It was Beauty killed the Beast. note
- In its description of Kong's species, the coffee-table book A Natural History Of Skull Island includes a heartbreaking illustration of an orphaned baby Kong, small enough to have barely been weaned, uncomprehendingly clutching his dead mother's fur.
- Jimmy's reaction to Hayes' death. As is, Lumpy's reaction to Choy's.
- How is it that the person you sympathize with most in this movie is Jack Black's ruthless film director? Everything Carl does from the moment someone tells us that his character "destroys everything he loves" has such a heartbreaking gravitas as we realize that he does care about things, including Kong himself. Yet he never changes his course of action to save the things he loves.
- As the script and some tie-in books describe, a deleted scene with Kong and Ann gives some insight into Kong's thoughts and more depth to his loneliness. Kong carries Ann gently clutched to his chest on the way to his lair after the V-Rex fight. At one point, Kong grabs some thick vines that break, sending him and Ann falling and landing hard. Then Kong gets startled and pushes Ann behind him protectively. Seeing the source of Kong's agitation, Ann realizes the vines revealed a giant gorilla statue, presumably one of Kong's ancestors. Ann tells Kong to relax and pulls more vines away from the statue. Pointing back and forth between Kong and the statue, Ann tells Kong that it's him. When it dawns on him, Ann notices the comparison bothers Kong; he initially saw the statue as a threat to Ann but now realizes that since it mirrors him, his size makes him monstrous to Ann. Then Kong looks at his hands as if seeing them for the first time and looks at Ann. She sees fear and sadness in Kong's eyes because he'd been alone for so long that Kong had forgotten how his kind looks.
- The troubled look Kong gives as he watches Jack and Ann escape. Ann would have wanted to leave the island eventually, but the look Kong makes and how desperate he is to have her stay serve to remind you of how lonely he would be again without Ann.
- Then, the scene after that when Kong tries to get her back by frantically chasing her and Jack down. Once he does find her, the rest of Denham's crew holds Kong down with ropes and sleeping gas. The scene then ends with Kong tiredly reaching his hand out to Ann, who cries and looks away from him before he collapses to sleep.
- The fact that the men in the boat are actively restraining Ann as she protests their capture of Kong only makes it worse; to Kong, it looks like they're hurting her. Yet, the strength that's never before failed him is draining away from the chloroform, and he's powerless to help his only friend.
- Then, the scene after that when Kong tries to get her back by frantically chasing her and Jack down. Once he does find her, the rest of Denham's crew holds Kong down with ropes and sleeping gas. The scene then ends with Kong tiredly reaching his hand out to Ann, who cries and looks away from him before he collapses to sleep.
- Seventeen people died to rescue Ann, yet she only cares about Kong. Some of the Too Cool to Live characters, like Lumpy and Hayes, died, and she is oblivious.
- To be fair, it's possible that Jack hadn't yet told her about the people that died trying to save her. And it's not like her not caring if Kong is hurt or captured would bring them back: she may feel that 17 deaths are already too many, so making it 18 won't help.
- Besides, who said Ann didn't care about them? She had gotten to know practically every crew member during the trip to Skull Island. Even if nobody outright told her who died and how many, Ann would have noticed the disappearance of a few familiar faces on the trip back, and it likely would have affected her deeply. It should be no small wonder that she had pretty much wholly become a Broken Bird by the time the New York segment takes place, even before having to witness Kong's rampage and subsequent death.
- Just because she tells Kong to "Go back" and protest the attempt to capture him doesn't mean she only cares about Kong's welfare. Ann knows how ferociously Kong can fight, so her wanting the ape to leave in peace and for the humans to let him do so is just as much for the crew's safety as Kong's.
- The deaths themselves are heartbreaking, from Mike and Herb's to the ends of Hayes, Choi, and Lumpy. One death in the deleted Piranhadon scene, however, is just cruel. After losing three men (two of whom got impaled and one was swallowed whole), the rest of the survivors get to safety. It includes one last man who manages to reach the rest of them, only for the Piranhadon to suddenly burst out of the water and grab the poor man before presumably eating or devouring him underwater. The fact that he was screaming while he was so close to safety only for it to get snatched in seconds makes it even worse. And the survivors could only watch helplessly.
- The dejected look on Kong's face at the beginning of Denham's show. He may be an animal, but he's clearly scared of his unfamiliar environment, wants to go back home to the island, and he misses Ann, the only "family" he has after a lifetime of loneliness and violence.
- Even worse is the brief Hope Spot he has when "Ann" is brought out for her performance. Kong is sulking during the whole show, with his only active movement being him barely moving his fingers when Denham touches his hand. Once the stage opens and he thinks he's about to be reunited with his surrogate family, he perks up, only to be greeted by someone who is most certainly not Ann. The crushing disappointment in Kong's eyes is palpable.
- Ann abruptly stops during her performance as a chorus girl, bearing an expression that shows her thoughts aren't focusing on the show—they're about Kong.
- Ann and Kong's reunion is a wordless scene that always tugs the heartstrings. As Ann walks toward him from the fog, Kong seems to have difficulty believing whether or not it's her. They slowly step toward one another and stare at each other longingly the whole time. A teary Ann walks to Kong and touches his arm before looking into his eyes again like she's asking for forgiveness. Then Kong gently picks Ann up and brings her close to his face, after which she strokes it while smiling, and Kong almost seems to smile at her touch.
- This scene is another heartwrenching showcase of subtle body language from Kong. Not until Ann caresses his face does Kong show any noticeable emotional change. Before then, Kong, aware of his vulnerability to Ann, seems stoic and hesitant to trust her. Truthfully, Kong is overjoyed to see Ann again, but his "gorilla machismo" kicks in, and he won't show his happiness.
- The following scene of Ann and Kong in Central Park shows they're far more than their damsel in distress and monster archetypes. The tearjerker factor here derives from the fact that we know how the film will end—as if the remake would change it—and know that there is no hope for a happy ending for them.
- After the biplanes show up, Kong sets Ann down and roars at them defiantly. Then he protectively pushes Ann back against the wall behind them before facing his latest opponents.
- After Kong saves Ann from falling off the Empire State Building, Kong gives her a look of sad resignation, as though he feels he might not survive. After taking down half of the planes sent to kill him, he doubles over, tired and weak, as he spots Ann on the guardrail below him. Kong gives Ann another sad look—he now knows for sure that his end is near, and she knows it too. Before he turns and spots the last of the planes making another run, Kong's expression changes to one of quiet resolve—his life no longer matters, only protecting Ann. Then Kong summons the last of his considerable will and defiantly beats his chest one last time in the face of his killers.
- Ann at the top of The Empire State Building, vainly waving away the planes and pleading for them not to kill the creature that went from her captor to her savior, then escaped captivity in a desperate attempt to get back to her.
- Kong's death in this version might be the most heartbreaking of them all. Bullet-riddled and barely hanging on to the side of The Empire State Building, Kong leans forward to let Ann touch his face. He weakly lifts his hand to touch her, but a plane comes out of nowhere and shoots him in the back. Now on his last legs, Kong gives a weeping Ann a mournful glance, and instead of looking away as she did when Kong got captured, Ann decides to be strong and keeps eye contact with him. Finally, Kong's pupils dilate, and he falls.
- At the end of it all, as soldiers and civilians swarm around Kong's body on the street, we're treated to a sad moment of disrespect by two reporters as they climb on top of his body to get a picture before some soldiers pull them away. After this, another man comments on Kong's actions and realizes he was no mere ape—in an era when there was so much misinformation about man and animal alike."Why'd he do that? Climb up there and get himself cornered? The ape must have known what was coming.""He's just a dumb animal. He doesn't know nothin'."
- At the end of it all, as soldiers and civilians swarm around Kong's body on the street, we're treated to a sad moment of disrespect by two reporters as they climb on top of his body to get a picture before some soldiers pull them away. After this, another man comments on Kong's actions and realizes he was no mere ape—in an era when there was so much misinformation about man and animal alike.
- Let's face it—the entire ending is heartbreaking. Kong's dead, and since he's the Last of His Kind, his whole species is now extinct. Several civilians and many of the soldiers who tried to bring him down and protect the city got killed. Carl Denham's career is over for sure, he is likely a pariah for his actions, and he'll never be able to donate the proceeds of his film to the families of the Venture's deceased crew members if he ever was going to do in the first place. Of the Venture's crew that survived, most of their friends (and in Jimmy's case, his father figure) are dead. And according to ''A Natural History Of Skull Island'', Skull Island itself sank into the sea in an earthquake, so every exotic species and the natives on the island became extinct. One of the only bright spots to come out of the ordeal is Ann and Jack's relationship, and there's a feeling that their story will make it in history. Many of the same points could apply to the original, but the '05 version's story is more "developed," making it even sadder. The bittersweet part about this is that at least New York is saved from destruction.
- Carl's "My God, What Have I Done?" after Kong broke free and is now loose in New York. That sadness when he shows up after Kong's death and says the signature line is just as much there too.Denham: It wasn't the airplanes. It was beauty killed the beast.
- Carl finds the camera destroyed. He went through all this insanity to get his movie. And now he can't even have it, especially since that was the only thing he could have used to try to make up for all the deaths he caused in pursuing it, including some of his close friends.
- Skull Island sinks into the sea 13 years after its discovery. Even if Kong had survived, he would have drowned as the island eventually sank.
- In the early New York scenes, it's abundantly clear that virtually all the human characters are broke or nearly so, and desperate for work (or in Ann's case, just a good meal) at the height of the Great Depression. Even if the expedition had never happened, few of them were likely to have fared well in the hard years to come.
