Why You Have To Stay Past The End Credits Of Kong: Skull Island

Some rituals are so common that, by now, they’re just a fact of life. Your aunt will always ask you if you’re dating anyone yet at the Thanksgiving dinner table. The concert headliner will always come back for an encore. And, if you’re at an action movie, some mysterious scene will pop up after the credits, so you better stick around.

Sure enough, after the insanely long credits of Kong: Skull Island, a cryptic scene plays out. Well, cryptic for me. Given the amount of riotous cheering this scene elicited from the audience, a lot of people knew what was happening and were pretty darn excited.

The scene opens with Conrad (Tom Hiddleston) and Mason (Brie Larson) sitting sulkily in front of a one-way mirror. Conrad yells at the figures on the other side of the mirror, promising that they won’t tell anyone about the horrors they saw on the island. Given Mason’s blank stare, they’ve been there for quite some time.

Eventually, the figures on the other side of the room make contact. Though Conrad and Mason are expecting U.S. authorities, the people who emerge are their compatriots from the mapping expedition gone awry: San and Houston, both scientists.

San and Houston reveal that they’re members of Monarch, a secret governmental organization that aims to find (and eradicate) the world’s monsters.

Turns out Conrad and Mason aren’t being punished. They’re being recruited. After San and Houston reveal their identifies, they show their captives footage of another monster who's been roaming about since the dawn of civilization.

The footage shows cave illustrations of a massive lizard with a fringed spine, and a few Japanese characters. Put together the dots, and it’s pretty obvious. Godzilla’s back, and so are his nemeses: Mothra (a giant moth), Rodan (a pteranodon), and Ghidorah (a three-headed dragon).

And that’s not much of a surprise, either. This post-movie scene merely confirmed what fans of big monster action movies have long hoped for: Godzilla's returning in 2019 for Godzilla King of Monsters.

Even more importantly, the teaser officially confirms that King Kong and Godzilla exist in the same reality. By linking Kong and Godzilla, Legendary Pictures has given birth to a whole new universe of action movies. By 2020, the monsters will duke it out in their very own movie, Godzilla vs. Kong.

Kong: Skull Island is merely the first installation in a brave new world.