The kids are in trouble, man. The kids are in trouble and they are out of control.
What in the world is Boy Kavalier supposed to do here? And do we finally get an inkling of what Kirsh is all about? Because it really feels like we’re about to find out what Kirsh is all about.
Before I get into it, there’s an odd discourse going on online, and I feel like I’m saying that more and more with every episode of this show. There are people out there going “this show is trash, this show is blah blah blah,” and I’m sitting here going, what show are you watching? Because clearly we are not watching the same one.
I mean that in total respect: if you disagree with me, come to the front of the line. I genuinely want to know what you people who hate the show are actually thinking. But walk me through it. If all you’ve got is “this show is trash,” why, man? What don’t you like? And it’s okay if it’s just your opinion. That’s called discourse. I’m all here for it.
Now let’s jump into this thing.
Two Boys and a Body
The episode opens with Slightly, who has hidden Arthur Sylvia’s body. You know the one. The one with the face hugger attached to it. It’s in his room.
His buddy Smee shows up, barreling through the doors like a child, and I realized in that moment what has been bothering me about these kids behaving like kids. It’s really just Smee. The actor playing him is wonderfully talented and he’s doing a good job, but every time he’s on screen he does such a good job of acting like a kid that I find him incredibly annoying. His kid behaving like a kid annoys me to no end.
Slightly gets him to help move the body, because Smee has to head to the beach. So the two of them literally pick it up and walk it down a hallway. My first thought was, oh my gosh, what are they doing, they’re going to get caught.
You find out later why they don’t.
If You Can Back Them Up, What Are They?
Over in the facility lab, everything is being cleared out and cleaned up, and you really start to see all of it. They send in a containment team. They grab the fly. Boy Kavalier walks in because he’s been told it’s safe, and he asks Kirsh the question that matters:
“Where are we on reboot and restore?” “Exceptionally, it’s possible. Practically, we haven’t corrected it.”
So apparently they have the capacity to back up these kids’ minds, which lends credence to what we’ve been chewing on this entire series. Go back to the ethical question that keeps running underneath everything: if they can be backed up, are they just programs who think they’re human, carrying all the human memories and everything else that made those people who they were?
That’s the big key to this whole thing. Is that what’s going on?
Wendy Realizes the Boy Genius Is Evil
When Wendy shows up, she’s furious, because she feels like Prodigy is brushing off Isaac, the one they call Toodles, and his death. You can’t erase everything, she tells them. You really can’t.
So Wendy leaves and convinces Nibs, and ultimately Joe, to escape the island with her. Neverland, if you will. She is realizing more and more that the boy genius is kind of evil.
And here’s the key thing that enables this entire situation. Remember last episode, when Arthur deactivated their tracking devices? We find out very quickly why that matters, because Wendy hacks into the system and releases her xenomorph. Because at this point, let’s be honest, that’s what he is. That’s her pet xenomorph. I’m sorry.
She uses him in the lab as a distraction, and a xenomorph is going to xenomorph. That’s what he does, and it is incredible. It is scary. It is what-in-all-the-hells territory. Now they have to deal with that whole scenario and everything it means for the rest of this.
Why Are All the Synths Dirty?
Back to Slightly and Smee, hauling a body and setting it down while they wait for transport.
Kirsh walks up.
He walks right up on them, and instead of stopping them, he tells them to hurry up. You’ve got to get to the beach. You’re going to be late. It’s that way. Get going.
What?
Dude’s dirty. I’m telling you. I’ve had this feeling about him because he’s a synth, and as far as I understand it, not everybody is out here building synths. That’s very specific technology. I have a feeling that deep down he’s Weyland-Yutani tech, or at the very least he’s up for experimenting in a way that Boy Kavalier may or may not know about, because that is the one connection this show hasn’t made yet.
Why are all the synths dirty, man? What is going on with these guys? Ever since the beginning, ever since Rook, they’re all dirty. And it’s rough.
Children Have to Learn How to Lie
Out on the outskirts, the boys have to put Arthur down while they try to avoid a patrol. And he wakes up. The face hugger has done its job and died off. He gets up asking what’s going on, what’s happening.
The kids tell him he’s been injured, this and that, we took you. They lie. And Arthur calls them out on it.
“We’re just taking you to your wife.” “Yeah. Thing is, children have to learn how to lie, and you two are still learning. I don’t know what’s going on, but I can tell you two are scared.”
It’s actually pretty brilliant the way he does it. And he convinces them to go back.
Slightly is very confused, but I know exactly what he’s about to do. Because on the way back, a xenomorph is going to xenomorph, the chestburster happens, and it is a whole horrible mess. It’s rough.
So what does Slightly do? He’s got no other choice. He feels like his family is at stake. He takes Arthur’s body and keeps going down the beach until he runs into Morrow at one of the lakes, and Morrow takes them captive as they enter the facility.
The Eye Alien Just Did Math
Kirsh reports back to Kavalier that the Ocellus specimen was responsible for the lab accident, and shows him the video. Kavalier goes to meet the creature, and he’s fascinated. Him and his head of security. He starts talking about the possibility of getting a human host in order to properly communicate with it. And he asks it about pi, something anybody should know.
What’s the next digit?
It stomps it out.
So now we know the eye alien is smart. And why does this Ocellus creature keep being the single most interesting alien in this alien show? It’s brutal and stupid. Fundamentally I am into the moral question they’re asking with Wendy and the kids, but at the end of the day, I don’t know that I care about them as much as the little boy in me who saw Aliens in a movie theater cares about finding out what Ocellus is and what other crazy creatures are out there. That’s a huge part of what makes this show so interesting.
Kavalier says he thinks he knows the perfect candidate to be the human host. I have a feeling Hermit is on the menu. We’ll see. Unless he’s planning on putting it in Curly, but can you even put Ocellus into one of these synth bodies? Would it work? Could it drive it like a car? Would that be the perfect setup, build a synth body and give the thing a parking spot to just park in?
That’s what I’m talking about. Oof. That’s a difficult question.
The Alliances Fracture
Wendy, Joe, and Nibs get held at gunpoint by the Yutani forces waiting on the outskirts. So Wendy uses her hybrid communication ability, the xenomorph shows up, and it is rough, man. The creature ultimately spares Wendy, Joe, and Nibs because Wendy tells it to.
She’s just become the most powerful person in this entire scenario.
Morrow and his team try to enter the facility, but Kirsh intercepts them, having already captured the newborn xenomorph. Morrow is held. Slightly and Smee are taken back. Wendy, Joe, and Nibs try to reach a boat, and Neverland enforcement stops them. Nibs, in a really frustrated moment, just starts ending fools. And Joe almost ends her, using an electrical gun that incapacitates her instead. Wendy is shocked. She’s livid.
“What did you do?”
And the xenomorph, out in the woods, watches them.
Oh yeah. Yeah, ma’am.
That’s the episode: betrayal and factional splits. Several characters cross moral lines or betray previous loyalties. Slightly with Morrow. Wendy versus Prodigy. Joe’s line in the sand. The alliances are really fracturing. You’ve got the human-hybrid identity conflict running through all of it, the hybrids struggling with what ownership means to them and what their agency is, tracking devices, all that nonsense. Joe is being protective, but there’s already contradictory behavior there, especially in how willing he is to use violence. And Wendy is stepping into her role, whatever that leadership thing is going to become.
Then the setup pays off. The xenomorph emerging from Arthur is a genuine shock and it deepens the horror stakes considerably. Because remember where we are at this point. This show has created something so interesting: I don’t care that we haven’t seen all these elements before, I find myself invested, and then just as I start getting tired of one thing, the xenomorphs are back and doing xenomorphy things. Okay. This show is balancing a whole lot of stuff very well from my perspective.
The one thing I find unsettling is Kavalier. He’s now tipped over into evil genius. He was just a genius before, and I was fine with that, okay, cool, maybe, whatever. Now he’s slipped into a cartoony version of what I sort of expected him to be at the very beginning.
The kids are trying to get out, everything is happening and moving, and this show is really driving toward something. I can’t wait to see what that is.
The Verdict
Now you know, and you’re halfway to being a know-it-all yourself.
I enjoyed this. I enjoyed it a lot, and I’ve enjoyed this entire show to this point, continually. So for the penultimate episode of Alien: Earth I’m giving it an absolutely earned, 100 percent solid 8 out of 10 on the Know-It-All Index.
Also, are you digging that little off-putting rock-and-roll type music they run at the very end? Because I’m kind of digging it myself.
Never forget, everyone loves a know-it-all.
Was I right, was I wrong? Are you starting to get a feel for what this show is doing, and if you’re one of the people who thinks it’s trash, walk me through why. The conversation lives in the comments on the video above.
