'Monarch' Reviews From Critics Are In, and They Aren't Too Great

By Michael Hein

Monarch premiered on Fox this month, and while it has been a ratings success so far, the reviews have not been stellar. The new series has some all-star talent behind it and an intriguing premise as well, but that doesn't seem to be enough to impress critics. At the time of this writing, the show has a 33 percent positive score on Rotten Tomatoes.

Monarch is a musical drama about a country music family, starring Susan Sarandon as the matriarch Dottie Cantrell. It was created by Melissa London Hilfers and it also stars Trace Adkins, Beth Ditto, Anna Friel, Martha Higareda, Emma Milani, Iñigo Pascual and Joshua Sasse. The show premiered on Sunday, Sept. 11 but will continue on Tuesday nights starting this week. It drew just over 4 million viewers on its first night, and the critics do not make a second episode sound too promising.

So far, Monarch has received only 12 ratings from critics trusted by Rotten Tomatoes. That's not a lot for a broadcast series from a major network, so there's always time for this to change. There are no audience reviews logged for the show so far. Scroll down to see the highlights from the series' negative reviews.

Soapy

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(Photo: Fox)

Heather Hogan's review for Autostraddle accused Monarch of being more like a soap opera than a prestige drama. Hogan believes that may work out for the series in the long run, but in the premiere, it seemed a bit incongruous with the limited promotion we have seen for the show so far.

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Casting Questions

In a review for Pajiba, Dustin Rowles raised the question many critics seem confused by – why is Sarandon involved in this series? Without her name in the credits, many non-country music fans likely wouldn't even consider giving this series a shot. At the same time, Sarandon's recent political activism makes the country music association a bit surprising.

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Similar Shows

Monarch brought to mind some other TV shows for writer Rob Owen of Trib Live, but unfortunately, they were all short-lived flops. He compared the show to Filthy Rich, but seemed to have hope that it would last a bit longer once it found its footing.

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Too Much to Prove

Variety's Daniel D'Addario felt that Monarch tried to cram too much into its pilot. He argued that the show was trying too hard to prove what it was and what it wasn't rather than trusting the audience to keep up.

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Predictable

Matt Roush of TV Insider summed up the critiques of many other writers by pointing out how predictable Monarch is. He argued that the series can't live up to its own hype because its plot is full of contrivances and it simply doesn't compare to the drama and suspense of the shows it's trying to emulate.

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Cliche

While the show seems to want to cater to the existing country music fan base, CNN's Brian Lowry felt that it does those fans a disservice by boiling their subculture down to a few stereotypes.

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Production Questions

Finally, Decider's Joel Keller points out that Monarch was originally scheduled to premiere in January of 2022, but was pulled at the last moment. Keller wonders if the delay indicates some hasty changes that may explain the show's hectic quality.

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