Every Kingdom Of The Planet Of The Apes Character, Ranked By How Much You Want To Hang Out With Them

Apes not kill apes ... and humans not spoil humans. Be warned: This article contains comprehensive spoilers for "Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes."

If I were living on a planet of the apes after a man-made virus wiped out the majority of humankind and left our simian overlords in charge, I would simply try to get along with everybody. Seriously, I'd like to know why nobody has ever thought of that before in the entirety of the "Planet of the Apes" franchise. The sociopathic Koba is itching to duel-wield machine guns from horseback? Just give the poor ape a Snickers! Woody Harrelson's up to no good as the military leader of a cult-like group of soldiers, clinging to the last vestiges of power they have left? Honestly, Caesar, maybe consider the possibility that even Colonel Kurtz had his good days and bad days before going full "Moses leading the Israelites out of Egypt" on them. A friendly gesture goes a long way, is all I'm saying!

Okay, luckily, nobody in "Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes" is as much of a naïve sap as I am. After a brazen attack on his village, young Noa (Owen Teague) must travel far and wide to track his people down — all while dodging rogue ape patrols under the command of Proximus Caesar (Kevin Durand), learning about the history of ape kind from wise orangutan Raka (Peter Macon), and dealing with the annoying presence of the human Nova/Mae (Freya Allen). Some prove to be allies, some are enemies, but all turn out to be fully-dimensional characters we'd 100% see ourselves hanging out with.

So, naturally, we've rounded up all the major players and ranked them based on only the most rigorous journalistic standards. What a wonderful day, indeed.

You know what? Screw this guy. I'm pretty sure the eagle that plays a surprisingly large role in "Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes" had an actual name, but I'm too mad right now to even bother to look it up. Aside from the impressive VFX used to bring this creature to life, I'm struggling to come up with a single redeeming trait that this insufferable raptor ever once displays in the entire story. Take his introductory scene, for example. Anyone with the ability to read the room could tell that Noa and his father Koro, Master of Birds (played by Neil Sandilands) have a fairly complicated relationship. So what does the eagle do? It promptly makes things worse by dive-bombing poor Noa's head before pecking him right in the face for no good reason as Koro looks on with pride. Talk about a teacher's pet.

Oh, but surely our winged friend would soften up following Koro's tragic death at the hands (paws?) of Proximus Caesar's henchmen (henchapes?) and make himself useful on Noa's grand adventure into the wild ... right? Wrong! The eagle simply flies up above, far removed from any danger, and taunts our hero like it doesn't have a care in the world. Sure, it eventually comes around just as Noa achieves his big, emotional turning point and helps him take action against Proximus Caesar's fascist ways, but maybe our ape could've reached that point a lot sooner if the eagle hadn't been such a big jerk up until that point.

You might assume that the eagle leading the attack on Proximus Caesar neatly brings things full circle and serves as a perfect thematic callback — and it objectively is — but that doesn't mean I have to like it.

In hindsight, we should've known this guy would be trouble as soon as we realized that Proximus Caesar is a really big fan of the Roman Empire. Nobody likes to be stuck at a party talking to someone with as big a fixation (or as big a god complex) as this one. In short, he's just kind of the worst.

You'd think that a new ape leader might've been able to do better than set up his so-called "kingdom" amid rusting shipwrecks and dilapidated buildings right next to the raging sea, but not our Proximus Caesar! Oh no, far be it from any of us to question the heights of his intellect and military strategies. After deciding to devote all his energy towards cracking the impenetrable front door of an old military silo to gain access to whatever lies inside with little more than gunpowder, chains, and a dream, he apparently figured his next course of action ought to be raiding ape villages scattered throughout the surrounding area and forcing their inhabitants to do all the hard work for him. For someone as obsessed with Caesar as he is, he probably should've re-watched "War for the Planet of the Apes" to see how that whole revolutionary uprising storyline played out. And can we talk about his resource management? The best he can offer his foot soldiers are easily breakable cattle prods? That's no way to inspire a following, man.

All that said, Proximus Caesar certainly has a way with words. Not only does his inspirational speeches have quite an effect (I'm on day three of running around screaming "WHAT A WONDERFUL DAY" to strangers on the street), but I haven't been able to stop thinking about the way he says "eeeeeee-vo-lution" for days now. Credit where it's due.

Everybody, let's give a round of applause to the most recognizable actor in the entire cast of "Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes" who, to my knowledge, never showed up in a single second of marketing for the film. Yeah, even as someone who covers this stuff for a living, I'd completely forgotten that William H. Macy had even been cast in this sequel. So imagine my delight and surprise when he suddenly turned up more than an hour into the runtime as some random old man named Trevathan. Basically treated as a historian of sorts for Proxima, his main job is to provide all those aforementioned Roman Empire factoids while making sure to laugh at all of the ape king's bad jokes. It's truly no way to live and his years of indentured servitude have clearly beaten the poor guy down, as his disheveled appearance and Stockholm Syndrome-like mannerisms further hint at.

So why isn't this pathetic supporting character dead last in these rankings? Well, mostly because of my overwhelming fondness for character actor extraordinaire William H. Macy, of course. On paper, Trevathan is simpering, weak, and essentially a traitor to the human race. But when you put all those characteristics into the hands of an actor who knows exactly how to elevate such material to another level entirely, I mean, it's no surprise that I could actually imagine throwing back a couple cold ones with him and picking his brain about the fall of Carthage or something. It's just a shame he had to get brutally strangled to prevent him from tattling on our main characters. So it goes!

Anyway, here's a good rule of thumb: If you have the opportunity to hang out with William H. Macy, even hypothetically, you should take it.

It's the unspoken rule of all the various "Planet of the Apes" movies: you must always have at least one gorilla as a secondary villain. After characters like Buck and Red did their thing in "Rise" and "War" respectively (admittedly, Buck eventually became best buds with Caesar), tough guys like Luca and the ever-conflicted Winter helped balance things out and add even more dimension to the big brutes. Now, the pendulum swings all the way back in "Kingdom" to place Sylva (played by Eka Darville) in the role of unlikable and thoroughly unpleasant heavy. As Proximus Caesar's second in command, the gorilla mercilessly hunts down anyone in his path — ape and human alike. We never fully learn about his exact motivations for siding with an ape dictator and taking orders with no questions asked, but maybe he just kind of enjoys it.

While that might not seem like a surefire recipe for a character we'd love to hang out with in our down time, this is the part where I mention I'm just a complete sucker for gorillas. Whether it be gawking at them at the Bronx Zoo or watching that "Seinfeld" episode where George Costanza gets nicknamed after Koko the gorilla, there's just something about these big boys that defies all logic. No matter how strong and powerful and somewhat frightening as they may be, I'd give anything to channel my inner Jane Goodall and live in quiet solitude with our fellow primates. Add on the fact that Sylva sports some pretty cool-looking armor, wields that cattle prod like a pro, and even rides a horse like he was born to do it, and the argument really just makes itself, honestly.

RIP Sylva, you magnificent beast. You deserved to drown, make no mistake, but you won't be forgotten!

You just have to respect someone who comes in with a game plan. While Noa just marches off into the wilderness in search of his kidnapped village and Proximus Caesar all but knocks his head against the wall trying to open up an unbreakable vault, Nova (we later learn her name is Mae) is the one who stands as the one and only person in this movie that thinks several steps ahead of everyone else. Content to let everyone assume that she's just another mute, savage human, she patiently bides her time and only ever exposes her secret when it's a matter of life or death. Even her inability to leave Noa alone turns out to have been another worthy strategy, as she uses him to steadily make her way to the military silo that she knows contains all sorts of weapons that simply can't end up in the possession of power-hungry apes. And when everyone else is flailing around trying to figure out a way to save Noa and his apes, it's Mae who takes the initiative, leads her new friends into the silo, and unleashes the explosion that floods the entire place.

Ironically, all the qualities that make her a bona fide survivor in "Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes" also make her downright unsuited to civilized life where humans still reign supreme (note: she does murder someone with her bare hands), but we're willing to overlook that nagging little complication because who doesn't want a little unpredictability and spice in their lives! Mae has nerves of steel, a talent for resourcefulness, and is pretty skilled with a revolver — oh, and she's one of the few remaining people around who can actually hold a conversation. That's a win in our book.

I'm going to cheat a little bit here and lump in our three main apes characters into one because, frankly, this is my list and I can do whatever I want with it. Okay, there's actually a method to my madness here, since this trio works so much better as a functional unit (say it with me, folks: Apes. Together. Strong.) than they do apart. Everyone needs a pair of friends who'll stick by them through thick and thin, backing them up on even their most misguided decisions. That's Anaya (Travis Jeffery) and Soona's (Lydia Peckham) dynamic with Noa, whom we're all introduced to in the film's opening sequence. They were all raised together, have been through every coming-of-age ritual together, and simply have each other's backs through whatever misadventures they end up encountering ... though that doesn't mean they don't have their own flaws and moments of doubt, too.

In all sincerity, that's exactly what makes Noa's two buddies so endearing. Soona is despondent about their captivity by Proximus Caesar, ready to give up and accept their lot in life. Meanwhile, Anaya goes so far as to refuse to help Noa and Soona in the plan devised by Mae, cutting through all his macho nonsense from earlier in the film and admitting that he's scared. These instances only make it that much more affecting when they conquer their fears and do the right thing anyway, helping Noa pull off what he never could've done alone. I'd go out for brunch with them, be their plus one at a wedding, or even help these guys move to a new apartment any day of the week.

What is it about these new "Planet of the Apes" movies and scene-stealing orangutans? The previous trilogy had the lovable Maurice serving as Caesar's conscience, connecting with both ape and human through the magic of empathy. This time around, Raka steps into a similar role as a lawgiver/caretaker who upholds the myths and legends passed down from Caesar's era. Burdened by a loss we only glimpse of in his introductory scene, he nonetheless gravitates toward Noa and eagerly helps him on his quest ... partly because it gives him someone to evangelize and talk nonstop about his devotion to Caesar. Still, he's the furthest thing from some pushy Jehovah's Witness. When Noa proves receptive of his teachings, Raka simply tries to instill within him all the teachings that the great Caesar once established for all apes.

But perhaps his best trait comes from balancing his monk side with his warrior abilities. When push comes to shove, he isn't entirely opposed to, well, pushing and shoving when the time for learning is over and the need for action presents itself. His quip about Caesar forgiving him when he smacks a marauding ape to save Noa and Mae is one of the funnier lines in the entire movie, rivaled only by how heartbreaking it is when he leaves Noa with one last lesson before he's swept away by a raging river: "Stronger, together." Our one major gripe with "Kingdom" is the fact that it appears to kill him off far too soon, but an end-credits tease at least suggests the possibility that he survived to see another day. He may have been #1 on the kill sheet, but Raka will always be #1 in our hearts.

"Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes" is now playing in theaters.