Monarch: Legacy of the Monsters has brought back the king of the monsters, Godzilla, while also introducing quite a few new giant beasts to help populate Legendary’s MonsterVerse. In the present, Cate, Kentaro and May have learned more about Lee Shaw and the mysterious dealings of Monarch, aiming to discover more about Hiroshi’s secret life. In the past, Lee, Keiko, and Billy have their own encounter with a familiar face. In the third episode, kaiju, old and new, make an appearance and rattle the Earth as a result.
Warning. If you have yet to be watch the latest episode of Monarch: Legacy of Monsters, we’ll be diving into serious spoiler territory.
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Monarch: Legacy of Monsters Episode 3: The Present
We pick up immediately where episode two left off, as Lee leads the trio of Kentaro, Cate, and May toward the “retirement home’s” exit after ditching his anklet. Before the quartet can escape without being seen, the alarms blare as Lee Shaw has to learn how to drive a van that uses a button rather than a key to start its ignition. Gunning it to the exit, Lee pulls off some evasive maneuvers to slam through the main entrance gate to escape from the Monarch enclosure.
Lee, Kentaro, May, and Cate reminisce about Hiroshi’s past, attempting to decipher his notes as they take a trip to South Korea. Cate isn’t thrilled to hear that her father and Lee knew about the giant beasts like Godzilla that had rampaged across the world, blaming them for not revealing them to the public before they marched down paths of destruction. As the four ride the ship, May makes a mysterious call to a person unknown before hurling her phone over the side into the ocean as Kentaro arrives. May isn’t a big fan of Kentaro at the moment, losing her business and livelihood in order to protect him.
Lee thinks its for the best to hurl Hiroshi’s files over the side of the boat, though Kentaro refuses. After having a meeting of the minds, Shaw offers to no longer be the “leader” of the group once they reach South Korea, stating that Kentaro and Cate can take the lead. Realizing that losing the documents is for the best, as May has a copy on her computers and they could be tracked, Kentaro throws them into the ocean, losing a connection with his father in the process.
A New Kaiju Appears
The quartet arrives in Pohang, South Korea, running into a bit of bad luck as they find themselves having to have their passports checked by someone who isn’t their contact. Lee attempts to bribe his way out of the situation before revealing that one of the guards who took them out of line was in fact Shaw’s contact. We pan back to the Monarch agents who had previously hassled Cate and Kentaro, Tim and his mysterious friend, meeting a higher-up in the mysterious organization. The Monarch agents come to learn that not only is Lee Shaw and company in South Korea, immediately setting out to find them. Luckily for Shaw and his friends, an old warbird is waiting that will take them to Alaska for the next leg of their journey.
Aboard the plane, Lee tells Kentaro and Cate more about their father as May is able to discover the location of Hiroshi’s destination, a locale near Barrow, Alaska. As Cate makes small talk with the pilot, their plane’s navigation system goes haywire as Lee takes the controls and makes some drastic maneuvers to make sure the plane doesn’t crash. Luckily, Lee pulls off a miracle and they’re able to land, discovering pieces of what was Hiroshi’s plane. Discovering a frozen body in the plane, Kentaro is relieved to discover it is not their father, stumbling upon a tent that has been erected near the crash site. They discover notes in the camp that were written by Hiroshi, leading Cate and Kentaro to believe that their father survived.
Despite the good news that Hiroshi might be alive, the pilot is horrified to discover that the crashed plane has some claw marks on its side, meaning that a kaiju was responsible for bringing it down. Looking to leave as quickly as possible, the pilot begins to operate the aircraft, only to be attacked by a kaiju that can only be described as a mix between an armadillo and an octopus. Using a freeze breath to stop the plane, and kill the pilot inside, Lee, Kentaro, Keiko, and May look on as their role in the latest episode ends.
Monarch: Legacy of Monsters Episode 3: The Past
In the past, where Lee, Billy, and Keiko are on an airfield, as Shaw calls in a number of military personnel to the Monarch location. Keiko and Billy are quite skeptical when it comes to the inclusion of these military men, but Shaw assures them that they are exactly the people that they need to get what they need in this “brave new world”. It is then revealed that this current scene is taking place in 1954, two years after the Philippines and the trio’s meeting with a particularly nasty flying kaiju. The three show the military men an impression/footprint left by a giant beast, stating that they might be able to find the kaiju who left the mark by using a wild amount of uranium. While the military is hesitant at first, the danger presented by a beast as big as the footprint implies changes their minds.
Lee, Keiko, and Billy arrive at Bikini Atoll, hoping to get their plan into fruition but discovering that the military is setting up quite a few defenses in an attempt to take down whatever beast they might summon with the uranium. Lee attempts to stop his higher-ups from moving forward by dropping a nuclear bomb on the kaiju, being shot down in rapid succession thanks to the kaiju’s status as an existential threat.
Godzilla Gets Nuked
On the beach in Bikini Atoll, the material waits as Shaw, Keiko, and Billy struggle with the fact that they’ll lose military backing if a kaiju doesn’t appear, but the beast will most likely be nuked if it does. Hearing a roar in the distance, Godzilla is spotted under the waters, as the trio are awe-struck at the arrival of the armored beast. Drawn to the uranium, the military begins the countdown to detonate the nuclear weapon as Keiko tries to futilely stop the explosion. Unable to stop the explosion, Keiko weeps for the kaiju that has seemingly been destroyed, but Godzilla fans know better.
Keiko now holds a grudge against Lee, who had stopped her from stopping the nuclear detonation. Thanks to the reveal of Godzilla, the military is more than willing to not only give Monarch what they had originally asked for, but that Lee, Billy, and Keiko would receive a “blank check” for their future projects. Unfortunately, the unlimited funding means that the trio can’t reveal the existence of the Titans to the world. With the funding that they need, Monarch has been officially born.
Monarch: Legacy of Monsters is currently streaming on Apple TV+.
