2024: Let's Try Villains Again

We were just having fun a few weeks ago when I realized that our villain pick, Jason Bateman in Carry-On (2024) was probably pretty weak sauce and mostly because I had just seen it. 2024 had a surprising amount of great on screen villains that we failed to recognize, so here we go!

Connor McGregor in Road House (2024)

Connor McGregor is a pretty awful person in real life, but boy is he a charismatic villain here! He's an absolute force of nature, psychotic, gleeful, and unstoppable. He has a memorable intro, butt naked and totally comfortable strutting his stuff around a chaotic environment. I hate to say he's pretty damn charismatic, too. The stakes in Road House are really solid, and he ends up being too much for even the people who hired him to control. That's all to say, it's really easy to hate him, but he also brings such competence and a challenge for Jake Gyllenhaal after the other goons are so dumb that you kind of cheer for him, too.

Dementus in Furiosa (2024)

Chris Hemsworth is an underrated villain and does a great impression of his grandfather here as the wildman throwing a wrench into Immortan Joe's works. He's a roving bandit of a villain, one utterly terrible at settling down even though that's what he's trying to do. You see him try to climb the ladder opposite to Furiosa but he's staggeringly incompetent. Furiosa seeks her revenge but finds more than anything she's outgrown him, and what seemed scary as a kid its just kind of a pathetic wiener man. He's got a magnificent arc, even it's a downward trajectory.

Evil monkeys

There was that weird guy in Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes (2024) and the weird red monkey from Godzilla X Kong and of course, Robbie Williams. Strong year for Apes. Scar King was interesting, totally a sort of wicked bad guy who mostly hid behind a strong spin whip and frost beast. Intelligent and a worthy adversary, though. You don't often see Godzilla villain kaiju hatching schemes. Proxima Caesar, was that his name? He was just having fun and probably arrives too late into the film to be a huge presence, but he's notable and has a great death.

Anything we missed?

First Impressions: Godzilla vs. KONG

 Here we go, folks - one of my most anticipated films of the year and it did not disappoint! It disappointed a little, but we'll get into that. Godzilla vs. KONG (2021) exists in such a weird context in every possible way, but we'll discuss that as well and dive into the biggest film of the year so far! SPOILERS for any Godzilla-loving fan out there, so be warned, feable populace.

Smashy smashy!

I am a Godzilla fan. Have been one since I was a little kid. I can tell you the difference between Kumonga and Kamacuras and eat up pretty much everything TOHO spits out. This mentality colors my reaction to these new films quite a bit. I am not a purist or anything, I think the Godzilla mythos can evolve and change, although there are some ridiculously bad interpretations, both recently (and out of Japan), and the more famous American 1998 version (that did, however, lead to a pretty good cartoon show). When dealing with Godzilla, you also always have to remember that the series has always been corny and campy and the best films have a nice dose of both the serious destruction as well as the lampshaded nature of how bonkers the whole premise of giant fire breathing lizards are.

The Legendary Studios' Monsterverse, kicked off in 2014, has had more good entries than bad, with each subsequent film arguably getting better than the one before it. Each subsequent film has also gotten much much crazier. Godzilla (2014) is mostly the world's reaction to a giant creature re-appearing today, and it is safe to say now that all the JAWS (1975) parallels were pretty misguided and the whole thing is pretty boring until the ending fight, which is still top notch. Then KONG: Skull Island (2017) got its due to introduce a giant ape, and it ratcheted up insane set pieces, monster fights, and presents a pretty fun movie with a renowned but game cast. I have gushed quite a bit over King of the Monsters (2019), which to me was a perfect representation of the campy fights from the Showa Era with the budget and backing of a major studio blockbuster.

Slowly, though, this universe has introduced more and more sci-fi elements which have just exploded by the time we get to Godzilla vs. KONG. In Godzilla (2014) we maybe had barely nuclear capabilities. In GvK we are traveling to the center of the earth inside anti-gravity spaceships. It's maybe not wackier than the giant submarine base and airship from KotM, but there is a heightened campiness on display that is either fun or world-breaking, depending on your viewpoint. I am all about it. I love unexplained giant bases and corporations that fund insanely complicated enterprises that bend reality. The film wisely doesn't get hung up on this logic, and if you've already entered the Godzilla vs. KONG door, you shouldn't either.

The film certainly takes some liberties with its premise. KONG is now in an enclosure - who the hell knows how they set that thing up. It's not outright said that Godzilla has murdered all the other Titans from KotM, I would be saddened to hear that, but it seems as if he does require all other Titans to bow to him, something that KONG would never do. So Rebecca Hall, who I only just realized now has not been in a great movie in a very long time, has tried to keep him hidden away.

Meanwhile, Godzilla is seemingly attacking human settlements unprovoked, but clearly these humans are up to no good and challenging his supremacy. It is a little weird that this movie is primarily driven by conflicts over pride - Godzilla basically just wants to continuously decimate any potential rival. But really, isn't that the basis of most human conflict? Almost as if the biggest monster...is ourselves.

The film wisely paints Godzilla as the antagonist half of this titular brawl. Not only is KONG more relatable from just an ape to human sense, but he's the clear underdog here. Godzilla is bigger, tougher, and has one of the most potent weapons in cinema in his atomic breath. The film does a great job of letting us into KONG's mentality, which is basically a desire to just sit around and eat bananas, but also a homesick loneliness for his long lost kind. He's also visibly older, not just bigger, but greyer, with a big beard. We get not one, not two, but three major Godzilla vs. KONG fights, which is fantastic. It's rare that a film billed as a crossover match-up actually delivers on satisfying goods, and this does so very well.

Godzilla is a terrifying enemy. The first fight is also completely on his turf, in open water as the scientists sail KONG away to try to find the center of the earth. Godzilla effortlessly dismisses the human navy and beats the hell out of KONG, who does get some fun platforming in, but you really do feel how the odds are stacked against him. Again, there's no real reason for their conflict besides Godzilla just being sort of a dick who can't share, but we can't get hung up on complexity here, it's just not that kind of movie. And again, there are so many human conflicts that get caught up in the same kind of non-logic. Like...all of them.

It really is such a perfect match-up though. Apes and alligators are natural enemies, from Donkey Kong and K. Rool to King Kong and those pesky dinosaurs. Okay, so both these examples were Kongs, but my point holds up. Even us humans, as primates naturally fear and fight the reptiles of the earth. Godzilla does seem very gator-ish in this, with an unusually high amount of biting and crawling.

The human story is so bad and uninteresting, but I might say not nearly at KotM levels or Godzilla (2014). The film also wisely splits them up into a KONG half and Godzilla half. The KONG half features Rebecca Hall, Alex Starsgard, and a young deaf native girl trying to reunite KONG with his ancestral homeland so that they may siphon ancient mystical life force power into a human-made Supremacy module. Not every character knows that at all times, but it's enough to push this story forward and they don't get bogged down in their petty garbage too much.

On the Godzilla side, though, Brian Tyree Henry's conspiracy theorist comes off a little played out - I kept thinking of Woody Harrelson in 2012 (2009). Also in an age where conspiracy theories are widely believed and disseminated, I'd like a film to not indulge big conspiracies as true. Millie Bobby Brown is also there, she doesn't really do much and is a rare continuation of the same character from one film to the next in this series. I have no idea why the Monsterverse has been so reticent to retain characters, but I kind of like it. We're here for the monsters, not the people. Including Kyle Chandler who is I guess leading Monarch, now? And Lance Reddick who, oof, way to get into the opening credits and then appear for one line in one scene.

We can complain about this all day, but get real, the human characters in Godzilla films are always, always, ALWAYS hot garbage. It is a shame. I don't know why giant monsters fighting each other can't carry a film. That story arc of a centuries-long battle for Titan supremacy is interesting and it's what we're here for. I can't say enough how bad this plays out in the Godzilla Earth Anime Trilogy. I really tried to give those movies a chance because the themes at work seemed really interesting, but crap, those humans are insufferable and indistinguishable.

It isn't the greatest excuse to say that it's okay that this film grinds to a halt every time we go back to the Godzilla humans and their conspiracy meetings because that's the case with every Kaiju movie and its humans. It'd be nice to have at least one movie with interesting humans. I guess I'm still partial to KotM's Bradley Whitford and Ken Watanabe. Not so much Charles Dance and Vera Farmiga, whose motivations just didn't resonate well. I feel like good humans are possible. Maybe not, because they can't really fight or take interest away from the giant monsters. Unless you give Mark Wahlberg an Alien Sword! It's all right there.

KONG eventually meets up with Godzilla in Hong Kong, and despite Pacific Rim (2013) seemingly cornering the market on rainy, neon Hong Kong fights, it proves ample ground for another marquee match-up. There are a lot of great moments. Godzilla uses his atomic breath to burn a hole through the earth's crust. KONG finds an axe that he swings like THOR. It's all sorts of fun. And impressively, the movie actually gives us a winner - Godzilla pretty much puts the smack down on KONG and proves he's the dominant species. BUT....that's not all that this movie has in store for us...

So, the fictional company APEX is trying to use secret planet Titan life force to power its own man-made dominant predator....Mechagodzilla! I did get a little spoiler, but I was pumped to see Mechagodzilla here. And somehow the transition from title fight to team-up fight isn't as contrived as Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice (2016), who also paused to fight a giant grey villain at the end. If only we had a Lady Godzilla join the fray! Then the movie would be complete.

I am a big Mechagodzilla fan, the Showa version was such a sinister capper to the era, and Terror of Mechagodzilla (1974) remains my favourite film of that run. It was always run by the Black Hole Aliens, though, and lacked a real personality or even antagonism of its own against Godzilla. Super Mechagodzilla and Kiryu were human creations to try to combat Godzilla, and I hate to say that this modern design does not beat Kiryu in pure coolness. The GvK Mechagodzilla (what do we call this? Mechagodzilla 4? Please exclude Ready Player One [2018]) combines some of these ideas. In Terror of Mechagodzilla the robot was piloted by a human brain (the daughter of a humanity-hating scientist, whose life the aliens saved through cybernetics, it's...um....it's complicated). In Godzilla Against Mechagodzilla (2003), Kiryu is built around the 1954 Godzilla's skeleton, whose soul periodically comes back to life and takes over. It's never as bad as GvK and is ultimately a weird plot point in the two films it starts in without much consequence.

In one of the many bits of mangled continuity that makes no sense, here Mechagodzilla 4 is built around one of two King Ghidorah heads, the other being the basis for a telepathic link-up and piloted by a Japanese guy who never speaks (okay - it was Serizawa?! As in THAT Serizawa's son? This is literally never mentioned in the film!). It feels only slightly Pacific Rim-y (2013), but is actually a creative use of something never really explored previously, but how the hell do the three Ghidorah heads work. From there we get a little Megatron taking over Galvatron action a la Transformers: Age of Extinction (2014), where Ghidorah starts running the show and destroys its creators. Yeah, maybe a little Frankenstein in there, too.

It works well as narrative shorthand. Godzilla recognizes his mechanical counterpart as both a threat as an APEX predator and the remains of Ghidorah. They fight, and Mechagodzilla kicks his ass, although he was pretty weakened from the fight with KONG. It reminded me of an age old tale where both combatants are too busy fighting each other to realize that they need their full strength to beat their REAL enemy. Teamwork. These movies have messages.

KONG is able to swing the axe, powered by Godzilla's fire breath, with lethal precision, dicing his way through Mechagodzilla and eventually chopping its head off. I don't know what it is with this series and lopping heads off. Godzilla did it to the MUTO in his first movie, they do it do Ghidorah, and again here. They also seem to like the idea of opening mouths to pour in fire breath. I suppose with relatively resistant outer skins the easy way to defeat a Titan is to burn them from the inside out. Mechagodzilla maybe goes down a little too easy, especially considering how fast it dispatched Godzilla. I'd also like to get a better look at it - I'm just a fan and felt like we never got to sit down and take in its glory or really see it be a huge evil dick, but as a last minute inclusion and way of bringing back Godzilla and KONG together, that wasn't going to happen.

Yeah, there's a bit of begrudging respect at the end. Godzilla could still annihilate KONG, but doesn't out of respect for KONG taking down the Mecha. It's actually a decent arc, and one that I appreciated. It was nice, and honestly rare, to have both a definitive winner and a satisfying ending to this hyped up mega-match.

My mind wanders to the other "great" mega-match marquee films. Freddy vs. Jason (2003). Alien vs. Predator (2004). Batman v. Superman. And of course, the original King Kong vs. Godzilla (1962), which sorry, folks, is truly terrible. I hate that I actually like a lot of these. Godzilla vs KONG might be at the top, though. That isn't actually high praise, but this film was pretty good, pretty fun, and a great Friday night at home.

That's right - let's dig into that one! This did get a theatrical release, which has gotten some people back to the theater, but not enough quite yet to justify many studios confidently arranging their release schedules. The big nod, though, was HBOMax, where it was the most widely watched movie in that platform's short history. We are certainly at an odd crossroads right now. On the one hand we simply have all these leftover massive films stacking up from pandemic delays that studios will eventually burn off one way or another. It's hard to exactly see the economic impact from shuttering towards streaming. I can say that I am at least appreciative - this is undoubtedly the kind of movie built for the big screen, but I am perfectly happy not driving somewhere, paying a ton of money for drinks and snacks, being able to pause whenever I need a restroom break, or interacting with any human being at all. It's all bliss and I'll give HBOMax all the money in the world to release all their movies on this platform for all of 2022 and beyond.

The future of the Monsterverse is also up in the air. In the post-Avengers (2012) world every studio wanted their own shared universe, and it is once again an impressive statement to say that the best one is this scrappy little Legendary Kaiju corner. It really even beats the DCEU by a good margin. What's the worst movie? Godzilla (2014)? That's not bad at all, folks. It has never really lit up the box office, although it's certainly finding a cultural moment to shine right now with a dearth of other big shared cinematic experiences to talk about.

I'm in a weird spot - I would love to see more of these films, especially developing other Kaiju and giving them the big screen modern mega-budget treatment. We've gotten to see quite a bit by now, but I'd be into developing some kind of Monster Island (this seemed like it would be Skull Island for a while, a notion not really dismissed until this film made that clear). One of the biggest things I left KotM wanting to see more of is each Titan, their backstory and how they interact. It's weird but one thing I really loved about the Showa era, and even Heisei films like Godzila vs. Mechagodzilla II (1993) was how Godzilla seemed to hang out with his buddies, Rodan, Mothra, and Anguirus.

The movies so far have burned through his more famous archenemies, but I'd still be into two big bads he has left - Space Godzilla and Destoroyah, the latter of which was foreshadowed with the mention of the Oxygen Destroyer in KotM. Although that could have also just been a reference to the 1954 Godzilla, which itself was referenced in Godzilla vs. Destoroyah (1995). There's a lot of places it can go, and one of the most fun ways might just be being content to throw up a few Monsters of the Week like Megalon and Gigan into the mix. It does feel weird since these movies are such events. It's a little different when they take so long to produce and need to feel so epic when they're out. It's not like rubber costumes in the 60s that TOHO just cranked out with low budgets. I'm not sure how this scale could ever do small character-driven breaks like Marvel does with Ant-Man & the Wasp (2018) and Spider-Man: Far From Home (2019) in between its giant epics.

Or maybe it's done. It sure felt that way after King of the Monsters. Its box office wasn't really there, and no one seemed to care. Godzilla vs. KONG definitely doesn't have the money to back it up, but that's not its fault. This is really going to come down to whether or not Warner Brothers wants to milk more out of this IP with more obscure or possibly new characters in a post-pandemic world or put it to rest. There's no telling.

Godzilla vs. KONG was really fun, it's a nice cure for COVID shut-in blues right now, and quite honestly, just great to see a big new escapist action film again. Obviously this was made pre-COVID but I'm curious if it is building a trend of absolutely un-realistic action adventure blockbusters that take us away from our horrible lives, and in many ways a complete reversal of the grounded, serious, grimdark action adventure we had for most of the last 15 years or so. Time will tell.

Go watch it! It's free, who cares.

Let's Cautiously Look at Cool 2021 Things

This is going to be real, REAL cautious, folks. It was a tough debate to even do this again this year. Half of these are holdovers from our 2020 Anticipated List. Ahhh January 2020. What an innocent time to be alive. So, there's always a chance these don't actually come out this year, in addition to the super real possibility that everything sucks. Every year I tend to look at my list and think, "Wow, what the hell was I thinking?" We live in a state of constant disappointment, mostly connected to big blockbuster movies that always leave us spiritually unfulfilled. WE'RE PRETTY SURE THAT WON'T HAPPEN THIS YEAR.

So, in no particular order....

Oh, and we're not even bothering to put dates on these. Maybe odds that we actually see them, though!

#1: Godzilla vs. Kong
Odds on Watching: 100%

Did Kong grow a beard?

My strong number one. Listen, I'm a complete convert - this will likely be the last of these, there's just no way this series continues unless it makes a ridiculous amount of money, and its sentencing to HBOMax seems to be a death knell for that. Or maybe it will better expose the series. I feel like it's trying to so hard, each film has been competent and fun in its own way - amazingly, Godzilla (2014) may be the worst of the lot. But I also hate to say, four films in seven years isn't quite enough to sustain an interesting shared universe that is fresh in our minds. There is also no consistency in human characters, which should never matter, but it also feels empty. I clearly don't care about any of that, I just want to lean into the bonkers bent this franchise has taken and see it run wild without consequence.

DUNE
Odds: 95%

DUNE is also set for HBOMax, but it's hard to tell what we'll look like in October. Might we all be over? Might our paradigms shift again to theaters? It's hard to tell exactly. I've never been a huge Duner, I haven't read the novel, I saw the David Lynch attempt and Jodorowsky's Dune (2013), and it's all cool, but my hype doesn't totally come from fandom. It mostly comes from Denis Villeneuve and Blade Runner 2019 (2017). He's the clearest master of contemporary thinking sci-fi. This movie will surely bomb but be awesome.

The Suicide Squad
Odds: 93%

This is another HBOMax hopeful, and one of the few superhero films I believe will not let me down. It's not very fair that DC just keeps getting free re-dos on all its movies, but I still have hype for this. James Gunn has proven himself time and time again, and the vibe feels like it's moving in a truer direction than Suicide Squad (2016), which makes me more angry each subsequent time I think about it. I am not a fan at all of movies playing with definite articles to distinguish themselves, I wish this just went weirder like Suicide Squad 1.5: Suicidier Squad but I am unfortunately not in charge of these things. The cast is bigger, weirder, more expendable, and the general attitude feels more irreverent in a way that fits the property. There has been a lot of good adaptations in other media, though, from the animated Suicide Squad: Hell to Pay (2018), which balanced the kind of mission this group would do much better, the Harley Quinn TV show, which is close enough, and upcoming video games. I have high hopes.

The Tomorrow War
Odds: 86%

It's been an entire year and I know no further information about this. It's a movie about drafting people from the past to fight aliens in the future or something. Directed by Chris McKay, who wasn't done too much besides The LEGO Batman Movie (2017), but that's something and starring Chris Pratt, who needs to recharge his leading man status after a few years off at this point. It's supposed to drop in July, so it should be okay, right? Who knows. I'm always into original sci-fi, even if they are mostly terrible.

Venom: Let There be Carnage
Odds: 81%

Listen, I think the first Venom (2018) is pretty underrated. It's not like....good, but it's a pretty fun movie. The ending fight is just kind of whatever and feels like every superhero movie ever, but there is some really dire antihero stuff leading up to that. It's enough that I'm into another shot at this interpretation. Things that worry me - Andy Serkis is not a proven director after making the far inferior competing Jungle Book adaptation a few years ago. Woody Harrelson still feels egregiously miscast as Cletus Kassidy. And the main villain from the first one was an insane symbiote, so the main villain here is....an insane symbiote? I'm pretty much done with mirrored superhero villains. Why is this on this list? Well, I hope it has more brain eating I guess. If this doesn't make it into the theaters hopefully we'll at least get to see it on Crackle.

No Time to Die
Odds: 78%

I was really thinking about this. Do we need or want a new Bond film? But really, isn't it always a big deal when we get another installment in one of the most storied film franchises of all time? It should be. It is inconceivable that it's been six years since S.P.E.C.T.R.E. (2015), which ties the longest time without a new Bond since the series began in 1962. The only other time was in between License to Kill (1989) and GoldenEye (1995) and that pause was due to heavy fatigue, re-tooling, re-casting, and re-evaluation. Now, obviously this break wasn't that intentional, and I'm not sure if we should be destined to ALWAYS have a Bond film every couple of years, but it's also insane that Daniel Craig was playing world-wearied, old out of shape Bond NINE years ago now in Skyfall (2012).

I straight up don't count Never Say Never Again (1983), but if you throw that in, Connery played Bond for 20 years in seven movies (conversely if you are like me, he played the role in six movies over nine years). Lazenby was one and done of course. Roger Moore did seven movies in twelve years, Dalton two in two, and Brosnan four in seven. All this means that Craig's tenure over fifteen years is the longest ever, if you don't count Connery's '83 outing. He's only done five films, however, ranking under both Connery and Moore.

This was the first big casualty of the pandemic, the studio pulled it last April at the last second. MGM needs a streaming service, huh? Bond ownership has been all over the place. Maybe it'll be streaming somewhere. Universal seems to be creeping up, maybe we'll watch this in between The Office on Peacock.

Barb and Star Go to Vista Del Mar
Odds: 70%

Kristen Wiig hasn't really gone away - she's had Ghostbusters (2016) and Wonder Woman 1984 (2020), but since Bridesmaids (2011) she's done far more tiny indie films than using its success as a springboard to comedy stardom like a Will Ferrell, or hell, even a Melissa McCarthy who DID use Bridesmaids as that springboard. This feels like the first movie where she's returning to that fun, broad comedy, and damn we need it. She's pairing with longtime writing partner but seldom seen on screen, Annie Mumolo for this. I'm excited. There is no real safety net here, though - we'll see if it gets to theaters!

The Last Duel
Odds: 77%

This is far off, set for October, when the world will obviously be healed and fine. Matt Damon is a medieval dude who wants to fight Adam Driver for supposedly raping his wife. That sounds like a fun time at the cinema if I've ever heard it. It's directed by Ridley Scott, which should be a good thing, like thirty years ago. He's still a good director, right! I forget that he did The Martian (2015). He's also 83 years old. He has pedigree with period pieces - Gladiator (2000) of course, Kingdom of Heaven (2005), uhh...Robin Hood (2010)? It's also written by Matt and Ben Affleck - these are Academy Award-winning writers, people. Affleck also plays the King of France. Do you love it when you just know that accent is not going to sound right? There's enough here that I am pretty interested. Mainly Adam Driver, I guess.

Army of the Dead
Odds: 68%

Zack Snyder directs a Vegas zombie heist film! What the hell is going on? This is like a B-movie but with the pedigree of a big time director. Well, at least a financially successful director. Dawn of the Dead (2004) is what made Snyder, man, this is going to be great. Or it's the high concept that sounds fun on paper but just falls apart because there's not actually anything there. But Zack Snyder is such a master of subtext and nuance - nothing could go wrong!

The Green Knight
Odds: 76%

This looks so cool! Another medieval movie! Why not? Dev Patel is an underrated actor, A24 despite recent flops is not far away from its perfect 2018 territory. It just looks silly and fun but also very serious and fun. I am hoping this can come in and be that underground film that really speaks to me and stays with me for a long time. Or it'll be completely bungled. Either way, this might be my #1 movie that doesn't feature a giant ape.

Kong is King: Apes and Other Jungle Shenanigans

There aren't a lot of cinematic icons bigger than King Kong, and today marks the eighth time the big lug, the Grape Ape come to life if you will, hits the big screen. Now, I'm sure you think that's like five times too many, but I jest you not. We talk a lot about pop culture sustainability here at Norwegian Morning Wood, and there's not much of a better case than Kong.

Don't talk back.

The first film, dropping in 1933 was just so huge. It was spectacle before spectacle was a thing. The effects were masterful at the time, and the adventure crossed pulp roots with big screen engrossment. Soon Son of Kong (1933) followed, and by soon I meant nine months later. I mostly know that exists due to a Futurama joke. Then nothing happened for a while. For some reason Toho in Japan wanted in on the action for their third Godzilla movie, even though the role of Godzilla antagonist was clearly meant for Frankenstein, which makes far less sense. King Kong shouldn't have electricity powers you say, well, why the hell should Frankenstein for that matter?!

We got King Kong vs. Godzilla (1962) and King Kong Escapes (1967) - where the ape fights the impeccable Mechani-Kong. I remember being really excited to finally watch King Kong vs. Godzilla as a kid, because obviously, watching these two titans of cinema go at must be awesome, right? It's a crossover movie fifty years before crossover movies were de rigueur in Hollywood! And forty years before Freddy vs. Jason (2003). But that movie blew chunks hard, even for a poorly dubbed Blockbuster video Godzilla film. It had the monsters but lacked the mash.

Next in the 70s we got the first redux of the classic Blonde meets Ape story, King Kong (1976). This installment is strangely forgotten today, although it was pretty popular at the time. I wonder if that has anything to do with the ape climbing the Twin Towers rather than the Empire State Building. It even won the Academy Award for best visual effects, along with nominations in cinematography and sound. It is most notable today for starring Jessica Lange and Jeff Bridges. Its sequel, that came out ten years later, King Kong Lives (1986) was basically universally hated and dismissed, despite starring Linda Hamilton fresh off The Terminator (1984).

Finally, our last outing with the ape has been Pete Jackson's King Kong (2005), which is a film that, despite its faults, I'm a big fan of. There is a tremendous amount of melodrama, hundreds of minutes of superfluous scenes, and the non-Naomi Watts casting really misses the mark. Still, it's chock full of iconic scenes that are all given proper weight and awe, along with competent action cinematography, a distinctive take on the Ape (really making him an Ape), and who can forget Bruce Baxter using a comb as a moustache or swinging on vines shooting bugs. I can't. I can't. I still hate the idiotic Jamie Bell side plot that goes no where and is horribly distracting. There's some rough edges for sure, but what are you to expect with the truest "Kong really wants to fuck this blonde chick" version of this story that we're going to get? The natives are pretty bad in this one, too. As part of that pair with Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest (2006) setting the standard in the mid-2000s. You know, back when people were just savages.

At any rate, here we are at Legendary's completely not-forced at all second installment in their Shared Giant Monsters Universe, KONG: Skull Island (2017). This is promising in that it doesn't seem to resemble an 84-year old story regurgitated for the fourth time, but rather a different take - different people surveying the island, different time period (ironically or not echoing the King Kong '76 era), and what looks like some drastically different characters, goals, motivations, and monsters. It's rad, yo!

So what is our critical, commercial, and cultural potential? Well, critically the film does not appear to be doing well. Consensus is that it's pretty awful, although fully into itself being an expensive giant monster B-movie, which isn't really a bad thing at all. Also apparently John C. Reilly is a dream. Of course he is. It doesn't seem like this film was out to win any favors from critics, but as long as it's fine with that and sets out to do what it is meant to do, which is feature a bunch of wacky giant shit crash into and eat each other, than it'll be just fine.

Croctopus!

Commercially the way is paved better than it would seem. Logan (2017) did well, but not astoundingly so, and I am not feeling great about Power Rangers (2017). KONG is what a March Halfbuster is meant to be - cheap schlocky primer fun for the Summer Season. I think its ad campaign has also been spectacular, even if its latest trailer seems like a cheap way to imitate Guardians of the Galaxy (2014) and Suicide Squad (2016). To be fair, not even Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 (2017) could escape from the trailer shadow of its predecessor. Still, little of this matters since the trailer is fun, violent, and adventuresome. That's all you need, baby. Word of mouth and buzz is pretty high - after the road to bummerville with Logan this is a good jolt in a 2017 that hasn't had many yet.

And finally, we get back to where we started: How will this land culturally? King Kong '05 has lasted in the public consciousness for a while, although that might be more in my mind than the populace at large. '76 has largely vanished, so we're really just left with the incredibly long shadow from '33. That's the toughest thing to get over, and diversifying what Skull Island is the way to do it. Debuting away from the crowd can help, too, along with just being a fun, action filled adventure with great, memorable characters. Actually, that's how all movies can have cultural impact. I have no idea how the Legendary Mega Monster Universe will fare, but maybe in ten years we'll think of this as Legendary's Iron Man (2008, tho to be more precise it would be their Incredible Hulk [2008]). That's not great.

I don't totally care about Beauty and the Beast (2017) dropping next weekend, clearly, but I might preview it. What are you going to see this March?