Director Wes Ball breathes new life into the global, epic, franchise set several generations in the future following Caesar’s reign, in which apes are the dominant species living harmoniously and humans have been reduced to living in the shadows. As a new tyrannical ape leader builds his empire, one young ape undertakes a harrowing journey that will cause him to question all that he has known about the past and to make choices that will define a future for apes and humans alike.

Nearly 300 years after the events of 2017’s War For The Planet of the Apes, ape civilizations have emerged from the oasis to which Caesar led his fellow apes, while humans have regressed into a feral, primitive state. When the ape king Proximus Caesar, armed with weapons forged from lost human technologies, perverts Caesar’s teachings to enslave other clans, the chimpanzee hunter Noa embarks on a harrowing journey alongside a human girl named Mae (who is played by Freya Allan. She is best known for playing Ciri in Netflix’s The Witcher series.) to determine the future for apes and humans alike.

Kingdom Of The Planet Of The Apes is now showing in Malaysian cinemas.

In the meantime, head on over here for our full spoiler-free review.

Kingdom Of The Planet Of The Apes Ending

Essentially, the movie is about Noa (Owen Teague) and his journey to save his kidnapped Eagle Clan from the clutches of the despotic Proximus Caesar (Kevin Durand). Along the way, he meets Raka (Peter Macon), a wise orangutan who teaches him the true teachings of the original Caesar from 300 years ago. Noa also meets a human woman named Mae (Freya Allan). Mae later reveals that she can speak because she’s part of a group of people who were safe from the Simian Flu that caused most of humanity to die or devolve into mindless animals.

Mae follows Noa on his journey because she wants to stop Proximus Caesar from obtaining weapons inside a vault, which also contains the remnants of the old world, including knowledge that would make Proximus Caesar powerful. Proximus Caesar wants the knowledge and weapons inside the vault to hasten the evolution and advancement of apes as a race, as well as solidify his power as a despot.

In the middle of the movie, Raka dies when he drowns after getting swept by a torrential river stream.

Kingdom Of The Planet Of The Apes ends with the death of Proximus Caesar, Noa saving the Eagle Clan and becoming the new Elder (to replace his deceased father) and Mae revealing that her true mission after all is to retrieve a keycard from the vault, which allowa her group of intelligent human survivors to contact another far-away group of human survivors from Fort Wayne, Indiana.

So, the questions remaining to be explored in a potential sequel are:

Where Do Noa And The Eagle Clan Go From Here?

Kingdom Of The Planet Of The Apes ends with Noa seemingly becoming the new Elder or leader of the Eagle Clan, and him proclaiming that the apes will learn to do things their way and move forward without the past knowledge of humans.

It’s hard to predict what a potential sequel can explore, considering that Noa and the Eagle Clan are now safe and in the process of rebuilding. Perhaps a potential sequel can fast-forward even more years into the future to show us how a more advanced Eagle Clan will have progressed in that era.

What About Mae And The Human Survivors?

Of course, the biggest question and mystery of Kingdom Of The Planet Of The Apes is actually about the intelligent human survivors.

A lot of questions remain; like how did these small splinter groups of humanity manage to avoid the effects of the Simian Flu? Are they immune even to the mutated effects of the Simian Flu which has caused other humans to devolve into mindless animals?

It’s been 300 years, how did they survive that long in a bunker or vault? Perhaps it’s similar to the situation in the Fallout universe where they have sustainable living conditions down there with supplies.

We know nothing else about Mae’s group of survivors, besides the fact that they’re led by an individual played by Dichen Lachman, whose name is unknown.

That being said, they wouldn’t have cast a high-profile actress like Dichen Lachman if they didn’t plan to feature her in potential sequels, since she only appears for a literally a minute or two at the very end of Kingdom Of The Planet Of The Apes.

No Repeats, Please

It would be a shame if Kingdom Of The Planet Of The Apes set all of this up just to rehash the same tired human versus ape conflict in future sequels. Let’s hope that things don’t resort to simply having Mae and the human survivors fighting against Noa and the Eagle Clan in a sequel because that would just be a retread of 2014’s Dawn Of The Planet Of The Apes.

Perhaps There Are More Followers Of Caesar Like Raka Out There

In Kingdom Of The Planet Of The Apes, Raka mentioned that he was part of an order that followed the original teachings of Caesar. However, he also seemed to have said that he was the last of them. Raka was one of the highlights and standout characters in Kingdom Of The Planet Of The Apes, so if a sequel explores more of Raka’s order of Caesar followers (if there are still any out there), that would be interesting to see.

Go Outside The US: In The Comics, Caesar Was NOT The Only Ape Leader In The World

Another way a sequel to Kingdom Of The Planet Of The Apes could offer something new is by setting the story somewhere out of the United States. So far, all of the movies starting from the reboot trilogy have mostly taken place around the same area, all of which are in what used to be the United States.

It would be fascinating to see what has happened in the rest of the world, and how apes outside of the US are different from those in the US.

We’ve partially seen a bit of this explored in the official comics; the five issues of Planet Of The Apes by writer David F. Walker and artist Dave Wachter (you can find them here).

And yes, these are comics published by Marvel and 20th Century Studios, so they should be considered CANON.

The comics took place after the events of 2011’s Rise Of The Planet Of The Apes, and focused mostly on the effects of the Simian Flu outside of the US. They revealed that there were other intelligent ape leaders in other countries, including a gorilla named Pug in Europe.

Yep, Caesar was not the only ape leader when the world ended.

There were others, like Pug.

Perhaps there’s a whole civilization of Apes out there in the world who have been following not the teachings of Caesar but the more violent and aggressive teachings of Pug? That would be awesome to see, more of a clash of ideologies between apes.

So, again, a sequel to Kingdom Of The Planet Of The Apes could feature a more global setting and story taking place outside of the US, which is an intriguing concept to explore.

Check out the full Kingdom Of The Planet Of The Apes final trailer below: