All 10 episodes of Monarch: Legacy of Monsters ranked from worst to best

8. "Aftermath" - episode 1

The first episode, "Aftermath" kicks the show off with a bang. We're whisked back to 1973's Skull Island, where Bill Randa chucks a satchel with the Monarch logo into the ocean, leaving breadcrumbs for a plot. Then we get into the dramatic side of the show: Cate and the discovery of Kentaro and his mother and the finding of Randa's satchel in her dad's hidden office.

The episode is like a jigsaw puzzle of timelines, personal stories, and Monarch's monster mysteries. And while it does a stellar job mixing human elements with monster madness, which sets the stage for even more intriguing discoveries, family drama, monster noises, and plot twists, it doesn't quite hit the spot as much as the later episodes.

"Aftermath" is the show's pilot episode - it only goes up from here. In the beginning, we're not entirely sure why we witness Randa's last moments, where he is, or what he was doing there and while we still don't have all those answers, we do know where this is going as more and more episodes fill in the blanks for us.

Sure, I came for Kurt Russell and the promise of destruction, but I admit I also stayed for the tangled web of family drama. While not the best episode in the show, it does peel the curtain back just a bit to let us see what surprises and twists future episodes could hold.