If the 2016 box office is any indication, moviegoers are overfull on sequels and reboots. From outright flops to just sub-par box office performance, it’s been a rough year for franchises not set in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. So I doubt I was the only person who saw Kong: Skull Island and thought “Why is this even happening?”
First announced during the Legendary Pictures panel at San Diego Comic-Con in 2014 as Skull Island. Over the next year and change, more information was released. Director Jordan Vogt-Roberts (The Kings of Summer) came on board. There was a bit of casting and script upheaval, and it was announced this version of Kong will eventually fight Universal’s newly minted reboot of Godzilla.
But nothing about Skull Island grabbed my interest. Even the first trailer, unveiled at San Diego Comic-Con in 2015, seemed to confirm this film would be yet another ‘paint-by-numbers’ updating that slapped a veneer of grit and seriousness on a classic icon. Then, late in the evening of November 16, 2016, Universal dropped the full trailer for Kong: Skull Island online and everything changed.
In the video below, I explain how the new trailer gives me hope for the film and why I suddenly find myself looking forward to a monster movie that isn’t Pacific Rim: Maelstrom.
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