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Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes' first trailer once again asks 'what if humans and apes can be friends?'

The blockbuster series is back after a long wait.

An ape wearing a three pronged crown looking down at something.
Image credit: 20th Century Studios

Seven years after the last entry, Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes is once again inviting us into a world where apes are the dominant species.

While it's only been seven years for us, about 300 years have passed between the events of War for the Planet of the Apes and the upcoming fourth entry Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes, and apes are now the dominant species, with humans having turned to a more neanderthal-like lifestyle. For the most part, apes are pretty happy with this arrangement, led by their bonobo rule Proximus Caesar (Kevin Durand), though the film's ape protagonist Noa (Owen Teague) isn't so convinced.

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You can see in the trailer above that Noa is starting to question the morality of hunting humans - which is fair - as well as him starting to piece together the fact that the planet's history isn't quite what he was taught. Freya Allen, who you've probably seen as Princess Cirilla in Netflix's The Witcher series, also stars in the film, a human that appears to be smarter than other humans, according to Caesar anyway, and the trailer soon quickly pivots to Noa and the woman teaming up. An ape & human on ape war seems like all but an inevitability at this point.

Where The Batman's Matt Reeves directed the 2017 War for the Planet of the Apes, this outing will have Wes Ball on directorial duties. Ball directed the Maze Runner series of films, but the thing you'll probably have heard his name attached to most recently is the live action Legend of Zelda film Nintendo has in the works. The Zelda film is the next project for Ball after Apes, so it'll likely be a while until we see anything concrete of it.

Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes is releasing in cinemas May 10.

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