The Alien franchise has gotten about as complicated as a Weyland-Yutani org chart. There are the core movies, the Prometheus side quests, and last year’s Alien: Romulus spinoff reboot. Don’t even get us started on the vs. Predator of it all. Now here comes Noah Hawley’s prestige drama set in the Alien-verse, helpfully titled Alien: Earth. It seems pretty self-explanatory. An alien comes to Earth, yes? Yes and no. First off, Xenomorphs have been literally chilling under Antarctica for centuries, according to Alien vs. Predator. But also, do we really know what kind of Xenomorph we’re getting? Those guys hybridize with every species they meet. And when in the increasingly convoluted Alien timeline does this series even happen? Below is everything you need to know about the who, what, when, and where of Alien: Earth.
Is Alien: Earth a sequel? A prequel? An alternate timeline?
Alien: Earth is a prequel to the original 1979 Alien, taking place two years before Ripley and the gang have their unfortunate encounter with the Xenomorph. So if you love the gritty vibe of the OG film’s space truckers, congrats. Here’s several more hours of story set in that particular slice of future history.
This also places Alien: Earth a little over 15 years after the events of the two Prometheus movies. Those focus on the premerger Weyland Corporation; its founder, Sir Peter Weyland (Guy Pearce); and his pet evil synth, David (Michael Fassbender). And you’ll have to know at least some of this fictional corporate structure because the true baddie of the Alien movies? Capitalism. The aliens are kind of a misdirect.
Evil corporations in an Alien property? Groundbreaking.
Alien: Earth reveals that five corporations run Earth. Countries are so 20th century. The show follows a group of synths that belongs to a conglomerate called Prodigy and its founder, Boy Kavalier (Samuel Blenkin). When Hawley announced the show in 2021, he said it would be about “what happens when the inequality we’re struggling with now isn’t resolved. If we as a society can’t figure out how to prop each other up and spread the wealth, then what’s going to happen to us?” Chestbursters are what’s going to happen to us, apparently.
Xenospecies galore in the Alien: Earth trailer
As the show’s official trailer promises, we’re getting more than just your typical Xenomorphs on Alien: Earth. First, we see the spaceship Maginot crash into somewhere called Prodigy City (more on that later). Then we find out the ship had “five different life-forms from the darkest corners of the universe.” And now the tech-bro leader of Prodigy City wants those life-forms for himself. What could go wrong?
Who will be fighting these aliens on Earth?
Sydney Chandler, daughter of Kyle, stars as Wendy, the first synth-human hybrid. Prodigy’s thing is trying to beat mortality by uploading human consciousness into a robot body. But almost all the synths we’ve seen in the Alien franchise are kind of lawful evil, so here’s guessing the hybridization process doesn’t have all the kinks worked out yet.
Timothy Olyphant plays Kirsh, a synth who is mentoring Wendy in the ways of the roboworld. When a Weyland-Yutani ship crashes in New Siam, Kirsh leads a Prodigy team to recover all the freaky alien monsters inside. It’s corporate espionage plus facehuggers. Joining Wendy and Kirsh on their mission are Alex Lawther, as the human brother of Wendy, and a whole bunch of hybrid roboteens. There’s Wendy, Slightly (Adarsh Gourav), Tootles (Kit Young), Smee (Jonathan Ajayi), Curly (Erana James), and Nibs (Lily Newmark). If you haven’t brushed up on your J.M. Barrie, you may not know that all these character names come from Peter Pan. Apparently, it’s a quirk of the hybridization process that each new human-synth mash-up names itself after someone from Pan’s crew. Again, probably nothing to worry about there!
When does Alien: Earth land?
The first two episodes of Alien: Earth premiere on FX and FX on Hulu August 12.
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Attend Xenobio 101 ahead of Alien: Earth.
