Godzilla is a legendary character that has been around for 70+ years, bringing with him other companions and enemies of enormous and devastating sizes. With it being 2026, we have gotten more production companies that have made attempts at creating cinematic universes after the success of Marvel. We’ve seen several die over the years, some faster than others, but Legendary has something, well, legendary on their hands with the Monsterverse, which began in 2014 when Godzilla was released. Since then, we’ve had four movies, with a fifth on the way and a television series titled Monarch: Legacy of Monsters, which is planned to dive into the creation of Monarch, the organisation that handles titans such as Godzilla himself.
Monarch: Legacy of Monsters takes place after Godzilla and follows half-siblings Cate (Anna Sawai) and Kentaro Randa (Ren Watabe) as they search for their missing father, Hiroshi Randa (Takehiro Hira), and his connection to Monarch. Concurrently, we get a story that’s two generations earlier which focuses on Bill Randa (Anders Holm) and Keiko Mura (Mari Yamamoto) who co-founded Monarch and team up with Lee Shaw (Wyatt Russell and Kurt Russell) who becomes a close ally with the Randa family in both the past and the present.
Season 2 takes place two years later, where we find ourselves on Skull Island with Kong and the threat of a new titan under the name Titan X, who is on the loose and must be contained before another G-Day takes place.
An issue that the Monsterverse usually finds itself in is that the balance of monsters and humans is never handled well. We don’t want constant monster fights on our screen (although they’d be welcome), but for a franchise whose sole focus is on the monsters, we’re usually dragged away from them to focus on the human characters, and those characters, half of the time, aren’t written well.
Monarch: Legacy of Monsters thankfully lacks this problem to some extent. There’s not a single character in this show that doesn’t fail to grab your attention, but despite there being some form of a monster in almost every episode of Season 1, it still felt like it wasn’t monster focused. It sounds like Chris Black and Matt Fraction have taken all the feedback from that first season and have massively improved on Season 2.
From the first two episodes alone, “Cause and Effect” and “Resonance,” you can feel the shift in Monarch: Legacy of Monsters‘ tone. This is a season that was made with the hardcore fans in mind; not only does it feel more monster-focused compared to its last season, but the start of this season throws you into the deep end as we get major deaths that change the dynamic of how everyone is going to tackle this new threat, Titan X.
“Cause and Effect” is a chaotic season premiere, as we find the team in a state of confusion on whether or not they should recuse Lee Shaw from Axis Mundi, where he was found stranded at the end of last season. There’s some tension within the Randa family, which is to be expected considering Kentaro got to spend two years with his father that Cate missed out on, and the show does an excellent job of differentiating both of their relationships with Hiroshi and how it affects their sibling relationship.
The latest monster to enter the fray is Titan X, an aquatic creature that has luminescent tendrils with tentacles that it uses to defend itself. Once she’s let loose, we immediately are made aware of how big and dangerous of a threat she is. The stakes for this season are raised with high-level risks being taken, and with Titan X creating yet another destructive disturbance for Monarch and instilling fear into almost everyone (myself included), there are some real consequences which change the playing field.
Monarch: Legacy of Monsters Season 2 doesn’t just feature Godzilla, Kong, and Titan X, but there are other monsters that both Monarch and Apex have to tackle, with a nice surprise thrown in for fans that will absolutely break the internet and have everyone prepared for the future of this show, its prequel series, and the overall future of the franchise.
The storytelling is among one of Monarch: Legacy of Monsters Season 2’s greatest achievements. It continues the trend of providing us with flashbacks that give more insight into Bill, Lee and Keiko and their love triangle, which doesn’t just play into effect during that time period but affects the storytelling in the present day and connects with Hiroshi’s relationship with his kids and his mother. There are decade-long secrets that are finally revealed, which further change the tide of relationships but also provide so much context into the characters’ behaviours.
Every character involved, from Lee to Cate, is complex, and it’s how the story intertwines and connects that makes Monarch: Legacy of Monsters Season 2 such a refreshing show to watch. Throughout the ten episodes, there isn’t a single dull moment, and despite bingeing through the season for this review, the weekly release schedule is one that’s going to work fantastically with this season and keep everyone on the edge of their seats each week until that finale drops on May 1.
There’s an episode that allows both Kurt and Wyatt Russell to deliver their best performance yet from this entire show as Lee Shaw, and it’s an emotional episode that allows the audience to connect with the character and understand how he feels towards Keiko. Monarch: Legacy of Monsters Season 2 doesn’t just deliver well-written dialogue with outstanding performances to match it; it provides a real connection with these characters that truly speaks to their hearts and souls, which you’ll struggle to find in literally any other Monsterverse project.
Despite the last few episodes not having their VFX 100% finished while I was viewing the show, the visuals still stand at the top as the greatest aspect of Monarch: Legacy of Monsters Season 2. The size and scale of these monsters can be felt, and the devastation that they bring upon cities and the various landscapes is no joke to be taken lightly.
At times, there can be so much going on on the screen that you wonder how these talented humans were even able to make any of this a reality. When you witness the scene with Titan X, hundreds of Scarabs and the destruction of buildings, you’ll come back to this review realising that I was absolutely right in questioning these visual effect artists. If anything, Monarch: Legacy of Monsters Season 2 is further proof that AI will never be able to replicate the beauty and craft that is VFX.
Unfortunately, while this season is stronger than the last and one of the best things to come out of the Monsterverse since Godzilla vs Kong, it introduces some new cast members who overall are rather forgettable and inconsequential to the overall story being told. Firstly we get Jason Trissop, played by Cliff Curtis, who is the Head of Special Projects at Apex Cybernetics, who temporarily takes over operations at Outpost 18. Jason comes off as quite a generic character that doesn’t pose any real threat and is mainly a puppet for Apex.
In the grand scheme of everything, he doesn’t provide on the same level as the rest of the characters, and that makes it noticeable in comparison. We then get Amber Midthunder, who makes her Monsterverse debut in the role of Isabel, a character that reaches out to Kentaro, promising him things that might prove to be a dangerous risk. Unlike Jason, Isabel has major connections to the Monsterverse and actually connects with some characters that we’ve seen in the past. She keeps a lot to her chest and comes across as deceptive, but it’s Midthunder’s performance that lets down the character, as she fails to sell the possible threat that Isabel may pose in the future.
Ultimately, Monarch: Legacy of Monsters Season 2 decimates what came before and stands clear as one of the best things to come out of the Monsterverse. It tells an extremely dramatic human story that can sometimes come across, funnily enough, as a love story told across time, but it doesn’t once forget that the monsters are the main attraction, and it connects them to the story like never before.
This season is a major upgrade from its visuals to its pacing and overall storytelling. It continues to weave threads through the Monsterverse that help this show to feel like it’s part of a wider universe. It has love, monster action, pure heart-wrenching emotion and twists that keep the storyline spicy. If Chris Black and Matt Fraction have showcased with this season the difference in quality between just these first two seasons, I can’t wait to see what the future of the Monsterverse on Apple TV looks like from here on out.
