Resident Alien - The Alien Within - Review
4 Sept 2022
JH Resident Alien ReviewsIt took me a bit to wrap my head around this episode.
Liv and the Sheriff managed to get all of the pieces of information they needed to close the case of who killed Sam, officially removing any speculation that Harry could be the murderer.
Unfortunately, this means that Detective Torres can return to Jessup. Sadly, Sheriff Thompson chickened out when it came to asking her out on a date. She was dropping some serious hints too.
I am hoping that the opportunity presents itself again.
Ben starts his campaign to get the citizens of Patience to agree to the sale of land for new resort.
I wasn’t remotely surprised to learn how few votes Ben got for mayor. The mayor of Patience was selected by Ben’s family, and only 9 other people.
So, IMHO, if the resort is built and the town ruined, it’s the fault of 84% of the people who didn’t bother to vote. Hopefully, they will turn out when the subject appears on the ballot.
In the meantime, Ben has a major fight on his hands from the same activists that finagled equal pay for the town’s female employees.
D’Arcy, Asta, Liv et al come up with a plan to prevent the resort ever being built. They set about bringing Kate over to their side.
(Was anyone else having visions of D’Arcy driving teachers into retirement when she was in grade school?)
I’m not really sure that getting Kate to work on getting Ben to give up his resort is the plan with the greater odds of success.
It’s not going help Ben and Kate’s marriage at all, but I suppose it’s a good place to start.
It is nice to see Kate begin to make friends and feel connected to the town.
Asta’s observation that Harry’s slowly becoming more human than alien completely freaked him out.
So much so that he went wandering in the snow packed wilderness without pizza.
Harry was continually surprised by his compassionate reaction to the struggles of the people around him.
He’s become connected to more than just Asta in this community.
The only klang for me with this storyline was the moment after that helicopter whisks away the RV with Baby inside.
Focusing that moment on Harry’s reaction to Sahar’s despair and ignoring Harry’s reaction to the kidnapping felt off to me.
There is a LOT riding on this infant alien for Harry. This is the one situation where Harry is justified in being self centered.
One of his people has been captured by the federal government, this captive is a newborn, and holds critical information needed to save Earth.
And Harry gets a good night’s sleep and a pizza before doing anything?
All I needed for that sequence to work for me was for the writers to resist the weak “There, there, there, there, there.” joke, and instead have Harry meet Sahar’s despair with a declaration that he would rescue the baby.
Now to the flashforward and flashback.
The episode opened with Harry declaring that he had become connected to Earth and remained, in his human form, long after Asta passed away.
(Had the destruction started before she died, or were they able to stave the attack off the attack until after her death?)
Then the episode ended with us learning that Harry was Goliath.
Which leads to a ton of questions. My biggest question is, did Harry know?
I think the source of my problem/confusion was in the directing.
Harry showed no reaction to Asta’s conclusion that Harry was Goliath.
His lack of reaction kicked me right out of the scene as I tried to figure out if Harry knew and when he found out…although it just didn’t seem logically possible for him to know at that moment.
The addition of future Harry stepping through a portal and into the past is one of those story points that tend to confuse and muddy a story more than fixing it.
The time line, as it seems now, is that we’re with the Harry before the destruction of the planet.
So, Harry arrives - meets Asta - tries to save the planet - fails and hangs out on Earth for 300 more years, returns to the past, finally dies (after falling in love, fathering a kid, and leaving a warning meant to prevent the destruction of Earth).
I don’t see a way for Harry to know he was Goliath at this point. But, why wasn’t he surprised?
By the way, this also indicates that Baby (or Bobby, thanks Max!) is literally Harry’s son.
I enjoyed a lot about the episode, but the lasting impression I was left with was of confusion and story logic difficulties to come.
What about you guys? What did you think of the episode?
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