Summary
Monarch: Legacy of Monsters delivers all the kaiju action you’d want in its Season 2 finale, but “Where We Belong” doesn’t skimp on emotion either.
The finale of Monarch: Legacy of Monsters Season 2 has just about everything you’d expect from a show in the MonsterVerse. There are giant kaiju punch-ups, kind of ropey visual effects, a lot of handwringing about how Titans aren’t really monsters at all but instead very big, very unpredictable animals, and like any ending of any streaming show, there’s also a clear tease for Season 3. What’s not to like? I’d argue very little, and it’s a bonus that Episode 10, “Where We Belong,” also contains some of the most affecting character work of the show thus far.
Granted, there isn’t much surprise or mystery. The most significant pieces were already put together in the penultimate episode, where the Skull Island rift’s significance was established, and the scope of Isabel’s plan was (mostly) revealed. The finale is all about paying off the different threads that have wound their way together, and on that level, at least, it’s a pretty resounding success. Some questions remain about how Isabel plans to monetize the Axis Mundi, but based on the climax, that’ll be a concern for Season 3 to deal with.
Kentaro’s Grief
I think it’s worth breaking down — or at least pointing out — what Kentaro’s motivation is here, since it’s the least convincing aspect of “Where We Belong”. Firstly, it’s important to remember that he’s still grieving his father’s death, so all of his decision-making is rooted in that, especially after he learned that Hiroshi visited the Axis Mundi. This is central to what he’s hoping to achieve by working with Isabel. He isn’t trying to time-travel, but to retrieve whatever version of Hiro may still exist inside the Axis Mundi.
This means tolerating Isabel’s plan to kill both Titan X and Kong — or have them kill each other — and also rejecting Cate, who is similarly grieving but not to such an extent that she’d believe this plan was anything other than bonkers. Kentaro sells Cate out again, leading to her being imprisoned, but she uses science to escape. She later stays behind to entreat Kentaro, but he rejects her again and leaves with Isabel.
Given how easy it is to see that Isabel is manipulating Kentaro, I suspect she’s going to be the Big Bad of Season 3. Her trust fund seems to afford her access to Apex-level resources, without her dad’s involvement, and she’s compelling enough to Kentaro for him to buy into anything she’s saying. She fits the bill for a bad guy.
Titan X vs Kong
Isabel’s plan to lure Kong to Titan X’s position works out rather well. Using Apex’s mind-control synaptic link, she pushes her boffin acolytes to make Titan X as aggressive as possible, assuming that her mothering instinct will cause her to kill Kong.
Needless to say, this big battle is a major focus of the finale. It looks pretty damn good, but it’s also complicated on a human scale, since Cate, having escaped her cell, is trying to telepathically talk Titan X down, and Keiko, having rendezvoused with Tim and May and acquired a jeep, is trying to rescue her. Some of the “character runs away while chaos ensues in the background” shots look a bit distractingly fake, but it’s still impressive to see this kind of action rendered on a TV budget.
Throughout the fight, Isabel and eventually Kentaro keep turning up the power on the synaptic link, driving Titan X more and more wild. Like when Brenda tried it, the energy output causes the entire system to shut down, meaning that Titan X can’t be calmed. The only way is to remove the link, but that’d require getting close. Luckily, while Cate and Keiko are escaping, they open the hangar doors where the egg is being stored. Seeing its offspring causes such profound maternal instincts in Titan X that the force of her emotions overpowers the synaptic link. Kong, upon seeing what Titan X is fighting for, allows her to leave unmolested. This made me oddly emotional.
Redirection
Since Titan X’s brain is fried, she begins heading to the rift… in the completely wrong direction. Luckily, Lee arrives piloting the Chinook that was used to lure Kong, the one with all the speakers attached, and the gang, sans Cate, jump aboard to try and lure Titan X to the rift using the recording of its own sonar communication.
Naturally, turning the volume up to maximum destroys the amps, so Cate has no choice but to appeal to Titan X directly using their telepathic connection. This is also played for maximum emotional resonance, but it’s a little less effective since we still don’t really understand how this connection works or why it’s specific to Cate. Nevertheless, Titan X begins to follow, and the gang leads it all the way to the rift.
This is where Monarch: Legacy of Monsters Season 2, Episode 10 really turns up the character work. When Titan X arrives, she activates the rift and gives Cate a little dap of respect on the way through. But the rift remains open a while, allowing young Lee to peer through from the other side, seeing both Keiko and the older version of himself. Present-day Lee is able to translate, telling Keiko that he was saying goodbye to her. It allows her to process the disagreement she had with Lee earlier, when he revealed how he saw her when he was in the Axis Mundi, but never revealed himself to ensure the timeline remained unaltered. Young Lee also gives a little salute of respect to his older self. It’s a cool scene, and a nice payoff for a lot of the relationship development that has occurred this season.
The Season 3 Setup
Naturally, Monarch: Legacy of Monsters Season 2 ends by setting up Season 3, which occurs primarily in two ways.
Firstly, Barris takes Keiko and Cate to a basement in the Monarch HQ, where he reveals that Tim and May are setting up an office. This is going to be Monarch 2.0, a smaller, even more clandestine version of the organisation that gets back to the intentions of its original founders, and their first assignment is to track down Kentaro and Isabel.
Lee is also following these two, but by different means. He’s tracking their progress in search of something that a contact named A-Wut explains they believe is the key to unlocking the Axis Mundi. They’re trying to play God and are willing to sacrifice almost anything to do so. Lee insists on being taken to this “key”. It turns out to be Rodan, nesting atop an active volcano.
“See you soon,” says Lee. He might as well be talking to us.
