Well, it felt inevitable: Alien: Earth is a complete series on Hulu now, and since my household is fairly obsessed with the Alien franchise as a whole (I used to be able to claim the honor of being the Alien aficionado around here, but my son has since usurped that role from me) it is only logical I include this in the 31 Days of Horror reviews.
So right off the bat, Alien: Earth is one of the more successful miniseries on streaming in 2025 so odds are if you are at all interested in this universe then you've already seen it. My understanding is that even non fans of the movies will probably enjoy this, since the story of the eight episode series is a fairly self-contained tale; the ubiquitous alien is introduced in a manner which does not require having seen 7 other movies, and focuses on topics which expand the setting of the movies in directions that are hard to explore in a two hour movie format.
Alien: Earth does something that I am always pleasantly surprised about: it uses its time on screen wisely, and it feels like every minute on screen counts toward the motion of the story, characters and plot such that it does not feel like there's very much filler at all, a common problem with a lot of television series. In fact there is so much going on in the eight episodes of the show that there is no pat resolution to many story elements; it doesn't so much end on a cliffhanger as a "and this will definitely be continued, either on screen or off" sense. I don't know if they've announced a 2nd season yet, but my understanding is the creators already have a script ready.
So what is it about? The plot is divided between two themes, with one plot literally crashing in to the other. The first story focuses on the corporation Prodigy, revealed as one of five megascorporations, and a rival of Weyland-Yutani, which have divvied up control of Earth after what is suggested to have been a very tumultuous period of conflict. Prodigy's territories include two locations of importance: the masive arcology of New Seoul, and Pacific Rim isle nick-named Neverland where research and development is working under Prodigy's mastermind, "The Boy Cavalier," a supremely obsessive fellow with lots of weird quirks, including a tendency to go barefoot everywhere, along with a deep obsession with Peter Pan. He is clearly a cypher for our own modern Megacorps and their eccentric and often out-of-touch leadership.
The story starts on Neverland, where Prodigy is attempting to create hybrids, the term to describe human minds uploaded to imprint perfectly into synthetic minds and bodies. They gain the consent of children who are suffering from debilitating and fatal diseases from which they would otherwise never recover, and the experiment is going along quite well, with a handful of children whose minds have suddenly been uploaded into powerful adult synthetic bodies. The five are given new names from Peter Pan, and our lead character is Wendy, who seems to be especially quick to adjust to her new capabilities. She is also obsessed with her older brother from her former life, who works in New Seoul (Prodigy City) as an emergency medtech with the civil defense force.
Throughout the series, the focus on the synthetic hybrids is one of questioning whether this is experiment is working as intended. Similarly to the themes in Alien: Romulus, where the Weyland-Yutani researchers harvest the plagarius praepotens* to engineer genetically modified humans who can survive in space (with at best dubious results, per that movie), Prodigy instead is looking at using synthetic bodies to give the minds of humanity immortality and enhancement. But...is the mind of a person uploaded in this manner really the same person? They use children because the minds of the young are still pliable and capable of being uploaded with better success rates (mostly)...or is that just part of the Boy Cavalier's Peter Pan obsession? What happens when the hybrids realise that they really aren't human, or even perhaps sympathetic to humanity? Or even their old selves anymore? The show tackles and plays with these concepts with fascinating success, making it distinctly interesting science fiction in that regard.
But this is an Alien series, so the other plot kicks off quickly, when a massive deep space exploration craft arrives in orbit and crash-lands in the heart of New Seoul. The massive ship has suffered a critical failure but survives the journey, at least in part due to the sole surviving crewman Morrow, who introduces cyborgs into the setting. Morrow's cybernetics are old; the ship departed on its journey 65 years earlier, and his cybernetics ad thematically in the style of the technology used for synthetic androids in the Alien universe. One also gets a sense that Morrow's basic humanity is a bit eroded (a nod to the cyberpunk genre's concept of cyber-psychosis, maybe) though later on as more of his backstory on the ship is revealed I think a lot of his attitude is completely understandable.
The ship is full of specimens. It was a Weyland-Yutani venture into space, set out long ago when presumably far fewer alien worlds had been visited, to find and return with living specimens of use to the corporation. The failure at its very end, and its crash into Prodigy City/New Seoul is part of the mystery, as well as whether or not the civil defense force can react to the catastrophic results of the crash and eventually figure out a means of containment. The story of the hybrids coincides with this tale when Wendy's brother is identified as being on site, and she convinces her creators to let the hybrid team participate in rescue and recovery operations. Headed by their synthetic handler Kirsh (who is himself weaved into the story as an example of a very old synthetic model), the hybrid teams discovers the real purpose of the ship, and also that five of the specimens on the vessel are, in fact, extremely deadly predators....of which our franchise star xenomorph is but one!
I could write a long time about this show, but advise instead it is better to go watch it for yourself. I will make a few side comments however: one is that there is some debate on whether the show is canonically in alignment with the movies. Some clues sort of suggest no, based on bits and pieces shown suggesting Weyland-Yutani had merged as a corporation before the Prometheus ever set off. The show creators admitted that they didn't pay too much attention to the movies taking place prior to the time period of the show (2120, 2 years before the original movie, and some years after Prometheus and Alien: Covenant), so if you were not a fan of those two prequels then this may not bug you at all. For my take, the Alien franchise as a whole has only been loosely consistent with a lot of these little details, so such inconsistencies (if they really are inconsistent) do not bother me; somewhere someone is writing an official novel or game module that reconciles such discrepancies, I am sure.
Anyway, stop reading about it and go check it out! Solid A+ and my most satisfying watch of the year so far (admittedly from someone who just does not usually get into streaming TV much).
*A name which, if you immediately know what it is, marks you as a true dedicate (or maybe you just payed close attention to Rook's rambling commentary in Alien: Romulus)
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