Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes Plot Revealed: Caesar Looms

Wes Ball’s new Planet of the Apes movie, Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes, has been filming and adding cast members for a few months—and now, we might finally know what all those people will be doing.

The Hollywood Reporter just announced that Dichen Lachman, who plays a key character in Apple TV+’s Severance and was a villain in Jurassic World Dominion, has been cast in the film. Which is certainly very cool news. But in the article, there’s also a rundown of the plot, which we don’t think has been widely reported before.

Previously, all that was officially announced was that the film “[picked] up many years after the conclusion of 2017’s War for the Planet of the Apes.” But now, the trade adds the following:

Many apes societies have grown from when the Moses-like Caesar brought his people to an oasis, while humans have been reduced to a feral-like existence. Some groups have never heard of Caesar, while others have contorted his teaching to build burgeoning empires. In this setting, one ape leader begins to enslave other groups to find human technology, while another ape, who watched his clan be taken, embarks on a journey to find freedom. A young human woman becomes key to latter’s quest, although she has plans of her own.

There you have it. Sounds like the legacy of Caesar looms large but that the apes, now the highest functioning species on Earth, are experiencing in-fighting. (io9 reached out to Disney to confirm the accuracy of this and will update the story if or when we hear.)

In the film, Lachman joins previously announced actors Peter Macon, Freya Allan, and Owen Teague, as well as William H. Macy and Kevin Durand. It was written by Josh Friedman, Rick Jaffa, and Amanda Silver (who all collaborated on the new Avatar films) as well as Patrick Aison (Prey), and is currently scheduled for release May 24, 2024.

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