Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes: Recap and Review (SPOILERS)

(photo courtesy of Northern Virginia Daily)

Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes, released May 8th, 2024. The movie is available only in theaters and marks the fourth installment of the Planet of the Apes reboot that started in 2011.
​by Lochlan Chastain

Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes, released May 8th, 2024. The movie is available only in theaters and marks the fourth installment of the Planet of the Apes reboot that started in 2011.

Recap (Three Previous Films)
A short recap of all the reboot movies as a whole, a scientist, played by James Franco, searches for a cure for Alzheimer’s due to his dad having the disease. The scientist tests a neurological enhancing serum on an ape. The ape is the first to work out of all the serums made for the potential cure. The company is worried about money concerns and went to shut the experiment down, so the scientist took the ape home and gave him the name, Caesar, named after Julius Caesar from the Roman Empire. The scientist raises Caesar in his home in San Francisco and teaches him many things. Caesar learns a lot about human history and becomes very intelligent. Caesar and the scientist's dad form a bond and Caesar starts to help the dad with his memory. Later in the movie, Caesar breaks free from animal control and recruits an army of apes to escape to the Redwood Forests outside San Francisco.

In the second movie, we return to Caesar, but humanity has fallen due to fear of the apes and the devastating Simian Flu. The world is now an overgrown apocalypse where the Apes are the most feared due to their ability to outmaneuver humans in the dense forests and their superior intelligence. Humans still hold some power with modern technology being the only defense against the Apes. An oasis in the form of a city made of scrap holds the humans of San Francisco where they run into an issue. 

The city’s electricity has gone out and they go into Apes’ territory to operate a dam for hydroelectric power. Caesar helps the desperate humans, while Koba, a tortured ape from the same lab as Caesar, wants to leave the humans to suffer. Koba starts a revolution against Caesar and eventually attempts to assassinate Casar. Caesar is presumed dead and Koba blames his “death” on the humans. Koba acquires weapons from the humans and overtakes the city along with the other apes' help. Caesar comes back and takes back the support of the Apes and takes out Koba. 

The third movie shows a colonel who hates the Apes and belittles them. A broken Caesar is forced to tap into his darker instincts to avenge the Apes. Caesar succeeds in his quest to bring the Apes back to their former glory, but this unfortunately cost Caesar his life.

The New Movie
The first scene of the new movie is Caesar’s cremation. The Apes gather around Caesar as they light a bonfire to send off Caesar. Then, the movie flashes forward a couple of decades and the new protagonist, Noa, is out climbing with his friends, Soona and Anaya. Noa is a part of an Ape clan that specializes in eagles. Noa’s father is the ‘Bird Master’ and leads the clan. The clan is called Eagle Clan, and they built two wooden towers around two abandoned and overgrown electricity pylons. Noa and his friends go out and find Eagle eggs that they bring back for a bonding day. 

Now, humans and apes have done a flip-flop on the food chain. Apes are more human-like than humans, with humans acting like wild apes. Humans have become a rarity in this new world. The Eagle Clan calls them Echoes. Humans have lost their ability to speak and build the technologies they used to. An echo makes her way into Eagle Clan´s camp and breaks Noa´s egg. Noa starts to dislike humans. 

Later on, a group of bad Apes who resemble the Roman Empire, use electric spears to raid the Eagle Clan’s camp. Noa tries to defend the camp but is defeated. Noa wakes up in the burnt remnants of his home and buries his father. His father’s bird dislikes Noa and flies around him to judge him. 

Noa seeks out his clan and finds the human that broke his egg, along with an orangutan named Raka. Raka is an old friend of Caesar and carries Caesar’s words and rules throughout the apes, but the apes have forgotten Caesar, and the ones that remember twist his words. Raka teaches Noa compassion for humans and they learn she can speak and has a plan to restore human intelligence. They travel and eventually run into more of the Roman Apes and they kill Raka. Noa and the humans are enslaved by the Roman Apes, but Noa is reunited with his clan. 

The Roman Apes are led by Proximus Caesar who is trying to open a vault filled with military weapons that would evolve the Apes further. 

Proximus risks the lives of thousands of apes to get into the vault. 

The human knows a way in, she planned to come to this vault to restore human intelligence. Noa and the human break into the vault and fight off Proximus. 

Against Noa’s wishes, the human floods the vault to prevent the apes from evolving. Proximus shows up to take out Noa, but Noa’s father’s bird accepts Noa and bonds with Noa to attack Proximus. The other eagles also join and the whole clan summons their eagles to assist. The movie ends with the human restoring human intellect and Noa rebuilding the Apes. Although Noa and the human are on opposite sides of the Earth, they both look into the sky and sort of connect in a way, hinting at another movie coming out.

I felt that this movie was not as good as the other Planet of the Apes movies. The movie felt more like a cash grab and didn’t interest me all that much. The reboot series should’ve ended with War for the Planet of the Apes. The gap that Caesar left is too big to continue the franchise. If the movie was about Raka and Noa uniting the apes through Caesar, then maybe I would’ve liked it more, but I feel the ‘Human B story’ was pretty weak. My personal favorite movie was Dawn of the Planet of the Apes and I think it might have been due to the clash between Koba and Caesar as well as the setting. I would’ve liked to see Noa become the next Caesar with the guidance of Raka. 

However, the world the apes now live in should be one with no humans at all. The apes won the war in the third movie and should now have outgrown humans. Noa would have to change Caesar’s rule about killing other apes, which would create a conflict between Noa and Raka.

Lastly, the death of Proximus. Proximus was a good villain. He represented the kind of dictator Noa would become if he didn’t listen to Raka. They killed him off in a boring way. When I watched Dawn of the Planet of Apes in theaters, when Caesar killed Koba, he said one of the coolest and coldest lines, “You are no Ape!”. The whole theater erupted in excitement and was hyped up about the franchise moving forward. Noa just hummed a song and there were no words or cold lines given to Proximus. Proximus falls off a cliff into water so he may not even be dead. The difference between Koba and Proximus is few and far between. Proximus reminds me of Koba a lot and I feel they wasted Proximus’s potential. Koba also fell to his death, but he was dropped from a burning skyscraper feeling the power of Caesar. Proximus was dropped from an inferior height compared to Koba and died to the hum of a clan. 

Recent movies have a desire to just make quick cash instead of a classic that will last years. I hope that producers will start making good movies again that don’t just want a portion of your paycheck.

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