© Courtesy of Empire
Directed by Adam Wingard, the upcoming MonsterVerse flick Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire promises to thrill viewers with an epic battle between the two legendary kaiju monsters. The two antagonists may be less hostile to each other as they join forces to oppose Skar King, another primate bent on mayhem and destruction. The film stars Rebecca Hall and Dan Stevens.
Advance images depict Godzilla with pink spikes on his back and Kong with a robot hand, attesting to the evolution of the two characters. Speaking of Godzilla, Wingard said “This is his version of a training routine. I’m really big into Shaw Brothers martial arts. Those films are always about, ‘Here’s a big threat, and you have to do all these things to pump yourself up so that you can take on that threat.’”
Wiegand added: “There’s a bit of a truce — Godzilla’s in control of the surface world and Kong is down in Hollow Earth. “It wasn’t, ‘Okay, give me a call when something goes wrong, Kong. And I, Godzilla, will rush to the rescue!’” Instead, he adds, “The buddy-cop dysfunctional relationship dynamic is probably the best one to describe Godzilla and Kong. My influences are always embedded with the ‘80s, and the ‘80s were prime for [that] storyline.”
The upcoming film will reportedly focus on character development in addition to mere violence. Insiders say that an effort has been made to depict both Godzilla and Kong as individuals with unique personalities above and beyond their capacities to induce terror. They may not be exactly lovable, but at least their rage will apparently have some personality attached to it.
This year marks the tenth anniversary of Legendary’s first Godzilla movie in 2014, with an anime titled Skull Island having been released in 2023. In an earlier installment in the franchise, Godzilla vs. Kong, the two monsters were pitted against a different enemy, the nefarious Mechagodzilla. Godzilla vs. Kong is at the moment available to stream on Max and Hulu.
Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire is set to make its theatrical debut on March 29.
© Courtesy of Legendary