History GodzillaKingOfTheMonsters2019 / TropesQToZ

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--->"''MADISON!''"
--->"''MADDIE!''"

** The [[NonMaliciousMonster MUTOs]] in 2014 and the [[HorrorHunger Skullcrawlers]] in ''Kong: Skull Island'' were just giant animals, following their species' hardwired biological imperatives that happened to pose an apocalyptic threat to humanity and the ecosystem. Ghidorah, however, actively enjoys what he does in his quest to take over the Earth and bring about global extinction, and he goes out of his way to gleefully and ''directly'' murder several people even when it's impractical for him. It's even suggested in the novelization that he isn't really [[HostileTerraforming xenoforming the planet]] out of any kind of necessity but simply because he wants to kill every other living thing.
** [[GeneralRipper Lieutenant Colonel Packard]] from ''Kong: Skull Island'' had no higher plan than killing Kong at all costs, and he simply ignored or overlooked how his actions put more people in danger from the creatures in the bigger picture. In ''this'' film, the much more serious-acting Alan Jonah is ''actively'' trying to get billions of people killed, as an '''[[MisanthropeSupreme end-goal]]''' rather than as an unfortunate side-effect, and he directly murders dozens of unarmed people in person when the Monarch outposts are being raided.

* ReadingsAreOffTheScale: It's stated later in the film during a military briefing that Ghidorah's typhoon has evolved into a Category 6. In reality, there's no such thing as a Category 6 storm, since Category 5 encompasses all possible readings above Category 4.
** Also, Admiral Stenz stating that the Titans are causing "disasters we don't even have names for yet."

* TimeShiftedActor: Creator/JoeMorton appears in the scene [[spoiler:where Mothra comes out of her cocoon]] as the present day version of [[Film/KongSkullIsland Houston Brooks]].

* TriumphantReprise: As the Argo encounters him in the storm, we see King Ghidorah forcefully flaring his wings while silhouetted in smoke and fog with lightning flashing behind him - and soon enough the film's DarkestHour takes place, with [[spoiler:Godzilla taken out by the military and Ghidorah in charge of the Titans]]. Later, once she emerges from her cocoon, we see Mothra elegantly unfurling her own wings with beautiful glowing patterns on them, symbolizing the return of hope.

%%* TheReasonYouSuckSpeech

%%* RoyalsWhoActuallyDoSomething

* TheStormbringer: Once [[Characters/MonsterVerseKingGhidorah Ghidorah]] is awoken, he generates a perpetual hurricane filled with yellow lightning around himself which follows him wherever he goes and gets more powerful the longer he's active. And when Ghidorah takes over as the ruling alpha from Godzilla and leads the Titans toward creating an extinction event, his WeatherManipulation begins spreading offshoot storms around the globe, and it's overall suggested that if Ghidorah hadn't been stopped he would've enveloped the entire planet in endless storms. Only [[spoiler:his death at the hands (and [[WaveMotionGun mouth]]) of Godzilla brings the storm to an end]].

%%* TakeMyHand

%%* TheTimeOfMyths

%%* VillainBall

%%* WashingtonDCInvasion

%%* WorldOfSnark

** The [[NonMaliciousMonster MUTOs]] in 2014 and the [[HorrorHunger Skullcrawlers]] in ''Kong: Skull Island'' were just giant animals, following their species' hardwired biological imperatives that happened to pose an apocalyptic threat to humanity and the ecosystem. Ghidorah, however, actively enjoys what he does in his quest to take over the Earth and bring about global extinction, and he goes out of his way to gleefully and ''directly'' murder several people even when it's impractical for him – it's even suggested in the novelization that he isn't [[HostileTerraforming xenoforming the planet]] out of any kind of necessity but simply because he wants to kill every other living thing.
** [[GeneralRipper Lieutenant Colonel Packard]] from ''Kong: Skull Island'' had no higher plan than killing Kong at all costs, and he simply ignored or overlooked how his actions put more people in danger from the creatures in the bigger picture. In ''this'' film, the much more serious-acting Alan Jonah is ''actively'' trying to get billions of people killed as an '''[[MisanthropeSupreme end-goal]]''' rather than as an unfortunate side-effect, and he directly murders dozens of unarmed people in person when the Monarch outposts are being raided.

* VilerNewVillain: Ghidorah and Alan Jonah respectively are much more unsympathetically evil than the previous two films' {{Kaiju}} and human {{Big Bad}}s, respectively.

* WeaponStomp: King Ghidorah [[spoiler: [[FearsomeFoot lovetaps the ORCA with his foot]] when Madison throws it at him.]]

* SwissCheeseSecurity: Jonah's bunker outside of the Boston metro area. The security presence is so poor that Madison is able to [[spoiler:snatch the ORCA from the control room, exit the bunker, hike all the way to the control room in Fenway Stadium, and set it running before Jonah and Emma even realize it's gone. In the novelization she ''is'' caught by one guard, but shocks him into unconsciousness with a stun gun before he can stop her.]]

* UnnecessarilyLargeInterior: The interior of the ''Argo'' was clearly shot inside a regular building set full of lavishly-sized corridors, rooms and ceilings. Its bridge alone is larger than your average apartment. It's unlikely that any RealLife utilitarian aircraft, and military ones in particular, would waste so much space on creature comforts.

* VillainBall: For some odd reason. Jonah allows Madison unsupervised free reign of his base. Which leads to [[spoiler: Madison being able to steal the ORCA -- the device Jonah and his cohorts have been using to awaken the Titans -- when they leave it in a insecure room]].

-->''[[https://www.artofvfx.com/godzilla-king-of-the-monsters-spencer-cook-senior-animation-supervisor-mpc/ Spencer Cook]]:''' One of my jobs on this project was to find the best way to convey each monster’s personality through body language and limited facial expressions. It was a tricky combination because if we exaggerated the personality it could seem cartoonish but if we only focused on monster qualities, it wouldn’t connect with the audience. In character animation, we always look for ways to visually communicate with the audience by finding aesthetically interesting poses, which we call "appeal" and visual clarity through clear silhouettes and clean staging of the action.

* SlidingScaleOfUnavoidableVersusUnforgivable: [[spoiler:Emma]] insists that their plan to accelerate the Titans' awakening through force and allow them to cause millions of collateral deaths around the world, is a necessary evil to ensure humanity's and the biosphere's long-term survival. [[spoiler:Emma]] out that if {{the government}} have their way and try to exterminate the Titans (which is only a matter of time away, thanks to the understandable mass fear of city-leveling monsters that caused so much destruction in the last film, and also thanks to [[HeadInTheSandManagement Monarch not taking the government as seriously as they probably should have]]); then the long-term consequences could be even ''worse'' for the world than [[spoiler:Emma]]'s plan. Regardless, the human heroes [[spoiler:including [[HeelRealization Madison]]]] are horrified and disgusted by the amorality of [[spoiler:Emma]]'s plan, and they argue the plan is a catastrophic gamble ''at best'' due to how little anyone understands about the Titans (the novelization goes into even more detail about this). The latter argument is backed up when [[TyrantTakesTheHelm King Ghidorah]], [[spoiler:whose [[AlienInvasion true nature]] basically makes him an OutsideContextProblem]], blindsides the terrorists who freed him by commanding the other Titans to help him raze back the world's ecosystems instead of healing them, with the [=MonsterVerse=] novelizations indicating that the likely end result is [[ApocalypseHow/Class5 the extinction of all multicellular life]] except Ghidorah himself if Ghidorah finishes this. [[spoiler:That having been said, once Ghidorah is taken out of the picture for good, [[TheExtremistWasRight Emma's plan]] ''[[TheExtremistWasRight does]]'' [[TheExtremistWasRight work the way she wanted it to]], in a roundabout way, with Godzilla pacifying the other Titans and even commanding them to steer clear of human habitations from now on]].

* SoLastSeason: In both ''Film/Godzilla2014'' and ''Film/KongSkullIsland'', the only help Godzilla and Kong really needed to bring the Kaiju {{Big Bad}}s down was some well-timed artillery and explosives from the human cast distracting the big bads from finishing the fight themselves. In ''King of the Monsters'', that on its own isn't ''nearly'' enough to ensure the good guys win when [[TheDreaded King Ghidorah]] is the Big Bad. It takes nothing less than an overpowered Godzilla, Mothra, and all four branches of the U.S. military all fighting together to even stand a ''chance'' at taking Ghidorah down. [[spoiler:And Ghidorah ''still'' almost manages to come out on top of '''all of them'''. If not for the Russells' final intervention with the ORCA, then Ghidorah surely would have [[VampiricDraining sucked the radiation-overloaded Godzilla dry]], killed him, and would have been decisively victorious]].

* TakesOneToKillOne: This movie shows beyond a shadow of a doubt that only Titans can kill Titans. TheGovernment think they can put down the Titans on their own terms, but not only does the military's FantasticNuke fail to permanently kill ''either'' of the Titans it directly strikes; the [[Film/Godzilla2014 2014 movie]]'s implications that nuking a Titan will only make them even more dangerous [[AscendedFridgeHorror are outright confirmed]]. The conflict between Godzilla and Ghidorah is a Heroic Menace vs. Evil Menace scenario, with Godzilla being strictly interested in maintaining peace and balance, whereas Ghidorah is an OmnicidalManiac seeking global extinction. [[spoiler:Mark and Monarch attempt to draw Ghidorah and the territorial [[{{Jerkass}} Rodan]] into a Menace Civil War to take both the Destroyer Titans out, but it Ghidorah wins and comes out of that fight none worse for wear]].

** At the movie's end, Godzilla lets out a triumphant roar [[spoiler:after he's killed Ghidorah and the summoned Titans bow down to him as their new king]]; solidifying [[RightfulKingReturns the reclamation of Godzilla's kingship]] and the restoration of balance.”), [expand VilerNewVillain], add VolcanicVeins(“This movie's portrayal of Rodan is a MagmaMan, with vein-like cracks along the edges of his wings oozing bright lava. [[spoiler:Burning Godzilla has burning orange light leaking through the cracks between his scales, giving off the impression of fiery glowing veins]].

** In the novelization, one of the scientists at the secret [[UnderwaterBase ocean-based]] outpost asks what's happening [[spoiler:when the resident Titan starts passing effortlessly through the {{containment field}} ''after'' the life sign-monitoring instruments say it has died. At which point, another operative realizes aloud that Kraken camouflaging its life-signs stops the fields from holding it back]].

** Emma Russell calls Serizawa out for condemning the notion of sacrificing masses of innocent lives when his HeadInTheSandManagement means that TheGovernment could take over Monarch any day now, at which point the government would cause just as much damage to humanity and the world as the [[EcoTerrorist eco-terrorists]]' plan if not ''more''. No-one actually has a comeback for ''this'', and [[{{Hypocrite}} Serizawa already demonstrated earlier in the movie that he doesn't treat the senate's foolishness nearly as seriously as he later takes Emma's plan despite the damage that either of them could cause]]. Serizawa later breaks his own philosophy against human intervention in Titan crises, [[spoiler:personally intervening with a manually-armed nuke to save Godzilla's life]].

* WoobieDestroyerOfWorlds: Although both of the lead eco-terrorists – [[NotSoWellIntentionedExtremist Alan Jonah]] and [[spoiler:[[SecretlySelfish Emma Russell]]]] – have some valid points (the latter more than the former), particularly with their concerns about TheGovernment[='s=] stupidity that provoked them to action; underneath it all, they're just using it to lash out at the entire human race for the suffering that mankind's follies put them through.

** [[spoiler:Emma]] was caught up in the destruction of San Francisco [[spoiler:where her son was brutally killed, after which her husband descended into alcoholism before [[GriefInducedSplit abandoning her and Madison]]]]. After five years of trying to work out why the Titan attack happened, [[spoiler:Emma]] bizarrely decided they're going to save the world at large by forcing billions of people to go through a hundred more Titan attacks so the Titans can [[UtopiaJustifiesTheMeans regenerate the ecosphere]]. The novelization more clearly states that the reason [[spoiler:Emma]] has decided on this course of action after theirself losing a loved one to a Titan attack is because they specifically blames mankind for causing the 2014 rampage in the first place, having discovered that mankind's environmental abuse is what instigated Godzilla and the [=MUTOs'=] emergence then and that it's ''still'' instigating other Titans' gradual awakening.

** After the world has discovered {{Kaiju}} are real and could likely be sleeping anywhere under our civilization's feet; [[Film/Godzilla2014 Admiral Stenz]], the government, and apparently most of the public who lost loved ones in the events of 2014 are convinced that our only recourse as a species is to kill all the Titans while they're sleeping, and they basically view Monarch as [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B9aM4rH692M Carter Burke]] for the organization's vehement resistance to the push for Titan extermination. What most of the world doesn't seem to realize is that this isn't a traditional ActionHorror movie in the style of ''Film/{{Them}}'', so much as it is a GreenAesop story in the style of ''Film/TheDayAfterTomorrow'': Monarch are actually {{ignored expert}}s who have very valid reasons for opposing Titan extermination, and it's furthermore unlikely the Titans will be easy to kill even while dormant.

* YouKnowTheOne: On the first viewing, Madison and Emma's breakfast conversation looks like they're discussing far-from-unique anxieties about how the world is changing with the Titans' existence, and also about how rough Mark's GriefInducedSplit from them has been on Madison. [[spoiler:On the second viewing, it's apparent that they're actually talking about Emma's EcoTerrorist plan and the [[ToughLove apocalypse survival training]] that Emma has been subjecting Madison to]]. Emma and Madison also don't refer to the ORCA as anything other than "it" nor do they allude to its function when bringing it up, enabling the next sequence to introduce the device and its purpose proper.

* SerendipitousSurvival: It's a subtle RewatchBonus, but there are two (unsuccessful) attempts [[spoiler:by the same character]] to [[InvokedTrope invoke]] this trope on others. [[spoiler:In the opening, Emma's reassurances to Madison that Mark is safe where he is appear on the first watching to just be a mother reassuring her daughter that he's far enough away from harm due to his isolated whereabouts ''if'' the worst comes to pass, but when re-watching the scene with knowledge of the EvilAllAlong twist, it becomes apparent that Emma is ''actually'' assuring her co-conspirator that he'll be safe '''when''' the worst comes to pass. Shortly before Jonah and his goons are due to slaughter everyone standing between them and Mothra (an attack which [[TheMole Emma is secretly in on]]), Emma attempts to persuade Dr. Mancini to take a sleep break so he won't become a casualty – it doesn't work and he gets a bullet to the head]].

* SlidingScaleOfUnavoidableVersusUnforgivable: [[spoiler:Emma]] insists that their plan to accelerate the Titans' awakening through force, and allow them to cause millions of collateral deaths around the world, is a necessary evil to ensure humanity's and the biosphere's long-term survival. [[spoiler:Emma]] out that if {{the government}} have their way and try to exterminate the Titans (which is only a matter of time away, thanks to the understandable mass fear of city-leveling monsters that caused so much destruction in the last film, and also thanks to [[HeadInTheSandManagement Monarch not taking the government as seriously as they probably should have]]); then the long-term consequences could be even ''worse'' for the world than [[spoiler:Emma]]'s plan. Regardless, the human heroes [[spoiler:including [[HeelRealization Madison]]]] are horrified and disgusted by the amorality of [[spoiler:Emma]]'s plan, and they argue the plan is a catastrophic gamble ''at best'' due to how little anyone understands about the Titans (the novelization goes into even more detail about this). The latter argument is backed up when [[TyrantTakesTheHelm King Ghidorah]], [[spoiler:whose [[AlienInvasion true nature]] basically makes him an OutsideContextProblem]], blindsides the terrorists who freed him by commanding the other Titans to help him raze back the world's ecosystems instead of healing them, with the [=MonsterVerse=] novelizations indicating that the likely end result is [[ApocalypseHow/Class5 the extinction of all multicellular life]] except Ghidorah himself if Ghidorah finishes this. [[spoiler:That having been said, once Ghidorah is taken out of the picture for good, [[TheExtremistWasRight Emma's plan]] ''[[TheExtremistWasRight does]]'' [[TheExtremistWasRight work the way she wanted it to]], in a roundabout way, with Godzilla pacifying the other Titans and even commanding them to steer clear of human habitations from now on]].

** In the novelization, one of the scientists at the secret [[UnderwaterBase ocean-based]] outpost asks what's happening [[spoiler:when the resident Titan starts passing effortlessly through the {{containment field}} ''after'' the life sign-monitoring instruments say it has died died. At which point, another operative realizes aloud that Kraken camouflaging its life-signs stops the fiels from holding it back]].

** Jonah, who [[MisanthropeSupreme is fine with Ghidorah creating an even worse extinction event than humanity to wipe us out]], has been driven mad by decades of fighting in dirty war after dirty war where he recurrently saw humanity at its absolute worst, causigng him to believe that ''anything'' is better for the world than the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthropocene Anthropocene]] being allowed to continue any further. The novelization of the film furthermore reveals that the tipping point for Jonah's descent into misanthropy was [[MoralityPet his daughter]] being gruesomely murdered on her way home from school, while he was away on a tour of duty.

* RedIsViolent: Rodan is a Titan with a violent temperament who's a red-colored MagmaMan, and even his introductory scene has a RedSkyTakeWarning. [[spoiler:And then there's Burning Godzilla, who levels Boston with thermonuclear pulses in the process of obliterating Ghidorah]].

* SicklyGreenGlow: The Oxygen Destroyer's blast produces a pale-green bright light, and it eradicates every lifeform except [[spoiler:the alien Ghidorah, and Godzilla (who's grievously injured by it)]] within the blast radius.

* {{Terraform}}ing: It's revealed in this film that the Titans do this on a regional scale wherever they go, with Godzilla and the [=MUTOs'=] presence in [[Film/Godzilla2014 the previous film]] having caused vegetation ecosystems to flourish in the ruined cities, and with [[spoiler:the awakened Titans' global presence at the film's end causing a recovery in declining ecosystems and endangered species, reversing the ice caps' melting, and even causing a new rainforest to bloom in the Sahara]]. It's also speculated by Dr. Stanton that King Ghidorah -- the exception to this rule as [[spoiler:an invasive alien who's not from Earth]] -- is creating an extinction event because he's [[HostileTerraforming xenoforming]] the planet to make it more to his own liking.

** The military pull a truly apocalyptic one, overlapping with LethallyStupid (see above). As an indirect result, an entire fleet composed of all four branches is thoroughly annihilated by Ghidorah and Rodan at Washington D.C..

* UnderwaterRuins: Midway through the film it's revealed that [[spoiler:Godzilla's lair is in a temple built inside an active volcano, next to the ruins of a sunken Cyclopean city in the Hollow Earth]].

* WhamLine: One is dropped shortly after King Ghidorah [[spoiler:survives the Oxygen Destroyer]], revealing [[spoiler:that he's an alien rather than another natural Titan.]]
--> '''Dr. Chen:''' [[spoiler:It tells of a great dragon who fell from the stars. A hydra whose storm swallowed both men and gods alike.]]
--> '''Mark''': [[spoiler:You mean an alien?]]