Godzilla, King of the Monsters is a demonstration of how more of something is not necessarily a good thing. The film improves on the 2014 Godzilla which had very little footage of monsters at all by filling the majority of the movie’s 2 and a half hour screen time with monsters fighting and destroying cities. Unfortunately, in the end we get a result similar to the 2014 film which was a boring, poorly balanced mess.

The film opens in a world where everyone is now aware of the existence of giant monsters living among us and it is treated with nary a tongue in cheek, but rather with such solemnity and seriousness that it becomes involuntarily funny at times. The problem this movie has is it doesn’t understand that its subject matter, chock full of fire breathing lizard, three-headed dragons, giant moths, and bird monsters bursting out of volcanoes, really cannot be taken that seriously at all.
At the very least the director of the 2014 film, Gareth Edwards, understood this and consequentially focused more on the aftermath of Godzilla’s actions and their effect on people in a vein similar to a disaster film and thus he got away with making a tonally serious Godzilla movie.
Here we have a 2 and a half hour action sequence with 6 or more giant monsters all vying for attention on screen to the point that the schlock begins to take over despite the filmmakers best efforts to present everything in a serious tone.

What little plot this movie does have gets easily overwhelmed by the perpetual action sequences and CGI effects. What story the movie does gives us is this: the world discovers that Godzilla and company were here on this Earth long before us and after being revived humans are getting caught in the crossfire between these Titans who are now vying for supremacy. A group of eco-terrorists led by the always delightful Charles Dance begin waking these monsters up in the belief that they are reestablishing the natural order of things.
But these story elements never stay long on screen before we are being subjected to repetitive monster fights and explosions. Ultimately many of the story’s plot threads are not tied up which is clear evidence of the producers’ intention of baiting future sequels.

Despite all the action, special effects, and monsters this movie is boring. There is no adequate balance between the film’s drama and the action scenes and the fighting and explosions begin to feel like a broken record. How many times does it take seeing a monster knocked down, get back up again, blast a few buildings, rinse, and repeat before we stop caring anymore. For me it was about 40 minutes into the movie.

I would also point out that for a movie called Godzilla, King of the Monsters this film gives him little presence. He constantly remains in stiff competition with Ghidorah and Mothra for the majority of the movie and it feels more like a monster ensemble piece rather than a movie that is actually about Godzilla.

Let’s hope that in the next one where Godzilla fights a giant monkey we will finally get a Godzilla movie we can take seriously.

2 Stars