Godzilla vs. Kong thoughts and opinions?

Johnny Novgorod

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What did you think of it? The movie, but then again, also the screening itself. Curious as to what the atmosphere is like at one of those these days, if you care to enlighten.
Can't talk about the movie yet, embargo lifts in 13 hours.
The screening itself was great. I hadn't been to a theater in over a year, landed my favorite seat (dead center, just a little over halfway distance from the screen), had four empty seats on either side of my row and got some complimentary food/drink. So overall wonderful.
 
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Godzillarich(aka tf2godz)

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Can't talk about the movie yet, embargo lifts in 13 hours.
The screening itself was great. I hadn't been to a theater in over a year, landed my favorite seat (dead center, just a little over halfway distance from the screen), had four empty seats on either side of my row and got some complimentary food/drink. So overall wonderful.
So we will know at 2:00 pm est time than, will be fun to hear.
 

hanselthecaretaker

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Can't talk about the movie yet, embargo lifts in 13 hours.
The screening itself was great. I hadn't been to a theater in over a year, landed my favorite seat (dead center, just a little over halfway distance from the screen), had four empty seats on either side of my row and got some complimentary food/drink. So overall wonderful.
Guessing you do freelance stuff then? That’s cool.
 

happyninja42

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I think Toho stance on this is unless it's a monster where that matters like Mothra or Rodan couple then Toho doesn't like to assign genders to the monsters. So it doesn't really matter.
true, but Novgorod did bring up a point about trying to accurately talk about the creature, when using languages that gender all the words.
 

Johnny Novgorod

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Guessing you do freelance stuff then? That’s cool.
I've been writing 10 years for the same site. I'm a no name reviewer basically but the site itself is enough of a big deal, at least regionally, that I get to fly over and cover festivals worldwide. Or used to anyway before the pandemic. It's what I miss the most after actually going to theaters.
 

hanselthecaretaker

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FWIW it currently has an 8.1 on IMDb after nearly a thousand ratings, whereas the previous two movies merely managed a 6.4 and 6.0 respectively. Of course, only time will tell where it settles in at.
 

Johnny Novgorod

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Here's what I think about Godzilla vs. Kong, no spoilers.

The fight(s) themselves are great, decently lit and overall wonderfully fun. And I wish they would take up more space in a movie called "Godzilla vs. Kong". Out of the two, Kong gets the bulk of the attention, being humanized and given some pathos about his existence while Godzilla is treated merely as a natural disaster that pops up now and then. I don't know if there's a fanbase for either but I imagine Team Godzilla will be pissed about this.

The human component gets in the way too many times, usually for totally irrelevant reasons, and don't provide a single good, interesting or especially likeable character. Nobody has so much as an arc in this movie, nor do we even get the typical Spielberg/Bay/Emmerich interpersonal drama of X looking for Y or A trying to prove B to C. Every character is simply doing something, usually their job.

Now for spoilers.

The actual fight: They go three rounds, with Godzilla winning first, Kong second and then Godzilla definitely besting Kong in a third (the spar being so brief it barely qualifies as a fight, but whatever). And obviously neither dies. As predicted, the climactic fight ends with Kong and Godzilla teaming up against Doomsday Mechagodzilla. They win and then fuck off to their respective habitats. While the fight itself is pretty spectacular, it does feel like an anticlimax. Though to be fair the reason for fighting in the first place (defining the "alpha predator" of the two) was pretty thin to begin with. And at least as far as humanity is concerned, it really doesn't matter who wins? The only reason they're fighting is basically to define who of the two will fuck off and leave the rest of us alone.

Last Jedi flashbacks: The movie divides the human element in two: those escorting Kong as part of the main plot (Skarsgard, Hall, token little girl acting as liaison to Kong), which overall is the fun, actually relevant part of the movie... and then the girl from Stranger Things and two other desperately unfunny comic relief types, going on a totally irrelevant sidequest where they infiltrate a bunch of bases, trying to figure out what an obviously evil company is up to. This is Canto Bight territory. It's bad enough their dialogue is purely expository and desperately unfunny, and that they're as far removed from Kong and Godzilla as possible, or even the other characters from the movie - but they also end up not mattering at all to the overall plot. Their big contribution to the story is emptying a flask on a keyboard (a genius move I remember from a Pete & Pete episode), which distracts Mechagodzilla for a crucial nanosecond during the final battle. And that's it. Half the movie, about 55 minutes, is wasted on a non-event.

Random complaint: The Alexander Skarsgard character is called a "coward" by the little girl and her mom near the beginning of the movie, when he cowers when first hearing Kong's roar. What a *****. His big thing at the end, the closest thing to an arc in the movie, is sacrificing himself to kickstart Kong's heart again (didn't they already to this in King of Monsters?). Except this isn't an arc at all, because the character has done nothing but brave, sensible things throughout the whole movie.

1) He risks his life to release Kong during the first fight, saving everybody else on the ship.
2) He then saves the woman and the girl from drowning by opening a hatch. The lady brilliantly locked herself and her daughter in moments earlier.
3) He saves everyone a third time by shutting off power on the ship, which makes Godzilla go away.
4) He gets chastised for killing the power, but immediately comes up with airlifting Kong to their destination.
5) He also comes up with tricking Kong into going to a specific place with the idea he might reunite with his kin. The lady does nothing but protest every idea by getting angry at the possibility of the worst possible outcome - even thought time and time again, it's the ONLY option they have left, and it ALWAYS works.
6) Now the guy sacrifices himself by distracting a monster from the lady and her girl, basically offering himself instead. Thankfully he doesn't die.
7) He pilots them both away to safety.
8) And now sacrifices himself a second time by safely leaving them on the side while he manually kickstarts Kong's heart with an explosion. This is treated as his big heroic turn, even though he's done nothing BUT throughout the whole movie.
 

Godzillarich(aka tf2godz)

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Here's what I think about Godzilla vs. Kong, no spoilers.

The fight(s) themselves are great, decently lit and overall wonderfully fun. And I wish they would take up more space in a movie called "Godzilla vs. Kong". Out of the two, Kong gets the bulk of the attention, being humanized and given some pathos about his existence while Godzilla is treated merely as a natural disaster that pops up now and then. I don't know if there's a fanbase for either but I imagine Team Godzilla will be pissed about this.

The human component gets in the way too many times, usually for totally irrelevant reasons, and don't provide a single good, interesting or especially likeable character. Nobody has so much as an arc in this movie, nor do we even get the typical Spielberg/Bay/Emmerich interpersonal drama of X looking for Y or A trying to prove B to C. Every character is simply doing something, usually their job.

Now for spoilers.

The actual fight: They go three rounds, with Godzilla winning first, Kong second and then Godzilla definitely besting Kong in a third (the spar being so brief it barely qualifies as a fight, but whatever). And obviously neither dies. As predicted, the climactic fight ends with Kong and Godzilla teaming up against Doomsday Mechagodzilla. They win and then fuck off to their respective habitats. While the fight itself is pretty spectacular, it does feel like an anticlimax. Though to be fair the reason for fighting in the first place (defining the "alpha predator" of the two) was pretty thin to begin with. And at least as far as humanity is concerned, it really doesn't matter who wins? The only reason they're fighting is basically to define who of the two will fuck off and leave the rest of us alone.

Last Jedi flashbacks: The movie divides the human element in two: those escorting Kong as part of the main plot (Skarsgard, Hall, token little girl acting as liaison to Kong), which overall is the fun, actually relevant part of the movie... and then the girl from Stranger Things and two other desperately unfunny comic relief types, going on a totally irrelevant sidequest where they infiltrate a bunch of bases, trying to figure out what an obviously evil company is up to. This is Canto Bight territory. It's bad enough their dialogue is purely expository and desperately unfunny, and that they're as far removed from Kong and Godzilla as possible, or even the other characters from the movie - but they also end up not mattering at all to the overall plot. Their big contribution to the story is emptying a flask on a keyboard (a genius move I remember from a Pete & Pete episode), which distracts Mechagodzilla for a crucial nanosecond during the final battle. And that's it. Half the movie, about 55 minutes, is wasted on a non-event.

Random complaint: The Alexander Skarsgard character is called a "coward" by the little girl and her mom near the beginning of the movie, when he cowers when first hearing Kong's roar. What a *****. His big thing at the end, the closest thing to an arc in the movie, is sacrificing himself to kickstart Kong's heart again (didn't they already to this in King of Monsters?). Except this isn't an arc at all, because the character has done nothing but brave, sensible things throughout the whole movie.

1) He risks his life to release Kong during the first fight, saving everybody else on the ship.
2) He then saves the woman and the girl from drowning by opening a hatch. The lady brilliantly locked herself and her daughter in moments earlier.
3) He saves everyone a third time by shutting off power on the ship, which makes Godzilla go away.
4) He gets chastised for killing the power, but immediately comes up with airlifting Kong to their destination.
5) He also comes up with tricking Kong into going to a specific place with the idea he might reunite with his kin. The lady does nothing but protest every idea by getting angry at the possibility of the worst possible outcome - even thought time and time again, it's the ONLY option they have left, and it ALWAYS works.
6) Now the guy sacrifices himself by distracting a monster from the lady and her girl, basically offering himself instead. Thankfully he doesn't die.
7) He pilots them both away to safety.
8) And now sacrifices himself a second time by safely leaving them on the side while he manually kickstarts Kong's heart with an explosion. This is treated as his big heroic turn, even though he's done nothing BUT throughout the whole movie.
I kind of expected King Kong was going to be the main star of the movie considering the set up so I don't really mind. You'd be surprised how much Godzilla isn't actually the main character in his own series.

Godzilla fighting Mothra movies, the millennium Mechagodzilla movies, hell the original King Kong versus Godzilla are examples of when the other monster is the main character
 

Johnny Novgorod

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I kind of expected King Kong was going to be the main star of the movie considering the set up so I don't really mind. You'd be surprised how much Godzilla isn't actually the main character in his own series.

Godzilla fighting Mothra movies, the millennium Mechagodzilla movies, hell the original King Kong versus Godzilla are examples of when the other monster is the main character
Sure, but ideally you want to balance a versus movie by giving you a reason to like both characters, right? Godzilla gets nothing from the script compared to Kong. Audiences have every reason to root for Kong, and absolutely no reason to prefer Godzilla. Also, something like Civil War or BvS have distinct possible outcomes depending on the winner, as well as good arguments to prefer either. Whether Godzilla or Kong win doesn't seem to matter.
 

hanselthecaretaker

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8) And now sacrifices himself a second time by safely leaving them on the side while he manually kickstarts Kong's heart with an explosion. This is treated as his big heroic turn, even though he's done nothing BUT throughout the whole movie.
Any chance they bust out a montage for this while Motley Crue’s Kickstart My Heart plays in the background? No? Well then, a missed opportunity if I may say so.

Really though, based on what you described to pass as a plot it wouldn't have been all that surprising.

Also if I had to guess, it’s the evil company (Monarch?) that builds Mechagodzilla to thwart the balance of nature Godzilla seeks to maintain so humans can be top dog again, but surprise!...It only reveals that humans were the biggest threat all along.
 

Johnny Novgorod

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Any chance they bust out a montage for this while Motley Crue’s Kickstart My Heart plays in the background? No? Well then, a missed opportunity if I may say so.

Really though, based on what you described to pass as a plot it wouldn't have been all that surprising.

Also if I had to guess, it’s the evil company (Monarch?) that builds Mechagodzilla to thwart the balance of nature Godzilla seeks to maintain so humans can be top dog again, but surprise!...It only reveals that humans were the biggest threat all along.
Pretty much that. Different company though. But the only case for Mechagodzilla being a bad idea is that it has a will of its own (for dumb, questionable reasons), rather than humanity not deserving the spot as top dog out of hubris or something. Frankly I don't see what's so villainous about the plan. It's as if the good guys in Pacific Rim were the bad guys.
 

hanselthecaretaker

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Wow. Ok, so now they’re bombing a movie that doesn’t even involve Snyder, other than being distributed by the company that actually responded to their rabid pleas and gave them the Snyder cut they demanded.
 
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Bob_McMillan

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Wow. Ok, so now they’re bombing a movie that has doesn’t even involve Snyder, other than being distributed by the company that listened to and gave them the Snyder cut they demanded.
Jesus Christ... I mean I will never take the side of a company, but this is just pathetic. Review bombing doesn't even really do anything. I wonder if Snyder himself ever gets embarrassed by shit like this.
 

Godzillarich(aka tf2godz)

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Wow. Ok, so now they’re bombing a movie that doesn’t even involve Snyder, other than being distributed by the company that actually responded to their rabid pleas and gave them the Snyder cut they demanded.
How low can you go I mean holy shit. Why did Godzilla fun do to deserve this crap, because our movie series was most successful?

Jesus Christ... I mean I will never take the side of a company, but this is just pathetic. Review bombing doesn't even really do anything. I wonder if Snyder himself ever gets embarrassed by shit like this.
If you change company to people working on the film trying to make it good being shit on because of jealousy it's easy to take company side.
 

happyninja42

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I still don't understand what the fuck needs "restoring" in the context of these films. I mean seriously, this #whine started AFTER the snyder cut was released, so what are they bitching about, and review bombing the monkey/lizard film for? Seriously does anyone know? I mean they got the fucking film, it's RESTORED, it exists, they were able to see it BEFORE the kong/zilla film. The article linked doesn't explain what they are bitching about.
 
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Godzillarich(aka tf2godz)

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I still don't understand what the fuck needs "restoring" in the context of these films. I mean seriously, this #whine started AFTER the snyder cut was released, so what are they bitching about, and review bombing the monkey/lizard film for? Seriously does anyone know? I mean they got the fucking film, it's RESTORED, it exists, they were able to see it BEFORE the kong/zilla film. The article linked doesn't explain what they are bitching about.
they want the shared Universe to continue
 

happyninja42

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they want the shared Universe to continue
....why do they think it won't continue? The ending of the snyder cut, clearly established the potential for an ongoing storyline and subsequent films.

*EDIT* You know, I realized I'm getting worked up over a bit of social media bullshit, about a movie and franchise I have zero interest in, and don't give two fucks about. So forget I asked.
 
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BrawlMan

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*EDIT* You know, I realized I'm getting worked up over a bit of social media bullshit, about a movie and franchise I have zero interest in, and don't give two fucks about. So forget I asked.
That is the most reasonable and best answer possible. Congratulations! Here is a tune for you.


Also, more about those crazy fans being dicks.