principle draw. Nevertheless it’s additionally a film that is dense with story and lore about Kong and his individuals, and the seemingly timeless people who used to reside on Cranium Island. And, on high of that, it units up a brand new establishment in Warner Bros’ MonsterVerse that opens up some fascinating prospects for a franchise endgame, ought to they determine to go that course from right here.
Let’s discuss it.
Warning: This the rest of this text will include spoilers for the plot of Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire, together with its ending.
There are three core plotlines in Godzilla x Kong: Kong and his struggle in opposition to the Skar King within the Hole Earth; the individuals from Monarch (Rebecca Corridor, Brian Tyree Henry, Kaylee Hottle coming back from the final film, and new addition Dan Stevens) who’re additionally exploring Hole Earth and making an attempt to determine what Kong has gotten himself into; and Godzilla again on the floor, leveling up his powers in anticipation of the Skar King’s arrival.
Kong’s thread is the first one which drives all of the movie’s motion. He is nonetheless exploring Hole Earth in the hunt for his individuals, and new pathways preserve opening up–and one in all these new holes permits him to lastly discover another large apes. However these are hostile, they usually assault Kong, however he defeats them and escapes, with the unwitting help of an enormous child ape named Suka who finally ends up serving as his sidekick–a son of Kong, if you’ll.
With Suka as his information, Kong finds the ape base and discovers the principle villain, the Skar King, has enslaved a bunch of different apes for some nefarious objective. Kong assaults, and the Skar King unleashes his greatest weapon: one other Godzilla-like titan named Shimo, this one crawling on 4 legs and firing a beam of ice from its mouth. Kong escapes, barely, however extra evil apes are in pursuit. Kong may be very a lot overmatched.
Our human characters, in the meantime, are investigating some sort of sign that is coming from beneath the Earth–one that younger Jia, who’s deaf, cannot cease seeing in her head. And so Ilene (Rebecca Corridor) units off into Hole Earth with Trapper (Dan Stevens), Bernie (Brian Tyree Henry) and a Monarch navy man destined to be killed off rapidly, to attempt to discover out what is going on on.
It takes a while for them to study something, as a result of the Monarch outpost they attempt to go to has been destroyed, however finally they encounter extra humans–members of the Iwi tribe from Cranium Island. Jia was considered the final of them, however it seems they’d relocated underground with a purpose to extra carefully monitor the Skar King, who had been imprisoned in part of Hole Earth that was fully closed off. The evil ape has made numerous progress towards escaping, and the sign that Jia had felt was the Iwi’s misery sign, basically.
It additionally seems Jia, as the one surface-dwelling Iwi remaining, is the one one capable of fulfill an vital prophecy associated to this case, by which an Iwi from Cranium Island would summon Mothra at an historical temple. And Jia does simply that.
That is going to finish up being an important contribution to the approaching struggle in opposition to the Skar King, however it’s not the one manner the people are capable of assist. Kong, after repeated fights in opposition to the unhealthy apes, is fairly beat up and one in all his arms is mainly ineffective at this level. However Trapper has an idea–the people at that beforehand talked about destroyed outpost had in storage a mechanized arm brace for Kong that had by no means been used. They handle to suit it on the large man (we’re not going to fret about how), and now he is stronger than ever.
However he nonetheless wants extra assist. He wants Godzilla, who had killed one other irradiated kaiju and absorbed its energy, and is now much more highly effective than earlier than. So Kong heads to the floor to attempt to recruit him. It goes poorly at first. The 2 encounter one another close to a few of the Pyramids in Egypt, and proceed to fully wreck the traditional landmarks by preventing too near them. Kong tries to cease the struggle, however Godzilla ain’t listening to it. However that modifications when Mothra reveals up–when Mothra speaks, Godzilla listens. Mothra is ready to get Godzilla on board, they usually all head again right down to Hole Earth to face the Skar King.
A spectacular main battle ensues, however it’s simply the prelude to the true factor. The Skar King escapes to the floor with Shimo through the struggle, and this titanic battle continues in Rio de Janeiro. From right here we get what we count on from this franchise: these large beasts beating the crap out of one another and devastating an iconic world metropolis within the course of, with Shimo’s ice beam freezing town’s well-known seashores. (That is the second time a film has frozen these seashores up to now decade, after Gerard Butler”s Geostorm.) It is anyone’s sport for some time, however the breaking level comes when the chain that the Skar King makes use of to regulate Shimo is damaged. And Shimo responds appropriately, by sending an ice blast the Skar King’s way–the stability of the struggle fully upended, Kong is ready to use the Skar King’s new vulnerability to place him down.
And this leaves us with the titular new empire, and a brand new establishment with Kong, Godzilla, Mothra in some sort of alliance, and the people of Earth left to proceed to hope they do not get stepped on.
Does Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire have a post-credits scene?
No, Godzilla x Kong would not have any bonus scenes after the credit which may tease the course that Warner Bros. plans on taking this franchise. It is seemingly that the studio is in wait-and-see mode with this one, with out a lot urgency to get the subsequent one started–while these motion pictures have been profitable, they have not accomplished nicely sufficient to warrant a sequel greenlight earlier than the numbers have been crunched.
So for now, the state of affairs after Godzilla x Kong is mainly the identical because it was after Godzilla (2014), King of the Monsters, and Godzilla vs. Kong, with titans operating round in every single place and the people unable to do a lot about it. That clearly leaves open the likelihood for extra, ought to Warner Bros. select to make one other film or one other season of the Monarch sequence on Apple TV. However this ending is open-ended, permitting for the potential of doing extra on this universe with out broadcasting any particular intent. So we’ll have to attend and see.
