One of the best parts of owning your own horror publication is that you can call an audible when there's a horror title you really want to talk about. So with three episodes of Alien: Earth now available to stream, Matthew Monagle and Matt Donato sit down for their first discussion about a horror television show. We've already talked about Alien: Romulus in a previous episode; will the new series be a hit with the Alien super fan and the Alien appreciator? Let's find out together.
The year is 2120, and mankind has finally conquered death. At least, that’s the hope of Prodigy Corporation CEO Boy Cavalier (Samuel Blenkin), who has seemingly perfected the art of transferring human consciousness into synthetic form. His first success is Wendy (Sydney Chandler), a dying child who is granted eternal life in an adult body. But when a Weyland-Yutani research vessel crash-lands in the middle of Prodigy Corporation territory, Wendy and synthetic researcher Kirsh (Timothy Olyphant) are selected to lead a rescue mission - not for the survivors, but for the dangerous and lucrative alien life forms set loose on the vessel. Following in the heels of Legion and Fargo, Alien: Earth is the latest small-screen adaptation from showrunner Noah Hawley.
In this short clip from the episode, Monagle argues that Hawley's freedom to tell a great story is very in-keeping with the history of the franchise:
Every Alien movie is the pure id of the filmmaker. From David Fincher to Jean-Pierre Jeunet to James Cameron to Ridley Scott, everybody gets to make the Alien that movie that they want. Even Fede Álvarez made the Alien movie that they wanted to make based on what they're into. And I think the same courtesy has been afforded Noah Hawley: to pick and choose from the Alien lore, to do the stuff that he's most interested in, without an over-abundance of adherence to or stress about canon.
The Alien: Earth episode of the Certified Forgotten podcast is now available to stream on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, YouTube Music, or the podcast platform of your choice.
