SPOILER WARNING: The following article contains spoilers for Kong: Skull Island. If you have not yet seen the film, please save this link, and return after you've been to a screening!
Post-credits scenes have become ubiquitous in Hollywood. Made popular in the modern era by Marvel Studios, it is now customary for any major franchise to have audiences stick around until after the credits are done rolling in order to get a taste of what's coming up next. It's no surprise, then that director Jordan Vogt-Roberts' Kong: Skull Island features one, as it is part of what Legendary Pictures has dubbed the MonsterVerse. The weird thing, though, is that there was a point in development when plans for the extra tease were nixed by the studio.
I got Jordan Vogt-Roberts to talk a bit about the post-credits sequence attached to Kong: Skull Island when we sat down together for an interview a few weeks ago during the film's Los Angeles press day. Being aware that some teases are planned far in advance and some come together at the last moment, I asked how the sequence to get audiences hyped for Godzilla vs. Kong wound up being attached to the film. The director acknowledged that it was something that was filmed during principal photography, but that there was also some extra internal deliberation regarding whether or not its inclusion was a good idea. Said Vogt-Roberts,
We shot that during production, and it was actually one of those things that they had taken off the movie at one point. For some reason, there was concern about it, and I was really happy when everyone decided let's bring this back. I think that's what people want to know is happening.
As I wrote about earlier this week, Jordan Vogt-Roberts and Legendary Pictures made sure not to overload audiences with MonsterVerse ties within the central narrative of Kong: Skull Island, but from my interview I could tell that the director was excited about using the post-credits real estate to tease the major crossover blockbuster that is currently on track for release in 2020.
In the post-credits scene, James (Tom Hiddleston) and Mason (Brie Larson) find themselves stuck together in an interrogation room -- calling through the two-way mirrors asking to speak to anybody about how they can get out. Eventually, Houston Brooks (Corey Hawkins) and Sam Ling (Jing Tian) arrive on the scene, and explain that they are with Monarch, and that what was experienced on Skull Island was only a piece of a much bigger picture. They are then presented with footage of Godzilla from the 1950s as well as cave drawings of Rodan, Mothra and King Ghidorah -- previewing some of the monster action that audiences will be able to catch in Michael Dougherty's Godzilla: King of the Monsters and the aforementioned Godzilla vs. Kong.
What did you think of the Kong: Skull Island post-credits scene? Are you adequately hyped for the MonsterVerse showdown, or are you still waiting for more? Hit the comments section below with your thoughts, and stay tuned here on CinemaBlend for more from my interview with Jordan Vogt-Roberts.
