Development began in 2012 as Monster Problems; the project lingered for several years until October 2018 when O'Brien and then Matthews joined the film.

The film received generally positive reviews from critics and was nominated for Best Visual Effects at the 93rd Academy Awards.

[5] The destruction of an asteroid headed for Earth releases fallout, causing cold-blooded animals to mutate into large monsters and kill off most of humanity.

During the evacuation of Fairfield, Joel Dawson is separated from his girlfriend Aimee but promises to find her, shortly before his parents are killed by monsters.

Seven years later, Joel lives in one of underground bunker, where all other survivors have paired up romantically while fighting monsters and seeking supplies.

After a giant ant breaches his colony, killing one of the survivors, Joel decides to set off on a quest to reunite with Aimee, so that he doesn't end up alone.

Joel falls into a nest of worm-monsters called "Sand-Gobblers", when two survivors, Clyde Dutton and Minnow, rescue him.

He is introduced to the survivors, as well as Brooks "Cap" Wilkinson, a ship captain, and his crew, who had all recently arrived on a large yacht.

Cap reveals that his group is going to raid the colony, and that their yacht is towed by a crab-monster controlled with an electrified chain.

Cap sets the crab to feed on the colonists, but Joel and Aimee escape and are able to fight for their lives, and Boy returns to help.

In June 2012, it was announced that Paramount Pictures was developing the film Monster Problems, with Shawn Levy producing, based on a spec script by Brian Duffield.

It was described as a post-apocalyptic road movie in the vein of Mad Max and Zombieland with a John Hughes-esque love story.

The website's consensus reads: "Led by a charming star turn from Dylan O'Brien, Love and Monsters peers into the apocalypse and finds an action-adventure with surprising emotional depth.

"[26] Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 63 out of 100, based on 14 critics, indicating "generally favorable" reviews.

[27] Jessica Kiang of Variety called it: "A fun if forgettable family-friendly adventure comedy set in a 'monsterpocalypse'" and a "silly but satisfying hero's journey entirely unencumbered by importance."

"[29] Indiewire's David Ehrlich wrote: "Love and Monsters is the rarest kind of movie these days: A fun, imaginative, genre-mashing adventure that was made with a modest amount of big studio money.