I was delighted when I found out that the Alien franchise was going to get a series. Not just a series, but a prequel to the original film from 1979 I believe it was, that made the world scream in terror at the presence of a truly terrifying other-world invader parasite.
The brilliance of the original film was that it was, well, completely original in many ways. I think that it is always tough to build on a beloved older film because obviously, our film-making technology has advanced just a tad since the original film was made in the late 70's
For the most part I think they do a damn good job of not surpassing the technology that is originally introduced in the original film, but at the same time there are some thing that happen in Alien Earth that are dangerously close to making the original film not make sense in the context of the timeline. This is something that is always dangerous with prequels and I suspect that the people making this series are not really all that concerned with ruining the timeline. I mean why would they? Entertainment these days seems to be rather dead-set on ruining the legacy of a lot of the classics.
Anyway, lets get on with my rant about why I am not hopeful about this series outside of a pure entertainment point of view filled with visual spectacles.
Mild spoilers ahead, be warned!
If you have never seen the original film or even the second one, Aliens which I think is the best one of all of them, what I am about to say might not be all that meaningful to you but I'll basically point out something that is very important: The human species in both of those films are completely unfamiliar with the Xenomorphs. They know NOTHING about them. In the first film nobody knows anything at all about them and that is what makes combating them so damn difficult. This becomes even more evident in the 2nd one where only one person in the crew, Ripley (Sigourney Weaver) has any idea what to expect from this new species and even her knowledge is extremely limited.
In Alien Earth, we are first thrust into the story aboard the USCSS Maginot , where the crew has been on a 65 year mission to specifically retrieve alien specimens and one of them is the famous "face-huggers" that create Xenomorphs inside of human bodies.
on board this research vessel, they have many samples of face-huggers as well as other extra-terrestrial species and they (the crew) already seem to have a pretty good knowledge of how they function and what makes them dangerous. They are not researching on them (or so it appears) on the ship itself and this doesn't make sense for a lot of reasons especially since we are told repeatedly in all the Alien films that a return to earth with any other-worldly items or species would be completely forbidden. Not only do they seem to be heading towards Earth to drop off these species with zero issues with customs, but they also seem blissfully unconcerned about the danger of doing so. They also communicate with Earth command on a regular basis before things go horribly awry as we always knew that it would.
This single thing, in episode one of this series, completely negates all the shock and awe horror that happens in the first two films that are set years AFTER this research vessel has collected the species.
As the episode goes on, the juvenile alien has grown up to a full fledged Xenomorph killing machine which is completely normal based on what we know from all the films including the first one since it has been well-established they "grow up" very rapidly. But since a lot of people witness this it would have made humanity very aware of the existence of the species, and how dangerous it is and again, negating everything that happens in the already existing films other than Prometheus.
I like the way that this is done. It is shown that the humans are sitting ducks like we would expect them to be in a contained environment like a spacecraft and I feel as though it is well-executed. The secret plot to get the specimen to earth is nothing new as that is the plan in most of the other films as well, but the problem I have with all of this is that it takes place BEFORE the timeline that shows humanity ever having contact with the Xenomorphs.
If they had simply not put it in the timeline before the original film, I would have no issue with it, but by putting it where they did in the timeline, they essentially destroy the entire timeline. There's a word for this, it is called "retconned" and it stands for "retroactive continuity"
a literary device in fictional story telling whereby facts and events established through the narrative itself are adjusted, ignored, supplemented, or contradicted by a subsequently published work that recontextualizes or breaks continuity with the former.
that nerdy enough for you? Well it makes me angry but well, this is Disney we are dealing with here (Disney owns Hulu and therefore FX) and if Disney has shown us anything over the past decade, they don't AF in the slightest sense about what they destroy with the things they produce.
We are presented on screen with an interesting story that could go on for a while about a corporate war that has 3 types of non-human but human looking entities: Cyborgs (altered humans), Synthetics (nonhuman AI entities), and Synths that have human consciousness downloaded into them.
This is actually something I am very interested in but yet again, it breaks the timeline of the original film since this tech was in relative infancy in the original film.
I do like the story, which appears to the the main focal point up to now about the Hybrids.
let me see if i can out-nerd you here with why it is that while I like the hybrids, I have a problem with them: They are too OP. Unlike the synths that we have seen in prior films, the hybrids are immensely strong and seemingly immune to damage. This is shown early on when "Wendy" jumps something crazy like 100 meters off of a cliff face and then lands with zero fall damage. Again, this is all fine and dandy but not when you place it a few years before the original Alien film where synthetics don't have any major advantages over humans other than not feeling pain.
We are being set up for an Alien vs Predator sort of situation but honestly, based on what we have seen so far of the hybrids, and what we already know about the Xenomorphs, the Xenomorphs wouldn't stand a chance against these things but I would imagine that Disney is planning on retconning that as well.
You will find out when you watch this (and I think you should) that there is definitely a Peter Pan sort of theme going on here and hence, the name of one of the main characters being "Wendy." However, we are shown clips from the actual Peter Pan animated feature somewhat regularly as well as Ice Age for some reason. Now don't get me wrong, I like both of these things but I have a difficult time believing that they would be culturally relevant in the year 2120, especially Ice Age whose association with what is going on with the film hasn't yet been established.
tl;dr
This series is in fact, good. It is a visual spectacle and has a lot going on in the story that is very interesting. The problem is that instead of making it its own thing taking place many years after events we have already seen in the original films, they instead plop it in front of the original Alien film in the timeline. This reason alone is something that just makes me really irritated since as you will see, putting them into the timeline completely negates all events that took place in all of the films. They didn't have to do this, so why did they? Is Disney just trying to destroy franchise timelines?
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good poster, I like it
Despite my obvious nerdy gripes above, I still think you should watch this. Just know that if you are a fan of the films and prefer that timelines remain intact and respected, that you are going to get a bit annoyed at what happens.
If you wish to disagree with me or out-nerd me, I encourage you to do so. Educate me on why I am wrong
You can legally watch this show on Disney+, Hulu, and FX.