Warning: The following article contains spoilers for all Monarch: Legacy of Monsters filming locations.
The MonsterVerse’s first television series, Monarch: Legacy of Monsters on Apple TV+, features a story that spans generations and the entire globe. The ambitious series similarly has filming locations across multiple countries to capture the international environments in the story.
With a story that runs from the ‘50s all the way to the aftermath of 2014’s Godzilla, the action unfolds across numerous continents to depict the emergence of Titans worldwide. Here are some of the global locations that appear throughout Legacy of Monsters and where the MonsterVerse series was filmed to double for its international settings.
What Settings Are Depicted in Monarch: Legacy of Monsters?
Monarch: Legacy of Monsters begins with a flashback to Skull Island, expanding the events previously depicted in Kong: Skull Island. From there, the series alternates between narratives set in the ‘50s and 2015, after Godzilla battled the monstrous MUTOs in San Francisco the preceding year. The 21st-century sequences follow protagonist Cate Randa as she travels to Japan after learning that her father, Hiroshi Randa, has apparently died.
After linking up with her grandfather’s old colleague Lee Shaw and her previously unknown half-brother Kentaro Randa, Cate finds her small group pursued by Monarch, a clandestine agency monitoring Titan activity around the world. This chase takes her from Japan to South Korea and Alaska as she investigates her father’s own connection to Monarch. Flashbacks to Lee’s history with Monarch has him travel the globe discovering early evidence of Titan activity, beginning in 1952 in the wake of increased nuclear weapons proliferation.
Where Was Monarch: Legacy of Monsters Filmed?
The sequences set on Skull Island and some of the exteriors set in Japan and the South Pacific were filmed in Hawaii. This includes the prologue of Bill Randa barely escaping Titans with his life in 1973 and a portion of the ‘50s adventures with Lee Shaw and his companions Keiko Miura and a younger Bill Randa in the Philippines and witnessing the Castle Bravo nuclear weapons demonstration in 1954.
The majority of Monarch: Legacy of Monsters was filmed in British Columbia, including sets in Vancouver for numerous interior scenes. Exteriors in British Columbia doubled for settings including Alaska and Kazakhstan, taking advantage of the diverse ecosystems in the Canadian province. Legacy of Monsters filmed for two weeks on location in Japan to help capture some of the cityscapes and other notable Japanese-set environments, grounding the show in the franchise’s homeland as a nod to its origins.
