Monarch: Legacy Of Monsters Reworks A Key Idea From 1998's Failed Godzilla Reboot

This article contains spoilers for "Monarch: Legacy of Monsters" Season 2, Episode 8, titled "Separate Ways."

We are rapidly approaching the endgame in regards to "Monarch: Legacy of Monsters" Season 2. The latest episode, "Separate Ways," finally brought Godzilla into the mix (in the flesh and not in a nightmare this time). He and Titan X duked it out, setting off into the ocean and seemingly teeing up a monster-heavy, two-episode stretch that will bring things to a close. And amidst the chaos, the episode delivered a major bombshell.

Yes, "Monarch" Season 2 just dropped an unexpected time travel twist on us. Now? We find out that Titan X has actually been on a quest to lay an egg and nest — that is, unless Apex Cybernetics has anything to say about it. Jason Trissop (Cliff Curtis) and his team are tipped off and, as Godzilla is fighting Titan X, they steal the egg. What do they want with it and what does that mean for the Titans in pursuit? These are questions without answers for the time being.

Titan X may be more realistic than you realize, but it's also still largely shrouded in mystery. One thing we know for sure is that it's terribly destructive, and if it's laying eggs, having more of those things around undoubtedly wouldn't be good for humanity's sake. It's not too often that we've seen Titans laying eggs in this franchise, but the egg-laying idea might feel a bit familiar to longtime "Godzilla" fans. 

It calls to mind the big third-act twist in 1998's "Godzilla," which reveals that the American version of the beloved kaiju laid a bunch of eggs inside Madison Square Garden. The big Titan X egg reveal carries similar weight, but there are some major differences.

In director Roland Emmerich's "Godzilla," the monster laid many, many eggs, which would have led to exponential reproduction, threatening humanity on a massive scale. In the case of "Monarch: Legacy of Monsters," up to this point, it's just one egg that we know about from Titan X. Also, Apex Cybernetics didn't just blow it to hell like the military did with Godzilla's eggs in the '98 movie.

The '98 movie has its problems and the writers of "Godzilla" know where they went wrong. It was a critical and commercial misfire that never got a sequel. Even so, the notion of a gigantic monster laying eggs was novel at the time. The team behind "Monarch" may not have been thinking about that directly, but what's going on with Titan X does feel like a slightly reworked version of that idea, intentional or not.

"Monarch" Season 2 fits into the MonsterVerse timeline in 2017, between the events of 2014's "Godzilla" and 2019's "Godzilla: King of the Monsters." We know that there aren't a bunch of Titan X's floating around in the MonsterVerse later on, so it's pretty clear that the egg situation is going to be handled before all's said and done. 

But is it just one egg? Is humanity going to be threatened by Titan X's reproductive cycle? Or is this more like Mothra, who lays an egg simply to continue her own lifecycle with no threat of population growth? We'll have to wait and see how it all shakes out.

"Monarch: Legacy of Monsters" Season 2 is streaming now on Apple TV.