WARNING: The following contains spoilers for Godzilla vs. Kong, now in theaters and streaming on HBO Max.
While 2019’s Godzilla: King of the Monsters crowned the Titan king, it also quietly made Kong a Titan without a home to lord over. The end credits sequence revealed Skull Island was becoming unstable in the wake of kaiju activity increasing worldwide. It eventually was uninhabitable by the start of Godzilla vs. Kong, depriving Kong of his lifelong kingdom. Fortunately for the giant ape, the movie also gives the Titan an ancient birthright to claim as his own, effectively making him worthy of the title King Kong by the film’s end.
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2017’s Kong: Skull Island introduced the Hollow Earth theory, a network of subterranean tunnels running around the globe and the core serving as home to many of the Titans. A team of scientists and soldiers are tasked by the nefarious corporation Apex Cybernetics to escort Kong to a passage into the Hollow Earth located in Antarctica. To handle the immense gravitational pressures encountered during the journey to the center of the Earth, Apex equips the expedition with hovercraft capable of withstanding the voyage.
Inside, Kong discovers a land that time forgot, matching the environment of his native Skull Island and populated with flora and fauna of the prehistoric age. Kong visibly finds himself right at home, defeating any kaiju challengers while discovering signs of an ancestral line that he never knew. The expeditionary escort finds an apparent throne that reveals Kong and his species had been at war with Godzilla’s species for potentially millions of years. Finding an axe forged from the dorsal fin of one of Godzilla’s ancestors, Kong takes the throne his ancestors fought and died for, showing an inner peace and sense of kinship that likely eluded him his entire life.
This happy homecoming is explosively interrupted when Godzilla uses his atomic breath to blast a hole straight down from Hong Kong into the Hollow Earth’s throne room. Following the ferocious rematch, Kong returns to his new home in Hollow Earth while Godzilla returns to his ocean territory. Monarch, the intergovernmental organization tasked with observing kaiju activity around the world, sets up an outpost in Hollow Earth to observe Kong. In contrast to the opening of the film, which saw Monarch contain Kong inside of an elaborate biodome as Skull Island became uninhabitable, the organization now watches a Kong able to roam free as the master of his domain, which makes him an undisputed king in his own right.
Skull Island and Godzilla vs. Kong really just referred to the giant ape as “Kong” rather than his original moniker of “King Kong.” By the end of Godzilla vs. Kong, however, Kong has completed something of an ascent to his ancestral throne to prove himself worthy of the title. Skull Island may be a broken, inhospitable locale, no longer capable of supporting its most iconic resident, but Kong has risen to take a new home and throne. Godzilla may be King of the Monsters, but Kong is King of the Earth’s heart.
Directed by Adam Wingard and written by Eric Pearson and Max Borenstein, Godzilla vs. Kong stars Alexander Skarsgard, Millie Bobby Brown, Rebecca Hall and Brian Tyree Henry. The film is in theaters and on HBO Max now.
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