Let me start by saying no apes were harmed during the making of this film. Remember that when you go see it, because even though the apes in this film look and sound real, they are, in fact, CGI. War for the Planet of the Apes is the culmination of Caesar’s story that began in Rise of the Planet of the Apes. While I enjoyed seeing how this character’s story unfolded in the film, I have to say the film, as a whole, was a bit of a disappointment. I am not saying that it was a bad film. I just feel that I built it up in my head a little too much, and it did not meet all of my expectations. So, let’s start with the positives. The CGI has never been better. Every hair, every wrinkle, and every expression on the apes’ faces looked real. Once again, Andy Serkis did great as Caesar, and for the first time, I could actually see his face in Caesar’s face. This was not as evident with the motion capture in the previous two films. Secondly, I felt that Steve Zahn stole the show as Bad Ape. He was kind, charismatic, and funny without trying too hard. He was a great addition to the cast, and I would love to see how his character interacts with Caesar’s group moving forward, should the series continue. Third, the film’s story paralleled the Hebrews escape from Egypt and journey to the Promised Land in multiple ways. Writers, Matt Reeves and Mark Bomback, without a doubt, intentionally placed this imagery in the script as there are other biblical ideology and motifs scattered throughout the film. Moving on to the negatives: the film was slow, really slow. I felt like I waited forever for the film to pick up and it really didn’t. We didn’t get much action from the apes in comparison to the previous film. Second, I found it weird that few of the apes really spoke. We saw in Dawn of the Planet of the Apes that the apes were using sign language in conjunction with human speech. In this film, however, they seem to have reverted back to mostly using sign language and rarely forming words or sentences. Caesar is basically the only ape who speaks in the film. Thirdly, Woody Harrelson played an okay villain as The Colonel. Sadly, he left much to be desired and did not live up to what Gary Oldman brought to the previous film. I am excited about where this franchise could go next because the ending left many possibilities open. Overall, I’m going to give War for the Planet of the Apes a Decent 7/10. Hopefully, next time the director will decide to pick up the pace and will give us the ape action film that was presented in the trailers.