Apple TV+’s Godzilla show may actually be set before Godzilla: King of the Monsters. Confirmed to be in development for Apple’s streaming service, a live-action TV series set in Legendary’s MonsterVerse will bring the Titans to the small screen. The announcement makes its untitled Godzilla series the latest in a long list of ambitious science fiction projects for Apple TV+.
Prior to the news, the MonsterVerse was facing an uncertain future. Despite Godzilla vs. Kong performing well at the worldwide box office, there were concerns that it wasn’t enough to ensure the MonsterVerse’s survival. A lack of announcements regarding any future installments only cast further doubts about Godzilla and Kong’s cinematic futures. However, it seems that at least some of the Titans are about to return, albeit in an unexpected way. A synopsis has been released for the Titans’ new series, but details about which monsters will be featured in the series alongside him remain under wraps for the time being.
As for the setting of the series, some might expect it to be set after the last MonsterVerse installment, but Godzilla’s synopsis indicates otherwise. Rather than pick up after Godzilla vs. Kong, it looks like the show’s place in the MonsterVerse timeline will be between Godzilla and Godzilla: King of the Monsters. Apple TV+’s official description specifically mentioned that the show will follow “the thunderous battle between Godzilla and the Titans that leveled San Francisco and the shocking new reality that monsters are real”.
The MonsterVerse has moved far beyond Godzilla’s fight with the two MUTOs in San Francisco and humanity’s discovery of the Titans, so this reveal creates the impression that Apple TV+’s show will reach back several years into the past. If Godzilla just killed the MUTOs, the show should be set in either 2014 or 2015. At this time, many of the Titans hadn’t been unearthed and Monarch’s existence hasn’t hadn’t been made public knowledge yet. Monarch still being a secret during this period in the MonsterVerse’s history is reflected by how the synopsis refers to it as a “secretive organization”. The state of the MonsterVerse is completely different in Godzilla vs. Kong, where Monarch is more transparent and humans have been putting up with Titans for years.
Apple TV+’s Godzilla series diving into the gap between the first movie and King of the Monsters will allow the MonsterVerse to properly cover an unexplored – yet incredibly important – period in the MonsterVerse’s history. When Godzilla: King of the Monsters kicked off, 17 Titans had already been identified and humanity had been aware of monsters for five years. By going back to a much earlier point in the MonsterVerse’s timeline, Apple TV+’s Godzilla show has an opportunity to provide some interesting answers about how society’s immediate response to Godzilla’s emergence, how the other Titans were found, and what Godzilla did after beating the MUTOs.
