Moviegoing audiences have gotten a double helping of ape-centric action this year thanks to March's Kong: Skull Island and July's War for the Planet of the Apes. While both properties have enjoyed decades of success on the big screen, they've have never crossed over with each other before in the cinematic medium and possibly never will. Fortunately for fans of both franchises, it's just been announced that the original Planet of the Apes mythology will soon share page space with the King Kong lore in an upcoming comic book series from BOOM! Studios.
Written by Ryan Ferrier and illustrated by Carlos Magno, the six-issue miniseries Kong On The Planet Of The Apes will take place after the 1968 Planet of the Apes movie. When Dr. Zaius and General Ursus lead a a group of soldiers into the Forbidden Zone to wipe away any traces of George Taylor's time among the ape society, they stumble upon the body of a Kong. It turns out that in this continuity, Skull Island still exists in the future, so Zaius will lead an expedition (which includes Cornelius and Zira) to this habitat to uncover the truth about this giant gorilla.
While BOOM! Studios' other King Kong comic book series, Kong of Skull Island, explores how there are numerous members of Kong's species roaming around, because Kong On The Planet Of The Apes takes place thousands of years in the future, the Kong that Zaius and the other intelligent apes find on Skull Island will be the last of his kind, who Ryan Ferrier described as "old and weary." Ferrier also detailed to Empire about why it was so appealing to bring these two properties together, saying:
There's such a deep mythology to both properties, especially if you take into account all of the amazing Kong and Apes comics that have come out in recent years. With this series, we've found a really coherent, meaningful way of having these two worlds and their legacies fold into each other. The implications of the Ape civilization discovering the Kong world are huge, and that's certainly on the forefront of the series.
This marks the first time BOOM! Studios has crossed over King Kong with another property, but the old school Planet of the Apes mythos has already crossed over with Tarzan, Star Trek and Green Lantern in recent years. Pairing them with King Kong, though, feels like a match made in heaven. There's no convoluted science fiction explanation required for why this "meeting" is happening, so the intelligent apes can simply travel to Skull Island and learn about an island containing a life form they never knew existed until now.
You can pick up Kong On The Planet Of The Apes' first issue digitally or at your local comic book store this November. And for those of you eager to see King Kong back in theaters, he'll be dealing with a different kind of crossover when he fights Godzilla in Godzilla vs. Kong on May 22, 2020.
