Godzilla vs Kong

[Solauren]

So, my wife and I just watched it.

My non-spoiler thoughts -
1 - The Titan fight scenes were absolutely awesome.
2 - The main human characters actually made sense. I wouldn't have minded some more fleshing out of one or two of them, but it wasn't really needed

My Spoiler Thoughts - Spoiler

1 - Hollow Earth - Is it really inside the Earth, or are those wormholes going somewhere else? I joked to my wife - And this is where we see the aliens from Pacific Rim.
2 - Yeah, I saw Mechagodzilla coming. Both Godzilla and Kong are 'good guys' most of the time. Godzilla always needs help to defeat Mechagodzilla.
3 - Well, at least we know what happened to the Ghidorah head. Oh, and using the regenerating evil alien monster as part of your super computer system, nothing stupid about that!
4 - Cliche 'corporate asshole character'. However, love how she died.
5 - GODZILLA LAUGHED AT KONG. That was just, EVIL sounding!
6 - Best of 3 goes to Godzilla. The movie goes to Kong.

[Gandalf]

My wife and I caught it last week. While I agree that the human characters made sense, I think they could have been pruned a little. But the film and ongoing series have weird tonal clashes like that, so none too bothered.

The big thing I liked about it was the reiteration of the best theme of these types of films; "history shows again and again how nature points out the folly of man"

[LadyTevar]

Well, when we started watching is when I found out my brother and especially my sis-in-law hadn't seen the last two. Cue movie-night becoming movie marathon as they got caught up on Background. Also gave me a refresher, tbh. Hearing Rando's voiceover as part of the starting credits for GvK was a giggle, and I'd forgotten he was part of the USS Lawson survivors (Godzilla's first attack on the US Navy).

The fight scenes were as epic as I expected from this series. It just left me feeling "ok, what next?" I mean, they have an egg that's either Battra or Mothra, they have a ton of monsters that AREN'T Toho (MutoQueen, Scylla, Behemoth, etc). Where do they go from here?

[Solauren]

The lisence expired last year for Godzilla and the other Toho copyrights. Toho let them delay the release due to Covid-19, but no one is discussing extending the license right now, as they wait out the pandemic, and see what the theater industry will look like afterwards.

Personally, I'd love to see them do a Godzilla/Kong vs Pacific Rim crossover.

[Q99]

I enjoyed it, a lot more than I did KotM (I was not a fan of Mark as lead). Not every part was good, but no-one really bugged me (like conspiracy-guy could've been improved, but he didn't detract like some of the comic relief in KotM did), Jia and Madison were both solid, and the kaiju action was fantastic.

Among monsterverse movies, it's jostling with Skull Island for my fav slot.

I also hope it's success in revitalizing the box office inspires more kaiju movies to be made ^^ Though even if it doesn't result in more monsterverse, it's a pretty solid end point.

[Majin Gojira]

It was a simpler, shallower film from human perspective. But it was also super fun. Kong had the best character arc of all the characters, and I liked that.

It's funny how the American films went from somber to goofy in less than a decade over 4 films, where it took the original Godzilla series ... Wait, no, that's exactly how long it took, just over more fims.

[Tsyroc]

I enjoyed it and it had a few nice nods to King Kong vs. Godzilla as well as other Godzilla movies.


I'm more of a Godzilla fan than a Kong fan but not by that much so I liked that they came up with a good balance with how things worked out.
I was actually not looking forward to this movie originally because I think, logically, Godzilla should win but I really didn't want to see Kong get curb stomped and I didn't want Kong to win because of some ridiculous new power or whatever. I had been somewhat relieved that the director had said there would be a clear winner but that everyone should be satisfied. I think he got that about right.

I just got the novelization today so I'll be starting on that soon. Supposedly, like most novelizations, it gives a little more context.


One thing about the Monsterverse series as a whole. The human technology has certainly improved at a very accelerated rate since the 2014 movie. What we saw then had humans at essentially our level of tech. KotM had that giant plane that could fly around the world while carrying several Ospreys inside, the oxygen destroyer, and the Castle Bravo underwater hidden base. This movie adds Apex' gravity ships, Mechagodzilla and Monarch's tunnel to the Hollow Earth in Antarctica.

I suppose some of those things, like the Castle Bravo Base, Kong's Containment and the tunnels to the Hollow Earth could have been started or even largely built before the 2014 movie. I do kind of wish they could have stayed a little more grounded in reality (besides the monsters) a little longer but I've still enjoyed the whole series of movies.

Kong Skull: Island and KotM had the best music.

Note: There's now a tunnel from the remains of Hong Kong to Kong Central in the Hollow Earth. That could be interesting.

[LadyTevar]

I just got the novelization today so I'll be starting on that soon. Supposedly, like most novelizations, it gives a little more context.

Let me know if it's worth the price. I'd like more details.

Note: There's now a tunnel from the remains of Hong Kong to Kong Central in the Hollow Earth. That could be interesting.

As I said, they left a lot of hanging threads there. Things that could be used in future movies. Tech, literal plot holes, and Mothra/Battra egg.

[Tsyroc]

As I said, they left a lot of hanging threads there. Things that could be used in future movies. Tech, literal plot holes, and Mothra/Battra egg.

I do wonder how many people actually saw how Mechagodzilla was performing before it got mega trashed? It might inspire others to try and take out the titans or it could scare the crap out of them, depending on what they know.

I would kind of like to see either a rebuilt Mechahgodzilla or some spin-off mech just get obliterated by Godzilla in no time flat. Given how Kong's charged up axe carved Mechagodzilla up I'm not sure it would stand up well against Godzilla's atomic breath or even a good tail strike. Godzilla just never got a chance to get a good shot in and then he and Kong were tag teaming it before Godzilla added some nuclear seasoning to Kong's can of whoopass.


Haven't got to the book yet. I've been working and I'd have fallen asleep if I tried reading it. I'm off the next couple of days so I'll probably get it done. I also picked up the two prequel graphic novels so I also have those to read.

[Tsyroc]

The novelization is pretty good. It fills out more of the backstories that are touched on in the film.

How the storm ended up moving onto Skull Island and pretty much destroying it. More about the links between Kong's species and the Iwi. There's a lot of stuff relating myths from various cultures to the Hollow Earth.

Some mentions of what I assume happens in the two prequel graphic novels, which I haven't read yet.

A brief appearance by another Titan that only appeared in the novelization of KotM.

It makes it a little more clear how the energy in the Hollow Earth works as well as explaining that Godzilla's beam is not just a radiation beam. His body converts radiation into the beam that is something else, but seems similar to the energy in the Hollow Earth. It kind of implies that most of the Titans have some link to that energy at all times but Apex was really able to mainline it with how they connected Mechagodzilla.

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One thing that has me scratching my head and it's apparently something I missed when I watched the film because people have been stating it and I thought they were wrong. Apparently Mechagodzilla uses two Ghidorah skulls. One for the control booth and the other inside Mechagodzilla's head. The book makes it clear that two skulls are sold to Simmons by someone who is probably Jonah but they avoid his name a bit. My question and confusion is where did they get the second Ghidorah skull? Did one of the skulls survive Boston? I thought both the right and left heads got vaporized in one of the nuclear pulses and the center head got smoked right at the end. Did the right side manage to turn enough so the skull survived? If so, how the hell did Jonah get that one too?

I had just assumed they used the one skull as the control booth and that inside Mechagodzilla was something they made from the skull or from remaining Ghidorah tissue.

[LadyTevar]

One thing that has me scratching my head and it's apparently something I missed when I watched the film because people have been stating it and I thought they were wrong. Apparently Mechagodzilla uses two Ghidorah skulls. One for the control booth and the other inside Mechagodzilla's head. The book makes it clear that two skulls are sold to Simmons by someone who is probably Jonah but they avoid his name a bit. My question and confusion is where did they get the second Ghidorah skull? Did one of the skulls survive Boston? I thought both the right and left heads got vaporized in one of the nuclear pulses and the center head got smoked right at the end. Did the right side manage to turn enough so the skull survived? If so, how the hell did Jonah get that one too?

I had just assumed they used the one skull as the control booth and that inside Mechagodzilla was something they made from the skull or from remaining Ghidorah tissue.

I think that might be a mistake. The one head survived ONLY because Godzilla had ripped it off prior to the Oxygen Destroyer hitting. The other three heads were totally destroyed by Godzilla's explosive pulses and by a final blast of breath weapon.
Jonah got the head from fishermen who'd dragged it up and needed money since the O-D killed all the fish and other lifeforms they'd relied on.

So unless the Novelization of "King of Monsters" says differently, there should be only ONE head.

[Tsyroc]

I think that might be a mistake. The one head survived ONLY because Godzilla had ripped it off prior to the Oxygen Destroyer hitting. The other three heads were totally destroyed by Godzilla's explosive pulses and by a final blast of breath weapon.
Jonah got the head from fishermen who'd dragged it up and needed money since the O-D killed all the fish and other lifeforms they'd relied on.

So unless the Novelization of "King of Monsters" says differently, there should be only ONE head.
[/quote]

I was sure it was a mistake until the novelization so I went back and watched the end of KotM.

Left head (Kevin): Definitely vaporized

This is where in looking at it more closely I get more confused. I had originally thought that it was the Center head that was still attached to the body when Godzilla stomped on Ghidorah's chest. Now I think It might have been the right head after looking again.

I was thinking that maybe one got blown off but looking some more it sure looks like at least two heads got smoked with the nuclear pulse and the last one got the atomic breath special. So I don't know where they got the other skull. I could see there maybe being older skulls around from ancient times. The KotM novelizations talked about Ghidorah having scars and scorch marks visible on it when it was still frozen in the ice. I think it was also talked about that in retrospect it was kind of obvious that the left head had been taken out before because of the scars.

Burning Godzilla vs. Ghidorah

[Tsyroc]

I finished the two prequel graphic novels.

Both are good.

The Kong one deals with Monarch messing up the tunnel to the Hollow Earth on Skull Island while making it big enough for their first attempt to fly manned aircraft into it. It causes another storm to merge with the one around Skull Island and move permanently onto the island, destroying the ecosystem. There's also a Titan that gets released and challenges Kong for Alpha status on the island. This is where they realize that if Kong leaves the island there's going to be issues with Godzilla.

The Godzilla one has him patrolling around after KotM making sure the Titans are getting settled and staying out of trouble. He interacts with Scylla, Behemoth, Tiamat, Amhuluk, and Na Kika for various reasons. He is also looking for a new home to rest and recharge in since his previous one got destroyed in KotM. There's some talk about too many of the Titans being awake at the same time being an issue because of resources.

[Solauren]

Possible solution for the 'dual skull' issue -
They cloned another skull.

Other possibility -
Part of the skull was in Mechagodzilla, the rest was in the control room.

[Tsyroc]

Possible solution for the 'dual skull' issue -
They cloned another skull.

Other possibility -
Part of the skull was in Mechagodzilla, the rest was in the control room.

Both of those are along the lines of what I thought from watching the movie, especially the later one. I just kept seeing videos saying "two skulls" and it was pissing me off because it didn't come across that way to me in the film and didn't make sense from what we saw in KotM. Then the novelization says that "Jonah" has two skulls to sell. WTF?

[Solauren]

Another possibility is that multiple skulls did survive, beyond the one Godzilla ripped off. Yeah, it doesn't seem likely, but we're talking about a movie with land and flying based life forms that violate the laws of physics and biology. A skull surviving really is low on the 'suspension of disbelief' scale.

[Tsyroc]

Another possibility is that multiple skulls did survive, beyond the one Godzilla ripped off. Yeah, it doesn't seem likely, but we're talking about a movie with land and flying based life forms that violate the laws of physics and biology. A skull surviving really is low on the 'suspension of disbelief' scale.

There's also that giant plane that could fly around with multiple Osprey's inside etc...

[Tsyroc]

Would Mechagodzilla actually withstand a good hit from Godzilla's atomic breath...or more than a few good interactions with Godzilla's spines while charged up?

Based on the way Kong carved up Mechagodzilla with the energized axe I think that Godzilla could do pretty well against Mechagodzilla if he get a shot or two in early on. In the movie Mecha G was beating his ass and also avoiding anything that seemed like it might be a powerful attack from Godzilla. Mecha G is very powerful but I don't think it can stand up to the sort of stuff it is dishing out.