Took me a while, I finally saw this and it was Kaiju Smackdown. Felt more of a Kong Film again, but was just a bit of Fun. Thanks for the Review, Casey 💯
7:32 😂 That’s why your reviews are the best, Casey, you’re not overly harsh, but you are very much pragmatic, while still knowing how to enjoy a film for its entertainment value, if nothing else. Plus your dry humor is always on point 😆 That said… i saw GxK, and I… it… [sigh] 😑 The monster fights were cool, i’ll give it that 👍 But everything else… I don’t dislike _what_ the Monsterverse movies do, i just can’t stand _how_ they do it 😞 The characterizations, the exposition, the plot contrivances… it all could be done _so much better!_ And yes, i know a large portion of the target audience only cares about the (admittedly good) fight scenes, but there’s a portion that cares about story too. Why does Legendary think these two components have to be mutually exclusive? 😭 I know many will argue “well most of the old Toho films don’t have great storytelling either, so NYAH! 😛” (yes, tongue-sticking-out emoji is within the quotes 😆) and while that is true, the Toho films don’t self-sabotage themselves with elaborate world-building and intricate backstory that DON’T PAY OFF WHEN IT COUNTS!!! For instance, Legendary bends over backwards to establish Monarch as this global powerhouse of an organization with near limitless resources and the best scientific, technical, and military minds humankind can offer… and yet Dr. Whats-her-name has to recruit Podcast-dude to figure out that Drawing “A” matches Drawing “B” 😓 Meanwhile how does Toho address these scenarios? Some dude in a labcoat declares “Space Titanium! It must be ALIENS!” and everyone is on board, no questions asked. Sounds simplistically silly, but it WORKS because those movies are _fantastical_ by their very nature! Yet Monsterverse films try to go the realistically complex route, but don’t know how to stick the landing, relying on face-palm inducing contrivance and plothole-sidestepping expository handwaving to escape the corners they’ve over-engineered themselves into. Toho films, with some exceptions (looking at _you,_ GvKG 😡) are simple and know what they are: giant monster movies. GxK made me feel like i was watching a POTA movie half the time, which is something i don’t actually do, because apes as characters, giant or not, smart or not, aren’t very interesting (as you alluded to, Casey). Which brings up another point: Kong and Skar were WAY too humanlike in their behavior. Despite appearances, this _wasn’t_ a POTA movie, where simian lifeforms have developed into a higher state of being; this is a kaiju movie, which, unless i missed something very important in the past few MV movies, involves cryptid-like animals, which, regardless of size, operate nearly exclusively on instinct. Plotting to take over the world, scheming revenge, understanding and employing humor and irony, and being self-aware to the point where I can almost HEAR Kong’s inner monologue, is not something animals do, fictional kaiju or not. Try this: swap out the two central kaiju with humans. Known characters that would make _some_ sense in their roles. Swap Kong with Tarzan, and Skar with Kraven the Hunter, for instance, without changing any of the plot beats. Would any of their actions or behaviors make you say “That’s not something _humans_ like Tarzan and Kraven would do!”? Not as far as i can tell 🤷🏻♂️ [Sigh, yet again] I WANT to like these movies. I WANT to be excited about stories where giant monsters beat the crap out of each other. I WANT to suspend my disbelief and just enjoy the ride. But the glaring faults just overshadow the few bright spots for me, and as a result, my disappointment overshadows my enjoyment. 😞 I need a nap. Then imma watch some _Destroy All Monsters._ That’s a movie I can enjoy 😊
I actually had a somewhat too lengthy, for how not so strongly I felt, about Kong's facial expressions being too much/ monsters should be monsters blah blah I'm sure you've heard me go on about that before so I'm with you there. Again, the trailers made me think it was going to be a lot worse I guess due to that one shot of kong's youtube O face lol. I'm not sure where the Monsterverse is even going to go now. You'd think not ANOTHER team up of Kong and Godzilla but we'll see. I kind of want to watch all the POTA movies before the new one comes out just because I remember liking the old ones. I guess the majority of the time they are more humanlike than apelike. I fell off the new series even after really liking the one with James Franco.
@@interwebkaiju Charlton Heston as Taylor summed it up perfectly in the original ’68 POTA movie: “A planet where apes evolved from men?!” So it makes sense that they act human-like (though i always thought they should have progressed _beyond_ human foibles, but i digress… 🐵). But the MV insists on giving those attributes to creatures that by its own canon are more animalistic than sentient, and doing so completely straight-faced. At least when Toho did it, it was with tongue planted firmly in cheek 😄 And it’s funny, I must have liked the old POTA movies at some point as a kid, cuz i used to have a Dr. Zaius hand puppet i absolutely loved 😅 Nowadays tho, they don’t interest me at all (i’m not endeared by monkeys in general either. Don’t judge me.) I think the last POTA movie i saw was the one with Mark Wahlberg cuz my friends wanted to go. Couldn’t tell you a thing about it today tho 😆
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Great Review Casey. Looking Forward to Checking this Out!
Thank you Bones
Took me a while, I finally saw this and it was Kaiju Smackdown. Felt more of a Kong Film again, but was just a bit of Fun. Thanks for the Review, Casey 💯
Godzilla x Kong Live from Hollower Earth.
And beating a monster with a smaller monster, that's good stuff right there.
Thanks for watching!
@@interwebkaiju I don't miss a video by the Casemaster General.
Yikes, that reminds me, i don’t think i watched the Snack Bar video from Friday 😨
[scurries off to correct this egregious oversight…]
7:32 😂 That’s why your reviews are the best, Casey, you’re not overly harsh, but you are very much pragmatic, while still knowing how to enjoy a film for its entertainment value, if nothing else. Plus your dry humor is always on point 😆
That said… i saw GxK, and I… it… [sigh] 😑
The monster fights were cool, i’ll give it that 👍 But everything else… I don’t dislike _what_ the Monsterverse movies do, i just can’t stand _how_ they do it 😞 The characterizations, the exposition, the plot contrivances… it all could be done _so much better!_ And yes, i know a large portion of the target audience only cares about the (admittedly good) fight scenes, but there’s a portion that cares about story too. Why does Legendary think these two components have to be mutually exclusive? 😭 I know many will argue “well most of the old Toho films don’t have great storytelling either, so NYAH! 😛” (yes, tongue-sticking-out emoji is within the quotes 😆) and while that is true, the Toho films don’t self-sabotage themselves with elaborate world-building and intricate backstory that DON’T PAY OFF WHEN IT COUNTS!!! For instance, Legendary bends over backwards to establish Monarch as this global powerhouse of an organization with near limitless resources and the best scientific, technical, and military minds humankind can offer… and yet Dr. Whats-her-name has to recruit Podcast-dude to figure out that Drawing “A” matches Drawing “B” 😓
Meanwhile how does Toho address these scenarios? Some dude in a labcoat declares “Space Titanium! It must be ALIENS!” and everyone is on board, no questions asked. Sounds simplistically silly, but it WORKS because those movies are _fantastical_ by their very nature! Yet Monsterverse films try to go the realistically complex route, but don’t know how to stick the landing, relying on face-palm inducing contrivance and plothole-sidestepping expository handwaving to escape the corners they’ve over-engineered themselves into.
Toho films, with some exceptions (looking at _you,_ GvKG 😡) are simple and know what they are: giant monster movies. GxK made me feel like i was watching a POTA movie half the time, which is something i don’t actually do, because apes as characters, giant or not, smart or not, aren’t very interesting (as you alluded to, Casey).
Which brings up another point: Kong and Skar were WAY too humanlike in their behavior. Despite appearances, this _wasn’t_ a POTA movie, where simian lifeforms have developed into a higher state of being; this is a kaiju movie, which, unless i missed something very important in the past few MV movies, involves cryptid-like animals, which, regardless of size, operate nearly exclusively on instinct. Plotting to take over the world, scheming revenge, understanding and employing humor and irony, and being self-aware to the point where I can almost HEAR Kong’s inner monologue, is not something animals do, fictional kaiju or not. Try this: swap out the two central kaiju with humans. Known characters that would make _some_ sense in their roles. Swap Kong with Tarzan, and Skar with Kraven the Hunter, for instance, without changing any of the plot beats. Would any of their actions or behaviors make you say “That’s not something _humans_ like Tarzan and Kraven would do!”? Not as far as i can tell 🤷🏻♂️
[Sigh, yet again] I WANT to like these movies. I WANT to be excited about stories where giant monsters beat the crap out of each other. I WANT to suspend my disbelief and just enjoy the ride. But the glaring faults just overshadow the few bright spots for me, and as a result, my disappointment overshadows my enjoyment. 😞
I need a nap. Then imma watch some _Destroy All Monsters._ That’s a movie I can enjoy 😊
I actually had a somewhat too lengthy, for how not so strongly I felt, about Kong's facial expressions being too much/ monsters should be monsters blah blah I'm sure you've heard me go on about that before so I'm with you there. Again, the trailers made me think it was going to be a lot worse I guess due to that one shot of kong's youtube O face lol. I'm not sure where the Monsterverse is even going to go now. You'd think not ANOTHER team up of Kong and Godzilla but we'll see. I kind of want to watch all the POTA movies before the new one comes out just because I remember liking the old ones. I guess the majority of the time they are more humanlike than apelike. I fell off the new series even after really liking the one with James Franco.
@@interwebkaiju Charlton Heston as Taylor summed it up perfectly in the original ’68 POTA movie: “A planet where apes evolved from men?!” So it makes sense that they act human-like (though i always thought they should have progressed _beyond_ human foibles, but i digress… 🐵). But the MV insists on giving those attributes to creatures that by its own canon are more animalistic than sentient, and doing so completely straight-faced. At least when Toho did it, it was with tongue planted firmly in cheek 😄
And it’s funny, I must have liked the old POTA movies at some point as a kid, cuz i used to have a Dr. Zaius hand puppet i absolutely loved 😅 Nowadays tho, they don’t interest me at all (i’m not endeared by monkeys in general either. Don’t judge me.) I think the last POTA movie i saw was the one with Mark Wahlberg cuz my friends wanted to go. Couldn’t tell you a thing about it today tho 😆
I saw this today! I was entertained as well, except the diddy kong. The Mothra part seemed off the lore, but it was neat. Glad I saw it.
Thanks for watching Jim!
@@interwebkaiju I'm no scrote
Lol, Diddy Kong 😂 I call him “Kongzooky” 😜
Hoping to see tomorrow night nice review Casey
Thank you Larry. Looking forward to hearing your thoughts
I’ve heard good reviews about it, will check it out when it comes out on streaming 😁
MayAnn 🔥🔥🔥
Glad you ended up enjoying it bro
Thank you Hobbs
Great review not sure if I'm gonna see this in the theater or wait for it to be streaming or on blu ray.
Thank you Echo
Great review Casey. I need to see this one.
Thank you Jason
Can't wait to hear your thoughts when you do
Great video keep it up
Thank you
Great review Casey. Bernie was so much better in this one I thought. I enjoyed the hell out of this movie.
Thank you Dan
Movie looks cgi overboard but might be good ... Thanks for the review
Thanks for watching Kal
Looks goooood