“Godzilla X Kong: The New Empire” has one of the most convoluted movie plots ever devised. Its strength lies in the action sequences and the visual effects, both top-notch. Viewers will need to keep up with the introduction of new people and creatures as the story hurtles from one arc to another.

This film is a sequel to “Godzilla vs. Kong.” As such, we find Kong now living in Hollow Earth. An Outpost of the company Monarch keeps tabs on the goings-on. A set piece shows Kong using traps and pitfalls to evade hyena-like carnivores in a chase. As he settles in to enjoy his food from his efforts, Kong discovers that he has an infected tooth, which is giving him much pain.

Up in the real world, the Monarch Academy’s students include Jia (Kaylee Hottle), the last representative of the wiped-out Iwa tribe on Skull Island. She is receiving strange visions that may connect to her telepathic relationship to Kong in Hollow Earth. Her teacher finds this alarming and tells her adoptive mother, Monarch scientist Ilene Andrews (Rebecca Hall). It takes Ilene forever to discover an obvious correlation between Jia’s pictures and strange readings from the Outpost.

Meanwhile, Godzilla continues to keep the world safe from the Titans liberated from Hollow Earth in the last movie. A nice opening set piece shows Godzilla fighting Scylla, a spider-like Titan, in Rome. After Godzilla emerges victorious, he sleeps inside the Colosseum. Rome will never be the same after the battle of the giants.

Kong emerges from the secret entrance to Hollow Earth at the Monarch site in Barbados. Jia helps discern that Kong needs his tooth fixed. Intrepid celebrity veterinarian Trapper (Dan Stevens) shows up. He deftly removes the infected item and replaces it with a new one. Kong is as good as new!

Hoping to understand Jia’s pictograms and the Outpost’s readings, Ilene travels to Miami to visit old frenemy Bernie Hayes (Brian Tyree Henry). He agrees to help on certain conditions. Ilene reluctantly agrees and they travel to Barbados.

Communication with the Outpost ceases. Of course a ragtag team consisting of Ilene, Bernie, Trapper and a pilot plan to head down to Hollow Earth to see what is going on. Predictably, Jia begs Ilene to accompany them and like any bad parent, she agrees to put her child in danger by bringing her along for the ride.

In yet another twist, Godzilla decides that he needs to amp up his radiation power. He travels to France to absorb a nuclear power plant. Then he swims to the Arctic to confront another Titan, Tiamat. Defeating her gives Godzilla super-nuclear-power capability.

A sinkhole allows Kong to go to another section of Hollow Earth. He meets hostile giant apes but defeats them. A young one, Suko, leads him to a slave-labor camp. The Skar King rules with an iron hand. He has a captured Titan, Shimo, who can freeze things with its breath. The Skar King has a special crystal which allows him to inflict pain on Shimo. To be free of this torture, Shimo does what the Skar King wants.

How will the separate arcs of Godzilla and Kong align, if ever? What secret will the Monarch team find in Hollow Earth? Let’s just say, even more complications ensue.

I can just see the brain trust behind this series sitting around thinking, how do we one-up our previous film? The solution: throw in so many story lines, characters and creatures that the audience will have to stay constantly alert to every nuance in the ever-evolving universe of Hollow Earth. Then be sure and add great visual effects and many battle scenes to keep the viewers engaged.

The confrontations between the denizens of Hollow Earth and the Titans on surface Earth are indeed very well-staged. Like most fight scenes, they tend to go on too long. The sequences also rely heavily on their exotic settings, e.g. Rome, Cairo and Rio de Janeiro, to add local flavor to the destruction and the mayhem.

The visual effects are wonderfully wrought. I loved the depiction of Hollow Earth. The freedom of the artists to create an entirely new world must have been heady indeed, but they rise to the challenge admirably. On the other hand, the trip down to Hollow Earth by the Monarch crew is so wild that it could easily be enhanced by dropping LSD a la the 1960’s. It is that over-the-top.

On the acting front, none of the characters are more than archetypes. Most communication between them consists of homespun wisdom, witticisms, put-downs or arguing in general.

Jia is presented over and over as pitiful (her tribe is gone), brilliant but misunderstood, or as a potential savior (no spoilers here as to what that means). The primary treatment of her character, though, is as “the Other.” She is never fully humanized.

Jia’s relationship with Ilene, and vice versa, tends to be sickeningly sweet. They have good chemistry but a little of their smarm goes a long way.

The movie’s editing creates a jerky effect as the story hurtles from one major event to another. The division between Kong’s story and Godzilla’s story is only made worse by the constant interposition of the boring human scenes.

Part of the reason for the less-than-adequate editing is the kitchen-sink story line. The screenplay just keeps adding more and more twists or arcs. As confirmation of this fact, my summary above of the movie does not even include the end sequences which add a major Hollow Earth revelation, a creature re-emergence, and more fights to conclude this slug-fest.

The positive aspect of all of this is that I was continually engaged. I dare anyone on first viewing to predict where this plot is going to go and I enjoyed that unpredictability. The sound and visual design are excellent which makes seeing this movie on the large screen mandatory.

The negative side is that the visual effects are clearly meant to draw attention away from a paucity of meaningful characters or the over-elaborate plotting. This film clocks in at just under two hours so a lot is crammed in to what usually would have been at least a two-and-a-half, if not three, hour picture.

So this is another movie about which I have mixed feelings.

Three out of 5 stars

The guardians of nature. The protectors of humanity. The rise of a new empire.

The epic battle continues! Legendary Pictures’ cinematic Monsterverse follows up the explosive showdown of “Godzilla vs. Kong” with an all-new adventure that pits the almighty Kong and the fearsome Godzilla against a colossal undiscovered threat hidden within our world, challenging their very existence—and our own. “Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire” delves further into the histories of these Titans and their origins, as well as the mysteries of Skull Island and beyond, while uncovering the mythic battle that helped forge these extraordinary beings and tied them to humankind forever.

Starring Rebecca Hall, Brian Tyree Henry, Dan Stevens, Kaylee Hottle, Alex Ferns, Fala Chen
Directed by Adam Wingard
Screenplay by Terry Rossio, Simon Barrett. Jeremy Slater
Story by Terry Rossio, Adam Wingard, Simon Barrett
Based on Godzilla and Mothra by Toho Co., Ltd.