Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire 4K Ultra HD

The latest entry in the Monsterverse franchise, "Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire" follows up the explosive showdown of Godzilla vs Kong. The story pits the almighty Kong and the fearsome Godzilla against a colossal undiscovered threat hidden within our world, challenging their very existence –– and our own. The epic new movie delves further into the histories of these Titans, their origins, and the mysteries of Skull Island and beyond, while uncovering the mythic battle that helped forge these extraordinary beings and tied them to humanity forever. (Gary Reber)

Special features include commentary by Director Adam Wingard, Visual Effects Supervisor Alessandro Ongaro, Production Designer Tom Hammock and Editor Josh Schaeffer; 14 featurettes: "GxK: Day Of Reckoning" (HD 05:58), "Evolution Of The Titans: Godzilla Evolved" (HD 05:33), "Evolution Of The Titans: From Lonely God To King" (HD 05:44), "Into The Hollow Earth: Visualizing Hollow Earth" (HD 05:46), "Into The Hollow Earth: Monsters Of Hollow Earth" (HD 05:39), "The Battles Royale: A Titanic Fight Among The Pyramids" (HD 05:30), "The Battles Royale: The Zero Gravity Battle" (HD 05:03), "The Battles Royale: The Titans Trash Rio" (HD 05:22), "The Intrepid Director: Adam Wingard: Big Kid" (HD 03:43), "The Intrepid Director: Adam Wingard: Set Tour" (HD 03:44), "The Imagination Department" (HD 03:47), "The Monarch Island Base: Portal To Another World" (HD 05:32), "The Evolution Of Jia: From Orphan To Warrior" (HD 05:58) and "Bernie’s World: Behind The Triple Locked Door" (HD 03:28) and a Movies Anywhere digital copy.

The 2.39:1 2160p HEVC/H.265 Ultra HD Dolby Vision/HDR10 picture, reviewed on a VIZIO Quantum X P85QX-JI UHD/HDR display, was photographed in IMAX digital and anamorphic Panavision® using the Arri Alexa Mini LF and IMAX MSM 9802 camera systems and sourced from a 4K master Digital Intermediate. The movie was produced with a 3D conversion by DNEG but no 3D Blu-ray Disc was provided for review. The picture exhibits a dynamic appearance with stylization, FX effects and intense lighting effects. Imaging dynamics are captivating with respect to the production design settings. The picture is full of tech gadgets and computer screens, of which appear realistic. Environments are incredibly elaborate in color and nuanced hue shadings. Color fidelity is nicely saturated with spectacular blues, reds, whites, browns and blacks. The colors actively move with the action. Hue shadings and image textures are impressively varied and nuanced. The color pallet throughout exhibits nuanced natural hue shadings. Greens are prominent during he Hollow Earth scenes. Orange shades are prominent on the baby ape and the flying Warbats. Kong appears in brownish-grays. Godzilla's palette is darkly hued grays and radioactive pink. So much of the picture exhibits earthy colors. There is a wonderful imaginative production design with such a diversified color palette, Flesh tones exhibit perfectly natural hues. HDR contrast is amazing with deep revealing black levels, nuanced shadow delineations, and often intense white levels. The picture is sharp with incredibly fine resolution, especially visible in Kong's fur, Godzilla's scales, clothing, jungle foliage, and cityscape environments. Resolution is excellent. People facial features and flesh tones are perfectly natural. The hair on Kong is amazingly detailed Costumes exhibit detailed fabrics. Object and environmental textures are revealing of fine detail. Spatial dimensionality is superb with incredible image depth. Visual effects, which are plentiful and impressive, are finely resolved. This is an extremely dynamic picture that is very visually impactful with dramatic and exciting visuals that will excite the epic's fans. (Gary Reber)

The Dolby Atmos/Dolby TrueHD 7.1-channel soundtrack is intense and diirectionalized with aggressive spatial directionality throughout. Deep bass dynamics extend powerfully to sub-25 HZ throughout. Atmospherics are soundfield encompassing. Sound effects are incredibly varied and dynamic with powerful bass enhancements and sharp transients. Both atmospherics and sound effects are aggressively directionalized throughout the soundfield. Kong and other ape grunts, and other animal howls and scream sounds, as well as fire and ice casts from Godzilla and Shimo, are heard throughout. Kong's growls are deep and powerful. These sounds enhance the realism and emotional projection of the action on the part of Godzilla and Kong and other apes and creatures. All this is supported with powerful deep thumping bass which pounds and rumbles through the soundtrack via the .1 LFE channel. Chaos is everywhere. There are so many scenes that create excitement with deep bass such as the battle between Godzilla and Kong among the pyramids in Egypt or the destruction of Rio De Janeiro, Brazil. The orchestral/choral score is dynamic and sweeping in dimensional effect and provides a wide and deep soundstage that wraps around the soundfield with a wonderful presence. Throughout all the intense action, dialogue is intelligible and spatially integrated within the numerous environments and settings, though most often ADR produced.

The Immersive Sound element is comprised of segments of the extension of the choral part of the score, some sound effects, such as overhead airplanes and helicopter and thunder, and occasional atmospherics. Other sounds include creature voicing, a strong ocean wave, swoop sounds and din. These elements are infrequent, however. Sadly, the height layer is not fully engaged and never was created to enhance the spherical dimensionality of the soundfield.

This is a specularly exciting ear level holosonic® soundtrack with Earth-shaking deep bass and occasional height layer engagement. Fans of the Godzilla/Kong Monsterverse will be excited. However, to feel the full excitement the soundtrack must be played back on a fully capable home theatre Immersive sound system capable of deep bass extension. (Gary Reber)