‘Kingdom’ Restarts the Apes Franchise

Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes

★ ★ ★

Caesar has been dead for a long time at the beginning of the Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes. We’re not given the exact or approximate time, but it has been long enough for him to become something far beyond a legend. We’ll get into that a little more later, but if you don’t know who Caesar is, that’s okay. The film doesn’t depend on viewers having seen preceding ones, and that’s always important for a sequel.

This is a film that wouldn’t have worked as well had the apes on-screen not been as convincingly real as they are. A brilliant blend of prosthetics, masks and CGI brings these apes to life, which makes it much easier to believe a world of highly intelligent talking apes is possible.

Noa prepares to ride into action in Kingdom of the Planet of the apes. © 20th Century Fox

We’re first introduced to Noa (Owen Teague) and his friends who are on an expedition to capture eggs from eagle nests. This for an important, traditional upcoming bonding day celebration. Noa is the assumed leader of his small group. Soona (Lydia Peckham) and Anaya (Travis Jeffrey) each get their eggs quickly. For Noa to get his own, he must climb to the “high nest,” a feat that earns him respect with his tribe, but also exhibits reckless and unrefined leadership.

When we’re back at Noa’s village, we’re introduced to his family and other members of the tribe. Noa’s father, of course, is the tribe leader, and we can safely assume Noa stands to be next in line.

This time around, most of the apes are able to speak, opposed to during Caesar’s reign where he was nearly the only speaking ape. Apes rarely see humans anymore, and as a result of the virus that gave the apes higher intelligence and the ability to talk while making humans dumb and mute, finding one that can talk is even more unlikely. In fact, it’s unheard of.

Noa, Mae and Raka on their journey in Kingdom of the Planet of the apes. © 20th Century Fox

The apes call these primitive humans “echoes,” an interesting idea that’s never really followed up on. We’re left to accept it as is without explanation.

Noa runs into an intruding female echo that evening, who smashes his egg when she pushes him back to flee her scouting expedition. She gets away and now Noa is faced with not advancing forward in the ceremony. This will set him back another year, so he decides to venture out and find a new egg on his own.

On his search, he stumbles across a set of apes from another tribe, The Masks. As you might guess, these apes wear masks and they’re a brutal, vicious group. Noa knows well to hide from them, but the horse accompanying him does not. It’s his horse that leads The Masks back to his village.

Noa returns to find his village on fire and his tribe in peril, scattered or perished. He tries to save his father but is thrown off a very high ledge by the biggest member of The Masks tribe.

This sets Noa on a journey to find his tribe and the leader of The Masks to both rescue what’s left of his people and extract revenge from the big ape that we believe killed his father.

Raka guides Noa in Kingdom of the Planet of the apes. © 20th Century Fox

On his way, Noa meets a lone ape named Raka (Peter Macon). Raka is the most interesting character in the film, providing gentle guidance and wisdom to Noa as he discovers the world beyond his tribe. It’s a relationship I wish had been fleshed out more than it was.

Both Noa and Raka encounter the echo who smashed Noa’s egg. Raka calls her “Nova,” in a nod to the previous film, which is what they call all humans. Nova is in rough shape – cold, hungry, disheveled- when they come together. They are dumbfounded to discover Nova can speak, and she eventually informs them her name is Mae (Freya Allan) opposed to Nova. She’s not primitive, nor is she an echo.

The apes in this story don’t remember a time when they weren’t able to talk and are shocked when they learn that the stories of them being in zoo cages are, in fact true. Equally, they don’t know of a time when humans could speak.

Eventually Noa and Mae are captured and taken to The Mask village on a large beach where they make use of cargo ships and other rusted out nautical equipment for housing and structures.

Proximus stands before his follower in Kingdom of the Planet of the apes. © 20th Century Fox

The leader, Proximus Caesar (Kevin Durand), has twisted and flipped Caesar’s leadership philosophy and turned Caesar’s legend to a god-like figure. Interestingly, the film, to its detriment, glosses over and keeps this at surface level. Proximus keeps his clan in check with what we can assume comes from something like a book of Caesar. The film could have taken us deeper into the reality of Proximus’ god complex and false-prophet leadership. Instead, we are given a scenic view rather than an up-close study.

And that’s what keeps this from being a truly solid film. There are so many rich themes presented that, had they been threaded into the story more, would have enabled incredible dramatic conflict and an exploration of the characters as they try to exist in the world Kingdom presents. As such, the character arcs are weakened and character development is minimal.

It’s still an entertaining film and provides a promising opportunity for the franchise to continue. Hopefully in future installments, we’ll go deeper into the woods with the subtexts Kingdom presents.

Sci-fi, Action, Adventure