Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire and Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire - Double Review

[Music] wow this is dogs and cats living together Mass hysteria two movies backto back double review well if this is how the studios want to release them this is how it's going to go down then let's do this so it was spring break schools were closed and what happens I get clobbered with a double whammy so first there's a new Ghostbusters movie in case you haven't heard in case you haven't already watched 200 reviews of it it came out the weekend before and then Easter weekend was another Godzilla movie yeah so it's frozen Empire and um the new Empire so it's been a very um Empire kind of theme so anyway I'm thinking oh boy everybody's going to ask me about Ghostbusters and everybody's going to ask me about Godzilla so boom Monday morning right off the bat I look up the show times the earliest I find is a noon screening for either I do Ghostbusters Tuesday a noon screening of Godzilla and now I saw them both and I'm ready to rock so first let's talk about Ghostbusters Frozen Empire I really enjoyed it uh some things I say here could be considered spoilers so I'm going to air on the side of spoiler alert here we go in a nutshell I think it's a great followup to afterlife afterlife did its job by introduc producing a new younger cast and finally bringing back the original gang even though it was extremely abrupt and at the very end I'll always remember back in the 2000s when Dan akroy was talking about making another Ghostbusters movie with the old cast passing the torch onto the younger cast and after so many rumors and false starts it was like a miracle when it finally happened it was a shame they couldn't have made it back when Harold Ramis was still alive but like the Titanic arriving it's better late than never who would have ever thought we'd see Bill Murray playing Venkman ever again let alone twice it makes you wonder why is all this happening now also before the movie there was a Garfield trailer that's right A Garfield trailer before a Ghostbusters movie The Garfield Venkman Bill Murray connection never goes away Frozen Empire could have gone two ways they could have been like well we passed the torch and now it's just going to be Paul Rudd and the kids I would have accepted that but they chose to keep the original Ghostbusters involved which is commendable because in afterlife they were thrown in last minute Frozen Empire corrects this this time the original gang is more a part of the plot this time it makes more sense for them being there and their screen time is spread out evenly Venkman doesn't show up until the final act with the exception of an earlier scene where he's testing the telekinetic abilities of a certain character it's a minor thing but in my opinion since they put the venman stuff mostly in that final Act they should have used somebody else for the telekinetic scene uh that way his appearance in the doorway of the firehouse would have had a much greater impact the one thing afterlife definitely has over Frozen Empire in regards to the old cast is that Egon Harold Ramis is there in spirit quite literally so in a sense it brings the original four ghostbuster characters together one last time in a very heartwarming kind of way way the whole movie of afterlife was a tribute to Harold RIS and there's a lot of emotional content that is not there in Frozen Empire there's nothing that gets you teary eyed in any way the only thing that comes close is a brief moment I remember when Winston is scolding Rey saying they're getting too old for this or whatever and that was a pretty good moment Ry is featured very prominently and Dan akroy looks like he's having so much fun with the role you can see the look of delight on his face and whenever he's explaining how paranormal stuff works knowing that he's actually really big on the subject makes it even more entertaining he is in his element I love how Ry is hosting a YouTube show and he's surrounded by all these occult books and haunted artifacts it's great Annie pots is back as Janine who finally becomes a Ghostbuster like in The Real Ghostbusters animated series she's very much an essential part of the original cast I do wish sigy Weaver and Rick Moranis could have been in there as well but I know it's hard to get everybody back the most surprising returning cast member was William Atherton as Walter peek the guy you love to hate now he's mayor wait hang on when did that happen who elected that guy mayor anyway he's back to the usual business messing with the Ghostbusters plans it's a welcome call back that I didn't see coming the standout performance from The Young cast is McKenna Grace as Phoebe the granddaughter of Egon she plays it just as great as in afterlife overall I can't decide which movie I like better afterlife or frozen Empire each have their strengths and weaknesses the plot in afterlife was very much straightforward uh it was more character driven or at least that's how it felt to me Frozen Empire is more busy there's lots going on Phoebe's befriending a ghost there's an orb that contains a spirit there's a whole plot about the Ecto containment unit filling up there's an evil enchantment on an audio tape much like Evil Dead lots happening uh that's not to say the original Ghostbusters movie didn't have a complicated plot if you want to talk about the whole thing with the gatekeeper and Key Master it can sound rather absurd but in the original none of it ever felt like Exposition it was covered up with all that comedy and you never had the time to think about it but in Frozen Empire it feels like you're getting a lot of explanation all the time there's a scene in the library with Paton Oswalt which is very very entertaining but it's like the old Trope where you stop everything and let's tell you the whole story I do like that there's a new villain gaka who freezes New York under all that ice so it doesn't have to be goer all the time uh remember how many villains there were in The Real Ghostbusters it was endless but I think the problem in Frozen Empire if I were to pick any one problem is that I think there are too many characters I suspected this could be an issue with having the old Ghostbusters and younger Ghostbusters all together it might get too cluttered uh because think about it you have all the kids which is plenty then you have Paul Rudd and then you have the old Ghostbusters including Janine and then they felt for some reason that wasn't enough so on top of all that they add a superhero character and that's exactly what it is a guy with firep powers yes because fighting ghosts with proton packs isn't enough so they needed someone with fire AB abilities to fight the ice villain he's played by Kum nanani he's really good in the new Twilight Zone and many other films but I just don't see the point of having a superhero character when all the ghostbuster characters young and old should have been enough I felt the interaction between the old Ghostbusters in afterlife even though it was brief was actually closer to the chemistry they had in the original 1984 film it's a hard thing to replicate and it was back in the 80s man that was a long time ago but it can't be overstated how funny that original movie was even I kind of forgot I probably went close to 10 years since the last time I saw it because it's one of those movies I saw so many times that I have it in my head I felt like I didn't need to see it again but recently I rewatched it and damn it holds up it's all about that natural chemistry between those actors and even in Ghostbusters 2 some of that chemistry carried over obviously now it's pretty hard without Harold Ramos but the comedic tone of these new movies is very different Paul Rudd reciting the lyrics to the Ghostbusters theme song or Kum nanani flicking a lighter at gaka we're not getting any of the same type of spontaneous comedy uh I don't think it's possible to recapture that same lightning in a bottle but perhaps if they allowed a little more time for improvisation and gave more space for Bill Murray to goof around maybe they could have gotten closer Slimer was kind of expected but what I didn't expect was how close they returned him to the original character they actually made Slimer a little scary again it's hard to remember but that first scene where he attacked Venkman was pretty terrifying seeing it as a kid so I like what they did with Slimer so the reason I bring up all the old nostalgic stuff is just to say as a Ghostbusters kid I appreciate it with afterlife and Frozen Empire they gave us what we wanted I thought the original Ghostbusters Cannon was long dead but it's nice they delivered overall I enjoyed both films and I'm happy they did it now get ready for Beverly Hills Cop 4 twister 2 Beetlejuice 2 Gladiator 2 spinal tap 2 alien Mad Max Karate Kid anything that ever existed is getting another sequel we are living in very weird times right now now let's talk about Godzilla X Kong the new Empire so the timing of this movie is a little bit unfortunate because didn't we just get a Godzilla movie it was this past December but it feels like it just happened Godzilla minus one was a masterpiece that's very hard to follow so here's the best way I can describe this if you've gone to a metal or Rock concert or can at least imagine seeing an opening band that's just amazing and blows everybody away and then the main act comes out with highed production giant LED walls maybe there's some pyro all that but the actual performance and the content behind it just pales in comparison don't get me wrong it's still a lot of fun of course this is part of the American Godzilla series the monster verse and it's a follow-up to to Godzilla versus Kong which came out in early 2021 that one came out streaming the same day as theaters because of course back then things weren't quite normal but man I loved same day streaming I wish we still had that option since getting out to a theater requires a lot more planning and unless it's something the whole family wants to see well got to wait till the holidays over streaming versus theaters is a subject for another day but these past two monster vers films are a perfect case in point that's the reason I bring it up to highlight the fact that the experience was different with streaming I'm in my own layer I'm more comfortable I can start the movie anytime I want especially if I'm reviewing it I can get started early in the morning and while I'm watching it if I see something that gets me excited or some observation or thought that I want to write down I can pause the movie that way I can write it down without missing a second of the movie that's how I give it my all uh this time it's in theater so I'm just working off memory which is fine it's just a different way to do it see the movie and then I write the whole script afterwards so it's two different experiences it's an important topic it's worth mentioning but everybody's different everybody has their own uh preferences so what's happening in this film once again I'm going to give you a spoiler alert just in case here we go Kong is still living down in Hollow Earth exploring this new Uncharted region which brings him to the villain scar King who's almost like an evil Kong who's the leader of a hostile Army of ape creatures makes me think of kingdom of the plan of the Apes which I'm looking forward to because all these new plan of the Apes movies have been amazing anyway Godzilla is on the surface laying the smackdown on other monsters while absorbing radiation and becoming a new glowing supercharged Godzilla and then there's the human characters the Monarch team who are investigating the source of a signal coming from Hollow Earth which leads them into the mix to help out with the good Monsters the human characters leave much to be desired but it's not trying to make a serious drama or anything this is a checky brain at the door kind of movie because they know you're here to see the monsters so they deliver exactly what's advertised with that said uh Gia is still a very Charming character she's the one from Godzilla versus Kong who talks to Kong with sign language that's all light-hearted and cute so it has that going for it but the real stars are the monsters Kong is definitely the protagonist he's the one who gets the most screen time I like how they got his personality down pat there's lots of facial expressions and Body Language so you can always tell what he's thinking so definitely Kong's personality is a big A+ for me Godzilla also has some interesting behavioral traits some of which I've never seen before he goes goes to sleep in the Roman Coliseum as soon as I saw that I immediately thought that's what my cats would always do they'd walk around the house and if they felt like taking a nap they would just look around and go right there that's a good spot it's funny and it's also totally believable because if there was a giant monster in real life it would probably do the same thing there's definitely an abundance of other beasts like suko who is a cute little ap-like creature who Kong makes friends with and then Mothra makes an appearance and I'm always happy to see Mothra but it felt kind of like she was crammed in last minute there's also an ice monster shimo who scar King Controls and this is where it drew a very strange similarity to Ghostbusters Frozen Empire which I'm sure was a complete coincidence since these movies were being worked on separately and simultaneously but there's a scene at the beach much like in Frozen Empire and the ocean freezes over I is sitting there thinking holy this is some major Deja Vu and there was another Deja Vu moment where they destroy the pyramids uh can you recall what movie I'm talking about um especially when Kong gets this robotic arm and there's a shot where you see the robot hand like coming up behind the pyramid and clutching it if you would have taken a screen grab and showed me that one shot I would have said that's from Transformers Revenge of the Fallen again I don't believe that was intentional but it does make me wonder are we running out of landmarks to destroy we should start keeping Italians see what's left I really did enjoy all the scenes when they're in the cities and anytime we see human-made structures getting wrecked because that gives us the proper sense of scale of the monsters when they're in Hollow Earth they're just in a big fantasy world so I don't find those scenes quite as interesting I like the cities as the battle stage that's my personal preference with the monster characters it's kind of nice to see them trying out new villains like gaka and Ghostbusters because we've seen gadora and Mecca Godzilla and all that it's kind of like the Batman movies like how many versions of the Joker and Catwoman do you need maybe it would be a good idea to see Gyan eventually I always liked Gyan if they ever go that route in the future but they should try to invent new villains I would personally like to see a a movie called Godzilla versus insert new monster name that we never heard before just like all the films of the 60s and 70s it was always Godzilla versus this Godzilla versus that it was always a new monster I'm not sure what the general public will think of this if you're looking for a really good story with substance then you'll be disappointed but if you just want to see monsters fighting and all that good stuff then you'll have a good time there was a very young child in the theater many row behind me who was making all kinds of noise it was rather annoying but I was more interested in trying to gauge what the child thought of the movie it was a mixture of cries and random yells so I couldn't make much of it uh they probably didn't care too much anyway this is a fun Monster Mash I'm really proud of Adam windguard for taking the Helms and continuing the monster verse so if you want a popcorn action flick and don't want to wait till summer this delivers anyway I just want to sign off by saying I'm honored that anyone would want to know my opinion on these movies I mean the fact that uh you'd think of me is still a big deal to me because there's probably hundreds of other YouTubers who review these movies maybe even like thousands and some of them get early access to these movies um I don't know how that all works I I think you have to live near La or New York for that I'm not sure but I still feel honored and privileged to know that there's certain movies that people want to know what I have to say I'm that God's Zilla guy and I'm that Ghostbusters guy For Better or Worse hope you enjoy the movies and the review got to get back to working on nerd and a bunch of other projects that I'm also very excited about see you soon

Channel: Cinemassacre

Views: 171,809

Keywords: james rolfe, cinemassacre, ghostbusters, godzilla, movie review, ghostbusters frozen empire, Kong, Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire, Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire, cinemassacre movie review, legacy sequels, Cinemassacre King Kong, AVGN Kong, AVGN Godzilla, James Rolfe Godzilla

Id: 0XMZl7lqvME

Length: 17min 50sec (1070 seconds)

Published: Wed Apr 03 2024