Directed by Michael Dougherty

Starring Vera Farmiga, Kyle Chandler, Ken Watanabe, Millie Bobby Brown

Godzilla: King of the Monsters is not the disaster the awful 2014 film was, though it is a direct sequel. It’s actually as good a monster movie as anyone could have hoped for, and seems to be more in line and true to the original spirit of the Japanese Kaiju films. Just as John Wick 3 acknowledged how terrible John Wick 2 was, so did the filmmakers for King of the Monsters openly show how truly bad that first movie was. They took to heart the rightful criticism that Godzilla was never onscreen, nor any of the monster fights. Now, they’re all onscreen. All the time. And it’s epic to see. They were several shots that had me smiling long after they ended, and some of the wides are as grand scale and magnificent as the Balrog and Gandalf falling through Moria. This movie kinda rocks.

The events unfold 5 years after 2014, now that the world knows and seen the existence of monsters. Godzilla has disappeared in that time, but other creatures, dubbed Titans, now begin rising from the Earth. Later on the movie explains that they were the original gods, and were nature’s balance of humanity.

But the humans. Of course they are useless in a movie like this, but not as boring or useless as in Godzilla 1. Emma (Vera Farmiga) works for an organization called Monarch, who track down Titans outside of government interference. There are senate hearings discussing how to keep Monarch in check, and reveal what they know about the location and number of living Titans. The dialogue isn’t as bad as you might think it is, although the characters spend a lot of time talking about things they’re about to do.

But Emma, along with Mark (Kyle Chandler) and Madison (Millie Bobby Brown), all lost a family member in the carnage of the battle that Godzilla had in the first movie. Their son Andrew, and it caused them to separate, and Emma to dedicate her years to keeping the Titans in check. Or so she says.

She’s created a device she calls Orca, which emits frequencies that the Titans can hear. She mixed Godzilla’s roars with some other things to communicate with the creatures. A turn in the story soon thereafter shows her real intentions, which I thought was pretty neat.

Mark wants all the titans, including Godzilla, dead. Emma wants to awaken them all to restore order in the world. Human beings are the real enemy. She’s teamed up with Charles Dance and a bunch of eco-terrorists to get the job done. In one scene, right before Ghidorah is woken up from the ice of Antartica, daughter Madison sees her dad Mark for the first time in years. The movie has her choose to go with mom or dad. For a few seconds, the surrounding sounds of chaos are muted, Mark’s words fall deaf on her, and she only hears Emma call her name. Get it? It’s like she’s using a human Orca to control her child. Hah they did a thing, cause she’s like the monster. Haha I quit

The human dynamics were never going to be a strong suit of movies like this. Everyone else delivers quick explanations of actions and one liners. Oh yeah, the comedy. It almost never works. There’s some side character named Sam, and he’s pretty bad. The film’s edits on all the jokes just don’t work, and it puts people out of focus that shouldn’t be. I think I laughed once from all the attempts at humor. The timing just is off.

I expected this movie to be faster paced. The average shot length doesn’t run too too short, but the average scene length does. The movie bounds around scene to scene in breakneck speed. I think the average scene length must be a minute or so? It’s nuts. And a lot of them transition to an ambush or explosion or some kind of damaging chaos, and use sound to take us there.

But it’s okay, because Godzilla gets so much screen time. And he’s never boring. He’s such a G, rocking such a mean and nasty look, but always on the side of good, protecting humanity. You can’t help but love the benevolent beast. Everytime he shows up you just want to cheer him on. His fights with King Ghidorah are awesome, worthy for anyone just wanting to see two legends battle. Ghidorah is the other apex predator, and he can control all the titans on the planet with his screams. He also shoots yellow electricity from his three heads and can fly. Holy shit.

The sounds of King of the Monsters are incredible. Each titan with their own unique voice. Wonderful and frightening work developed by a talented sound design team. And the music this time around is so much better, and has chilling new themes to elevate already great imagery. It works amazingly well for the fights, and the birth of Mothra. I can’t believe how much fun it is to watch this movie at times. What’s interesting is that Godzilla 2 gets better as it goes along. All the worst parts are at the beginning, and I thought for sure Kyle Chandler was going to give a bad performance this time around (he’s usually a great actor, but those opening scenes threw me off completely).

The movie has opened to a pretty mediocre debut at the box office, close to half the opening numbers of the 2014 film. GEE I WONDER WHY. Maybe that movie was so bad it killed people’s hype for a sequel. Could it be people realized they were fools to ever defend a film as boring as that? Gareth Edwards work in that movie is shameful, and he would go on to later repeat many of the same mistakes in the trashy Rogue One. His characters always seemed trapped in an uninteresting play they cannot escape from. But thank god he did not return for this project. Godzilla 2 was directed this time around by Michael Dougherty, and also has a writing credit. He’s the guy who made Krampus, which I never saw, but he has an eye for epic setups, and has made a movie that is true to its roots just about all the way through.

Godzilla: King of the Monsters is a flawed movie, because of course it is. It’s Godzilla. But it’s a masterpiece compared to the 2014 one. And once again, the dumb critics and youtubers have decided this movie is bad, even though they largely recommended the first. Pure lunacy. This movie has better fights, better music, better humans, and better Godzilla. It has cheesy and campy elements, and maybe you won’t care at all about Maddy or any of the cast. But you will care about the monsters. You’ll care about the touching relationship the magical Mothra and Godzilla have. And the heartfelt moment between Ken Watanabe and Godzilla himself. And the visuals are on point, though so silly at first, they kick it into overdrive by the end. I can’t believe how epic it gets.

The movie connects to Kong: Skull Island, which I also never saw. If this monster universe is to continue (after the end credits scene it prob will), I hope we get more movies like this one, and pray garbage like the 2014 one never makes it again to the screen. King of the Monsters is a fun ride. Good as a film, great as a monster movie.