The Cutprice Guignol

Observation is the type of episode that will test the will of some of Alien: Earth’s audience.

After the action and horror-heavy first two episodes, Alien: Earth has settled into a slow pace and Observation continues it. Both Metamorphosis and Observation double down on exploring the children in android bodies with the alien experimentation feeling like an afterthought until the end of this current episode. Your patience for this depends on two things – if you have come to the show as a fan of the Alien franchise, I wouldn’t blame you for getting frustrated at another episode of slow character drama with only a dash of creature feature driving the whole Alien part forward. But, if you are a fan of Noah Hawley, you will feel right at home with these types of episodes – both of which feature heavily in Fargo and Legion, and have proved to be essential as part of a broader whole in Hawley’s work. I lie somewhere in the middle, as both an obsessive of the Alien franchise and a passionate defender of Hawley, so let’s get into what works and what’s yet to come in the fourth episode of Alien: Earth.

Observation continues to deal with the aftermath of the crash: specifically, how the experience changed the robot kids. Some – well, two – in Curly and Tootles (who has named himself Isaac after Isaac Newton) are thriving with the organisation of Prodigy, with Curly is still trying to impress Boy, and the newly-renamed Isaac inspired to better himself due to his role in the alien experiments with Kirsch.

Then there is Nibs who, after her encounter with the the Eyeball Tentacle Nightmare (Trademark Pending), has stopped walking around completely dissociated and announced that she is pregnant. This is impossible, at least in theory – but instead of getting her to the lab immediately, Dame (Essie Davis) instead tries to talk to Nibs to try and understand why she feels that this is true. Nibs, being a little girl in a grown body, has a vague notion of how sex works (she grew up on a farm) but seems to put equal value in magical Christian thinking of the immaculate conception. It is a very freaky scene, one that is created through deft direction and cinematography, but it’s the calibrated performances of Davis and Lily Newmark as Nibs that make it stand out.

The Dame and Nibs plot also connects to the episode’s wider theme: the manipulation of the children by the adults that they, for the moment, see as authority. Nibs is the exception – nothing Dame says or does changes her mind about her condition. In fact, when Dame pushes Nibs to tell her more about her experience at the crash site, Nibs launches herself at Dame and threatens her. Isaac Asimov is mentioned earlier in the episode and I don’t think these android bodies were built with his laws of robotics in mind.

Elsewhere, we have Wendy – who, throughout the episode, is quite literally having her powers taken away from her just when she shows her unique ability to communicate with the Xenomorphs. Boy brags that he’s always ahead of people, but he’s behind me by a week on the crocodile clock comparison. Take that, trillionaire! Boy ransoms her brother to guarantee Wendy’s cooperation, despite the fact that she probably would have anyway, especially if Dame was the one to ask her. By doing this, Boy, Dame, Kirsch – all the adults, really – pressure Wendy to toe the line because they need what she has. Even her brother, Hermit, though in a much gentler fashion, tries to manipulate her into leaving the Island with him. For that he gets a reminder from the very scary Atom Eins (I never thought I would be scared by Adrian Edmondson) that he has no right to his sister (if she even qualifies for that role) or the synthetic lung Prodigy give him to save his life.

Perhaps the worst example of this manipulation is Morrow’s pressure on Slightly. Despite Kirsch being aware of their contact, he is allowing Morrow’s attempts to turn Slightly against Prodigy to play out. This involves Morrow giving Slightly the soft sell: trying to befriend him by using the kind of logic and bad faith arguments that would easily confuse a child into his way of thinking. Slightly turns out to be stronger than this – at least, until Morrow moves on to the hard sell. Not only does he threaten Slightly’s mother (who perfects the expression of being both delighted that her son is alive and terrified of what Morrow could do to her) but her other children, Slightly’s own beloved siblings.

It’s hard to see how this will play out: Slightly has Hermit in his sights for the plan to sneak a Xenomorph out of the lab, but Kirsch knows all of this. He also knows that a new Xenomorph is in play and that Wendy can communicate to it directly, which will be a relief to the viewers who are tired of the talky stuff.

Observation is more intriguing than it is entertaining even as it moves things forward to keep the Lost Boys plots compelling, we need some action, Noah. We need some really, really disgusting action. And no, that sheep is not enough.