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As a way to honor the previous installments of the MonsterVerse established by Legendary Entertainment, Toho Company and Warner Bros. Entertainment, show creators Chris Black and Matt Fraction weaved scenes from Godzilla (2014) and Kong: Skull Island (2017) into the narrative of new Apple TV+ sci-fi series, Monarch: Legacy of Monsters.
The first season of the show, which debuted in November, revolves around two stepsiblings discovering the role their family played in establishing a mysterious global organization with a mission to study and protect the world from kaiju. Bringing these massive creatures to life meant producing over 3,000 visual effects shots across 10 episodes under the guidance of Sean Konrad and digital expertise of Rising Sun Pictures, Rodeo FX, Framestore, FuseFX, Outpost VFX, Crafty Apes, Wētā FX, MPC, Storm Studios, Vitality VFX, BOT VFX, Mr. Wolf, Scarab Digital, The Third Floor, Proof, MPC Visualization and an in-house team.
Opening the series is what looks like lost 16mm footage of William Randa (John Goodman) being chased by a Mother Longlegs and encountering a Mantleclaw, while later on in the same episode, Kate Randa (Anna Sawai) witnesses the destruction of the Golden Gate Bridge by Godzilla. “Matt Fraction did a brilliant job of taking the aesthetic and tone of Kong: Skull Island and Godzilla, and then having the rest of the show feel like this unique story,” notes Sean Konrad, the show’s VFX supervisor. “That one shot of Kong destroying the helicopter is a straight lift from Kong: Skull Island but the rest of the footage captured by William Randa was freshly shot for the show.”
MPC which did the original G-Day bridge scene in Godzilla was responsible for its recreation. Konrad notes, “We had the same bridge and destruction setup from Godzilla that had to be imported as MPC changed from Maya-based destruction to Houdini; they had that geometry ready to go so we able to do the same snaping cables and twisting tarmac.”
The points of view of the human characters dictates the show’s visual language. “The creature design was conceptualized to be subjective to the characters in the show,” says Konrad. “That means we’re making the creatures fit the terrain that we’re shooting in. When we were on Skull Island and the Mantleclaw comes out of the ground, we designed that creature around the location that we had found so that it would make sense and be structured with the actors. That part of it has been different. Trying to drill in and understand how do we make these characters feel that they’re in the same space as the monsters in a serious way? Normally in the world of visual effects, you get a script, go and do your previz and try to insert some ideas.”
The Ion Dragon was given a gargoyle-like body. “The team at Wētā FX spent a lot time trying to figure out, ‘How much up down swing do you want? What is the cadence of that?’ A lot of that stuff is achieved by doing flight and walk cycles until you look at it and go, ‘That’s right.’ We did that with all of the creatures even the more human-sized Endoswarmer at the end of Episode 101. It’s not only the physics and the believability of it, you’re trying to communicate a personality to them as well.”
The series features a whole lot of practical shaking courtesy of the special effects team. “We had one airbag deck that we probably used on every episode from putting a bus on it to the rescue pod to a sand set,” reveals Paul Benjamin, special effects supervisor. “We did one shaky gimbal set for the hallway scene in the ship when the monster comes and starts bashing around. There was a point where we were going to put the bus on a hydraulic gimbal but then they decided at the last minute to keep it lower to the ground so we slapped it on an airbag deck. When making things shake, we always try to give them more than what they’re probably going to want and try to make it adjustable because every shot is a little different.”
Throughout the show, a number of scenes required rain. “We made the fishing boat in the water and were on a little dock. That was hard to get a bunch of rain over top of the boat because the loading dock we had was only permitted for so much weight. However, we managed to get a small lift up there and some rain towers or misters and fans; that looked neat.”
Shooting took place in a parking lot for the freighter reveal shot. “We had a simple set build and our director was wanting to have a sense of scope for that moment,” states Konrad. “We’re not just going to pull back, show a few cars and be done with it. It started as a handheld move and hands over to a crane. Going from a Steadicam to a crane is technically challenging. We had about five lanes of cars and few shipping containers which were extended. I like some of the miniature Japanese trucks so we got to put some of those fun little cars into the scene. The team at Outpost VFX did a lot of research to find something that would actually make sense with the way we had designed the set.”
Major water simulations were produced for when Godzilla surfaces in Episode 103. “Rising Sun Pictures did a good job of managing the level of foam and aeration in the water. When so much water gets disturbed it starts to aerate and the quality of the water changes; that’s a challenging thing to get right.”
The VFX supe points out that digital doubles were used quite judiciously. “The total number of digital double shots was under 10 in the whole season,” remarks Konrad. “We had one crowd shot in a later episode that you probably won’t notice is a crowd shot. Whenever we were doing something that became unsafe for the actors we opted for digital doubles. If it was a simple rig hanging with a drop, all of the actors were onboard so we were able to use a lot of that performance. No digital de-aging was required for Kurt Russell, as his son Wyatt Russell played the younger version of Lee Shaw. “I loved the way that the two of them collaborated together to create a consistent character,” remarks Konrad. “The make-up team looked at some of the physical differences between Kurt and Wyatt, and did a make-up pass to help make them feel more similar.”
The project’s plutonium plant was quite an interesting environment to bring to life. “The production designer had a strong vision of what it should look like and the director had a strong idea of how he wanted to utilize the space and compose the shots,” explains Konrad. “We drew reference from destroyed buildings in Eastern Europe from the era depicted in the story. Outpost VFX did the exterior and Rodeo FX did the interior; they both did a great job of communicating that space.”
Given the number of different elements that had to come together, some scenes proved quite challenging to put together. “The Endoswarmer sequence at the end of Episode 101 has this great build-up of tension and while things were coming together, you’re not sure if it’s quite there and right. The day I saw the final colors I got an emotional reaction out of it. I was so stoked that it actually landed in the way that we had planned.”
The first season of Monarch: Legacy of Monsters is currently streaming on Apple TV+.
