Alien: Earth episode 6’s ending was about Slightly finally fulfilling the task that was given to him by Morrow in the fourth episode of the show. The show touched upon a variety of other subjects, like the negotiations going on between Weyland-Yutani and Prodigy so that the former could retrieve its property; Hermit trying to convince Wendy they should leave Neverland Island and live as a family; and Nibs’ memories from the crash being erased, thereby causing Wendy to realize that they are not and never can be “people.” But coming back to Slightly, Tootles messed things up royally while feeding the creatures in the lab, which triggered a chain reaction that made it easy for Slightly to do Morrow’s bidding. You see, amongst all the specimens that were aboard the USCSS Maginot, the most important one for Weyland-Yutani was the Xenomorph. While the top brass negotiated and debated, Morrow was running a covert operation to attain a Xenomorph. He was holding Slightly’s biological mother hostage, whom he promised to let go if Slightly sacrificed someone to an Ovomorph and then brought them to Morrow. Since Slightly was envious of Hermit because he was the only family member of one of the hybrids who was getting to hang out with them, he targeted Hermit. However, when Tootles perished while feeding the creatures, which prompted Arthur to check on him, Slightly found his next target. What happened next? Let’s find out.
Spoiler Alert
After failing to get Hermit into the lab where Prodigy kept the Ovomorph, along with the rest of the creatures that had been procured from the USCSS Maginot, Slightly begged Morrow for some more time. Fortunately or unfortunately, Arthur showed up at the lab because he had noticed that Tootles’ locator wasn’t working. In the time it took for Arthur to get into the lab, find Tootles, and try to get him out of the enclosure, which had these bug-like creatures that specifically consumed machines, Slightly made up his mind to make him the human host of the next Xenomorph. If you are wondering why Slightly didn’t just steal the Xenomorph that had been birthed out of Hermit’s lung, well, the straight answer is that it’s impossible. The only one who has subdued a Xenomorph and bagged it in such a way that it could be transported so far is Morrow. I don’t know how Weyland-Yutani developed that technology, or if that technology is exclusive to Weyland-Yutani; the bottom line is that Morrow did it, and he didn’t want to share that tech with Slightly to avoid letting it fall into the hands of Prodigy. Could Slightly have consulted with Wendy and requested her to use her linguistic powers to take the Xenomorph to Morrow? No, because Wendy has recently started to have negative feelings about Prodigy. Prior to that, she was dedicated to the cause. She felt special while communicating with the Xenomorph, and she wouldn’t have jeopardized her relationship with that creature or with Boy Kavalier just so that Slightly’s mother could be saved. Therefore, yeah, trapping a human with a Facehugger was the only way. Now, of course, Slightly couldn’t just waltz out of the front door with a Facehugged Arthur and throw him into Morrow’s lap; they are on an island, after all, and Morrow is in Prodigy City. So, how will this gap be bridged?
Well, at the beginning of episode 6 of Alien: Earth, Morrow said that one of the ways to extract the human host of the upcoming Xenomorph was by creating a state of chaos in Neverland and then using that pandemonium to steal the host, which is Arthur in this case. How to cause this chaos? Well, a hybrid is dead. Those machine-eating flying bugs are out in the open. Arthur has been facehugged, which means he is practically dead. On top of all that, another hybrid has gone missing. I think that’s enough to plunge Neverland into a state of disarray. But that still doesn’t explain how Morrow is going to get into Neverland to extract the Facehugged Arthur. There’s no way of secretly getting onto that island and leaving quietly because, as explained by Rashidi and Siberian, the security around Neverland is pretty robust. Yes, the situation at the lab will probably require most of the security personnel to focus on the main establishment rather than the borders. However, since we don’t know what other forms of security systems are in place at the island, I can’t say for sure that lack of human security guards at the borders will allow for easy access. The only approach that I can think of is that Weyland-Yutani is going to offer a helping hand to Prodigy regarding the chaos at the lab. Prodigy is charging a hefty penalty for the damages done to its city by the USCSS Maginot. Maybe Yutani will get Kavalier to lower that price by getting the creatures out of his hair. Of course, Kavalier is not going to let go of his new prized possession: the Xenomorph. Yutani will probably surprise him by saying that he can keep it once she is sure that Morrow has secured the Chestburster developing inside Arthur. That brings us to the question: how long does everyone have before Arthur “gives birth” to that chestburster?
There’s a common joke amongst fans of the Alien franchise that the pace of a Xenomorph’s growth depends on the person writing the script. If they need to build tension, the Chestburster will take its own merry time to come out; if they need to speed things up, it’ll emerge almost instantly. In this show, we saw Kirsh insert the Xeno-tadpole into Hermit’s lung in episode 3, and the Chestburster arrived at the end of episode 4. So, roughly speaking, it took somewhere between 24 and 36 hours for the creature to take shape. Is that enough time for Yutani to negotiate with Kavalier and get her people onto Neverland or for Morrow to get to Slightly and Arthur? Yeah, I suppose so, because even though Kavalier acts like a nonchalant douchebag all the time, if things get serious, that kid is going to bow down instantly, and that’ll give Morrow the perfect opportunity to conduct a heist. Will Wendy use that state of pandemonium to escape with Hermit and take her friendly Xenomorph with her? I am not really sure. It seemed like she had attained a certain level of disillusionment, and she understood that she and the other hybrids were just playthings for Prodigy. But what good will that be if she can be remotely shut down and rebooted? So, yeah, while it’s great to see Wendy understanding what Hermit has been trying to explain to her for such a long time, it’s possible that her bond with her brother is headed towards a tragic conclusion. And what about Kirsh? That synthetic is quite confusing. Earlier in this episode, we saw him talking to Morrow in a hostile manner. We know that Kirsh is aware of what Morrow is forcing Slightly to do. In fact, he saw Slightly unleash a Facehugger on Arthur, and when Kavalier asked him if everything was alright, he just said, “Affirmative.” Huh?! What is his deal?
On one hand, he expresses his disdain for Kavalier’s methods, and on the other, he makes sure the hybrids remain subservient and Hermit doesn’t harbor any delusions about “freeing” his sister. And then he watches Neverland descend into chaos on his little iPad-esque monitoring device like he’s watching the latest edition of Keeping Up with the Kardashians. He could have alerted the authorities on the island to initiate some kind of quarantine until he reached the lab, along with Kavalier and Atom. Does he think that ordering a lockdown will cause Slightly to panic and harm Arthur and the chestburster growing in his body? Maybe. Kirsh knows that Slightly and Arthur are in the air ducts. So, it’s possible that he hopes to get to them before they become untraceable (because Arthur turned off the trackers of the hybrids), secure the Chestburster, and initiate another round of experiments on not one, but two Xenomorphs. It’s a risky maneuver because, as mentioned before, the machine-eating bugs are out of their enclosure. If somebody else wanders into the lab and accidentally lets them out into the open, it’ll lead to the exact mess that Weyland-Yutani is trying to create. Which makes me wonder, does Kirsh actually want Prodigy to crash and burn? Did he send Tootles into the lab on purpose? There were several instances where he could have notified somebody that Morrow was manipulating Slightly into doing his bidding, not just in this episode but earlier, and he didn’t. He could have stopped Tootles from going to the lab on his own, but he didn’t. Therefore, yeah, maybe he is going to end up helping Morrow take Arthur to Weyland-Yutani and join that corporation once Prodigy has been destroyed. I just want to see the look of betrayal on Kavalier’s face when he realizes that Kirsh is not loyal to him anymore and then watch him die at the hands of one of those creatures; a man can hope. Anyway, those are just my thoughts on episode 6 of Alien: Earth. What are your opinions on the same? Feel free to share them in the comments section below.
