The structure of a King Kong story hasn’t changed much in the last 90 years: people find a big gorilla on an island, the gorilla falls in love with a girl and is taken to the big city, the gorilla escapes, and then the gorilla collapses meet his death from a very high place. The 1933 original and the 1976 and 2005 remakes all follow this blueprint, but there are pieces scattered across other films as well, due to the connections to humans (Son of Kong, King Kong escapes, Kong: Skull Island) to Kong being kicked out of his house (King Kong vs Godzilla, Godzilla against Kong,) to the violent demise (King Kong lives brings Kong back to life with a goddamn heart transplant just now only to kill him again near the end of the movie.)
With such a predetermined trajectory for our most beloved giant movie apes, the films’ directors and crew are only really free to go bananas in the parts dedicated to Skull Island, Kong’s homeland. There they can invent all kinds of locations, creatures and situations to populate the monkey’s world, from the prehistoric to the fantastic. And with the new Netflix cartoon, Skull Islandsince it’s set almost exclusively there, it gives the show a chance to absolutely bathe in that sense of delightful (and often gory) freedom.
Being part of the “MonsterVerse”, the shared universe starring Godzilla and Kong in an MCU-like lineup means that Skull Islandcreated by Brian Duffield (Love and monsters) is bound by the rules of the live-action expanded universe – so don’t expect to see the Lost World of dinosaurs from the 1933 movie or Peter Jackson’s remake. Instead, the show’s monsters are like Kong: Skull Island director Jordan Vogt-Roberts once said, feel “realistic and could exist in an ecosystem that feels kind of wild and out there,” and “felt beautiful and horrifying at the same time.”
This focus on fitting monsters into their environment is evident from the start Skull Island. As such, many of them feel like extensions of their habitat, predators that have gone beyond camouflage and turned Skull Island into a living, man-eating world. Throughout, the characters battle creatures like giant crabs that only attack when they sense movement, an immense mollusk with shiny guts that pulls in its stunned prey, deadly snakes that resemble the vines around them, and even a large rodent with a backbone. which turns into a field of tall grass. Like the spider from the movie that hidden among the trees before impaling future meals with its stalk-like paws, the cartoon constantly tries to build mutated creatures that are part of their environment. It’s great to see a show that’s so consistently enamored with the idea that no matter where you try to hide, there’s something nearby that you’ll see for lunch.
Image: Netflix
That commitment to fun also keeps the environment alive, even when most of the characters are just walking or running through it. You constantly ask yourself: “What is lurking here? What monster is hiding and waiting to devour you? That feeling that defines some of the best moments in Kong’s history, from the first time the hapless sailors journeyed through the swamp on a raft in 1933, only to be dumped by an inexplicable carnivorous brontosaurus lurking beneath. It’s that desire for a thrill ride panic that landed us one of the creepiest scenes in blockbuster history: the “insect pit” series. on the 2005 reboot in which every possible crevice was infested with carnivorous insects. This place shouldn’t exist (a vast majority of people who find it think it’s just a weird jungle) and Skull Island plays beautifully into that moment of shock – When you discover that these life forms not only shouldn’t be here, but apparently shouldn’t be here. And it’s too late.
The story of King Kong is inherently about humanity’s inability to leave nature alone. Inevitably, we will destroy the wonder in the world and even franchise tent poles like Godzilla against Kong, only an innocent child can befriend Kong, especially since she doesn’t want to kill him, or worse, put him on Broadway. There are plenty of budding relationships like that in there Skull Islandbut it manages to be balanced by a fascination with the terrifying potential of the environment.
After all, it’s on Skull Island that the tables are turned.
Whether it’s a group of dinosaurs, a place where giant creatures have alternately evolved over the years, or, as the MonsterVerse seems to pass on, a tropical hideaway connected to some kind of “hollow earth”, Skull Island is a place to let go. Man’s greed and misguided ambition has no power in an area where the “beauty and horror” of nature is limited only by the creativity of the filmmakers, meaning there is literally no end to what you want to eat.
Skull Island now streaming on Netflix.