RECAP: Monarch: Legacy of Monsters Season 2 Episode 2 — “Resonance”

Monarch: Legacy of Monsters Season 2 kicked off its season by getting all of its main characters in one place. Cate Randa (Anna Sawai) and her father Hiroshi (Takehiro Hira), brother Kentaro (Ren Watabe), and May (Kiersey Clemons) saved Lee Shaw (Kurt Russell) from Axis Mundi, and her grandmother Keiko is helping Monarch. But in doing so, they let loose a new titan. Now, in Monarch Legacy of Monsters Season 2 Episode 2, titled “Resonance,” the narrative is moving forward by focusing on capturing this new threat. 

In the past, Keiko (Mari Yamamoto), Bill (Anders Holm), and a young Lee Shaw (Wyatt Russell) headed to Chile to find the sea monster that ate Bill’s boat. What they found there was a titan whose existence had spawned a religion on the island: “Gran Dios del Mar.” In the present, the opening of Monarch Legacy of Monsters Season 2 Episode 2 captures this with the fear on Keiko and Shaw’s faces as the helicopter moves from Skull Island back to base.

With Director Verdugo (Mirelly Taylor) dead, thanks to the new titan, Tim (Joe Tippett) has been put in charge. But even while injured, Colonel Shaw isn’t about waiting around for bureaucracy; he is trying to save people before the titan makes landfall.

Despite needing to rush, the pissing contest between the two is enough to make the entire room uncomfortable. But between them, Lee Shaw’s grit is far more important than Tim’s timidness, leading them to track the titan and hopefully stop it, even if the mobile outpost ship they are on is lacking defenses. 

As Lee Shaw, Kurt Russell is bringing forward so many of the commanding characters he has played in the past. And while it is weird to see an ageless Keiko so taken away by this older version, it also feels right. But one thing that Dr. Keiko Randa has to reckon with, that we have yet to see, is what Monarch is today. 

At the same time that Tim and Shaw are fighting for control and next steps, the hitchhiker on Shaw’s ship from Axis Mundi is making its way around the base. Similar in appearance to a fossilized trilobite (Redlichia rex), this monster has tentacles it uses to move around, and it’s creepier for it. 

The camera chooses common sci-fi angles to map the monstrous, probably crustacean, across the ship. We see parts of its body as it moves along walls, trying to create tension. But the real tension in Monarch Season 2 Episode 2 is in the continuing Randa family drama. 

As Hiroshi and Kentaro fight about Cate pressing the button, opening the rift to Axis Mundi, and rescuing Shaw. For them, it was a mistake to rescue Shaw at the risk of what they had just let loose. But for Cate, that decision was everything. After she overhears them, Hiroshi confronts her, calling out the blame she places on him for leaving her and her mother.

To which Cate just stares, tears welling up. The Randa family is broken, and it’s clear that Monarch Season 2 is going to be about chasing a titan and fixing those cracks in the family. However, the former is far more entertaining at this point. 

Monarch Season 2 Episode 2 has a stowaway in play.

Still split between the present and the past, Monarch Legacy of Monsters Season 2 Episode 2 is an absolute genre highlight in the series so far. In the present, the showrunners Chris Black and Matt Fraction have put together a sequence on the ship that harkens back to the Alien franchise and other fantastic tribute episodes like Cowboy Bebop’s “Toys in the Attic.” With the trilobite monster wreaking havoc as it snatches unassuming Monarch employees, this homage is a standout of the series so far. 

In the past, however, we’re in a full-on action adventure with Keiko, Bill, and Lee back on Santa Soledad, Chile, learning more about El Gran Dios del Mar and how they can record it. Particularly, Bill shines his flashlight across cave paintings as he begins to see the stories along the walls. At the same time, Keiko is testing the water and trying to understand how the titan has impacted the local culture and people. 

But the paintings on the cave were more than just a story; they were a map, a migratory pattern that the sea monster takes. Bill, of course, is ready to leave and track the monster. On the other hand, Keiko wants to stay and study the land and the sea. It leaves the perfect opportunity for the budding love triangle to take shape even further, with Lee and Keiko staying behind as Bill chases his white whale. 

Back in the present, Lee and Tim have a heart-to-heart. Tim is taking over the role as director, and with the US government giving him the same answer Lee gave (to follow the titan), his character is undermined by uncertainty. There is an uneasiness to what Tim is doing, an uncertainty in his calls. The government’s directives also instruct Shaw to be captured and turned over. And Tim ignores it, knowing that he needs the Colonel to help. 

Outside of the shotcalling, Cate is still struggling with her decisions. She’s carrying her father and brother’s critique, and now, May agrees that maybe the button shouldn’t have been pressed. Unfortunately, Cate is riddled with guilt, and no amount of reassurance that they did the right thing is correct. 

Cate’s sulking about her decision is frustrating as “Resonance” continues. Where the real excitement is is between Keiko and Shaw. She doesn’t know the world as it is, but she also doesn’t know him with 50 years of life tacked on. It’s not just his face that has changed, but the violence he’s committed also makes Keiko question if she still understands him. 

As “Resonance” continues and the ship gets closer to the titan with collateral damage in the way, Keiko sees just how much her legacy has been changed. Or more specifically, how Monarch is really just Bill’s legacy, one of defense and not just the truth or research. 

Keiko is forced to see what her legacy has become with Monarch, or rather what Bill’s legacy is. 

Monarch Legacy of Monsters Season 2 Episode 2 jumps back to the past, with the locals making an ominous admission that Keiko and Lee’s time is up. But in the cave, as they continue to research, the time alone also becomes something special to discuss. 

Keiko explains that, despite being arranged, her first husband was a good man. But he was a doctor in Nagasaki during and after the war, but he died after Hiroshi was born. However, even with the protection and providing for his family, Keiko needed something more. 

For her, Bill allows her to be her own person. He will drag her to the end of the world, but she knows how much he loves her and even Lee. It’s a moment of vulnerability that draws silent emotion from Lee and interrupts the usually calm Keiko. 

When the two of them are ready to leave the cave, the man who threatened Bill when they first arrived, Augustin (Camilo Jimenez Varon), and the woman who showed them the cave, Lucia (Camila Ponte Alvarez), show up. He speaks about superstition, and Keiko asks about the creatures on the walls. The locals explain that the creatures on the cave walls are sacred to the people of Santa Soledad. 

The man offers an invitation to their festival, but it’s hard to see the smiles of the locals as anything other than threatening, given the conversations we’ve heard from the audience. However, Keiko has no reason not to trust them and agrees to attend. Lee, of course, is reserved but amenable to doing what she wants. 

With their past experiences in the cave, breadcrumbing what we are about to see in the present, Keiko and Shaw explain that the titan responds to subsonic sound. Using drones, Monarch plans to launch them emitting subsonic signals in an attempt to keep the titan away from a populated strait. 

As Hiroshi works on the device, he and Keiko have a chance to share a tender moment. It’s awkward as Keiko instructs him to stop biting his nails, as any mother would, only the two are now the same age. The awkwardness is endearing, but it also comes with a tinge of sadness when Keiko realizes that Bill threw himself into his work, not fatherhood. Which tells the audience where Hiroshi learned it from. 

Monarch Legacy of Monsters Season 2 Episode 2 is all about the Randa family drama.

When we catch back up with Cate, the horror of Monarch Legacy of Monsters Season 2 Episode 2 continues. The monster on the ship stalks Cate. Armed with a fire extinguisher, she takes it on, while in the war room of the ship, they launch the drone, only to lose it because of Shaw’s impulsivity.

Thankfully, Kentaro and May aren’t on the deck, and there is nothing that a flare can’t do to stop a monster. Or at least that’s what they think. The trilobite-like monster isn’t dead, it’s pissed, and because it is, it unleashes a subsonic wave immediately calling the titan directly to Monarch’s ship. 

El Gran Dios del Mar is heading directly toward the Monarch ship, and to get ahead of it, Shaw loads the small monster onto a zodiac in the hopes of pulling the titan away. And in true Lee Shaw fashion, it works, as does his miraculous escape. 

Back in the past, Lee and Keiko witnessed a festival in Santa Soledad, partaking in the festival that exists to pull in a bountiful catch while fishing. They dance, they drink, and take part in the ancestral tradition of worshiping the Great God of the Sea. But the wine isn’t just wine, it’s something stronger. 

Keiko grows nervous and gets separated from Lee, both pulled into their own dance circles, Augustin watching from afar. It’s a moment of joy, but it also highlights the anxiety of the situation. When they make it back to each other, the wine has taken hold, and the kiss they shared previously comes to mind. But as they stand there, both begin to realize that they may be in danger once the fish is hoisted in the center of the festival. 

From then, a procession begins with a man, a knife, and then he guts the giant fish, offering a sacrifice to the God of the sea. Monarch Legacy of Monsters Season 2 Episode 2 then shifts gears and makes good on the tension that has been built up on the island.

The sacrifice isn’t so much to honor the god as it is to call the monsters forth. As the blood pools beneath the fish, the same monster we saw on the Monarch ship in the present erupts from the ground, and they head down the hills like a wave, forcing Keiko and Lee to run. 

“Resonance” fails to balance the past and the present.

Monarch Legacy of Monsters Season 2 Episode 2 is a good episode; however, it still struggles to find the right balance between the past and the present. Because the past now works as flashbacks to understand the characters’ decisions in the present, it gets a little difficult to find excitement in both pieces. But this is part of the larger issue: the Randa family drama is nowhere near as compelling as Keiko and Lee Shaw’s relationship in the past and present. 

As Monarch Season 2 Episode 2 finds its footing with a large ensemble cast, it’s starting to stumble in the same ways it did in the first season of Monarch Legacy of Monsters. It’s a frustrating element of the series that makes it hard for me to keep finding footholds to hold onto. Right when I begin to invest in the past, we switch to the present, and vice versa. 

Despite stellar performances, Cate’s reluctance to think about anyone other than her own guilt in “Resonance” bogs down all of the plot points that she is involved in. Instead, I found myself wanting more of Keiko and Hiroshi or Keiko and Shaw. But in the end, I just wanted Keiko. 

Monarch Legacy of Monsters Season 2 Episode 2 is par for the course of the series, but because of this, it squanders the potential it had to correct the issues from the first season. In a way, it even feels repetitive of last season, even though now the stakes have been raised since our characters are effectively stuck at sea. 

Monarch Legacy of Monsters Season 2 Episode 2 is streaming now, exclusively on Apple TV with new episodes every Friday.