#koba answers

[ask-elliot-doorman-fam]

(let's see...)

The young pink child wakes up in bed, shrouded in darkness.

The house is nowhere to be seen, he's somewhere else entirely.

Somewhere dark and deserted.

The fear of the unknown spikes, it's off the charts.

All he finds to be on hand is a flashlight to light the way.

Does the child proceed?

Koba squints around the room from beneath his thick framed glasses. He takes the flashlight and tests it before removing the sheets from him. He observes, quietly.

His tail hisses.

"Shush! Have you not seen a horror movie!" He argues with his own tail.

[ask-elliot-doorman-fam]

He looks hurt before Spectre explains, and he nods slowly in understanding.

When the pod lands. It's... near Sanctuary, the sounds of town can be heard in the distance, but it is decently far away.

Instead there's a small path leading up to a rather large house next to a lake...

Koba laughs immediately. "Biscuit! Gravy!" He shouts and two furry blobs tackle him, one brown, one white. "Hehehe! Hi!"

The nightstalker puppies yip and nip at him, though gently enough that it's clear they've been trained not to hurt him.

"They're inside!" He advises.

"Are you my mom?"

Says a young, 12 year old boy to Spectre, with pink eyelights and pink dissasembly drone eyes on top of his head- his glasses are broken and in his hand... which is probably why he's asking

(This is a terrible idea but I just drank an energy drink and now I'm JITTERY)

"I, uh..." She looks at the drone, and instantly her eyes widen and a smile creeps onto her face. "I don't think so, but I think I might know her."

(@ask-elliot-doorman-fam Is this who I think it is? If it's not, I'm gonna feel stupid.)

[the-monkeies-girl]

I feel like Koba is an titty man no matter the size 🥵

You know you're right and i can elaborate but who wants that

Caesar: Ass man. Has probably been caught by Maurice here and there staring at yours from across the colony as you're walking away. Or you're on your hands and knees in front of him and he likes to knead it? Ohhhhhh

Noa: Really switches, has no preference but if you're in his lap? Hands on ass and he's using his strength to bounce you up and down and to keep him grounded enough to not snap, head dipping to play his mouth along your breasts. We love a dual king.

Blue Eyes: Boobies. Like to look. Boobies. Like to feel and squeeze and suck and play around with. But in all seriousness, likes to watch how they move when you're sleeping and breathing. Not innately sexual, but he just likes the visual v. good.

Anaya: ASS BABY. Do we need to explain? His favorite thing is if you sit in his lap, front facing, and you place yourself right against his lower navel and he's allowed to subtle grind himself against you goodbye i am deceased

Koba: indeed, a titty man. Thoroughly enjoys the bounce ( or lack of depending on the size ) will rip them off with his teeth though, don't let him get too wild. Likes the softness in his hands, he'll rip them off tho.

[reddesires]

Hear me out: drunkenly kissing one of the ape boys. How would they react?? how would reader react in the morning?? drunkenly giving them a lap dance, completely wasted, stripping off your top faster than they can protest-

I LOVE THIS SM HAHA YOU WERE HEARD OUT

The overall reaction:

•Noa is not only shocked BUT HORRIFIED he's completely baffled by your extreme change of behavior after being given the fermented juice, you're not only performing for him but also swaying your hips flirtatiously towards him and WORSE!! IN FRONT OF HIS MAMA

•Caesar tries to play it cool when you plop onto his lap and lay a kiss smack dab on his lips, a drunken giggle slipping from you. You completely slip off his lap, landing with a LOUD ASS thud, your legs upwards in the air. Caesar is totally SPAZZING TF OUT internally

•Blue Eyes is not only SCANDALIZED by your bold approach HE TRIES TO RUN FROM YOU LMFAOO but for some ungodly reason you have gained strength so unlike you that you become a stage 5 clinger to him, absolute baby koala style onto him

•With Koba, that's a risk you don't wanna take. Girl, do you want your face to be ripped tf off?! LOL

Yeah, the next morning, you are mortified, I mean, who wouldn't be? You not only did this in front of EVERYONE, but you also showed your affections in the utmost embarrassing way possible 💀

[fragglez]

HIII‼️‼️‼️

I I would like to hear ur thought process behind Koba and Caesar if u don’t mind, I think it’d be a very interesting dynamic but I wanna hear ur thoughts since ur the one who put the idea out :D

(Unless ofc, if ur tags in that one post were just the entire thought process and I’m just thinking too deep into it lol 😭)

HIII ‼️‼️ thank you so much for asking... I will absolutely love to elaborate

Welcome to: A Hopefully Legible Collection of My Thoughts on Caesar/Koba ™ (actually it's mostly just Koba... i stay biased) im gonna divide it into the different movies begging w Rise

RISE + Book:

okay so Koba isn't in Rise a lot and we don't really get a lot of information HOWEVER in the book "Planet of the Apes: Caesar's Story" by Greg Keyes we get this quote

(the narrator is Maurice btw) in which Koba thinks so fondly of Caesar he becomes Issape Newton

DAWN + book again:

dawn is complicated because at first we see Koba as this super loyal guy who will do anything to protect Caesar and his fellow apes, and then later in the movie he does a full 360

There's a deleted scene that happens after Koba saves Caesar and Blue eyes (I think)

"You saved my life today, Koba"

what a sad miserable guy that man would do anything for Caesar just look at him

after the hug Caesar stands infront of all the other apes while still holding onto koba, and says "Apes together strong" while Koba looks at him like he's the only person in the whole world

that dude is in love ↑

Koba worshipped Caesar like he'd do anything for him, so when Koba starts to believe Caesar cares more about humans than apes that's when he begins to turn "evil" Everything Koba did was to protect Caesar, I'm confident that in Kobas mind killing Caesar is what he had to do to protect him and his family

I don't remember which movie this quote was from but:

"From humans Koba learnt hate"

and from Caesar he learnt love, so when Caesar started "prioritizing humans" he turned back into hatred

↑ again it's Maurice telling this

WAR:

I don't have much more to say cus Kobas dead in this one rip dude but

Fellas is it gay to hallucinate your dear old friend (who you murdered) calmly caressing your face telling you to join him in the afterlife??? just asking

Summary:

uhh yeah this is pretty much everything hope you enjoyed like and subscribe 👍 yeah the movies are tragic and i feel like caesar/koba just makes everything so much more tragic and i love that pain and suffering on planet earth <3

+ an extra little treat

[artist-issues]

Loved your apes posts.

Honestly, the first half of Dawn was what made Koba so fascinating. It showed his positive traits he had when the humans weren't there, when he had nothing to hate. It makes it much sadder to see what he becomes. I love the "Human work" scene especially.

I also like that they made an ape the villain of the second one because it shows how the apes truly aren't better than the humans, however much they wanted to feel otherwise.

Do you think that when Ceasar said said "Koba belong in cage" it tied into his "You are not ape" line? Like he's saying Koba is not one of the evolved apes anymore, he's just a mad animal that needs to be caged or put down?

Yeah, I think so! I think that's exactly what was happening, like I said in my Koba post: Koba can't be reasoned with, Koba just wants to lash out out of hate—and a little bit out of lust for power, at the end. Thats just senseless animal aggression. So yeah, the "Koba belong in cage" line was kind of the same in that sense. But also I think Caesar was goading him, at that particular moment, so he could get in his head a little bit during the fight.

[piiiiinkheart]

I love that every time babymetal is in a music video they stand together like 🧍‍♀️🧍‍♀️🧍‍♀️!!! Like they are ready to watch the world blow up or are watching over something or someone. Maybe that's their lore now. They are the fox god

They’re ready to watch the world blow up for the 86th time

[twistedtummies2]

Rump ranking for Koba from the "Planet of the Apes" franchise?

Smother My Soul / Crush Me to Death / Make Me a Cushion / Sit On Me / No Thanks / Who? / No Way / Maybe Just to Tease / Decent Pillow / Comfortable Seat / Living Furniture

Koba is the villain in one of the newer "Planet of the Apes" films, right? I actually haven't seen any of them, so, just based on that grounds alone, I can't really offer judgment. Sorry. (shrugs) There are some ape character crushes I have, but he's not among them.

[silusvesuius]

they want to be caesar and koba so bad

nerevar+dagoth @wirethroat requested 💛 but tumblr won't let me format the answer to the ask the way i want it so it goes as a post. some bonus stuff too

i want his uggy mask to have a permanent 'sad' expression rather than a blank one ... it's all for the theatricals

u can't really tell but the second one is vivec; idk what 2 do with that drawing so i'll just drop it here lul

[ask-elliot-doorman-fam]

Hey Koba. Do you have a temper like you mom?

"Hmm, you mean Mamá?"

"She has a temper?"

[the-monkeies-girl]

Again not a request just throwing it out there because I loved your Caesar and noa affection headcanons!!!! So cute!!

Dare I say kobas favourite form of affection is surprisingly physical touch but mostly in the sense of grooming?? He's been out on a hunt with the others and he can't get some stuck mud or leaves off his back so you help comb through his fur saying nothing, he thanks you with a gruff snort (and saves you the best berries for dinner) - ✨

I swear ✨ I love you to the ends of the earth and I would DIE FOR YOU.

Only physical touch from you. Koba refuses it from anyone else, and almost expects you to drop whatever you're doing at the time when he requests you to groom him. It becomes a frequent game of back and forth. Each time you groom him, he gives something rather superficial in return. Berries, fruit, fish, sometimes he'll even save you a seat at the communal dinner knowing what spot you favor over others ( It's close to the fire, he knows you like to be warm but he'd never ADMIT that he knows. ) It's pretty surface level to start. A means to keep himself personally disconnected. If he gave you personal things? Oh boy h boy UUUUUUhhhhh don't take to any other male ape in the colony or he will rip their faces off because at that point, beyond recognition to yourself or others, you're Koba's. And only his. Like, imagine him just LEAVING a pile of clothes by your doorstep after he stumbled upon them in the wild. He has no idea if they're your size, why would he know that? all he knows? They were abandoned, he brought them to you knowing you'd use them. For the longest time, you're not sure where they're coming from until you finally stumble upon Koba dropping them off one night.

[ask-elliot-doorman-fam]

He furrows his brow. "Aw..."

Still he returns the hug, tail wrapping around Cassidy's back. "Sorry I worried you..."

He shuffles up to Spectre, nodding to tell her he's ready to go. "I hope we see each other again! It was nice playing." He grins back at the fellow 12 year old. His tail nods along with him, licking it's own eye.

"Are you my mom?"

Says a young, 12 year old boy to Spectre, with pink eyelights and pink dissasembly drone eyes on top of his head- his glasses are broken and in his hand... which is probably why he's asking

(This is a terrible idea but I just drank an energy drink and now I'm JITTERY)

"I, uh..." She looks at the drone, and instantly her eyes widen and a smile creeps onto her face. "I don't think so, but I think I might know her."

(@ask-elliot-doorman-fam Is this who I think it is? If it's not, I'm gonna feel stupid.)

[historicalvandal]

Ooh, the reverse trope of no one thinks they are dating (courting???) would be super funny and works with your previous answer of what if they knew each other before Ceaser came along. Human and koba reunit and get closer and soon become mates silently, but like old people level of marriage. Where they look like they want to kill each other, but its all fun and love. Koba obviously is a private ape and just told no one because in his mind it whos business is it who he chooses? The human catches on quicker what everyone thinks and thinks it's just funny af, also saying nothing... until Cornelia or Tinker tries to stage an intervention. Or Maurice and Rocket try to intervene during a "fight."

*koba and human eating across from eachother*

Human: *stares*

Koba: *stares back*

Human:*squints*

Koba:*growls*

Human:"monkey man" (affectionately)

Koba:*throws leftover fish at them with a serial killer grin* "stupid human"(also affectionately)

Everyone else: are you two ok???? Is the human safe????

Sorry this took me so long to reply too- Not been feeling too hot rn! But I shall ride forth with the ape love 🫡 Such a brave soldier right here rn- They'd totally become mates privately, their first time seeing each other in a long time and they just can't breathe because "Oh my god it's him/her" moment, they'd be super private though- And nobody knows they are a mated pair, it'd cause a few problems if any male ape comes sniffing around Reader- Or if any ape can smell Koba on the human gotta think about that! Their interactions would be hilarious, as you have posed there so kindly, they are so mean to each other but in that old married couple kinda way, Reader would love using pet names and Koba gets it because she used to call him sweetheart a lot during their first moments together, but now they're the old married couple (trade mark) Koba just takes to calling Reader Stupid or fool and Reader has taken to calling him killer or stinky ape all in good jest of course, but they have their sweet pet names, Koba would think mate would be sweet to whisper at night but he's also taken to calling Reader lover, and Reader likes to use sweetheart still and sometimes handsome too, when together at night is when their sweeter sides and nicknames come out!

[priksie]

KOBA X READER

Warnings : none

Words count : 1547

PRT 3

The third part of my fanfiction , like before please do not hesitate if you have any advice and more for me.

This is also a reminder that I am not following the movies! I will keep koba action and some other moment of the movies but that's about it.

☆Look at the end of this prt for a little bonus

A CHANGE IN YOUR PLAN.

----------------------

A few days later .

everything has calmed down, or at least on the surface.

you had managed to find refuge with a few colleagues who had survived and who had themselves gone to the surrounding soldiers to ask them for shelter. You weren't just an employee of a laboratory now but you were working with the people trying to defend humans from what they thought was danger.

No idea if it was good luck or horrible bad luck but you now had to work with them, to treat the wounds of the people collected in your shelter and to help keep some surveillance. But You couldn't fool anyone , you didn't want to help them more and your face told it to everyone around.

The way your face looked at them with disgust , telling them all that it was their fault. The way your eyes are only filled with pity when passing by any apes corpse.

Not a single words was coming out of your mouth that didn't seem full of resentment towards the soldiers , only for the random citizens who had never asked to be in all that mess. You couldn't be mad at them, they didn't do anything for most of them.

Even for your old colleagues since you didn't have any reason left to pretend to be on their side.

As much as you tried , you had never hidden your hatred for them. You couldn't , even If you had tried your face always ended up revealing how you felt, whether you liked them or despised them.

Once again, a man came by you asking for your help with his injured arm and you didn't bother asking him how he got wounded like that the teeth shaped marks was already giving you the answer.. not that you cared much anyways. You took his injured arm and placed it on your tight so you could have a better Access to it , starting to disinfect it and cleaned the blood off of it.

'' you should smile more princess. You look like an old lady like that '' he said , looking at you probably the same way he would look at a steak in his plate. His second hand reached for your face but before he could even got to your hair to move it to the side you purred a good quantity of alcohol on the wound , he yelled before holding his arms in surprise, that definitely burned.

'' YOU BITCH-''

The only thing coming out of your mouth after that was '' my apologies, I'm tired I didn't get to sleep a lot last night and it slipped out of my hand. '' it wasn't an accident and he knew it but what could he really do?

You Calmly wrapped his arm in some bandage before pushing it away and he didn't hesitate before he walked back to his occupation but not before glancing at you like you were a freak.

Sometimes you wanted to run back home, have your parents hugging you to sleep but the reality was hitting you fast when thinking about that, you couldn't do such a thing and not because they wouldn't do it but because they weren't here anymore.

But at the same time....wasn't it better ? With what was happening right now you wouldn't want your family to be around.

Thankfully you didn't have to be sitting there all day waiting to help with wounds, and at some points you just wanted to walk away from the safe zone they created all by yourself but it wasn't recommend a lot.

After all, no one knew when those animals could attack.

But she needed some space , she needed to walk a bit away she wouldn't be so far so nothing would be happening.

Those past days were only the start of there nightmare and you already couldn't do it anymore , you felt so weak because of that. You wanted to give up and just sleep without waking up the next morning. you took a jacket and a bag with you , and just in case

A gun too. they all had one even a small one for protection if they do see an Ape.

They had been ordered to kill it , which you absolutely wouldn't do but still you had continued to carry the weapon in case.

You had walked off , around 15-30 minutes before you decided to sit down next to a tree. No sign of any animal around so you convinced yourself that that it was completely safe.

For some time , you almost forgot that the world was collapsing. Taking fresh air without any noise around....nature all around you as you were sitting down with your eyes closed. That peace didn't last long , you heard leaves getting crushed under someone's feet and it took you back into reality , not wasting any second to take your gun out of the bag you carried with you and stood up.

Your eyebrows frowned in fear and confusion. Both eyes scanning the area to see someone... something...but you couldn't see anyone, but you could feel those eyes on you.

Why wasn't it attacking ? If it was only a human trying to find shelter they wouldn't be hiding, even then why would an ape hide from you like that? Was it observing you ?

'' show yourself! I'm not scared of you ! ''

you yelled , but no one was getting fooled. You would pee yourself if you didn't have the control of your body correctly. Shaking almost like the day everything started , even the way you were turning around to see if anyone was there was giving out the information that you weren't confident at all.

Not even 10 seconds had passed after yelling that something was behind you, you felt it.

It was breathing so close to you that you could feel the warm air on your neck.

Frozen in place , you didn't dare to move and turn around directly.

Please be him, I don't want to die in the hands of someone else. if I have to die I want it to be by your hands.

The gun still in your hand you turned around carefully and you had to look up because he was now taller than you.

'' kob-'' you started in Shock and also some relief, but you didn't get to finish , you wrist was grabbed and the weapon you were holding had been taken before it had been throw far away from you. You did moan in pain as your wrist was still crushed in the hand of this... animal. Luckily he didn't hold onto you for long before he made you fall to the ground.

Never before has he watched you with so much anger and sadness.

You shouldn't be here , I don't want to see you.

You started to growl further away from him and he didn't move, he was just looking at you creating that distance between the both of you.

His gaze went somewhere else , he made a slight movement of his head in the same direction he was looking, as if indicating something. as if he wanted to show you a direction, he does not seem to be accompanied and nor does he seem to have found a group to take refuge in himself and yet he seems to show you a path.

He didn't wait to see your reaction and ran off , he didn't except you to follow him now.

Do you want me to follow you? Do you feel as alone as me ?

This time you didn't wait and you took off , running back to the shelter you had with your colleagues and the soldiers. But you couldn't shake the thought of following koba out of your mind.

Just disappearing like that wasn't a possibility, you can't just take your stuff and go they will find it suspicious and maybe send someone to follow you.

☆

Hours passed , the sun was going down. You tried hard to stop thinking about it, maybe you should give up and go see for yourself. You didnt have anything to lose here, he could have killed you already and he didn't do it so maybe you should actually find him.

And that's what you did , you will find him again.

Getting the few stuff you had , a pocket knife and some stuff just in case you get hurt....another gun in case. This time you will keep it hidden you didn't need him to throw it away a second time.

You waited until no one was able to see you to run back out and go back into that forest , you were just happy you took a light with you otherwise you wouldn't have find the spot you had met him.

What was the direction again?

Thankfully it didn't took too much time before you figured it out , starting to walk in that direction as silently as possible.

You walked , and walked...maybe it wasn't the right direction or maybe you have already missed him and he was gone , and when you started thinking about going back...you saw it , it wasn't much but you could see light with a very small fire and what seemed to be a small hide with with branches and foliage was there...

'' koba ? '' you murmured , not loud enough to wake up what was hidden inside.Your feet stepped closer , trying to look who or what was sleeping there.

ITS HIM , he's there. Did he wait for you ? Or was this just his spot ?

A stick break under your foot , waking him up in a panic. He stood up and turned to you.

For a moment you though he was going to tear your face off. You stepped back FAST , the fear being obvious in your eyes as you dropped on the floor the light your were holding.

Thankfully , it probably just helped him realize it was only you. So he '' calmed '' down and went out of his little hut.

He wasn't looking at you like a friend , and was walking around you as he was trying to see if you were here against him or if you were now walking by his side.

Did you came with people ? Are they hiding somewhere ? He didn't trust you but wanted too so bad.

You showed your hands , to prove you weren't here as a threat. '' no one else is there , I came alone ''

Suddenly, you were pushed toward the hut.

'' rest , until sun is up '' he said , it took you off guard. Did he just talk ? But he didn't stay close to you , you were now in the hut but he was on the opposite of the fire far from you. Watching .

He wanted to be able to keep an eye on you. He wouldn't sleep next to you or before he is sure you are sleeping before he does close his eyes.

Why was he doing all that? Did he want you to stay with him? Maybe he actually was lonely and you were the only thing that didn't seem as dangerous as the rest?

He wanted something he was used to see , and something he new he had an advantage on.

Hours passed , the sun was starting to wake you up.

Before you could open your eyes correctly by yourself you were taken out of the hut and and tackle the ground outside of where you had slept.

The visibly angry bonobo went into your bag.

Why did you get yourself another gun? We're you planning on killing him? Are you going to hurt him? WHY DID YOU HAVE IT WITH YOU?

Hidden so well in your bag , were you going to use it against him?

'' TRAI-TOR '' he yelled in your face as your tried pushing him off , he was stopping your ability to breath with his hand.

'' C-can explain! Please stop- '' you said with difficulty before you saw the gun fly away the same way the first one had. He didn't want YOU, To have gun. He wasn't pleased.

He let you go, before walking off.

Another direction again but this time you HAD to follow him now , you stood back up tried to calm yourself down. you didn't realize it but tears were rolling down your face.

Thankfully he didn't chocke you long enough to actually harm you.

Taking back your bag , you followed him from a certain distance not knowing what will now happen.

You felt like a pet now , following him and you could only obey if he had something to say.

He didn't seem to want to talk to you tho , maybe you had pissed him off too much and he didn't want to look at you. Too hurt by the feeling of betray when he was trying to trust you.

----------------------

You can have Access to a spicy version of a scene from this part right here 😉

Please keep in mind that I never wrote anything in English before , and that I am not used to writing fanfiction in general.

( there is a little star in there to show you where the spicy will be starting on ao3 )

[piiiiinkheart]

Metali having 2 million views is amazing. See this is what happens when we get an actual music video. I wish koba understood that

2 MILLION ALREADY?!?!!! Now imagine the views they could have had if they changed the thumbnail 😭 this makes me kinda wish we got an mv for Metal kingdom or Divine attack

[artist-issues]

Would love to know your thoughts on the Planet of the Apes series, or at least the newest movie!

This is so kind of you, to ask!

I started watching those movies before my formal education. And they're in that teeny little corner of my brain where I just like things, without having examined why I like them. In that teeny little corner, I have my critical thinking and movie analyzation turned off, and I just enjoy things like singing animals even if the movie is objectively bad (I'm looking at you Alpha & Omega 🫠) or Transformers. So yeah, Planet of the Apes falls in there.

I know. I just made a post about how important it is to train your tastes for good stories, and accept no junk food...and then the very next post was like "the future is meaningless but the monkey movie is now" ^^" Look there's a time and place for examining why you like things and I'm just saying I haven't gotten down the list to why I like the monkey movies yet!

Until now! Partly because you're asking, partly because watching the new one made me start to think about what I liked about the first three...because the new one hit me differently. So what I'm getting at is, I'll answer you, but I'm going to be "thinking out loud" and we'll find out what I think of those movies as I type, and it's going to be rambly. Sorry! (Skip to the bottom to read about the Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes.)

I Miss Caesar

My favorite character in these movies is actually Koba, but Caesar is the heart and soul of them.

There's nothing particularly unique about Caesar as a main character—he's a coming-of-age, great-leader-from-nothing Savior-type character. He doesn’t have many character flaws, he��s the idealist, etc.

But what makes you, the audience, love Caesar so much is that you get to see his story, and the whole driving hook of the movies—“apes with human intelligence”—embodied in him, from the very beginning.

Caesar has two really awesome things going for him. The first is that he is an ape, and you get to see his intelligence and his empathetic, human nature, grow in real-time. The audience is excited to see how he’ll respond to the simplest thing because he’s so believably a super-intelligent ape. You’re like, “ooo, he just noticed that he’s wearing a leash, and the dog is wearing a leash, so how will he respond to that comparison? Ooo, now he’s meeting other apes, is he going to notice that they aren’t as smart as him? Ooo, he just attacked a neighbor, but he’s smarter than the average animal on a rampage, so how will he feel about the moral repercussions of violence?” We want to watch an animal that’s becoming self-aware; it almost doesn’t matter what he’s doing, we’ll watch it, because that’s fascinating. That’s the first thing he has going for him.

But then the second thing he has going for him is that, even if he were human, he’s just a really inspiring, likeable character. If you rewrite Caesar as a human (but somehow keep the equivalent of “gradually becoming self-aware of his uniqueness as a creature” plot point) his story is still really compelling. Think about that scene where he learns what he is, for the first time, point-blank.

Once he learns who he is and what he is, he does not immediately turn bitter, or resent his adoptive father, or even try to change the status quo of his own life. He looks sad, and very contemplative about it, but when he loses his temper and gets taken to the ape sanctuary, he still wants to go back home. He wants to go back to living in an attic, with brief excursions to the woods on a leash. At that point he already knows, on some level, that he’s a super-intelligent freak of nature and could resent Will for making him that way or keeping him a secret. But he doesn’t.

He also shows mercy to Rocket, the bully ape, and makes him super-intelligent.

He also shows signs of being interested in Cornelia, his eventual wife—before she turns super-intelligent. While she’s still significantly stupider, on a whole lower plane of intelligence, than him.

They give him all these little touches, like the fact that he wants to play ball with the other apes immediately when he meets them, instead of being shy, or treating their naked stupid selves like they’re beneath him. Like the fact that he asks Will’s permission before he goes climbing. Like the fact that he gives them all super-human intelligence, instead of keeping that superpower for himself and leveraging it to his own advantage, or gatekeeping it for only the apes who are nice to him.

He’s awesome because he’s got all the protective, trusting, loving, humility of our favorite pets. But then he takes all those pure qualities and combines them with supernatural intelligence, and “noble leader of the pack” traits. So he feels like a wise king, even in the second movie, when, from our perspective, he should just be…a naked ape who talks in broken English and lives in a tree fort.

Probably the best character trait of Caesar’s is that he inherits this “family” mentality from his adoptive father, Will. He thinks that the difference between apes and humans is that apes are loyal and love one another, specifically “like a family.”

And what that means to Caesar is that you would do anything to keep your family safe. Because that’s what Will did. Will only made the serum that started this whole franchise because he was trying to cure his father of Alzheimer’s. Will was always willing to break rules and cheat the system and change the world if it meant he could keep his family safe, and that included Caesar, who was not his blood relation.

So to Caesar, being a family means you would never hurt the people in your family; you can’t hurt them yourself, and you can’t let anyone else hurt them—and you can’t do things that would lead to them getting hurt, like starting a war.

And that’s just really appealing. A noble leader whose whole heart is “family,” but also, he’s this really interesting animal-that-learns-human-empathy.

I was going to talk about Koba, but this is too long, so maybe in another post. Suffice to say, I think the first two movies do a really good job of pacing everything, so that you have plenty of time to fall in love with Caesar, feel like you’ve watched him discover who he is and decide what to do with that in real-time, and then feel fully invested in the world he’s trying to build.

Basically what I’m saying is, I think I just really love Caesar, and so does everyone else who watches him, because he’s really well-done. And Andy Serkis smashes this role out of the park. It’s like my favorite thing he’s ever done. He does it perfectly. And in the fourth movie, I just go into it…already missing Caesar.

War For the Planet of the Apes

I didn’t like this movie as much as the first two. The first two I’ve seen over and over again. But the third one is not as enjoyable.

I think I don’t enjoy it because a lot of it feels like gratuitous misery. I mean, I understand—traditionally, in an epic-scale trilogy, you develop your main characters over the course of the first two movies. They learn who they are, they commit to a mission statement born out of the lessons they’ve learned, and then, in the third movie, that lesson learned gets tested with the “ultimate challenge.”

Well, so, Caesar learned he was the leader of basically a naive species and the founder of a new world—and the lesson he took from that was, “to keep my family safe, I must protect them from hate.” (I know that’s broad, but what I mean by that is, Caesar initially took the apes to the woods when they were “reborn” as their own species to hide them from humans, who would fear and hate what they couldn’t understand. But then he had to protect them from a new form of hatred; the hatred of Koba, and other apes like him, who hated humans so much and hated anyone else being in power so much that he was willing to hurt “family” to satisfy that hatred.

So what’s the ultimate test of “to keep my family safe, I must protect them from hate?” Giving Caesar hate. Caesar is not a hateful character. He’s like the total opposite of that—that’s why he can single-handedly defend the ape species from Hate in general.

But you murder his wife and child in the first part of the movie?

That’ll do it!

Plus, it’s been a long, hard fight and nothing he has done since the “war” against “hate” started seems to be working, so he’s understandably tired even before Blue Eyes and Cornelia die. Then they die. And then the rest of the tribe gets nabbed. And Caesar is ready to focus all his energy on revenge, just like Koba.

So yeah, that’s the correct “ultimate test” of everything Caesar has learned as a character, to put him through in this trilogy. But honestly, it was just too sad to enjoy watching.

And remember how I said that the two things Caesar has going for him as a character that make the movies (which are all about him) so enjoyable are:

He’s a well-written, inspiring character outside of being an ape (we just talked about that side of the 3rd movie, how it’s the conclusion to that character.)

The movies are well-paced so that you’re fascinated by watching an animal become increasingly human-like and empathetic, without losing the best parts of a noble/niave/animal nature

Well. The problem is that, because of the way these movies go, the apes have to become less animal as the story goes on. The whole point is that they’re as smart as humans now. So they’ll make human-like mistakes, and start to come to some of the same “conclusions” as “early man” did.

What I’m saying boils down to, they stop acting so much like believable apes in War for the Planet of the Apes. They talk out loud more often than they pantomime or speak through obvious body language. Heck, Caesar has full on monologues or confrontations with the human villain, the Colonel, in the third movie.

What made his interactions with humans before so appealing to watch was that he would still act like an ape. When he wants the humans to drive him to his old home, he just lays in the back of the car and grunts and taps the window when they’re getting close to make them stop, without explaining himself. Like your dog might, straining at his leash toward home when he wants to be done walking. But we, the audience, like that sort of thing because with Caesar, we know there’s human levels of understanding behind all the appealing animal actions that make us think of our pets.

It’s that sweet savage naivety. It’s that fascinating simplicity meeting human wonder. You like watching Malcolm try to explain why they need to get the generators on, while Caesar just silently looks back and forth from him to the machines, because it’s fun to try and figure out what’s going on in his head. It’s fun to watch how the animal with superhuman intelligence will communicate that he sort of understands what the stranger wants. It’s also fun to see how the new species of superhuman apes will still act like animals with each other.

The whole fact that, even though they’re just as smart and technically non-savage, mentally, as we are, but there’s still a part of the apes that will just follow Koba if he beats Caesar in a fistfight, is fascinating. The fact that Caesar is the most “evolved” of the apes, mentally and emotionally, but when Koba challenges his leadership or insults his love for his family, Caesar will just straight-up start ripping him to pieces with his fists, is fascinating. You keep watching to see what an anthropomorphized animal really looks like, because they make that part so believable.

But in War for the Planet of the Apes, the Apes don’t have that contrast as much. You’re not getting to see civilized, fully-realized human characters share you, the audience’s, fascination with apes who are still figuring out what it means to be empathetic. You’re not watching anthropomorphized animals anymore as much as you’re watching…hairy, superstrong humans. Which brings us toooo…

Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes

Sorry it took so long to get to the part you asked me about 😅

They’re just hairy, superstrong humans in this movie. That’s all. They’re very clearly super-humanly intelligent, they walk less like apes and swing through trees almost not-at-all after the first climbing part of the movie. They talk out loud (even though sign language wasn’t completely abandoned, which I appreciated) even when they’re just talking to themselves. They look more human, in the face. It’s just a joy to watch Koba, and in this movie, Proximus, even though they’re bad guys, because those two characters have the most animal-like faces. So you love to watch their snarly, long snouts and teeth speak human words, in ape-tones.

But the main ape characters all have human-like faces. Too human-like. They look uncanny-valley-y in some shots. (Except Anaya, who I liked best out of the new main three apes.)

And like I said, they have these more-advanced cultures, which just makes them feel more human. It felt like I was watching a movie about, like, a tribe of post-apocalyptic humans meeting the leftovers of civilized humanity. Not anthropomorphized animals meeting the leftovers of civilized humanity.

I kept waiting for the apes to have those fascinating interactions with the human characters. I kept waiting for May to teach something to Noa and the other apes, and for them to get all fascinated and have like, an animal reaction. That never really happened. The closest moment to that was when she switches on the lights in the bunker and the apes whoop and stumble around confusedly. Or when Noa learns to curse. 🫠 Also, the apes don’t have any kind of interesting reaction when May murders the other human of her own kind. They just stand there, looking sort of surprised, while dramatic music plays and May looks stressed. It felt like that should’ve been a moment where the apes realize something profound or scary about humanity (that she’d turn on her own so quickly,) or respond to her like they might an alpha-animal who just killed a challenger, or something like that. But that doesn’t really happen.

The movie was kind of full of moments like that, where it felt like they were building toward something profound…and then concluded on a vague or undecided note. Can humans and apes live side by side? …We don’t know. Was Caesar using apes for his own gain, or was he a noble elder? We don’t know. (Well, we do, but the main characters don’t.) Was May just trying to re-establish a communicating human community, or are she and the other humans out to retake the apes’ world? We don’t know.

Other random notes:

The cinematography was really good. There were moments where I felt like I was standing in the scene, or like I was on a ride at Disney World that believably sprays you in the face with water even though it’s a virtual environment, or pumps the smell of trees into the room to make you feel like you’re there. I don’t know what it was about the way this was shot, but I felt like I could feel the sun, and the wind, and smell the rain, etc. I actually can’t remember the last time a movie made me feel that way, so the cinematography was great. The animation is good, too, despite the uncanny valley ape faces.

I can’t decide if I like Noa. I could tell they were being very protective of the value of slow pacing, and maybe that “feel-like-you’re-inside-the-screen” cinematography was meant to help with this, but I also felt like they were trying to make us feel like we were vicariously on Noa’s long, scary, melancholy adventure with him. It was definitely supposed to be an epic-scale coming-of-age for that ape character.

But I was a little bored. I didn’t need to see him walk from one end of a field of vision to the other every single time he entered a new area. (Especially not when he’s just walking, or worse, sitting on a horse who’s just walking. When he’s an ape. And all you want to do is see him climb and swing and flip.) I also thought the actor did a really good job of emoting, but there were so many scenes of him choking on blood after a hard fall or a fight, or crying, or gazing sadly into the middle distance for a long time. It was like, “I get it. I don’t need so much of this.”

Also, there were things I didn’t care about emotionally that I felt like I should have, in order to empathize with Noa. First off, his father and his father’s death. Noa made lots of anxious expressions and clearly wanted to please his father, I guess…but there wasn’t really an indication that his father was a tough guy to please. Or that they were super close. We didn’t get enough scenes with the father before he died to make us feel emotion that would carry us all the way through Noa’s journey, in my opinion. Even his two best friends—I felt like they were building up to some thematic thing about growing up together, doing everything together, etc. But they didn’t. That sort of went nowhere.

I also felt like the most compelling parts of the movie were when May had not yet revealed herself to be intelligent, and Noa didn’t like her…but they were slowly starting to trust and understand each other. When she stands up and calls his name, that was my favorite part of the movie. Not because it was a great callback to the impactful, iconic “The Animal Spoke” moments of Caesar. But because it was her, a dumb brute, learning to trust and rely on this alien-like creature that was so much smarter than her, and building that dynamic.

It was just that I was missing “animal interacts with human” fascination. But then it turns out they’re both human. Noa is just hairy and strong, and May is not.

Also I didn’t love the whole spin they took to communicate “nature over unnatural progress” with Proximus. I get it. The eagles are symbolic of nature and living in harmony with it. Proximus is symbolic of trying to cheat nature and jump the gun unnaturally. But I’m a Christian. I don’t find anything compelling, inherently, about the idea that it’s “nature” that causes us to “evolve” to what we’re “meant to be.” It also doesn’t even make sense within the context of these movies. You can’t have it both ways. You can’t have the reason apes become super intelligent and free be a non-natural drug…and still say that the non-natural drug was a bad choice with world-ending consequences. Which is it? Try to control nature? Or don’t? Because if you don’t, the apes still get treated like dumb brutes and rounded up for experimentation. And Alzheimer’s is never cured. But if you do, yes the brutes get freedom, but all of humanity goes through a brutal virus, your father’s suffering is prolonged, and your girlfriend tells you “some things aren’t meant to be tampered with.”

So like, which is it? Should the vault be opened and shared with the apes? Or should the eagles knock the mean unnatural King Ape off the cliff? I don’t know.

I don’t love that the movie ends with so much of that. But I guess it had to. Thats the logical next step of a series that is about a new species continually growing to be more human, and it’s the next step for setting up the next phase.

So that’s how I felt about all of that! Thanks for asking. Maybe I will talk about Koba someday.