You could make a very convincing argument that a lot of big budget blockbusters these days are much longer than they’ve got any right to be, which can often result in either sensory overload based on the relentless onslaught of action sequences, or often outright boredom setting in as the narrative drags its heels, stretching both interest and engagement to breaking point.
One notable recent culprit is Wonder Woman 1984, which could have done with trimming some of its 151 minutes to tighten up a bloated story, while there was absolutely no need whatsoever for Michael Bay’s four Transformers sequels to run for two and a half hours apiece, with the audience beaten into submission long before the credits rolled.
We’re a little over two weeks away now from Zack Snyder’s Justice League, and a lot of folks still aren’t sold on the idea of sitting through a four-hour version of a movie that they didn’t like the first time around, but Warner Bros.’ other major streaming release this month is going to be a much shorter experience, with Godzilla vs. Kong reported to clock in at 113 minutes.
That would make it the briefest entry in the MonsterVerse yet, with Kong: Skull Island the shortest so far at 118 minutes and Godzilla: King of the Monsters the lengthiest at 132. Looking at the relatively thrifty runtime of Godzilla vs. Kong, coupled with the footage we’ve seen so far, it seems pretty clear that director Adam Wingard isn’t too concerned about an in-depth plot. That’s hardly a bad thing, though, with the epic blockbuster promising the sort of spectacle that viewers have been almost entirely starved of for the last twelve months.