Dr. Charles Decker (Michael Gough) has been presumed dead, but he’s really been hiding out in Africa, learning how to grow plants and animals to a huge size. Like the baby chimp Konga, which he turns into a monstrous ape and then, well, he goes bonkers. I mean, he was before too, but even more after. He sends Konga to London to kill all of the scientists who made fun of him like Professor Tagore (George Pastell) and Dean Foster (Austin Trevor).

No one knows that and he keeps on teaching, getting obsessed with one of his students named Sandra (Claire Gordon), which angers his assistant and lover — and wife? — Margaret (Margo Johns). When she turns him down, Decker assaults her, at which point Margaret injects Konga with so much of the serum that he grows gigantic and kills her before going wild on London, starting with grabbing Decker and tossing him. As for Sandra, she’s attacked by a man-eating plant and the movie never gets back to her!

The cops kill Konga — no comments, I’m trying to be non-political — and he turns back into a chimp.

Directed by John Lemont, this was written and produced by Herman Cohen, who also produced Bela Lugosi Meets a Brooklyn Gorilla. His co-writer was Aben Kandel, who was also Cohen’s co-writer for Trog, Craze and I Was a Teenage Werewolf.

Dudley Dean McGaughy wrote the novelization as Dean Owen. It has a ton more sex — the movie has nothing like it — than the film, as does McGaughy’s Reptilicus paperback. Charlton Comics — who published two issues of a Reptilicus comic book — had also done a Gorgo comic book with Joe Gill and Steve Ditko. Of that work, said, “I read the screenplay of Gorgo. From the first reading to this day, I marvel at how well Joe adapted the character to comic books.”

Gill and Ditko brought the big ape back from the dead for a few stories in which he fought mole men and undersea monsters. It’s wild that Ditko was drawing this book at about the same time that he was on the Marvel monster books and starting on Spider-Man.

You can watch this on Tubi.