Godzilla vs. Kong parents guide

Godzilla vs. Kong Parent Guide

The monster mashing is lots of fun but the film overall is a bit of a letdown.

Overall B-

HBO Max and Theaters: Godzilla and Kong are fighting for dominance - and humans are trying to survive the fallout.

Release date March 31, 2021

Violence C
Sexual Content A
Profanity C
Substance Use A

Why is Godzilla vs. Kong rated PG-13? The MPAA rated Godzilla vs. Kong PG-13 for intense sequences of creature violence/destruction and brief language.

Run Time: 113 minutes

Parent Movie Review

After leveling most of Boston in an epic showdown with the three-headed Ghidorah in Godzilla: King of the Monsters, Godzilla has apparently retreated beneath the waves, content to leave humanity to its own devices. But when he appears in Florida and destroys the Apex research laboratory there, people start asking questions…people like conspiracy theorist Bernie (Brian Tyree Henry) and Madison Russell (Millie Bobby Brown).

Meanwhile, Apex continues to search for the entrance to the so-called “Hollow Earth” from which all Titans theoretically originated. Deciding that a tour guide would be useful, Apex staffers drag Kong off to show them the way. Godzilla isn’t about to let another giant beast supplant him as King of the Monsters and takes Kong’s emergence as a threat. Monster rivalries are a problem for humans too: a fight between these incredible creatures could spell unimaginable disaster for everyone caught in the middle.

As a committed fan of both Godzilla and Kong, I have frequently been asked who I’m rooting for in this film. This is, essentially, an impossible question. How do you choose between your children? I love them both a great deal, and although it does hurt to see them fight, it’s also insanely cool. The scale and wonder of their combat is genuinely fascinating – in what other franchise can you see a 335-foot ape throw military aircraft at a 394-foot radioactive lizard?

As usual, your enjoyment of this movie is going to depend on how much you like the monster flick genre, so the real test is how well Godzilla vs Kong appeals to existing fans. I feel qualified as one of those fans to say that this is… a little bit of a letdown. Godzilla: King of the Monsters is such a strong film, not only in terms the awe-inspiring giant battles, but in terms of the pacing and structure of the movie. This script separates its storylines too much, which hurts the pacing. As soon as you get some momentum on one storyline, you’re whipped away to the other one – which frankly, isn’t nearly as good.

Perversely, that’s the big problem with Godzilla. He’s such an awesome character that the humans wandering around beneath his skyscraper-crushing feet are never nearly as interesting. I have particularly little patience with Bernie, the resident conspiracy theorist who keeps getting sidetracked on dialogue tangents into unrelated territory like GMO’s and water fluoridation. I don’t know how to tell Warner Bros. this, but nobody is watching Godzilla vs. Kong for some paranoid conspiracist to lecture them on GMO’s. We’re here to watch the two most dangerous organisms on Earth level a few cities and have a good time doing it. King of the Monsters succeeded by having the human storylines constantly intertwined with Godzilla. Separating them means long periods of functionally dead air that kill the pacing.

Apart from some brief language and the typical genre violence, there aren’t any content concerns here. No sex, not even any sex jokes, and no drinking, smoking, or drug use. Of course, the body count for this movie is likely somewhere in the low millions – you can’t level that much of a city with 7.5 million inhabitants and expect minor losses – but those happen almost exclusively off-screen. This is definitely suitable for a teen audience, and arguably intended for one as well.

While Godzilla vs. Kong is still a good time, and Kong is a tremendous addition to the franchise, this flick just doesn’t quite measure up to its predecessor. Hopefully, the screenwriters can up their game for the next movie – because of course there’s going to be a next movie. Godzilla has been terrorizing the screen ever since he was a heat-stroked Japanese man in a rubber suit waddling around a model village in the 1950’s. He’s not going to stop now.

Directed by Adam Wingard. Starring Alexander Skarsgård, Millie Bobby Brown, and Rebecca Hall. Running time: 113 minutes. Theatrical release March 31, 2021. Updated

Watch the trailer for Godzilla vs. Kong

Godzilla vs. Kong
Rating & Content Info

Why is Godzilla vs. Kong rated PG-13? Godzilla vs. Kong is rated PG-13 by the MPAA for intense sequences of creature violence/destruction and brief language.

Violence: Humans are shown threatening people with guns. Titans fighting each other are shown using every weapon, limb, and nearby infrastructure at their disposal, leading to, at a bare minimum, hundreds of thousands of deaths.
Sexual Content: None.
Profanity: There are seven uses of scatological profanity and infrequent use of mild profanities and terms of deity.
Alcohol / Drug Use: None.

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Godzilla vs. Kong Parents' Guide

Bernie subscribes to a lot of conspiracy theories, several of which turn out to be true…more or less. What is the risk with his mindset? How does a mentality like that make people more susceptible to dangerous misinformation?

Home Video

Related home video titles:

Obviously, the previous films are a good place to start. Godzilla and Godzilla: King of the Monsters are part of the same reboot as Kong: Skull Island. Earlier depictions of King Kong include the 1933 original and Peter Jackson’s 2005 remake.

If you’re looking for more giants from a different franchise, Guillermo del Toro’s Pacific Rim and Pacific Rim: Uprising might be your style – although the first is much better than the sequel. If that’s a little too robotic for your taste, you should look at Rampage, which sees Dwayne Johnson team up with a 20 foot tall gorilla to fight other monstrously sized animals.