Diksha Sundriyal
Apple TV+’s ‘Monarch: Legacy of Monsters’ builds upon the mythology of the Monsterverse through its first season, which is connected to the movies in interesting ways. Even though it draws upon the movies for its tentpole events, the show also creates its own universe with a new set of characters, all of whom have a lasting impact on how things turn out. Lee Shaw is one of them. He plays an important role in the season, becoming the person that ties the past with the present and brings quite a lot to the table in the process. The end of the season, however, does not bode well for him.
Lee Shaw Might Still Return to the Monsterverse
In the penultimate episode of the show, Lee Shaw finds himself in the Monsterverse, or at least some part of it, called Axis Mundi, with Cate and May. Later, it is revealed that they are not alone in this alien universe. In fact, Keiko Randa has spent quite a lot of time there; she only doesn’t know it yet. At the beginning of the final episode, Keiko and Lee are reunited. For her, this meeting takes place about 57 days after she fell into the portal in 1959. For Lee, a lifetime has passed, and the meeting is taking place in 2015.
Lee is just as surprised to see Keiko as she is to see him. While she mourns all the time she has lost, he is happy that she is still alive and also sad that he didn’t find her earlier. Even Billy died believing that she was dead. Nothing can be done about the lost time, but they do have to worry about the time that they are losing. Lee knows that the longer they stay there, the more years will pass by on Earth, which is why they need to find a way back. Luckily, he has a plan.
The last time Lee fell into the portal, he had a pod-shaped ship. Considering that time passes differently in this realm, it has been only a few weeks for that ship, which means it is almost how he had left it. Lee also knows that the only way to activate and travel through a portal is to get a Titan to do it. He fires up the pod and uses the beacon to invite a Titan, though one shows up prematurely. Meanwhile, the pod also gets stuck, and someone needs to go out and get it free. It would have been difficult to do it with a Titan right on their heads, but they receive a short window when Godzilla shows up, and the other Titan is distracted.
Lee is able to free the pod, and it starts to move towards the portal created on Godzilla’s entry, but it happens simultaneously, which doesn’t leave enough time for him to climb the pod. Keiko gets a hold of him and tries to get him inside the pod, but Lee knows that he is dead weight and needs to be let go so the rest can make their journey. Keiko is not ready to let go of him, having reunited with him after such a long time. However, he knows he has had his time, and now, it’s her turn to go back to the world and live the life she missed.
In his last shot, we see Lee falling back to the ground while the pod is sucked into the portal and lands in 2019. The others make it back safely, but Lee is left behind. Considering that he falls from a height and there are already two Titans, one of them Godzilla, fighting each other in that area, chances are that Lee either fell to his death or was crushed by one of the Titans. However, because we don’t exactly see his dead body, there is a chance that he didn’t die. If so, then it leaves a window open for his return.
Considering that time moves very slowly in Axis Mundi, years could pass by on Earth, and Lee would still be the same age. This plot point allows the show to keep Lee Shaw a viable character while also shelving him for a while so that the story can focus on other characters, especially Keiko, her family, Apex, and Monarch. With all this in mind, we can say that Lee might return to ‘Monarch’ in the future.
Read More: How is Keiko Alive in Monarch, Explained
