History MonsterVerse / TropesQToZ

** '''The kaiju:''' In ''Film/KongSkullIsland'', the Skullcrawlers are relatively small by Kaiju standards, and Kong who ''isn't even fully mature yet'' can beat back hordes of them. In ''WesternAnimation/SkullIsland2023'', the Kraken can hold its own in a fight against a more mature Kong, coming close to killing him. In ''Film/Godzilla2014'', the [=MUTOs=] are nearly the size of Godzilla, they create an {{EMP}} around themselves which does a lot to cripple the entire U.S. Navy's efforts to track and stop them, and the pair make Godzilla (whom ''Godzilla vs. Kong'' would later establish to be basically a lot more physically powerful than Kong) work quite a bit to kill them both, and it looks like the [=MUTOs=] nearly win the fight against him. In ''Film/GodzillaKingOfTheMonsters2019'', Ghidorah is roughly ''twice'' the size of Godzilla, he's powerful enough that Godzilla is considered the ''only'' force on Earth that can truly rival him (and even then, in a fair fight without Mothra's assistance or watery terrain, Godzilla despite himself does seem to be the underdog), Ghidorah generates an intensifying electricity-filled hurricane around himself merely by being active, and he gains command of ''all the other Kaiju on the planet'' except Mothra when Godzilla is briefly incapacitated. ZigZagged by ''Godzilla vs. Kong'', where the BigBad Mechagodzilla [[spoiler:is essentially Ghidorah's {{reincarnation}}, but is not as powerful as Ghidorah was: lacking Ghidorah's HealingFactor, EnergyAbsorption and apocalyptic WeatherManipulation, also being stated to have only curb-stomped Godzilla because the latter was already weakened, and never getting the chance to take control of other Titans before it's killed]]. The trope picks back up in ''Film/GodzillaXKongTheNewEmpire'' -- although the Skar King is physically weaker than Mechagodzilla on his own, he's very intelligent, and his reluctant RightHandAttackDog Shimo is both larger than Godzilla, and close to King Ghidorah's power level based on the measures Godzilla took to counter her and her ability to plunge the world into a new ice age.
** '''The humans:''' The human antagonists of ''Kong: Skull Island'' are an AWOL band of decimated soldiers with limited supplies and ammunition, whom have already been decimated by the time they become antagonistic. In the ''Skull Island'' series, Irene and her band of {{private military contractors}} are a little better-equipped, but they're still clearly out of their depth on Skull Island. In the 2015 plot of ''Monarch: Legacy of Monsters'', [[spoiler:Lee Shaw forms a {{renegade splinter faction}} out of ex-Monarch operatives whom are more resourceful and well-equipped to accomplish their anti-Monarch goals, but they're still international criminals on the run whose best ammunition are explosives]]. In ''Godzilla: King of the Monsters'', Alan Jonah and his eco-terrorist paramilitary are only marginally better-equipped than the ''Legacy of Monsters'' antagonists, except they possess Monarch resources including access to their secret bunkers, and the ORCA with which they can awaken Titans; and they consequently manage to do much, ''much'' more damage in a comparatively shorter time. In ''Godzilla vs. Kong'', Apex Cybernetics are a multi-billion, international [[ResearchInc hi-tech corporation]] with a [[VillainWithGoodPublicity law-abiding public image]], making them much more powerful with more resources. The trope starts to [[InvertedTrope invert]] with Raymond Martin in ''Godzilla x Kong: The Hunted'' -- although he still has far more money and power than the pre-Apex antagonists, his technology and bases also appear to be more limited than Apex's.

* TooDumbToLive: Naturally there's a lot in this kind of franchise. Besides MilitariesAreUseless, other major examples include: the G-Team standing and shooting at Ghidorah when it awakens (the novelization amends this into a HeroicSacrifice via AdaptationalExplanation); the military firing their untested Oxygen Destroyer prototype at Ghidorah, which unwittingly gives Ghidorah a direct opening to almost ''succeed'' at exterminating all complex life on Earth (leading to the military losing a lot of their own trying to fight Ghidorah and its Titan army off); but arguably taking this trope up to eleven is everyone who was directly involved with Apex Cybernetics' Mechagodzilla project, [[spoiler:which involved using King Ghidorah's still-partly-alive telepathic skull as the '''brain''' for the machine (a machine which was designed to be the WorldsStrongestMan) and doing this '''''after''''' what happened in ''King of the Monsters'' with Ghidorah's OmnicidalManiac rampage]].

* UncertainDoom: Admiral Stenz' status is unknown after his latest appearance in ''King of the Monsters'', with the novelization and a deleted scene both heavily implying that he died at the Washington D.C. battle against Ghidorah and Rodan due to his submarine sinking, but the former account doesn't confirm anything explicitly. In the first season finale of ''Skull Island'', it's unknown if the Rock Bug which Kong throws at the Kraken survives getting ''violently'' swatted out of the air into the ocean. In the opening of ''Monarch: Legacy of Monsters'', it's uncertain if either Mantleclaw or the Mother Longlegs survived after they fell into the ocean while fighting each-other and weren't seen resurfacing, it's uncertain if the Frost Vark survives being pulled into a closing Vile Vortex violently; [[spoiler:and in the first season finale, it's uncertain if the Ion Dragon survives having its arm ripped off before being thrown by Godzilla into an Axis Mundi portal, and it's also uncertain if Shaw dies after disappearing into a dust cloud kicked up by a black hole-like suction in Axis Mundi]].

* VictoriousRoar: [[Characters/MonsterVerseGodzilla Both]] [[Characters/MonsterVerseKingKong of]] the franchise's main Titan heroes tend to roar to the heavens in victory after killing the serial's resident BigBad. In ''Godzilla: King of the Monsters''; in a much darker twist on the trope, the now-King Ghidorah lets out a triumphant screech after he's [[TyrantTakesTheHelm seized Godzilla's office as King of the Monsters]], with the sound awakening other Titans around the world and bending them to his will.

** The [=MUTOs=] in ''Film/Godzilla2014'' are overall [[NonMaliciousMonster Non-Malicious Monsters]] if highly callous, they just want to survive and reproduce regardless of how their life cycle threatens other life, and they do get some TragicMonster treatment. In the subsequent prequel film ''Film/KongSkullIsland'', the Skullcrawlers are voracious and relentless man-eating predators who are driven by an extreme, biologically-ingrained HorrorHunger: though they're ultimately just doing what they're programmed to do the same as the [=MUTOs=], the Skullcrawlers are played for a lot more horror. Then in ''Film/GodzillaKingOfTheMonsters2019'', the BigBad is King Ghidorah, who compared to the previous films' kaiju is intelligent but {{sadist}}ic to an unnatural degree; being aware of its actions whilst exhibiting unmistakable ForTheEvulz tendencies, killing humans with malicious amusement and relish, and threatening all life on Earth as it tries to engulf the entire planet in Titan-made mass destruction. ''Film/GodzillaVsKong'' has Ghidorah's reincarnation Mechagodzilla, who is just as sadistic and genocidal as its predecessor, yet it seems to lack Ghidorah's theorized end goal of [[HostileTerraforming xenoforming]] Earth into a suitable home for itself and instead it only seems to have [[MoralMyopia morally myopic]] revenge and murder on its mind (although to be fair, Mechagodzilla is hinted in the movie and stated in the novelization to be a borderline AlmightyIdiot). In the prequel animated series ''Skull Island'', set in-between ''Kong: Skull Island'' and ''King of the Monsters'', the Kraken is extremely sadistic and mass murderous, and it's only less vile than Ghidorah in that it's solely focused on conquering Skull Island instead of conquering and destroying the whole world. In ''Film/GodzillaXKongTheNewEmpire'', the Skar King is just as malicious as Ghidorah/Mechagodzilla and the Kraken while also having genocidal plans of his own for the Earth, plus it's implied that he's built up a harem of abused female {{sex slave}}s and has sired children whom he abuses and murders on a dime; the latter are lines that no villain human or Titan has ever been shown crossing before him.
** This is also present among the main human antagonists, in the movies. Preston Packard in ''Kong: Skull Island'' is an AxCrazy ColonelKilgore who becomes more and more willing to sacrifice the lives of everyone around him in pursuit of his personal vendetta against Kong, but he starts out as a relatively good man and his fall into darkness over the course of the movie is framed in a tragic light, and his endangerment of everyone else was more by negligence and inaction than direct malice. In ''Godzilla: King of the Monsters'', the FromCamouflageToCriminal MisanthropeSupreme Alan Jonah, though he has very tragic reasons for being so disillusioned with humanity, is a nasty piece of work who not only slaughters people left and right by himself in pursuit of his goals, but he's willing to let the three-headed monster that he helped release condemn all of humanity and potentially ''all life on Earth'' to certain extinction, so long as he gets to see the human race that he so despises wiped off the board. ''Godzilla vs. Kong'' has Walter Simmons, a high-functioning sociopathic {{narcissist}} who has ''no'' tragic backstory to explain his actions, and whose justifications are presented in the story as even more hollow than the eco-terrorists': he's simply a self-spoiled industrialist who puts millions of people's lives in mortal danger by [[spoiler:instigating and knowingly continuing to instigate Godzilla's rampage]], all to satisfy his own ego. After ''Godzilla vs. Kong'', the ''prequel'' instalments that are chronologically set before ''King of the Monsters'' feature villains much nicer than Jonah and Simmons -- Irene and her {{private military contractors}} in the ''Skull Island'' series are just trying to bring Irene's long-lost daughter back to her, and they don't try to hurt anyone human, while Lee Shaw in ''Monarch: Legacy of Monsters'' is an AntiVillain who's trying to help Godzilla safeguard the Earth, and he doesn't sacrifice innocent lives knowingly.

* WeHardlyKnewYe: [[Creator/SallyHawkins Dr. Graham]] is infamously a victim of this, getting the bare minimal characterization in the movies as anything other than Serizawa's SatelliteCharacter before she suffers SuddenSequelDeathSyndrome. There's also Sandra Brody plus Serizawa and Graham's colleagues at the Janjira containment site in the 2014 film, Victor Nieves in ''Kong: Skull Island'', Alan Jonah's close MookLieutenant Asher in ''King of the Monsters'', and Karsten (the first one to die) in ''Skull Island: The Birth of Kong''.

* ShockAndAwe: Several Titans have bio-electrical powers, including: the [[TheStormbringer thunderstorm-generating]] and [[BreathWeapon lightning-spewing]] Ghidorah, the stinging tentacled Kraken, the lightning-spitting Psychovultures, and to a lesser extent the {{EMP}}-producing [=MUTOs=]. In ''Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire'', Kong's B.E.A.S.T. Glove has offensive electrical capabilities, in a nod to Kong's Toho portrayal where he possessed electrical powers.

* SortingAlgorithmOfEvil: Not in release order, but if the franchise's film and animation instalments are put in ''chronological'' order, this trope is in full effect until ''Film/GodzillaVsKong''. In ''Film/KongSkullIsland'', the Skullcrawlers are relatively small by Kaiju standards, and Kong who ''isn't even fully mature yet'' can beat back hordes of them. In ''WesternAnimation/SkullIsland2023'', the Kraken can hold its own in a fight against a more mature Kong, coming close to killing him. In ''Film/Godzilla2014'', the [=MUTOs=] are nearly the size of Godzilla, they create an {{EMP}} around themselves which does a lot to cripple the entire U.S. Navy's efforts to track and stop them, and the pair make Godzilla (whom ''Godzilla vs. Kong'' would later establish to be basically a lot more physically powerful than Kong) work quite a bit to kill them both, and it looks like the [=MUTOs=] nearly win the fight against him. In ''Film/GodzillaKingOfTheMonsters2019'', Ghidorah is roughly ''twice'' the size of Godzilla, he's powerful enough that Godzilla is considered the ''only'' force on Earth that can truly rival him (and even then, in a fair fight without Mothra's assistance or watery terrain, Godzilla despite himself does seem to be the underdog), Ghidorah generates an intensifying electricity-filled hurricane around himself merely by being active, and he gains command of ''all the other Kaiju on the planet'' except Mothra when Godzilla is briefly incapacitated. ZigZagged by ''Godzilla vs. Kong'', where the BigBad Mechagodzilla [[spoiler:is essentially Ghidorah's {{reincarnation}}, but is implicitly not quite as powerful as Ghidorah was: lacking Ghidorah's HealingFactor, EnergyAbsorption and apocalyptic WeatherManipulation, with Word of God and the novelization suggesting the Mecha only succeeded in curb-stomping Godzilla because the latter was already heavily weakened before their fight, and with the heroes successfully killing Mechagodzilla before it can take control of any other Titans]].

* UngratefulBastard: Packard in ''Kong: Skull Island'' goes as far as pointing a gun at the face of the same journalist who earlier saved his and his men's lives for trying to talk him down. The Russell parents really are a match made in an un-heavenly realm: Emma treats Tarkan like dirt after he saves her from [[FearlessFool getting herself killed]] rather than acknowledge any of her own wrongdoing in ''Godzilla: Aftershock'', while Mark in ''Godzilla: King of the Monsters'' takes his {{misdirected outburst}}s out on the people whom are currently trying to track down and save his kidnapped ex-wife and daughter. Apex Cybernetics in ''Godzilla vs. Kong'' want to KillAndReplace Godzilla even after everything he did to save the world previously, not giving a damn that all of humanity would have been wiped out by King Ghidorah if not for him.

** The [=MUTOs=] in ''Film/Godzilla2014'' are overall [[NonMaliciousMonster Non-Malicious Monsters]] if highly callous, they just want to survive and reproduce regardless of how their life cycle threatens other life, and they do get some TragicMonster treatment. In the subsequent prequel film ''Film/KongSkullIsland'', the Skullcrawlers are voracious and relentless man-eating predators who are driven by an extreme, biologically-ingrained HorrorHunger: though they're ultimately just doing what they're programmed to do the same as the [=MUTOs=], the Skullcrawlers are played for a lot more horror. Then in ''Film/GodzillaKingOfTheMonsters2019'', the BigBad is King Ghidorah, who compared to the previous films' kaiju is {{sadist}}ic to an unnatural degree, being aware of its actions whilst exhibiting unmistakable ForTheEvulz tendencies; killing humans with no gain other than malicious amusement to be found. ''Film/GodzillaVsKong'' has [[spoiler:Ghidorah's reincarnation Mechagodzilla, who is just as sadistic as its predecessor]]. And in the prequel animated series ''Skull Island'', set in-between ''Kong: Skull Island'' and ''King of the Monsters'', the Kraken is murderously sadistic and it's only less vile than Ghidorah in that it's solely focused on conquering Skull Island instead of conquering and destroying the rest of the globe.
** This is also present among the main human antagonists, in the movies. Preston Packard in ''Kong: Skull Island'' is an AxCrazy ColonelKilgore who becomes more and more willing to sacrifice the lives of everyone around him in pursuit of his personal vendetta against Kong, but he starts out as a relatively good man and his fall into darkness over the course of the movie is framed in a tragic light, and his endangerment of everyone else was more by negligence and inaction than direct malice. In ''Godzilla: King of the Monsters'', the FromCamouflageToCriminal MisanthropeSupreme Alan Jonah, though he has very tragic reasons for being so disillusioned with humanity, is a nasty piece of work who not only slaughters people left and right by himself in pursuit of his goals, but he's willing to let the three-headed monster that he helped release condemn all of humanity and potentially ''all life on Earth'' to certain extinction, so long as he gets to see the human race that he so despises wiped off the board. ''Godzilla vs. Kong'' has Walter Simmons, a high-fuunctioning sociopathic {{narcissist}} who has ''no'' tragic backstory to explain his actions, and whose justifications are presented in the story as even more hollow than the eco-terrorists': he's simply a self-spoiled industrialist who puts millions of people's lives in mortal danger by [[spoiler:instigating and knowingly continuing to instigate Godzilla's rampage]], all to satisfy his own ego.

* RedIsViolent: Rodan has a red coloration and is a particularly destructive and HotBlooded Titan, Mothra's LivingMoodRing turns a red color when she's angry, and Godzilla displays this [[spoiler:during his literally city-leveling SuperMode which coincides with an UnstoppableRage]], in ''Godzilla: King of the Monsters''. In ''Godzilla vs. Kong'', Mechagodzilla's body produces a crimson light, and it's as psychotically malevolent as [[spoiler:Ghidorah]] ever was once it becomes sentient, plus the [[HorrorHunger Skullcrawler]] sicced on the Mecha has a red coloration.

* {{Sadist}}: Ghidorah is different from most of the other Titans in that he'll kill any humans he sees not because they're an inconvenience or are in his way, but just because he enjoys it; flashing {{slasher smile}}s as he attacks, and often disengaging with the big atomic lizard who ''does'' pose a threat to him when an opportunity to slaughter humans for his own amusement presents itself. In ''Godzilla vs. Kong'', Ren Serizawa grins in ecstasy when Mechagodzilla is violently sawing a Skullcrawler in half under his control. In ''Skull Island'', the Kraken kills anyone or anything that passes by its aquatic territory, and it furthermore has a nasty habit of taunting Kong with the remains of its kills (some of whom were Kong's own beloved charges).

* SealedEvilInACan: The original MUTO pair's eggs were sealed away in Adam/Dagon's subterranean grave for thousands of years before a mining company breached the underground pocket, accidentally setting off the eggs' awakening. [[AlienInvasion Ghidorah]] was dormant [[MonsterInTheIce within the]] [[MysteriousAntarctica Antarctic ice]] since ancient times, until [[EcoTerrorist eco-terrorists]] forcibly broke him free and awakened him without knowing [[OmnicidalManiac what he really was]].

* RedEyesTakeWarning: The [=MUTOs=], Ghidorah and Mechagodzilla all have red eyes (or, red eye-like sensor-thingies in the [=MUTOs'=] case), and all of them are the main antagonists of their respective debut films, posing an existential threat to humanity. To a lesser extent; Kong has reddish eyes, and Godzilla's eyes have an orange hue from ''Godzilla: King of the Monsters'' onwards, and neither Titan is someone you want to mess with.

* ThroatLight: Several of the Titans produce shining light in their throats. Shinomura produces light from its composite forms' mouths constantly, whilst Ghidorah, Mechagodzilla (and Godzilla in his later film appearances) produce light in their necks when they're charging up their {{breath weapon}}s.

* UnblockableAttack: In ''Godzilla'', Hokmuto's {{EMP}} blasts are practically a OneHitKill for all U.S. military hardware. In ''King of the Monsters'', Burning Godzilla's fiery Nuclear Pulses are able to power through Ghidorah's [[WingShield wings]] and cripple him as if the dragon is made of nothing.
* UncertainDoom: Admiral Stenz' status is unknown after his latest appearance in ''King of the Monsters'', with the novelization and a deleted scene both heavily implying that he died at the Washington D.C. battle against Ghidorah and Rodan due to his submarine sinking, but the former account doesn't confirm anything explicitly. In the first season finale of ''Skull Island'', it's unknown if the Rock Bug which Kong throws at the Kraken survives getting ''violently'' swatted out of the air into the ocean. In the opening of ''Monarch: Legacy of Monsters'', it's uncertain if either Mantleclaw or the Mother Longlegs survived after they fell into the ocean while fighting each-other and weren't seen resurfacing, [[spoiler:and in the first season finale, it's uncertain if Shaw dies after disappearing into a dust cloud kicked up by a black hole-like suction in the Hollow Earth]].

* VillainousUnderdog: Given that this is a franchise where Kaiju which are literally beyond humanity's ability to control or effectively destroy exist, the human {{Big Bad Wannabe}}s are this to the heroic Titans such as Godzilla or Kong when they seek a direct confrontation with them, and the main threat these human antagonists present comes not so much from the threat they pose to the heroic Titans' lives but from their ability to put them at a disadvantage or exacerbate their situation with the villainous Titans who ''do'' pose a threat. Notable examples include [[GeneralRipper Colonel Packard]] in ''Film/KongSkullIsland'' attempting to kill Kong with manpower (and releasing Ramarak in the process), for which Kong [[SquashedFlat squashes him like a bug]]; and [[EvilInc Apex Cybernetics]] in ''Film/GodzillaVsKong'' plotting to use [[HumongousMecha Mechagodzilla]] to kill and usurp Godzilla [[spoiler:and also being responsible for provoking Godzilla's rampages on population centers due to their creation's Ghidorah-derived organic parts emitting a signal, only for Apex to suffer HoistByTheirOwnPetard when Ghidorah's leftover subconsciousness hijacks Mechagodzilla for itself and makes it destroy them]].

* WouldHurtAChild: In ''Skull Island: The Birth of Kong'', [[PsychoSupporter Riccio]], upon [[SanitySlippage losing his marbles]], has no compunctions against hitting a child across the face, nor against exposing an entire village including children to being decimated by Skull Island's man-eating predators. In ''King of the Monsters'', Ghidorah, in reference to his ''Film/RebirthOfMothra'' iteration, is all too happy to murder a child using all three heads' gravity beams, to say nothing of how his global plans call for all life on Earth being slaughtered by rampant Titans, storms and natural disasters under his command. Ghidorah isn't the only one in ''King of the Monsters'' either: Alan Jonah in the novelization threatens the twelve-year-old Madison's life, ordering one of his men to slit her throat if her mother defies them (to say nothing of how in both versions of the story, Jonah and his organization were willing to set over a dozen Titans loose on the world and cause potentially billions of deaths before Ghidorah took over). The Kraken in the Netflix ''Skull Island'' series is no better than Ghidorah, slaughtering a whole village including children in the WholeEpisodeFlashback, and toying with and attempting to kill human teenagers during the first episode. [[VanHelsingHateCrimes Raymond Martin]] in ''Godzilla x Kong: The Hunted'' goes out of his way to hunt down and try to murder a pair of Spineprowler cubs using his Titan Hunter.

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* TheyCalledMeMad: Dr. Brooks mentions that he joined Monarch as a scientist with a keen interest in Hollow Earth theory after he was laughed out of a college auditorium for proposing the Hollow Earth was real. In ''Godzilla vs. Kong'', Dr. Nathan Lind is a ScrapHeapHero who was laughed out of the scientific community for the same reasons, because everyone magically forgot that the Hollow Earth's existence was revealed at the end of the previous movie.

* SayMyName: There's a lot of characters dramatically screaming their compatriots' or loved ones' names at the tops of their lungs in (often Titan-related) times of distress and mortal peril; in the 2014 ''Godzilla'' movie (Joe Brody), ''Skull Island: The Birth of Kong'' (Aaron Brooks), ''Godzilla: King of the Monsters'', and the 2023 ''Skull Island'' series.

* SmugSnake: Packard in ''Kong: Skull Island'' greatly overestimates his ability to harm Kong. Alan Jonah crosses into this trope's territory in the ''Godzilla: King of the Monsters'' official novelization's expansion, which portrays him as having a genuine OriginalPositionFallacy in the face of the existential threat King Ghidorah poses to all life as we know it. Apex Cybernetics in ''Godzilla vs. Kong'' see themselves as visionaries but are TooDumbToLive to an ''insane'' degree.

* SoleSurvivor: In ''Film/Godzilla2014'', the infamously UnluckilyLucky Ford Brody is the sole survivor of no less than ''two'' military missions that get slaughtered by the female MUTO, in as many days. In early Monarch operative Bill Randa's backstory in ''Film/KongSkullIsland'' and ''Series/MonarchLegacyOfMonsters'', he was the sole survivor of a WWII warship called the USS ''Lawton'', which was destroyed at sea by a marine Titan. At the end of the graphic novel ''Skull Island: The Birth of Kong'', protagonist Aaron Brooks is the sole member of the expedition cast who survives to the end of the story. The aforementioned ''Legacy of Monsters'' reveals later in the first season that Lee Shaw is the sole survivor of Operation Hourglass, [[spoiler:a failed pioneering expedition to Hollow Earth that went awry in the 1960s]]. The backstory of ''Godzilla x Kong: The Hunted'' BigBad Raymond Martin is that he was the only survivor out of his entire family when Femuto destroyed the building they were inside.

* TeethClenchedTeamwork: Emma's teamwork with Tarkan and especially Atherton in ''Godzilla: Aftershock'' is strained due to her [[InsufferableGenius insufferable and abrasive attitude]], and her teamwork with Jonah in ''Godzilla: King of the Monsters'' is likewise strained due to their differing end-goals. The {{novelization}} of ''Godzilla vs. Kong'' confirms that DragonWithAnAgenda Ren Serizawa has to clench his teeth while working with Walter Simmons.

* UncertainDoom: Admiral Stenz' status is unknown after his latest appearance in ''King of the Monsters'', with the novelization and a deleted scene both heavily implying that he died at the Washington D.C. battle against Ghidorah and Rodan due to his submarine sinking, but the former account doesn't confirm anything explicitly. In the first season finale of ''Skull Island'', it's unknown if the Rock Bug which Kong throws at the Kraken survives getting ''violently'' swatted out of the air into the ocean. In the opening of ''Monarch: Legacy of Monsters'', it's uncertain if either Mantleclaw or the Mother Longlegs survived after they fell into the ocean while fighting each-other and weren't seen resurfacing.

* SoleSurvivor: In ''Film/Godzilla2014'', the infamously UnluckilyLucky Ford Brody is the sole survivor of no less than ''two'' military missions that get slaughtered by the female MUTO, in as many days. In early Monarch operative Bill Randa's backstory in ''Film/KongSkullIsland'' and ''Series/MonarchLegacyOfMonsters'', he was the sole survivor of a WWII warship called the USS ''Lawton'', which was destroyed at sea by a marine Titan. At the end of the graphic novel ''Skull Island: The Birth of Kong'', protagonist Aaron Brooks is the sole member of the expedition cast who survives to the end of the story. The aforementioned ''Legacy of Monsters'' reveals later in the first season that Lee Shaw is the sole survivor of Operation Hourglass, [[spoiler:a failed pioneering expedition to Hollow Earth that went awry in the 1960s]].

* TheStoic: Dr. Ishirō Serizawa, Lieutenant Ford Brody, Admiral William Stenz, and the villainous Alan Jonah are all calm, reserved and intellectual men whom keep their emotions in check so that they can do their jobs, even when faced with closely personal or public losses of human life (although it should be noted that Jonah has an ''extremely'' unstable mentality unlike the other three, and any notion that he remains genuinely stoic in the face of Asher's death is negated by the ''King of the Monsters'' novelization's account and expansion).

* VillainousBreakdown: In ''Kong: Skull Island'', [[GeneralRipper Colonel Packard]] in his final minutes starts ranting that he's a soldier protecting his country, and he shouts at the youngest of his men as if it's the latter's fault that he isn't doing anything about having a gun pointed at his head, before going catatonic at the sight of the Alpha Skullcrawler rising. In ''King of the Monsters'', King Ghidorah has an ''epic'' breakdown into utter terror and naked panic for his life when Burning Godzilla starts atomizing him piece by piece, destroying his still-thrashing central head last. In ''Skull Island'', the Kraken loses all composure in the tail-end of the season's FinalBattle, after Kong has grievously wounded it by stabbing out half of its face.
* VillainousLegacy: Some surprisingly positive in the long run, others negative. The MUTO pair who rampaged in the 2014 film before being killed by Godzilla are directly responsible for TheUnmasquedWorld in all instalments chronologically set afterwards. The global Titan-rampage that was caused by King Ghidorah and indirectly caused by [[spoiler:Emma Russell]] in ''King of the Monsters'', after both characters' respective deaths, has made the world at large much more aware of the power discrepancy between human and Titan and the Titans' positive effects on the ecosystems mankind relies on -- beforehand, the population's main sentiment was that the military should try to kill every Titan indiscriminately, and there was little regard for the probability that would only piss the Titans into attacking. It's also revealed in the ''Godzilla vs. Kong'' novelization that Packard's attack on Kong taught later generations of Monarch a thing or two about how to effectively tranquilize Kong. On the negative side, Ghidorah left a PerpetualStorm behind after his death which, together with the Dark Titan Camazotz's actions, is responsible for the destruction of Skull Island in ''Godzilla vs. Kong'' even after Camazotz was defeated.

* WouldHurtAChild: In ''Skull Island: The Birth of Kong'', [[PsychoSupporter Riccio]], upon [[SanitySlippage losing his marbles]], has no compunctions against hitting a child across the face, nor against exposing an entire village including children to being decimated by Skull Island's man-eating predators. In ''King of the Monsters'', Ghidorah, in reference to his ''Film/RebirthOfMothra'' iteration, is all too happy to murder a child using all three heads' gravity beams, to say nothing of how his global plans call for all life on Earth being slaughtered by rampant Titans, storms and natural disasters under his command. Ghidorah isn't the only one in ''King of the Monsters'' either: Alan Jonah in the novelization threatens the twelve-year-old Madison's life, ordering one of his men to slit her throat if her mother defies them (to say nothing of how in both versions of the story, Jonah and his organization were willing to set over a dozen Titans loose on the world and cause potentially billions of deaths before Ghidorah took over). The Kraken in the Netflix ''Skull Island'' series is no better than Ghidorah, slaughtering a whole village including children in the WholeEpisodeFlashback, and toying with and attempting to kill human teenagers during the first episode.

* ReverseCereberusSyndrome: Mirroring the trajectory of most other Godzilla series, the Monsterverse has gotten lighter and jokier as it's gone on. ''Godzilla'' (2014) is a very dour, serious film with only the occasional moments of levity with the [[RealIsBrown colour palette to match]], ''Kong: Skull Island'' and ''Godzilla: King of the Monsters'' (2019) are more comedic and fantastical than the first film but are still relatively grounded and then ''Godzilla vs. Kong'' and ''Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire'' are bright, colourful and light hearted affairs, almost like $100 million plus instalments in a saturday morning cartoon show.

* RoyalsWhoActuallyDoSomething: {{Justified}}. Practically all of the Alpha Titans have a RedBaron calling them a King/Queen (King of the Monsters, Queen of the Monsters, King of the Primates, etc.), and they at times have to fight other Titans to maintain their positions of dominance due to the creatures' AsskickingLeadsToLeadership.

* RealityEnsues: Unlike the Toho films, which tend to have Tokyo and other cities quickly rebuilt between flms, the damage caused in these movies is far more permanent: San Francisco and Las Vegas have both been devastated and abandoned as a result of the kaiju appearances/battles that occurred there. Its not looking too good for Boston, Hong Kong, or Washington DC either, although nothing has been confirmed yet.

* SuperWeight:
** Type -1: Jia.
** Type 0: U.S. government and U.N. officials, Akio, Apex Cybernetics, Monarch top brass, most humans.
** Type 1: Alan Jonah and his eco-terrorists, G-Team, Emma, Mark and Madison Russell, Annie, Island Girl.
** Type 2: Chen family, Madison Russell (in ''Godzilla: King of the Monsters -- The Official Movie Novelization''), Rock Critters, Scaly Quadruped, Grass Hedgehogs, Nightboys.
** Type 3: Hellhawks, Warbats, most Skull Island creatures.
** Type 4: Kong, Mechagodzilla, Mothra, most Titans.
** Type 5: Ghidorah, Godzilla.

** King Ghidorah is the biggest and clearest case of this as well as the biggest threat and arguably the true {{Satan}} of the [=MonsterVerse=]. A supremely malevolent and cruel [[EvilCounterpart polar opposite]] to the far more benevolent [[MessianicArchetype Godzilla]] amongst the Titans, Ghidorah originally fell to Earth from the heavens (indicating to Monarch that he's an extraterrestrial creature in origin), he's been safely [[SealedEvilInACan sealed in a can]] by Godzilla's hand for [[AncientEvil thousands of years]] before he's freed and symbolically emerges from a fiery pit in the present day; his presence and actions threaten to sow apocalyptic chaos and destruction across the Earth where Godzilla's would bring destructive renewal and natural harmony; and he seeks nothing more than to murderously usurp Godzilla's dominion over the entire Earth for himself, swaying Earth's other Titans including the Fire Demon (many of which themselves normally safeguard the Earth's natural order under Godzilla's rule) to his will to that end. In his modern appearance, King Ghidorah successfully instigates a brief worldwide reign of terror and apocalyptic destruction, before Godzilla returns for a {{final battle}} and ultimately stops him before seemingly ushering in a new, harmonious natural order for the world.
** There's also a couple other Titans besides him who have Satanic symbolism attached to them; namely the Alpha Skullcrawler, Camazotz and the Skar King, all of whom have emphasis placed on them literally coming from deep "beneath the earth" and seeking to kill and usurp one or both of the setting's benevolent "gods" (Godzilla and Kong).

* TheStoic: Dr. Ishirō Serizawa, Lieutenant Ford Brody, Admiral William Stenz, and the villainous Alan Jonah are all calm, reserved and intellectual men whom keep their emotions in check so that they can do their jobs, even when faced with closely personal or public losses of human life (although it should be noted that Jonah has an ''extremely'' unstable mentality unlike the other three, and any notion that he remains stoic in the face of Asher's death is negated by the ''King of the Monsters'' novelization's account and expansion).

* SatanicArchetype: King Ghidorah is the biggest case of this by far as well as the biggest threat and arguably the true {{Satan}} of the [=MonsterVerse=], but there's also a couple other Titans besides him who have Satanic symbolism attached to them; namely Ramarak and Camazotz.

* TheSwarm: Shinomura in the graphic novel ''Godzilla: Awakening'' is technically TheWormThatWalks, composed of many flying, smaller individual organisms. In the graphic novel ''Kingdom Kong'', Camazotz has a horde of flying monsters resembling miniaturized versions of himself at his beck and call.

* ReasonableAuthorityFigure: Dr. Serizawa listens to others' advice on how to best handle a Titan situation Serizawa is overseeing at Monarch, as does the military's commander Admiral Stenz (mostly). In the 2014 film, Joe Brody used to be a reasonable nuclear power plant engineer when keeping an eye on approaching tremors -- in the present, the master sergeant in charge of transporting the nukes lets Ford hitch a ride only once Ford makes a decent case. Shaw in the (now CanonDiscontinuity) ''Godzilla: Awakening'' gives Eiji Serizawa the time of day regarding his concerns about Godzilla. Miles Atherton in ''Godzilla: Aftershock'' is concerned about Monarch's jurisdiction but does everything in his political power to help them combat the apocalyptic threat posed by Jinshin-Mushi. Admiral Wilcox in ''Godzilla vs. Kong'' listens to Team Kong on how best to combat the threat. General Puckett in the 1950s storyline of ''Monarch: Legacy of Monsters'', despite trying to nuke Godzilla first and ask questions later, is in complete agreement with Monarch that the Titans could be a threat to all of civilization and so gives Monarch whatever they need to be prepared to deal with other Titans.

** This is also present among the main human antagonists. Preston Packard in ''Kong: Skull Island'' is an AxCrazy ColonelKilgore who becomes more and more willing to sacrifice the lives of everyone around him in pursuit of his vendetta, but his fall into darkness is framed in a tragic light. In ''Godzilla: King of the Monsters'', the FromCamouflageToCriminal MisanthropeSupreme Alan Jonah, though he has very tragic reasons for being so disillusioned with humanity, is a nasty piece of work who not only slaughters people left and right in pursuit of his goals, but is willing to let the three-headed monster he helped release condemn ''almost all life on Earth'' to certain extinction so long as he gets to see the human race that he so despises wiped off the board. ''Godzilla vs. Kong'' has Walter Simmons, a {{narcissist}}ic egotist who has ''no'' tragic backstory to explain his actions, and whose justifications are presented in the story as even more hollow than the eco-terrorists': he's simply a self-spoiled industrialist who puts millions of people's lives in mortal danger by [[spoiler:instigating and knowingly continuing to instigate Godzilla's rampage]], all to satisfy his own ego.

* VillainousBreakdown: In ''King of the Monsters'', King Ghidorah has an ''epic'' breakdown into utter terror and naked panic for his life when Burning Godzilla starts atomizing him piece by piece, destroying his still-thrashing central head last. In ''Skull Island'', the Kraken loses all composure in the tail-end of the season's FinalBattle, after Kong has grievously wounded it by stabbing out half of its face.

* ReasonableAuthorityFigure: Dr. Serizawa listens to others' advice on how to best handle a Titan situation Serizawa is overseeing at Monarch, as does the military's commander Admiral Stenz (mostly). In the 2014 film, Joe Brody used to be a reasonable nuclear power plant engineer when keeping an eye on approaching tremors -- in the present, the master sergeant in charge of transporting the nukes lets Ford hitch a ride only once Ford makes a decent case. Shaw in ''Godzilla: Awakening'' gives Eiji Serizawa the time of day regarding his concerns about Godzilla. Miles Atherton in ''Godzilla: Aftershock'' is concerned about Monarch's jurisdiction but does everything in his political power to help them combat the apocalyptic threat posed by Jinshin-Mushi. Admiral Wilcox in ''Godzilla vs. Kong'' listens to Team Kong on how best to combat the threat.

* ScientistVsSoldier: This trope seems to be absent in ''Film/GodzillaVsKong'', perhaps due to the events of ''Film/GodzillaKingOfTheMonsters2019'', but it's otherwise a recurring theme across the previous movies, and the Scientist side of the conflict are always ultimately proven to be the ones in the right (although the military often get portrayed with at least a little more sympathy than the usual DisasterMovie standard regardless). The military leaders (from ReasonableAuthorityFigure Admiral Stenz to the AxCrazy Preston Packard) seek to use increasingly-ludicrous methods to attempt destroying the Kaiju, and they often don't care to discriminate between the bad and good Kaiju nor do they realize that [[HumansNeedAliens humanity needs the good kaiju around in order to stand a chance at survival]]. The Monarch scientists meanwhile, are sooner or later made {{Ignored Expert}}s by the military, and it can be argued that all the Monsterverse's first three films, the military can be rightfully blamed for causing things to go FromBadToWorse and for unwittingly assisting the hostile Kaiju.

* WhatTheHellHero: Mark Russell receives a few for his biased behavior and shoddy judgment (particularly in regards to Godzilla); first from Dr. Serizawa for holding a toxic and fallacious AnimalNemesis grudge against Godzilla, then from Madison for jumping to an unbelievably-contrived conclusion about Godzilla's rampage. Emma also calls out Serizawa in ''Godzilla: King of the Monsters'', for lecturing her on gambling with billions of people's lives after '''he''' hasn't done enough to stop {{the government}} from unwittingly causing an impending apocalypse without her. In the ''Godzilla vs. Kong'' novelization, Jia calls out Dr. Andrews and Monarch for saying they're drugging and restraining Kong for his own good when their actions only feed Kong's distrust of them.

** The prequel graphic novel ''Godzilla: Awakening'' reveals that the real reason Monarch was founded was because of a Kaiju named Shinomura, which is killed at the end of the book. Monarch didn't learn of Godzilla's existence until ''after'' Shinomura's existence was verified.

** In the prequel graphic novel ''Godzilla Awakening'', Serizawa's wizened father Eiji has traded his youthful self's NerdGlasses for a pair of thin-rimmed spectacles in his old age.
** In the other prequel graphic novel, ''Godzilla: Aftershock'', Miles Atherton is bespectacled, and he's the most calm-mannered and stern member of the main team.

** U.S. Army officer and mid-20th century Monarch operative Lee Shaw first debuted in the ''Godzilla: Awakening'' prequel graphic novel, which was published in 2014 to tie into the ''Film/{{Godzilla|2014}}'' movie's release before ''Film/KongSkullIsland'' officially established a [=MonsterVerse=]. Although ''Series/MonarchLegacyOfMonsters'' establishes Shaw as a canon character, his background there doesn't line up with the graphic novel's story: instead of being part of Monarch when it was first founded in 1945, and being involved in tracking Shinomura and Godzilla and recruiting Dr. Serizawa's father; the show's version of Shaw appears to have been an ordinary military officer who wasn't aware of Titans' existence until his Philippines Titan encounter in 1952.

* {{Retcon}}: ''[[Film/GodzillaKingOfTheMonsters2019 Godzilla: King of the Monsters]]'' places considerable emphasis – the novelization even more so – on the awakening Titans reclaiming the Earth, and the ending makes it clear that {{nothing is the same anymore}} and [[DawnOfAnEra a whole new world has begun]] with humans and Titans now forced to cohabit the planet; plus the HollowEarth is discovered by Monarch and the public to be real. ''Film/GodzillaVsKong'' and its spin-offs ignore or rewrite all these things, making the events of ''King of the Monsters'' out to be little more than a dramatic global hiccup instead of a bittersweet permanent turning point in history: the Titans have gone back into hibernation, things in the world have gone back to the way they were before, and the Hollow Earth for some reason is once more treated by the public as an unproven quack theory. It's almost as if ''Godzilla vs. Kong'' takes place in an {{alternate continuity}} from its predecessor entirely.

** In the 2014 movie, Ford invokes this to convince the master sergeant handling the nuclear warhead to give him a ride on the freight train to San Francisco, bringing up his EOD experience: unlike the rest of the team, Ford ihas professional experience "put[ting his] fingers in a live bomb."

** In ''Godzilla vs. Kong'', [[CorporateConspiracy Apex Cybernetics]] still cling to the mindset that all Titans, not least [[BigGood Godzilla]], are monsters that pose an existential threat and need to be either corraled or destroyed; past the point where the previous movies already proved creatures like Godzilla, Kong and Mothra are on humanity's side so long as we don't cross them, and that humans and Titans ''can'' share the planet in beneficial balance. Instead, Apex and their egotistical CEO have implicitly just taken the events of the previous films as proof that humanity needs to build even bigger and more dangerous weapons in order to annihilate Godzilla and take over his kingship.

* UncertainDoom: Admiral Stenz' status is unknown after his latest appearance in ''King of the Monsters'', with the novelization and a deleted scene both heavily implying that he died at the Washington D.C. battle against Ghidorah and Rodan due to his submarine sinking, but the former account doesn't confirm anything explicitly. In the first season finale of ''Skull Island'', it's unknown if the Rock Bug which Kong throws at the Kraken survives getting ''violently'' swatted out of the air into the ocean.

** ''Film/{{Godzilla|2014}}'': Ford Brody -- portrayed by Creator/AaranTaylorJohnson as an adult in the present, C.J. Adams as a child in the {{distant prologue}}.

* ShutUpKirk: [[GeneralRipper Packard]] has a simple and admittedly golden response in this category towards Weaver in ''Kong: Skull Island'', whilst [[spoiler:[[VillainHasAPoint Emma Russell]]]] has a counter-argument for most of the moral highground arguments that Monarch make against her plan in ''King of the Monsters''.

** ''[[Film/GodzillaKingOfTheMonsters2019 Godzilla: King of the Monsters]]'': Emma Russell's plan to [[spoiler:forcibly awaken the Titans via global eco-terrorism, and then]] manipulate the Titans into repairing the world's ecosystems using the ORCA. On one hand, [[spoiler:her plan involves committing global mass genocide by letting the Titans cause potentially billions of collateral deaths mid-awakening, and]] she's far too arrogant and sloppy in her assertions that the Titans will play ball. On the other hand, the world is already seeing the first warning signs of a looming manmade mass extinction, and Monarch, despite knowing that the Titans are the key to restoring the balance of nature, can't stop {{the government}} from planning to shut them down and try exterminating the Titans in their sleep.

** Hokmuto and Femuto are the franchise's {{starter villain}}s. Although they're killed off in their debut, their rampage devastates several cities and directly [[TheUnmasquedWorld exposes the existence of Titans to the public]], which has lasting ramifications across the graphic novel and film sequels. Without Hokmuto and Femuto, none of the events of later [=MonsterVerse=] stories would have likely come to pass.

** In the ''Skull Island'' Netflix series, the mercenaries who captured Annie are just trying to get a particularly-aggressive and -capable [[WildChild feral child]] back to her grieving mother by force if necessary, and they're happy to work with and support the human heroes when the latter aren't getting in their way any longer, whereas the [[BigBad Kraken]] is an extremely vicious Titan with a homicidal personality which has killed Kong's friends and his charges as well as Mike's father.

* VillainHasAPoint: In ''Skull Island: The Birth of Kong'', Aaron acknowledges at the end that despite Riccio's dangerous insanity and the harm he caused, he did prove in the end whether Kong is a monster or a protector, which in itself was Aaron's original mission. In ''King of the Monsters'', the eco-terrorist [[spoiler:Emma Russell]] makes some legitimate arguments about the Titans' potential to restore balance to the world without destroying humanity, and about the government's looming intent to try exterminating the Titans in their sleep: arguments which the novelization notes the heroes can't completely refute.

* WhyWeCantHaveNiceThings: Dr. Brooks' and Monarch's recurring visits to/harassment of [[IsleOfGiantHorrors Skull Island]] eventually lead to ([[DownplayedTrope or at least assist]]) the island's terminal extinction in the graphic novel ''Kingdom Kong'', when Camazotz reaches the island's surface due to Monarch's seismic surveys and he permanently enshrouds it in a PerpetualStorm. Skull Island is the single most unique and alien ecosystem ever discovered outside of the HollowEarth, populated by {{planimal}}s and other bizarre creatures found nowhere else on Earth, but ignorant and cocky if well-meaning scientists harassing and trampling over it one time too many accelerated a precious, alien pocket world's erasure from the planet.