The Kong Has Landed — But Is Anyone Asking for This Movie?
The year is 2026. Another Donkey Kong movie is apparently in the works. No trailer. No casting. Just a quiet little copyright filing, executed in May and recorded June 5, like it's sneaking through the back door of Hollywood's IP vault.
And look, I'm not against Donkey Kong. I grew up throwing barrels and slipping on banana peels like the rest of you. But a whole movie? Now? After everything?
Let's rewind.
A Barrel Roll into the Marioverse
The groundwork was laid in 2023 with The Super Mario Bros. Movie—a hyper-stylized sugar rush that did for Nintendo what Minions did for… well, chaos. Donkey Kong showed up there, voice provided by a predictably smirking Seth Rogen, and promptly punched Mario through a temple. Cute. Loud. Profitable.
That film made over $1.36 billion worldwide. Of course there's going to be more. A sequel is already on the books for 2026. (Good luck dodging that press cycle.) But the Kong spinoff? That's new. And it's real. Thanks to a copyright filing jointly submitted by Universal and Nintendo, it's officially classified as a motion picture. So, yeah. The ape's got his own ride now.
No release date yet. No director. No confirmed cast. Just… vibes.
And maybe that's the point. Hollywood's doing what Hollywood does best—taking something that worked once, hitting “print,” and hoping for fireworks.
Illumination, Legacy, and the Zelda Parallel
The odds-on favorite for animation duties? Illumination, the studio behind Mario, Minions, and several other things your five-year-old won't stop quoting. The Kong filing doesn't confirm it, but if you've got the formula, why switch beakers?
Meanwhile, Nintendo's ramping up its film ambitions. The Legend of Zelda movie (the live-action one) just got delayed to May 2027, with Wes Ball (Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes) directing. That's a whole different energy—more swords, fewer bananas.
So now we're looking at a cinematic Nintendo-verse: Mario, Zelda, Donkey Kong… who knows, maybe Metroid gets its moody, neon-drenched A24 reboot next. (Hey, I'd watch it.)
But back to Kong.
Is Donkey Kong… a Character?
Here's the uncomfortable question: Who is Donkey Kong, really?
Mario's a plucky underdog. Zelda's royalty with a destiny complex. Donkey Kong? He's a big monkey who hits stuff. Charismatic, sure—but thinly sketched. His lore exists in the same space as ‘90s instruction manuals and blurry SNES memories.
Unless they plan to invent a whole personality from scratch—Pixar-style—this could go sideways fast. Rogen's take in the Mario movie was basically “Donkey Kong, but stoned.” Not a lot of pathos. Not a lot of runway for something feature-length.
And if they don't bring Rogen back? That's a whole other problem. Try recasting a voice that already made $1.3 billion. It won't go well.
The Bigger Picture (and the Weird Timing)
This whole thing feels like part of Hollywood's ongoing obsession with franchise cartography. If a character gets five minutes of screentime and audiences clap, boom—give them a movie. Sometimes that works (Creed), sometimes it implodes (Morbius, anyone?).
But this DK project? It's still vapor. A copyright form with a logo on it.
And yet—it does exist. Universal doesn't register these things for fun. Which means somewhere, probably in a soundproof Illumination boardroom filled with Minion plushies, a writer's outlining the emotional arc of a gorilla with abandonment issues.
We are so back.
Final Thought, or Lack Thereof
Maybe this'll work. Maybe it'll be a surprising, subversive jungle odyssey with heart. Or maybe it'll be 90 minutes of punchlines and product tie-ins. I don't know. Nobody does yet.
But I'll tell you this: If this movie ends with DK crying under a palm tree while a ukulele cover of “Mad World” plays—I'm walking out.
