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May Olowe-Hewitt, (birth name Corah Mateo), is a character created by Legendary Pictures who made her first appearance within the 2023 MonsterVerse series, Monarch: Legacy of Monsters.

History[]

Monarch: Legacy of Monsters[]

2012[]

Corah was recruited by Applied Experimental Technologies to work for them as a programmer and coder. She worked under Brenda Holland, who promised Corah that her coding would help people walk again. As time went by, Corah became frustrated as she learned her coding was actually being funneled to another unit of the company, the Cybernetics Neuro-Interface Unit. Brenda brushed off her concern and coldly reminded Corah that the code belonged to AET, not herself. Corah hacked into the unit and learned that AET tortured monkeys with brain devices. Her coding only furthered their inhumane research. Corah decided to crash AET's systems, which cost the company years of research and millions of dollars. She left behind a digital signature that allowed AET to identify her. Corah went on the run to avoid prosecution and AET's wrath.^[1]

2013[]

Corah changed her name to May Olowe-Hewitt and moved to Tokyo, Japan, where she worked as a freelance coder and game designer. She last spoke to her family the day she met Kentaro Randa outside his art show. They hit it off instantly and began a romantic relationship^[2] that lasted about a year and ended when he ghosted her.^[3]

2015[]

Around April 1, 2015, May's ex-boyfriend Kentaro visited her to ask for her help to decrypt antique files. She initially didn't want to help and was angry at him because he ghosted her. He told her about his newfound half-sister Cate, and he how he hoped that the files would help him understand his father. May decrypted the files rather easily. The saw photos of Big Foot and Godzilla. This forced Cate to open up about her past - she was in San Francisco on G-Day. She then spotted a photograph her grandmother Keiko in a giant monster print.^[3]

May continued to work on the rest of the files even after Kentaro and Cate left. She brushed off Kentaro who wanted her help to play more footage he found. They argued over their failed relationship and he left. Later, her apartment was broken into by Monarch operatives. Cate saw them inside and May pulled her away before the operatives could see her. May took Cate to a restaurant where she had a duffel bag stashed of fake passports, IDs, and cash. She claimed it was in case of another G-Day attack. They met up with Kentaro in the street and disagreed for a moment about what to do to escape Monarch. Kentaro convinced the girls to come with him. They visited a retirement home where Hiroshi's uncle Lee Shaw lived. After a conversation, May found cameras hidden in the trees. Lee revealed the facility was Monarch's version of secure asset management. He didn't believe Hiroshi disappeared without a trace. He offered to help them get out of there and learn what happened to their father.^[4]

Lee successfully broke Cate, Kentaro, and May out of the facility. Once safe on a boat to South Korea, he looked through Randa's files which May had digitized before they left Japan. May called someone to say she might be able to come back soon. She tossed her phone into the ocean after the call. Kentaro tried to pry for information, but May refused to give it to him. May was mad that she was dragged into this mess because it cost her everything. She couldn't leave until they sorted out this mess and he could get back what she lost. The group found Lee's old friend Du-Ho who flew them to Alaska, where they believed Hiroshi crashed. They hit turbulence and the meters inside went crazy. Shaw managed to land the plane, though not gracefully. Once landed, Kentaro found the wreckage of Hiroshi's plane, though only one body was inside. Several feet from the crash was a tent. Cate and Kentaro realized Hiroshi survived the crash and hugged. Meanwhile, Du-Ho investigated the wreckage and realized the plane landed safely but was destroyed after the crash. He screamed for everyone to get back to the plane, though moments before they could reach it, a Frost Vark erupted from the ground. It murdered Du-Ho when it used its ice breath to turn the whole plane into ice.^[5]

They hid from the Titan in an ice cave. May's leg went through the ice and her risk of hypothermia rose. The group tried to find a civilization. Kentaro insisted he saw a building in the distance. Lee wanted to continue to the bright light in the distance, which he thought could be a town or oil rig. Cate and May agreed with Lee's ideas. Ultimately, Kentaro left the group to find the building he saw by himself. Cate wasn't happy with his departure, but stayed with Lee and May. She tried to keep May awake and alert with hopeful messages of impending warmth. They were disheartened to end up back at Hiroshi's tent - having walked in circles. Lee wasn't surprised as a Titan can manipulate their environment. They sought shelter in the tent. Cate helped May warm up by the fire. May wanted Cate to call her sister Lyra if things didn't work out well for her. She believed that she wouldn't survive, and that Cate would have to leave her behind. She wanted Cate to leave Lee behind too, if the time came. One of them had to make it out alive. The fire attracted the Frost Vark and they narrowly escaped another attack. Armed with the knowledge that heat was its fuel, Lee decided to turn Du-Ho's corpse into a funeral pyre. His plan barely worked as the Titan attacked once again. Luckily, Kentaro had made it to an outpost and used a communications system to radio for help. Lee, Cate, and May narrowly escaped onto the helicopter. They landed and were stunned to arrive at a Monarch outpost - greeted by Tim.^[2]

May spent the night in a hospital bed in recovery from the injuries she's sustained in Alaska. Duvall visited May and offered her a symbiotic deal. Tim later escorted Cate, Kentaro, and May to the nearest airport with a plan to send them all home. May was ready to head back to Japan, though Cate reminded her they should stick together. She assumed May had a backup copy of Randa's files. She convinced May by telling her they need each other. The trio went to San Francisco to finish their search for Hiroshi. May met Cate's mom Caroline and tried to comfort Kentaro when Caroline had a breakdown over Hiroshi having another family. Cate convinced Caroline to drive them to the red zone where Hiroshi's office was. The journey through the wreckage of San Francisco proved fraught for Cate. She suffered flashbacks and PTSD. May and Kentaro did their best to support her as they hid from police, navigated rubble, avoided cats, and sang cheesy commercials. When Cate's panic attack in the tunnels made her mistake Kentaro for Hiroshi, the younger Randa went to find an escape route. May consoled Kate and helped her with breathing exercises. Cate felt she wasn't any better than her father because she let others down. May reminded Cate of all she did for her in Alaska. Kentaro ultimately found a way out. Once they reached Hiroshi's office, things seemed pointless until Kentaro figured out the wall map could only be completed with a projected image. He put a piece of paper, that he holed using a map file from May's tablet, on the window. It shined points on the wall map. They realized each point was the path Hiroshi took - San Francisco to Alaska to Africa. Once out of the red zone, May checked in on Kentaro and he was doing better for the first time since his dad disappeared. Kentaro left to call Emiko and May accepted Duvall's deal because she wanted to go home.^[6]

Lee and Duvall surprised the trio at Caroline's house with a warning of an impending emergence. Lee convinced Cate to let Duvall help them find Hiroshi, who could help. The group traveled to the Algerian desert where they connected with a group of ex-Monarch operatives who believe in Duvall and Lee's cause. On the drive there, May reminded Duvall that this wasn't part of their deal. Duvall than promised to get her home after they leave the desert. When Cate was reluctant to follow Duvall and Lee, May encouraged Cate, primarily off a look from Duvall. Cate, Kentaro, May, Lee, Duvall, and another operative followed Hiroshi's map to a ridge. Cate was thrilled to see her father and shouted to him with Kentaro and Lee. When Lee looked through the binoculars, he noticed Hiroshi wasn't waving back, but waving them away. Lee insisted they all run, but it was too late. A Monarch helicopter arrived with Tim inside. They planned to land until the ground shattered beneath them. A shrill roar ripped through the air as Kentaro, Lee, Cate, Duvall, and May tumbled down a cliff. Cate recognized the shrill sound - it was Godzilla. He knocked the helicopter out of the way. He then turned and marched away. Lee wanted to follow Godzilla while Cate wanted to follow her father. Lee refused to give her back the map. He wasn't trying to stop Godzilla like Cate thought, he wanted to help the Titan. Cate, Kentaro, and May left Duvall and Lee so they could pursue Hiroshi. On the way back to civilization, May revealed her secret alliance with Duvall and Monarch. She had led Monarch to them after Alaska because she wanted to go back to her real life, not the one she made up in Japan. She could get them wherever they wanted by using funds she hadn't accessed in years. Cate was furious with her betrayal and stormed away.^[7]

May was abducted in the bathroom of the airport and taken to Washington where she faced her past with Applied Experimental Technologies (AET). May, whose real name was Corah, had taken down the entire company when she left. She destroyed years of research that was worth millions of dollars. She had discovered her coding was being used for immoral animal testing. Brenda Holland, the leader of AET, was vengeful. May fled her old life to escape persecution and to save her family from harm. Brenda threatened to put May in jail and bankrupt her family. When Monarch deployed an early warning system for a Godzilla sighting, it spurred Brenda to realize it was a hoax and May knew something about monsters. Inspired, Brenda offered May a deal. She wouldn't press charges, May could go home, be rich, and have anything she wanted - if she fed Brenda information about monsters and Monarch. May refused the offer because she didn't want to betray her friends again. It was time for her to own up to her mistakes. Tim, Cate, and Kentaro burst inside AET as a rescue mission for May. She refused to go with them and accepted her fate with Brenda. This all changed when Monarch leader Natalia Verdugo made a call to Brenda. May was released and reunited with her friends. Cate and Kentaro had made a deal of their own with Verdugo to free May. They had to find a rouge Shaw and Duvall who were destroying rifts around the globe. May offered to join them, so Cate hugged her and accepted the offer. Before they left, May reunited with her family for the first time in years.^[1]

May, Cate, and Kentaro went to Monarch Headquarters where Tim debriefed them about the gamma ray spikes around the globe. They haven't seen spikes like that since G-Day. Shaw recently exploded a rift in Alaska which made the gamma rays drop to zero, though they spiked in a dozen different locations. The group they spent the day in Tim's office to sort through dozens of boxes for a clue on where Shaw was headed next. Cate found a file about where Keiko died on a field job. Because Shaw was sentimental, in love with Keiko, the gamma rays were high in that area, and it was on Hiroshi's map, the team headed of Kazakhstan with other Monarch operatives. They arrived at the power plant and Tim stepped on a creature. May examined the creature and determined it was a shell. When they reach the area where the reactor used to be, Tim identified the area as a portal, an entry point. Duvall and Shaw ambushed the team. Cate convinced Shaw to hear her out first. She failed to stop him and he detonated the charges around the plant. Everyone fled except May, who turned back to pursue Cate. She tripped over the debris and, hit her head, and fell through the portal.^[8]

May awakened in a different world and was found by Shaw. He helped her through the electricity storm. Shaw explained he had been in this world before on a recon mission. They're in the Titans' world now and part of their realm. May was worried about Cate and believed she died. Shaw revealed that Cate fell but he caught her, so she was in the realm with them. He asked her to trust her, though May only wanted to find Cate. As they searched, he explained how time moved differently in this world. He was only down there a few weeks, but it was twenty years in the real world. He hoped to find a way to get May home so what happened to him wouldn't happen to her.^[9]

They found Cate and were shocked to see her with Keiko Randa, who had survived in Axis Mundi for the last thirty years. The reunion and revelations was a lot for Keiko to handle. They survivors banded together and made it to Keiko's campsite, where Lee devised a plan to use the Gamma Radiation Simulator Keiko made to get them all home. They carried the simulator over the terrain. May wondered how much time had passed back home, while Cate questioned Keiko about Axis Mundi's resemblance to Earth. Keiko explained this phenomena because they weren't in the Titans' world entirely, but a place between their world and Earth. May wondered how light could get in if the were underground. Lee challenged her belief that they were underground or fell. They might have just entered. She remarked they were in the rabbit hole.

The foursome reached Lee's original crash site and he got to work on repairing the pod. Keiko wanted to stay behind because so much time had passed, though Cate convinced her otherwise. The group prepared for takeoff and used the simulator to power the pod and draw in a Titan from Earth. They were attacked by an Ion Dragon who sensed their signal from within Axis Mundi. The monster detached the cables from the simulator to the pod. Shaw exited the pod to make repairs just as Godzilla emerged from the rift. Godzilla defeated the Ion Dragon while Lee repaired the connections. The pod headed for the rift, drawn out by Godzilla's presence. Lee barely grabbed the pod in time. His awkward position was too much weight for the ship, so he pried his hand from Keiko's and fell. May pulled Keiko inside the pod and closed the lid. She held hands with Cate as the pod shakily entered the rift and took them home.^[10]

2017[]

The pod came through a rift on Skull Island outside an Apex Cybernetics research center. May and Cate were reunited with Kentaro, the latter of whom also reunited with her father. May watched as Hiroshi and Keiko met for the first time in over thirty years. Brenda Holland walked over to the group with Tim, which angered May as she accused Tim of working for Brenda now. Kentaro admitted a lot had changed in the past two years. May was shocked by the passage of time, but didn't have time to digest it before an alarm sounded. Everyone rushed into the center as King Kong stomped across the island to let out a monstrous roar.^[10]

List of appearances[]

Television[]

• Monarch: Legacy of Monsters
  • "Aftermath" (First appearance)
  • "Departure"
  • "Secrets and Lies"
  • "Parallels and Interiors"
  • "The Way Out"
  • "Terrifying Miracles"
  • "Will the Real May Please Stand Up?"
  • "Birthright"
  • "Axis Mundi"
  • "Beyond Logic"

References[]