Noah Hawley, as a writer and director has developed a reputation, for taking a popular film and making a TV version of them Successfully adapting the Coen Brothers classic Fargo, which ran for five series. So you can understand Disney, when they wanted to create an Alien series, would make him their first port of call. Since the first Alien film the sequels/prequels have been very patchy affairs, that even Ridley Scott has not always pulled off successfully. An Alien series might then prove to be a tricky beast to manage. It has to an extent to pay homage to its predecessors, to some, but not all, the elements of the story lineage. But simply making it about a xenomorph that runs havoc in a situation, would run out of steam pretty quickly. A series brings an opportunity to really open out the franchise, give it fresh air and impetus. With an intriguing new story arc, with a breadth, depth of character development and themes, that a two hour movie really cannot achieve. Oh, and it also has to please, and not greatly upset, the die hard fans. So, no pressure.
When you watch Alien Earth, you realise just how clever Hawley has been in its placement within the frequently wandering infidelity of the Alien storyline. Setting it in a period two years before the first movie. So it can absorb all the period details of sets etc and the not fully fleshed out nature Wayland -Yutani and those troublesome synthetics. Earth, is now effectively run by a small number of high tech companies. Of which Wayland-Yutani is a major player, another one is Prodigy
Prodigy, founded by Boy Cavalier (Samuel Blenkin),, has pioneered a new form of synthetic human that has the consciousness of a prepubescent child downloaded into it. Boy Cavalier is a self confessed genius, an eternally youthful Peter Pan to his synthetic creations -Wendy ( Sydney Chandler) & the Lost Boys & Girls. Always hoping to meet someone else as clever as himself, so he can at last have a decent conversation. His narcissistic self conceit makes him a poor judge of the morality of what he does, seeing himself as somewhat above such considerations.
A Wayland-Yutani ship crash lands back on Earth. Colliding into a skyscraper owned by Prodigy. In charge of the ship is Morrow, a human- augmented cyborg. It contains a long voyage's collection of alien species, of which our beloved xenomorph is only one. As this bizarre range of aliens escape, we learn what each of their special predilections are. Boy Cavalier decides to send his new synthetic creations into the crashed ship, as a sort of road test for how they will cope in real live situations. And so the scene is set for the rest of the series.
Alien Earth brilliantly explores the contentious issue of what makes anything human. Morrow (Babou Cessay) is an augmented cyborg, Kirsh (Timothy Olyphant) is a full synth, Wendy, throughout the drama is compelled by her encounters with the world, to dwell on what exactly she is. Her makers treat her like a slave that they own, Yet she can outthink and outperform any human, she is almost indestructible. Is she better or worse off for thinking herself human or synthetic? And all the synthetic and semi-synthetic creations exhibit differing responses to that question. Kirsh observes the synth/human hybrids with some curiosity. He is analogous to the synthetics in the first Alien film, a coolly dispassionate creation who has his job to perform, and does so with a certain logical efficiency. We are also led to consider what sort of level of intelligence do some of these alien species have.
Alien Earth employed all the tension and unexpected twists one might expect, and a great deal more. With thoughtfulness given to its narrative engagement, purpose and structure, than the film's now cliched format. Disney, with Alien Earth and Andor has produced not just two of the best reinventions of science fiction classics, but the two best dramas of 2025. They're on a bit of a successful roll at the moment, long may it continue.
CARROT REVIEW - 7/8
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