Editor’s note: This article contains spoilers for the “Godzilla Vs. Kong” movie.

Man, it feels good being back at theaters again. Granted, there’s not a lot to see right now, but “Godzilla Vs. Kong” is a great way to pull fans back to the movies. I’ve been a lifelong Godzilla fan and was excited to see Godzilla and King Kong get a rematch.  

The two titans fight fought back way back in “King Kong Vs. Godzilla” (1962). While the two films’ stories are really different, the new film does bring back a few moments from the original. Scenes like moving Kong chained to a ship, and another scene flying Kong with several helicopters (in the original, it was with balloons. Yeah, it sounds weird. The sixties were very weird). There’s a moment in the fight where Kong tries shoving his weapon down Godzilla’s throat to stop him from firing his atomic breath. In the original, Kong grabbed a tree and used that to shove down Godzilla’s throat. 

“Godzilla Vs. Kong” is directed by Adam Wingard, whose recent works include “You’re Next”, the American adaptation of “Death Note”, and “The Blair Witch” remake. Wingard seems to prefer horror, so this film seems like a bit of a different approach for him. I don’t think I even saw anything that would suggest horror here.  

“Godzilla Vs. Kong” stars Alexander Skarsgard as Nathan Lind, an expert in what is known as Hollow Earth; Rebecca Hall as Ilene Andrews, a scientist monitoring King Kong; and Millie Bobby Brown as Madison Russell from the last Godzilla film. Brian Tyree Henry plays a crackpot conspiracy podcaster that joins Russell in proving Godzilla isn’t a villain.  

So, there are two stories going on. The humans, led by Lind and Andrews are using King Kong to lead them to Hollow Earth, where all of the MonsterVerse monsters originally came from. They believe that within Hollow Earth is a powerful new energy source that a powerful corporation wants to get their hands on. It gets pretty weird, but it’s a cool trip. Inside, Kong finds the remains of his ancestors’ home and gets a nifty weapon made from an older Godzilla spike.  Meanwhile, Godzilla has turned to “bad guy” mode and is attacking humans… OR IS HE? Yes and no, but spoilers…  

Oh yes, there’s another story going on, with Millie Bobby Brown doing a Scooby-Doo routine with her friends and uncovering a huge conspiracy leading to why Godzilla is attacking. They don’t contribute much to the story, but these movies always got to have humans doing pointless things.  Hollywood!  

So, the human characters aren’t the best, but who really goes to these movies expecting to see deep-rooted character development worthy of Oscar nominations? We are here to see a really big monkey fight a radioactive dinosaur. This, the movie really delivers. The fights are exciting and epic. AND WELL-LIT! Godzilla and Kong fight in a couple of rounds in this movie, and the first one is in the middle of the day on top of an aircraft carrier (yes, both are able to stand on an aircraft carrier, it happened). Even when the fight goes underwater, you can clearly see the action. The final battle happens in Hong Kong and even though it’s at night, the city is literally laced with neon lights. This lit up the night battle and gave the movie a cool imagery for the movie that’s almost at the same level as “Marvel’s Guardian of the Galaxy”. 

What really surprised me was while the movie follows Kong’s journey through Hollow Earth, you start to feel like rooting for him. I’m 100% Team Godzilla but Kong was really something in this. Once they’re fighting at the end, I was feeling that both had an equal claim to being the worthy winner. And how it all ends makes it all the more satisfying.  

In the end, this movie is a lot of fun and, unlike most versus movies, ends with a clear winner. It’s a film that doesn’t take itself too seriously and really wants to give what the fans want to see. It gets silly and it has its flaws, but the action makes up for it. It’s definitely something to see on the big screen but if you’re still wanting to play it safe, it’s currently streaming on HBO Max for a month. Oh, and there are no end credits, in case you were wondering.