Description

Alien: Earth is an American science fiction horror television series created by Noah Hawley. It is the first television series in the Alien franchise and is set two years before the events of the 1979 film Alien. The series stars Sydney Chandler, Alex Lawther, Essie Davis, Samuel Blenkin, Babou Ceesay, Adarsh Gourav, and Timothy Olyphant in main roles.

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  Hello everyone and welcome to the concession stand here on a KB radio network. I am your host Kevin Reed and this is the review of FX Hulu's new science fiction horror show alien earth season one at least i hope it's season one they have not officially greenlit a second season which spoiler alert i hope they do because i really really enjoyed alien earth uh first and foremost i am a huge alien fan you know going all the way back to Wrigley Scott's alien and then when uh james cameron took over and did aliens i was i was all in i didn't care after that you know all the other movies in the franchise you know hit or miss mostly hit for me even the bad ones you know even the alien uh versus predator movies i can find in a certain level of enjoyment in those movies but i really really uh love this franchise and it kind of got a shot in the arm last year for me in one of my favorite movies from 2024 alien romulus and it was a return to form in my humble opinion to this franchise and when they announced that they were going to do a tv show i was a little skeptical I was a little skeptical because, okay, how can you put this in a television episodic format? You know, with crews on a spaceship or wherever they may be running from a xenomorph. You know, how are we going to do this for 8, 9, 10 episodes or whatever they were going to do? And I was kind of curious. and then they announced that Noah Hartley was spearheading this thing and i'm like okay okay i feel a little a little ease now because i i i like fargo love fargo um not all the seasons you know there's a couple of week seasons in fargo but for the most part i i really enjoyed it i enjoyed legion that came out a few years back which was uh kind of a x-men offshoot Even though it's based in the X-Men universe, it wasn't a part of any, you know, cinematic canon. But I did like Legion. And I felt good for some strange reason. I felt a sense of comfort when Noah was attached as the showrunner, as the writer of this show. And the fact that it's on FX, which isn't going to skip on the gore or the language or the violence. oh okay i'm not i'm in i'm in uh you know previously uh i did review the first two episodes that came out when it premiered on august the 12th and i chose not to go week to week with this show i wanted to uh wait to the end and do an overall season review i kind of regret that And I tend to do that every single time. I decide to wait. And it don't be because every episode be bang, bang, bang, bang. Even though every episode of this season had its plus. It has pluses that I could have discussed every week. To be honest with you, in the spirit of transparency here, it really came down to Alien Earth or Peacemaker. I decided which one I'm gonna do every week because I couldn't do both. I just couldn't, I could not bring myself to do both every week. Even though the episodes didn't drop on the same day of the week, I just couldn't do it. You know, it was too much for poor old Kevin's head. So I flipped the coin and it fell on Peacemaker. If you follow the show, thank you by the way. I do do Peacemaker reviews for every episode. uh it that when it drops so i i chose that way i i don't i'm not mad at that but i i should have toughed it out it did every episode of alien earth because like i said i enjoyed this show so much uh until i didn't and i'll get to that when i get to that i'm not going to break down every episode i'm just going to go over parts that i enjoyed and things that i didn't enjoy there were some things that i didn't enjoy about the show but uh i can't tell you this i enjoyed a lot more than i didn't enjoy so it's it's a really really good show let's start off first and foremost uh alien earth this picks up on earth you know if you go through duh if you go through all of the alien movies and we've been through a million and one of them the xenomorphs have never been on earth and now i know there's going to be somebody in the comments somebody uh screaming at their phone or television and say that uh uh stupid they had an alien versus predator uh predator requiem they were on earth I'm not counting those movies. If you want to count those movies, that's fine. Alien vs. Predator movies, I am not counting in the lore of Alien movies. Those were Elseworld type deals. I don't even... No. No. I can't. I can't do it. I just cannot count it. I know I mentioned that I enjoy these movies, even those to a degree, but that doesn't mean that I'm going to include them. in my in my uh alien cannon but anyways as far as an alien proper property we've never had an alien on earth and so that that was the selling point for me i mean the the nail in the coffin we was going to be on earth and so how did it get on earth well this show picks up where a spaceship crash lands on earth and then we have this young hybrid woman and a group of tactical soldiers they make a discovery that puts them face to face with the planet's biggest threat and that is an alien and I'm going to stress that an alien that's a big threat to planet earth this show had so many surprises so many unforeseen developments that took place now this takes this movie takes but movie this show takes place two years before the events of the first film in 1979 alien and so this is before this is a prequel if you will and so you have this ship crash landing on earth it it has and it has a xenomorph morph but even more so they have other different species of aliens now i didn't really play them no mind first and foremost going into the show because my focus is on the xenomorphs you know that's what i've been uh for 45 years or 46 years that's what we've been centered on in this franchise it's the xenomorph the crazy thing about this show that really blew my mind when i sat back and thought about it was the fact that the the least threatening thing on this show was a xenomorph that was the least threatening thing on this entire show and i mean i'm including humans it was we're talking uh uh you had cyborgs you had uh synthetics you had hybrids you had other species of aliens and then you had Whacked Out. billionaire uh human beings it was just a hodgepodge of villainy and so you have all that and the xenomorph is the least of your concerns on this show and that's a plus i'm not saying that as a knock that's a knock in no way shape form or fashion everything else was frightening to me especially the billionaires because that's that's real All the other stuff is science fiction. The billionaires freak me out because they are literally walking around as we speak or being driven around. And so you have that in the show. But what really intrigued me the most about this show were these actors who I know nothing about. Besides Timothy Orphan, I knew nobody else on this show. And I was like, okay, let's go for a ride because I don't know much about these actors here. Now, Sydney Chandler, who is the lead here, she plays Wendy, this hybrid. I don't know her or didn't know her, but I knew her dad. Not personally, but I think everybody knows her dad, Kyle Chandler, an awesome actor. awesome actor probably one of the one of the most underrated actors in hollywood I absolutely love Kyle Chandler. I will watch him in anything. He's a part of Lanterns, a part of DC. That's coming up. He's going to be playing Hal Jordan in Lanterns, and that's exciting to me. But anywho, his daughter here is the lead. And the first thing that probably pops into everybody's mind is nepotism. She's a nepo baby. No, she can act. She... acted she carried this show and that's that's that's one of the gems of this franchise that's what makes this franchise and i'm talking about the alien franchise such a powerful franchise for 46 years female leads and this is in a genre where you don't have that To be honest with you, you don't have that in any genre. You know, sadly, not too many of them. And especially something that lasts this long. In a franchise that is just centered around the strong woman. You know, not a damsel in distress. Sigourney Reaver is a pioneer in that. Or one of the pioneers in that. You know, her character of Ripley is... still celebrated as one of the greatest action heroes of all time. Not one of the greatest female action heroes. No, one of the greatest action heroes of all time and is rightfully deserved. But, you know, it has carried on. You know, after Sigourney Reaver stopped being a part of the franchise, you had Nobe Rapace and Prometheus. You had Katherine Waterston. in Alien Covenant, you know, and most recently you had Kelly Spadey in Alien Romulus. So it always had a strong female lead in those films, and the show did the same thing. This show manages to squeeze in one here, even though she isn't a human character, or a fully human character, but a strong female nonetheless. Her compadres, her fellow hybrids, the Lost Boys, if you will. One in particular, Jonathan Ajayi, who plays me, is awesome. Now, what makes the Lost Boys so significant to me, and why, as far as the actors or the characters that I really followed and enjoy on this show the most, They are kids, you know, and they have the personality of kids because their consciousness was trans, uh, uh, not transformed, but, uh, transported into these synthetic bodies or whatever. And they still kept their consciousness. They're still kids. And, you know, the only one that really grew up was Wendy was, was, uh, uh. sydney uh chandler and the rest of them acted like kids now most of them matured up you know through the circumstances of the story that was being told except for smith he he kept the kid vibe throughout the entire show and it was like watching a little kid i forgot that was a grown man he was that good Now, is it difficult to play a kid? I don't think. I don't know. I'm not an actor. I'm not, you know, I'll go as far to say I can't act. But he really, he nailed it. I was super impressed. But I was impressed with them all and their progression through these eight episodes, you know, where they started off and where they ended were completely different for most of these characters. And we got to see them grow. as the show went on and the show took its time with it but didn't linger you know it did a good job of pacing through that story because there was so much going on in this season but i enjoyed all of those kids in this kids lord all all of these actors in this episode another actor who my god just blew my mind can't wait to see him in whatever else he's in Uh, I hope I don't butcher his name. Uh, Baiju, Baiju Cisse, he played Monroe, Monroe. who was a cyborg he had uh you know synthetic parts put in his body you know he had a uh sword for a hand or whatever i don't know what he is all type of stuff he could do but he was he was so menacing as the antagonist of this show and by the end by the end this in in spite of all the stuff that he did throughout the season you still kind of roll with him you know you kind of on his side to a degree especially you know his backstory they did a good job of uh flushing out his backstory what type of person he was before he was on the ship for those 65 years and the fact that he lost his daughter and all this other stuff he has a tragic backstory and the things that he did on that ship before it crashed it initially you'd think that he was just this evil individual but not really you know not not necessarily so it you can't you understand his character don't make it don't excuse the stuff that he did but um you get it uh timothy alder fan. I mean, what else could I say? He plays kush. or kush or however you pronounce it as this synthetic being man i love timothy all it he needs to be protected at all costs man that dude is phenomenal i love and this was the perfect role for timothy all the fat didn't think it didn't you know i was just happy he was in the show you know because i love him and everything he's in i think he's uh phenomenal but Sitting down watching him portray this character was like, man, you was born for this. You was absolutely born for this role. This was his tour de force, if you will. It is not the biggest role on God's green earth, but it is phenomenal in my eye. I actually enjoyed his subtlety. And you know, when you watch Timothy Orlefan, have you seen his past work? Which I'm pretty sure you have. He's been in almost everything. thing but uh he has this style you know his the way he speaks his speech pattern and the way he moves the way he uh you know emotes it it just fits a synthetic it was like he was literally bred for this role i loved him loved it loved it uh i'll be remissed without mention mentioning my favorite episode of this season. And it's... think everybody can agree if you watched the entire show uh it has to be episode five in space no one that's the title of it and that was a that was pretty much a mini movie that that episode and that was an alien movie it felt like a not a shot by shot remake of the 1979 film but it felt like the 1979 film everything from when the crew comes out of cryo sleep to the crew uh eating around the table uh the the aliens getting loose and the insanity that takes place around you know on the ship it just felt like the alien movie and they just threw it in the middle of this season like here you go here you go just just a little change of pace if you will and man what an episode this was the episode after it ended that i sat back and said i messed up i should have did a week-to-week review of this season because i wanted to talk about that uh episode so bad but uh it wouldn't have been fair to the other four episodes or two episodes um prior to this but this was phenomenal phenomenal television um yeah it's i mean it's hands down hands down best episode of the season but that doesn't mean that the other episodes were horrible because every other episode had a singular goal it's like it's like art You can take each episode and hang it on a wall, you know, and it will be just beautiful, you know, you know, but if you put them all together is just a great collection of art. And this is what this season was to me. Going back to the threats of this season of this show, like I said, the xenomorph was the least threatening thing and it is a deadly. perfect killing machine and it was the least that deadliest thing on this show it was the other ones it was the other alien uh species that struck fear in me namely the eyeball thing that eyeball thing kept me up for at least two nights because it is so free it was it was the freakiest looking thing and the most I guess you could say highly intelligent being that you can ever think of, you know? And there's more to come, hopefully, if we get a season two, which I don't understand why they haven't greenlit that yet. But, anywho, it is frightening what that thing can do. Crawl into your eye, pop out your eye, and then take its place and control you. Oh, man. oh man that is freaky that thing is deadly in in hyper intelligent hyper intelligent it is not about survival for him it was displayed i think in episode six when he set up uh uh one of the one of the lost boys the one that went in to feed the species or the specimens and it trapped them they found a way to trap them so another Alien species can kill him not so he could kill him just so that thing can kill him just for the joy of it Just so he could watch it was is it was so disturbed It was so disturbing man, but uh, yeah, the other species were was More frightening to me than the xenomorph probably, you know at this point you kind of desensitized to the xenomorph, but No, no the other things are all whacked out crazy um let me get to my negatives my negatives of this show well and there's only a couple oh man a few um my negatives well first and foremost since it's the uh clear and present i didn't like the ending i did not like the ending of this season i know it's a cliffhanger you know and that's all fine and good who doesn't love a good cliffhanger but uh the cliffhanger when you start thinking about canon in the alien franchise i don't see how this can work you know if we're going to continue on with this how is this gonna kind of coincide with what took place in the original alien film because this is like i said only two years before those events and that crew didn't know anything about an alien you know they didn't know anything about the xenomorph especially it being on earth so it's it's kind of it's kind of weird how they left off now if you get a season two pretty sure they're going to explain it away and my my worries will be vanquished but as it stands right now i'm kind of like i just i don't see how this is going to play out you know chronologically in the timeline of this story but It is what it is. My second thing is the relationship between Wendy and the Xenomorph. Number one, I don't understand it. You know, just to be completely honest, I'm not that smart. I don't know how they got this connection and how she can communicate with it. Now, it's cool that she has superpowers. That she's able to control... technology and control you know all the devices and stuff around that compound but the xenomorph you know the only thing that they have a quote unquote connection with is the fact that the one alien that damaged her in that battle I think in episode 3 or 4 one of them and Okay, but that it wasn't like it left an egg in her or something, you know in that particular Xenomorph had no connection with her, you know, they took that it they took that I guess sperm from it and put it in the lung of Her brother even though you know the detached lung of her brother And so I don't know how now if they if it would have had a connection with the brother I probably would understood But he's just a human. He's just normal. Her didn't make sense to me. It just didn't make sense. I rolled with it. I accepted it for what it was. Didn't mean that I liked it. You know, I didn't too much care for it, but mainly because it makes no sense. It's kind of like out of left field. Once again, we get a season two. All of this can be explained and all of my worries will be cast away. But as it stands right now, no, it is. Is not. Is not. Um, my other, my other negative, as much as I enjoyed this entire class, class, Jesus, we're not in school, this entire cast, uh, there's one, and I hate to do this because there's only one, there's only one actor that I did not enjoy in this show, and that was, uh, uh, Alex Lalter, who plays Joe, the brother of Wendy. And I didn't I just didn't care for his performance. He was so bland He was he was so bland Now there was one episode where I liked him and that's it It was and it wasn't even the whole episode. It was like a scene or two where I enjoyed him But I didn't he just he looked disinterested. He looked like he didn't even want to be a part of the show it I don't know if that's the character. I don't know if that's how that character was written. I should say or that's just him That's his personality. He doesn't really vote because there was no emotion. I felt no emotion from it It was like he was just there and he was he stayed around You know the entire show it was just weird to me. I did that enjoy that character I'm not gonna blame the actor. I just didn't enjoy that character the way it was written. But other than that, other than that, those few little things, I deeply enjoyed Alien Earth. I think it is probably the best version of an alien TV show you can make. I don't know how you can make an alien TV show any better than this. You know, yeah, I had my gripes, but... When you really think about it, how else would you make an alien show? There's no other way. This was perfectly made, I think. You know, in this franchise, the rules that have been set within this franchise, it followed it to a T. We didn't deviate from nothing. We didn't change any lore, at least not yet. You know, everything seems to be on track. as far as what we know of this franchise you know and so it's it's a good addition to the alien ip i believe and i give alien earth all eight episodes a letter grade of a b yeah i really enjoyed it man. I think it's an outline for other IP properties that can be made into television shows you know these movies that we love these franchise films that they just throw out there maybe sometimes it's best that we transition to television it's not it's not the end of the world you can make a tv show out of these properties out of these science fiction film these horror films the action franchises and stuff like that you can make tv shows you know that's faithful to the source. material, yet tell a deeper story, a drawn-out story where you can get more character development and things of that nature, yeah, this is an outlier. I think this can really change the game. It's really that good. I really, really enjoyed it. I was like, oh, oh, oh, real quick, I should have mentioned this first. D. The Peter Pan reference. Now, when you get this in the first episode, you're kind of like, okay, so this is the template. This is what we're going to kind of base the show on with the Peter Pan references, the Lost Boy references, and all this other stuff. Even naming them after the Lost Boys, some of those kids, all of those kids. even have a captain hook you know with with the character of monroe but as the as the show went on those characters flipped you know uh the captain hook and the boy cavalier they kind of flipped and even with wendy the whole basics of uh the peter pan lore or the books was that wendy grew up you know and that's what happened on the show wendy grew up and so it it I love that they used that. Didn't understand the Ice Age references, but I'm pretty sure somebody smarter than me can figure it out. But anywho, I would like to know, what did you think of Alien Earth? Did you like it? Did you hate it? Did you not even check it out? I would love to know your thoughts. If you did, though, email the show, kbradiopodcasts at gmail.com. You can also search for the show on all social media platforms. Just search for the KB Radio Network. Also, don't forget about the five stars, the reviews, and sharing this show if you're listening on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, iHeartRadio, wherever. You are currently listening to The Concession Stand here on the KB Radio Network. Everybody, thank you for joining me for this review of Season 1, Alien Earth. I want you all to know that I love you. Continue to love everyone. And until we speak again, you all be blessed.