Godzilla: King of the Monsters (2019)

The book of Revelation crossed my mind a good amount while watching Godzilla: King of the Monsters. One verse I did not expect to think of was in chapter 3, when Jesus is talking to the church in Laodicia.

“So, because you are lukewarm-neither hot nor cold-I am about to spit you out of my mouth.” _ Revelation 3:16.

The reason for this is simple: I have not been this “lukewarm” about how I feel over a movie in sometime. In the end, I have to choose a side, and that side is on the positive…barely.

Set five years after the previous movie, we meet Dr. Emma Russell (Vera Farmiga), who has been trying to find out how to make the titans less vicious (I think, I admit I am not sure) after losing her son Andrew in the events five years ago.. Along with her daughter Madison (Millie Bobby Brown, aka Eleven from Stranger Things), she is soon kidnapped by the (over the top) evil Alan Jonah (Charles Dance), who is dead set on being eco friendly. Her ex husband Mark (Kyle Chandler) teams up with a team of doctors from the first film (played again by Oscar nominees Ken Watanabe and Sally Hawkins) as well as new faces such as Bradley Whitford and Ziyi Zhang. There is conflict over which of the titans are here to help us (such as Godzilla) or destroy us (newcomers such as Rodan, Mothra, and Monster Zero, better known as King Ghidorah).

The human drama does tend to take away from the film, though none of the actors can be at fault. Grizzled faced vets don’t get played much better than Kyle Chandler, and if you need a girl who is quick witted, smart, and capable of emotion in the blink of an eye, then look no further then MMB. The drama involves whether or not to let the titans battle it out, or have humans put an end to it (with help from the military, of course).

All of that is sheer background to the real reason we see these movies: all out monster mashing. Since the 1998 version of Godzilla (a film some friends of mine still like for reasons I may never understand), the battle sequences have always seemed to be in the dark rain, obscuring the visuals. That is a shame, because the 2014 version showed some rather impressive visuals (regardless of the weather situations), and this film is just as fun to look at.

Parents, the film is fine for anyone who has seen a modern monster movie before. The only thing to mention is there is some good amount of swearing, but nothing worse than the PG-13 rating allows. Middle school and up is totally fine.

Going back to the book of Revelation, it is clear that the return of Jesus will come. It will be an event that will be like no other. We humans can either try to prevent it (which would be foolish to say the least), or just leave it up to God to fix it all. The same goes with Godzilla, as his movies have shown that they tend to work the best when pesky humans are not in the spotlight.

Note: The next matchup scheduled for Godzilla is King Kong. As someone who watched the 1960s version of the matchup many times as a kid. I am stoked for the remake, and have my choice picked out regardless of the odds.

Overall: