Skip to main content

Godzilla: King Of The Monsters Review (No Spoilers)

Godzilla is one of the most recognisable movie characters in history. Being a staple in Japanese cinema. However, he hasn't really faired well in Hollywood. There was the first movie adaptation in 1998 directed by Roland Emmerich (Independence Day, 2012) which many fans of the character took a serious disliking too and then there was the reboot in 2014 directed by Gareth Edwards (Rogue One) which fans were nicer too but overall weren't entirely pleased. But that movie was the first in a cinematic Monster Universe that Warner Bros is hoping to continue. With the 2014 Godzilla movie, Kong: Skull Island (2017, Jordan Vogt-Roberts) and with this current follow-up Godzilla: King Of The Monsters (2019, Michael Dougherty)

Initial Thoughts

This movie is awesome! Sure, it's dumb and loud. But it's a movie about giant monsters fighting each other. It's not meant to be deep and meaningful. It's meant to be crazy and explosive! And it does that very well. So if you're a fan of Kaiju movies then you will definitely love this movie!

Monster Fights

Now, let's be honest, the reason fans love these movies is because of the crazy monster fights, and whilst the first movie didn't really have a lot of fighting in it, this one definitely does! And it is amazing to watch! Each Titan looks incredible and each shine in different parts of the movie, some of them quite literally. This movie does a great job of capturing the scale of what a fight between giant monsters would look like. With huge destruction and carnage! You could definitely see why these creatures would be considered as Gods. It was amazing to watch! So if you're going mainly for the Monster fights then you will not be disappointed!

Madison/Millie Bobby Brown

Millie Bobby Brown (Stranger Things) is always great to watch. She's definitely one of the best child actors working right now. She brings a fair bit of heart to this movie, which at points it needs. My only problem with her in this movie is that she doesn't really get a lot of screentime. Instead, most of the time is focused on her dad (Kyle Chandler) and the organization Monarch. Who are actually kinda boring. So it was annoying that she was just a supporting character even though the promotional material for this movie focuses on Godzilla and her. Madison should have really been the main human character for this movie.

Mark and Emma/Kyle Chandler & Vera Farmiga

I think the movie's biggest mistake was focusing on these two characters. They were both quite dull and boring to watch. They start the movie off as pretty interesting characters. They have a sad backstory, each has their own way of dealing with it, but as the movie goes on they just get boring. And the decisions that they make throughout the movie don't really make much sense. Making it harder to relate to them at all. 

Monarch

Most of the slower moments happen with Monarch. Basically, they're there for exposition and not much else. The movie tries to flesh out some of its characters in the Monarch scenes but there are basically too many characters in the Monarch organisation so the audience doesn't feel a close connection with any of them, so even when a few of them die it doesn't really have much of an impact. Although, I will give prompts to Bradley Whitford's character for being a good source of comic relief. And I did like that Monarch was at least diverse. Giving representation to different minorities and also for female characters. Which was good.

Future Movies

It's no secret that the next movie is Godzilla Vs Kong (2020, Adam Wingard) which the film does allude to a couple of times. Not really getting in the way of the main story, which was good to see as many franchises fall into the trap of taking up time to allude to future movies. And if that movie has as many good action scenes as this movie did then I am pumped! One thing that was good about both Kong: Skull Island and Godzilla: King Of The Monsters is that they had great action scenes. So if they can continue with that then I am in! They just need to work on the human characters. Millie Bobby-Brown is back for the next one so hopefully, they give her a bigger role in that movie!

Conclusion

This is a wild, insane movie! Full of action and carnage. It'll satisfy fans of Monster movies and lovers of disaster movies. The monsters in this movie are insane and Godzilla lives up to the title of the king! The human characters kinda slow it down a bit and aren't fleshed out enough for audiences to care. But they don't take away from the awesomeness of watching Godzilla and Ghidorah duking it out on this scale!

So that's my review of Godzilla: King Of The Monsters. What did you think of the movie? Do you agree or disagree with anything that I said? Please leave a comment down below. And, if you liked this review then you can follow this blog for more content. Thank you for reading!

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Auteurship: David Fincher

The Auteur theory is that a director's film reflects the director's personal creative vision.  I am going to use  David Fincher as an example, because he usually has similar aspects throughout all of his films such as bleakness of a setting; several single frames that flash, low-key lighting and characters that are in the shadows so you can’t see their faces. All of these styles can be found in Fight Club (1999). In most of Fincher’s films the settings seem to have a bleak and uninteresting look to them. In Fight Club this is shown in places like the office of where Jack works, the cancer support group hall, Jack’s apartment. All of these places are just different shades of the same colour (mainly green, grey or dark orange). This is to convey a sense of misery and darkness within the storyline, which the characters are just drifting through their lives. Something that Fincher portrays beautifully in Fight Club. This is a good example of David Fincher’s position as an Au...

Oz: The great and Powerful Review

When I first heard that this film was being made I was very skeptical. The Original film with Dorothy and the wicked witch was an important part of many people's childhood that it seemed that this prequel couldn't live up to it. But after seeing it at the cinema my skepticism was laid to rest. This film is AWESOME!!!    The film follows a similar structure narrative-wise to that of the Wizard of Oz. You start off with in Kansas where everything is in black-and-white, keeping to continuity, then you have the twister that takes the character to the land of Oz. The audience is then introduced important characters like Theodora and Evanora, we even get the journey down the yellow-brick road. The writers have brilliantly taken all these elements from the previous film and used them to create a contemporary origin to the Oz that children were introduced too in 1939.    James Franco was well cast in this role as a rude and selfish magician who w...

Star Wars: The Last Jedi: Trailer Highlights

Star Wars: The Last Jedi New Poster So Star Wars: The Last Jedi (2017) comes out in December and we're only now getting the second trailer, just two months away from the release date. Either Disney has seriously dropped the ball on the promotional campaign or they're just so confident in this film that they feel it doesn't require a lot of publicity for fans to get excited about. My guess would be the latter. Since the past two Disney-Produced Star Wars films have both raked in a combined total of $3,124,280,897, It'd be safe to say that Disney would think that. However, right before the trailer was released last night, director Rian Johnson (Looper, Brick) suggested to fans that they should avoid this trailer. WHAT?! What kind of a marketing tactic is that?! Perhaps if you wish for fans to avoid spoilers then you should urge the marketing campaign to avoid them at all costs. Initial Thoughts Yeah! This trailer has me more intrigued about the story than ever, ...