The Lost World, released in 1925, was the first movie to use giant monsters. However, it was in 1933 that King Kong truly captured their essence and kickstarted the craze for kaiju — Japanese for “strange creature” — movies. The titular giant ape was introduced as “The Eighth Wonder of the World” and “The King of Beasts,” and captured the imagination and wonder of audiences around the globe.
King Kong has appeared in thirteen movies over the course of the nine decades since his debut. The giant ape has remained an American icon, and has inspired the creation of many characters across different types of media. Many of these characters have since become iconic in their own right, but they owe a lot to original King of Beasts.
5 Best Video Games Featuring King Kong
The iconic King Kong has featured in several video games, with the following entries being the best.
10 Queen Kong
A Female Version Of King Kong
- First appeared in Queen Kong (1976 film)
The 1976 film Queen Kong is a parody of the original, in which all the gender roles are reversed from the original movie. A male actor is kidnapped by a female director, and then a giant female gorilla, Queen Kong, falls in love with him.
The movie was released one week before a remake of the original King Kong, and became a cult classic abroad. The way that the movie parodies the original, along with the timing of its release with the first of several remakes, makes Queen Kong a great character based on the original King of the Beasts.
9 Conga (Banjo Kazooie)
A Great Ape Who Guards A Fruit Tree
- First appearance: Banjo Kazooie (1998 video game)
Banjo-Kazooie is a video game franchise full of wacky animal and humanoid characters. Conga the giant ape, the first boss from the original game, is one such character. The player has to get past him and steal oranges from the tree he guards in order to gain access to the egg firing ability. Then, they can return to defeat the great ape by using their new power.
Conga’s proportions and relatively fearsome frame are obvious callbacks to King Kong. His role as a ferocious guardian in the jungle is also inspired by the Eighth Wonder of the World.
8 George (Rampage)
An Ape Who Wreaks Havoc On The Modern World
- First appearance: Rampage (1986 video game)
Rampage is a series of games in which players choose a giant monster to control while they travel around the world, leveling cities in their wake. In the original game, there were only three options: Lizzie the lizard, Ralph the wolf, and George the ape. However, more beasts were added in the sequels.
Players who enjoy King Kong can live out their dreams of scaling skyscrapers and taking out helicopters by playing as George. He may not be the original King of Beasts, but George has done a lot to live up to the original great ape’s reputation.
7 Slaking (Pokemon Franchise)
A Pokemon Design Based On King Kong
- First appearance: Pokemon Ruby and Sapphire (2002 video games)
Slaking is one of the strongest Pokemon introduced in Generation 3. It is the third and final form of Slakoth, and can evolve from Vigoroth starting at Level 36. Slaking is a Normal-type Pokemon and sleeps a lot of the day, like Snorlax from the first generation.
Slaking’s hulking ape-like appearance is reminiscent of many iterations of King Kong. An episode of the Pokemon anime called “Slaking Kong” even features a giant Slaking. The name of the episode itself serves as an obvious reference to the Pokemon’s inspiration.
6 Creature From The Black Lagoon
Classic Movie Monster Who Also Abducts A Woman
- First appearance: Creature from the Black Lagoon (1954 film)
The inspiration for this classic monster movie came to William Alland from several sources. The first was a story he heard about a creature in the Amazon that would leave its swamp to abduct a woman once a year. The other major source was King Kong.
The creature from the Black Lagoon, also known as the Gill Man, was originally planned to be captured and brought back to the United States where he would go on a rampage before being killed. To distance this new movie from its inspiration, the movie was instead set entirely in the Amazon, although the Gill Man still abducts a woman like Kong does in his original story. The Gill Man has gone on to inspire movies of its own, such as Guillermo del Toro’s The Shape of Water.
5 Mothra
One Of The Most Famous Kaiju
- First appearance: Mothra (1961 film)
Mothra is one of the most famous kaiju in cinema. Her film debut was in 1961 in her own movie, in which she wreaks havoc on Tokyo until the fairy priestesses that worship her are returned. She also holds a major role in the Godzilla canon, having fought both against and with the King of Monsters in multiple films from the 60s to the 2010s.
Godzilla: Every Version Of Mothra, Ranked
Mothra has a long history in film, but some portrayals did her greater justice than others.
Like many prominent movie monsters, Mothra owes her creation in part to King Kong. Without his success and huge Japanese fandom, Mothra could never have been created and brought to the silver screen.
4 Oozaru (Dragon Ball Franchise)
A Destructive Form Taken On By Saiyans
- First appearance: Dragon Ball (1986 anime)
Saiyans transform into giant apes during a full moon, unless they have had their tail removed. This ape form is called the Oozaru, which literally means “great ape” in Japanese. A Saiyan’s power is multiplied by ten when in this form, making them even more formidable than they already are in humanoid form.
Although Goku was originally based on Sun Wukong, The Monkey King, this great ape has many similarities with King Kong. The humanoid features and the proportions of arm length to body are akin to the great ape from the 1933 movie King Kong. Given that film’s popularity in Japan, it is easy to see how it influenced the design at the very least.
3 Mighty Joe Young
A Friendly Giant Gorilla
- First appearance: Mighty Joe Young (1949 movie)
Mighty Joe Young has had two movies, the original in 1949 and its 1998 remake. In the movies, a young gorilla named Joe is raised by the Young family, who live in Africa. Joe grows to be much bigger than a normal gorilla (12 feet tall in the original and 15 in the remake), and cannot live with other gorillas. Instead, he is eventually brought to the city, where an inciting incident causes him to be violent and then scheduled to be euthanized. Joe ends up saving people’s lives during a fire, however, and avoids death.
The original movie was made by the same team that produced King Kong in 1933. Having seen the wild success that an ape-centered movie could bring, they decided to tell a story about a smaller (albeit still huge) gorilla with a good heart. Mighty Joe Young may not be as well-known as King Kong, but he is a fully-fleshed and beloved animal character.
2 Donkey Kong (Super Mario Franchise)
Great Ape Who Has Been Bad And Good
- First appearance: Donkey Kong (1981 video game)
Donkey Kong, surprisingly, is older than both Mario and Bowser, even if he has not featured as prominently in the Mario franchise in recent years. In Donkey Kong, the titular character was the antagonist who kidnapped Pauline, who had to be rescued by the player character Jumpman (who was later retconned to be Mario). Donkey Kong later became a protagonist in Donkey Kong Country and has starred in many games of his own, as well as remaining a feature character in the Mario Kart and Mario Party series.
Since he is an ape who shares his last name with King Kong, the connection between the two characters is obvious. It also helps that both of them have served as both antagonists and protagonists depending on the entry in their respective series. Donkey Kong is one of the most enduring ape characters in media today.
1 Godzilla
A Great Kaiju Called The King Of Monsters
- First appearance: Gojira (1954 film)
The original King Kong movie was wildly popular in Japan, and is often cited as the original inspiration for the creation of Godzilla and the kaiju genre in general. Godzilla, while clearly reptilian in nature, was originally called Gojira — a name which translates roughly to “gorilla-whale”. He was originally set to have gorilla-like features but with an aquatic origin, so the name and original design were both callbacks to King Kong.
Godzilla has since become arguably the most popular giant monster across all types of media, and has more film appearances as well. He and King Kong have fought many times over the decades since their first match in 1962, and The King of Monsters has nearly always come out on top over the King of Beasts.
8 Strongest Versions Of King Kong, Ranked
From the 1933 original to his recent battles with Godzilla, these are the strongest depictions of King Kong ever put on film.
