re: Alien: Earth Discussion (FX/Hulu) *spoilers* Renewed for S2

Agreed. Stupid. No excuse.

Whether it's Scotty working miracles on the Enterprise, Kaylee rigging together something on Serenity or Naomi and Alex figuring out what else they can use to save the Roci when their engines are down, there's a long history of sci-fi nerdiness that is embedded in the DNA of these shows. Think Mark Watney in The Martian or Interstellar... there's always a back up system, or some sciency way to do just enough to avoid total disaster.

But here? Sorry boss, one perfectly placed bomb knocked out nav, drive AND exposed everyone to the deadly super secret cargo. What are the odds???

The odds are freaking stupid, that's what. And it's lazy AF writing.

I don’t think so. The guy talking to Boy Howdy was a new character we had not seen before. It wasn’t the chief engineer, who ended up getting eye raped by the alien octopus. Remember Morrow took the saboteur out, and he still laughed at him, even though he was being turned into a human kebab. Which made no sense either because he was dead and wasn’t going to be living forever, just like he was promised.

Dude was literally on screen for less than five minutes. So while the chief engineer was in Cryo, the back up engineer was the one training the retard? OK, if that’s what you call good writing.

This is just shoddy writing trying to cover for itself. You’re fully buying into it because you want to believe this is a good show. It isn’t.

FFS they expect you to pay attention to every detail of this boring show when they flash up some guys job description on a screen for five seconds and you think “oh yeah, he’s super important“.

quote:

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they expect you to pay attention

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How dare they!

Why do people always do what is so contra to survival in these movies?

I'm watching it but I wouldn't have done half the things they do as it makes no sense. First of all if a space ship crashed into a high rise, then hundreds of first responders would be there, not a small team. Anyway, enjoy it, and we'll see how it ends.

And there it is

It’s much much better to write it smartly with the right precautions and security all over the place. A saboteur being successful and letting the face huggers loose is enough. A fully grown xenomorph can wreak enough havoc to cause everything on the ship to unravel.

The characters in the first two movies made smart decisions that were thwarted just as smartly:

A rogue android acting on Company orders overrides quarantine laws. The crew makes the decision to kill the xenomorph but the its stealth, intelligence, and biological defenses make it almost impossible for the crew to carry out their plans.

The marines, filled with hubris based on previous successful “bug hunt” missions, don’t listen to nor treat Ripley as an expert at first and get slaughtered. They try to leave the planet to nuke it from orbit but the xenomorph thwarts that attempt. They try to wait it out but damage to the colony’s power plant coolant system creates an urgent need to leave the planet. The remaining characters work as a team to find an escape with three of the remaining Marines sacrificing themselves and dying with honor.

All of this is good writing because, while they are desperate, the characters don’t lose their wits (except for Hudson and Lambert). Those that die are tripped up by their own built in character defects or they are just unlucky. Several die heroically trying to kill the alien or save the others.

All of the newer Alien movies: starting with Prometheus through Alien: Earth have characters that make illogical decisions, plots that feel contrived, rehash previous films’ beats and moments, or just throw the rules of the previous films out the window which makes for an unsatisfying experience for the viewer.

I know. I was saying that people doing dumb things that wouldn’t happen also happens in slashers but worse