Kate McCaffery
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Kate McCaffery was a zoologist employed by Eighth Wonder Expedition Company as "Attendant in Charge" to lead their voyages into the legendary Skull Island. She is the main character in the 2016 Universal's Islands of Adventure attraction Skull Island: Reign of Kong, which presents itself as a prequel to Universal Pictures' 2005 film King Kong. Her likeness and journals were also present in the marketing campaign leading up to the attraction's opening, Myth Explorer: The Quest for Kong. In 2024, the ride was recreated in Minecraft: Bedrock Edition as part of the "Minecraft x Universal Studios Experience" DLC, which gives her a slightly expanded role as a walkaround character with an available side quest.
History
Skull Island: Reign of Kong
McCaffery was an adventurer known for her expertise in live animal capture. Her travels had seen her tangle with the likes of polar bears, anacondas, crocodiles, Siberian tigers and bull elephants. Due to this, she considered herself a perfect fit for the expedition to Skull Island being put together by Sir Robert Ashmore Wallace. At some point prior to the expedition, she and much of the rest of the crew was interviewed by Richard Armstrong of the National Broadcasting Company. In 1931, after reaching the island,[3] she participated in flyovers for survey purposes. During one of these flights, a Terapusmordax attacked her plane, but was quickly shredded in the propeller.[4]
Following McCaffery's discovery of previously unknown vast underground caverns, new recruits were called to the island by Dr. Horace Clark to reinforce their dwindling numbers. She arrived to greet them alongside her two lead explorers, Flores Joe and Juan. McCaffery congratulated the bravery of the new explorers, and was about to get back to work when Clark began reading an incantation from the journal of one of their fallen comrades and summoned a wave of fog. McCaffery grabbed the book to see what he had done, but a native "sha-woman" emerged from the mist and chanted ominously. Reading the book, Kate began to realize something was happening, and pillars of flame leapt up, followed by a great roar from the other side of the wall, which she associated with the legendary "Kong." The woman disappeared in a cloud of smoke, and McCaffery encouraged the new recruits to join her in uncovering the mysterious goings on.[5]
One day, she and her colleague Flores Joe were setting traps in one of the underground caverns. One of six variable crewmates, either Will Denham, "Doc" Jordan, Becky Callaghan, "Jinks" Costanza, or their native guide from a nearby island Kalana, arrived in an expedition vehicle full of supplies and fresh recruits. Joe launched a flare deeper into the cavern to give them more light, but in doing so, stirred up a swarm of bats. McCaffery was not a fan of theirs, but did not have much time before three Terapusmordaxes emerged from the darkness as well. She called for the recruits to take cover, but soon saw that one of the pungent bat-creatures had picked up Joe, and was beginning to fly away with him. McCaffery grabbed his legs, using her added weight to pull him from its claws. As she ran for cover in a nearby truck, another Terapusmordax came up from behind, grabbed her by the shoulders, and flew away with her. It carried her into one of the island's deep, muddy canyons before she was able to hack its leg off with her machete. They dropped into the mud, and the driver of the truck full of new recruits called out to her about a Carnictis approaching from behind. She slashed the beast and the others around it as Weta-rexes began to fly in overhead. She grabbed her Thompson submachine gun, and began firing away at the encroaching life forms after calling for the other explorers to duck. She encouraged the driver to keep moving just before she was plucked out of the pit by a Deplector, who pulled her into its hollow.
She later radioed the exploration team, but could only describe how she survived as a "long story."
Myth Explorer: The Quest for Kong
McCaffery spent at least 14 days on the island, and kept a detailed account of her time spent there.
In the year 2016, nearly 90 years after the Eighth Wonder Expeditions Company first arrived on Skull Island, and 68 years after the world was told that Skull Island had sunk beneath the Indian Ocean, television personality Erin Ryder discovered trace evidence of pre-Denham expeditions to the island, and that the place itself may not have been destroyed. While there, she discovered remains of one of the Exploratory vehicles and a trunk of McCaffery's belongings, including her journal. She presumed that the trunk had been aboard the destroyed vehicle, but drew no conclusions about McCaffery's fate, or if she had been aboard during whatever incident led to its destruction.
What became of McCaffery and the rest of Eighth Wonder Expeditions is unknown. Ryder claims to know that the expedition ended in "a lot of fatalities," but it is never stated whether these included McCaffery.[3]
Video games
- Minecraft: Bedrock Edition (2011; added in 2024) - Windows 10, Windows 11, Xbox One, Xbox Series S, Xbox Series X, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Nintendo Switch, Fire OS/TV, Android, iOS, Windows Mobile, Samsung Gear VR
Minecraft x Universal Studios Experience
Kate greeted new explorers in the Eighth Wonder Expeditions base camp, but could also be found inside "Kong's Banana Path Temple," where she and Bryan Goldaber tried to solve the temple's puzzles to get to Kong at the end. When the player completed these tasks, they returned to McCaffery and Goldaber with a golden statue of Kong that they took from the player in exchange for a missing letter from the "Universal Studios" sign. To get a better idea of how the temple puzzles worked, they welcomed the player to try them out again. If the player rode the attraction, they would see a faithful recreation of the ride, with the notable exclusion of Kate's machete wounding her Terapusmordax captor.
Gallery
Skull Island: Reign of Kong
A promotional photo of McCaffery, Joe, and Juan
Myth Explorer: The Quest for Kong
McCaffery's employee ID
Minecraft x Universal Studios Experience
McCaffery outside the attraction in the "base camp" area
McCaffery and Flores Joe in the cavern
Joe's flare disrupting the bats
Kate seeing the Terapusmordax
Kate picked up by the beast
The Terapusmordax arriving in the mud pit
Kate watching the Carnictis devour her captor
A sign pointing to Kate
McCaffery and Bryan Goldaber at the Banana Path Temple
Trivia
- According to her employee ID, McCaffery was 26 years old, 5 feet five inches tall, and weighed 124 pounds and had green eyes.[1]
- Minecraft x Universal Studios Experience replaces Kate's pistol with a small crossbow, as it does with all of the guns seen in the original ride.
References
This is a list of references for Kate McCaffery. These citations are used to identify the reliable sources on which this article is based. These references appear inside articles in the form of superscript numbers, which look like this: [1]
|
Comments
Showing 0 comments. When commenting, please remain respectful of other users, stay on topic, and avoid role-playing and excessive punctuation. Comments which violate these guidelines may be removed by administrators.
|
|
