TL;DR – This is a perfectly watchable show, but it never reached its potential, with some odd tone issues and a lacklustre narrative holding it back.

Disclosure – I paid for the Netflix service that viewed this series.

Skull Island Review –

When  Kong: Skull Island came out in 2017, I was delighted with the world they created, full of mystery and wonder. This meant I was slightly disappointed when they killed off the island with one line of dialogue in Godzilla vs. Kong. However, there is clearly still a lot of space in the Monsterverse, and today we look at more adventures on an island where nearly everything wants to kill you.   

So to set the scene, we open on a research boat of some sort in the South Pacific Ocean. There is a loud commotion when a girl named Annie (Mae Whitman) in handcuffs tries to escape the crew hunting her down. She makes her way onto a lifeboat in a last-ditch effort and drives into the storm. Meanwhile, on an exploration boat, Charlie (Nicolas Cantu) and his father, Cap (Benjamin Bratt), have a significant conversation about going to college. As Charlie’s friend Mike (Darren Barnet) consoles him, Charlie notices a girl floating in on some wreckage. It is quite a commotion, but while Annie is concerned about the mercenaries chasing her, she is even more concerned about what lurks in the deep. Now from here, we will be looking at the season as a whole, so there will be some [SPOILERS] ahead. 

One thing I liked about Skull Island was the creature design. Given the previous film and the history of the island in the franchise, there was a lot to live up to on that front. A significant influence on the design was hybrid animals with many plant/animal combinations. It is an island where camouflage is everything for hiding and hunting. Do you dig under the sand and wait for your prey to come to you, or do you hide like a vine slithering through the trees? Then we have King Kong, which I think is a good rendition of the character, I am not sure why he has a bird friend here, but I kind of dug it.

To add to this, I liked the animation style that had a very fluid motion to it. You feel the weight that some of the larger animals have as they move around the world. But also, the grace of some of the monsters as they slip through the oceans or jungles. This is helped by a lot of good work from the environmental artists to build a dangerous and beautiful world. A world where you are almost willing to go visit, even though your life expectancy would not be high.

One thing you need to prepare yourself for when watching this show is how much it oscillates in tone. It switches from fun buddy comedy to a guy getting ripped apart by some crocodile thingy in the space of a second. These shifts give you severe tonal whiplash as they swing back and forth and back again. Throughout the first season, you could feel they never landed where they wanted to pitch the show. The oscillation being the symptom of this, but also the need to constantly add a quip, even when the situation does not call for it.   

Where things do start falling flat is the narrative, it is not bad, just very surface-level. The previous issues with tone were probably a big part of this, and some narrative elements felt meandering. I think this was not helped by the audio mix or the voice recording session because it felt like everyone was running at about 75% of where they needed to be. There were some more touching moments in the film, like the scene between Cap and Mike, and they did an excellent job with Kong in his special episode. However, were just enough inconsistencies to hold it back, which probably helped the ending to feel a bit meh.

In the end, do we recommend the first season of Skull Island? Well? Look, it is not bad. Indeed it is quite watchable. Keeping the episodes short probably helped with that. However, it never excelled higher than just being okay, and it just felt like it was missing its drive in places.

By Brian MacNamara: You can follow Brian on Twitter Here, when he’s not chatting about Movies and TV, he’ll be talking about International Relations, or the Solar System.

Have you seen Skull Island yet ?, let us know what you thought in the comments below, feel free to share this review on any of the social medias and you can follow us Here. Check out all our past reviews and articles Here, and have a happy day.    

Credits – All images were created by the cast, crew, and production companies of Skull Island
Directed by – Brian Duffield & Willis Bulliner
Written by – Brian Duffield
Created by – Brian Duffield
Based On – King Kong by Merian C. Cooper & Edgar Wallace and Kong: Skull Island by John Gatins, Max Borenstein & Dan Gilroy
Production/Distribution Companies –
Starring – Darren Barnet, Benjamin Bratt, Nicolas Cantu, Mae Whitman & Betty Gilpin with Ian James Corlett, John Dimaggio, Phil Lamarr, Yuki Matsuzaki, Trever Devall, Mara Junot, Sunil Malhorta, Charlie Townsend, Fryda Wolff & Tania Gunadi
Episodes Covered – Maritime Pilot, The Last Blank Space on the Map, What’s Up, Croc?, Breakfast Fit for a Kong, Doggone It, Terms of Endearment, You’re not a King, You’re Just a Stupid Animal & You’ll Never Catch a Monkey That Way