‘Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire’ review: Monster mash goes overboard with wacko plot

nypost.com:

between lizard and monkey. A creaturely collab.But “x” is also the symbol that should have been prodigiously used to cross out the script’s many, many stupid ideas.

Does Kong, who heretofore believed that he was the last of his kind on the planet, really need to meet a cute giant child ape and then weigh the pros and cons of fatherhood?

Must Jia (Kaylee Hottle), the lonely little native girl discovered on Skull Island and then adopted by Dr. Ilene Andrews (Rebecca Hall), be the 11 o’clock prophesied savior of a lost ancient civilization?And are we supposed to buy that the deadliest foe that both the surface world and the subterranean Hollow Earth have ever faced is a cartoony orange primate called the Scar King, who wields a whip made of some poor sap’s spinal cord?

In the next movie, will Kong sing “The Circle of Life”?When the titans, including a rather underwhelming Mothra, have their climactic battle in Rio de Janeiro, it’s not just the most exciting scene in the entire movie — it’s a breather from a brain-busting plot in which, early on, an anesthetized Kong gets his cracked tooth replaced by a hippie veterinarian played by the leading man from “Downton Abbey.” Later, with his life imperiled, Trapper (Dan Stevens) jokes, “Nobody likes a dentist.” For the love of Godzilla.Before all of this madness happens, Ilene is at the Monarch headquarters in Barbados when she becomes alarmed by unusual quakes emanating from Hollow Earth.