FX’s showAlien: Earthwill premiere on July 19, 2025, and early reviews from critics are already hinting at an exciting series to come. Ahead of its release next week,Alien: Earthhas already received an impressive RT scoreof 90%, putting it in line with some of the franchise’s best entries.
The new series brings the franchise down to Earth, and, excitingly,Alien: Earthwill introduce new species, meaning the show’s characters will have more than the deadly xenomorphs to battle. Likewise,Alien: Earth’s trailerhas teased that it will capture the essence of the original film. Luckily, reviews highlight that the series lives up to the iconic franchise’s name.
7The Richly Written And Well-Acted Characters Are Easy To Invest In
Alien: Earth Includes Some Great Performances
TheAlienfranchise has always had some great, complex characters, and it seems thatAlien: Earthis continuing that trend in a unique way. While Sigourney Weaver’s Ellen Ripley will likely always be the definingAlienfranchise character,critics have praisedAlien: Earth’s Sydney Chandler and her character, Wendy.
TheAlienfranchise has long explored the bounds of humanity through its synthetic characters, andAlien: Earthtakes that to an extreme. Wendy is a human consciousness inside a synthetic body, while Timothy Olyphant’s Kirsch is a synthetic. Like previous installments, this forces audiences to keep guessing where their loyalties truly lie.
Collider’s review of the series outlines this perfectly, arguing that “Chandler’s Wendy is particularly exciting as she tries to figure out her new body and what she’s capable of.” Similarly, the reviewer praised Olyphant for being “restrained and in control throughout,” while noting just how impressive the entire cast is.
6Alien: Earth Strikes A Great Balance
None Of The Alien Franchise’s Key Features Are Ignored
Developing a new show that fits into a franchise with such an extensive history is not an easy feat. Noah Hawley could have easily overdone the character development, losing the action and horror elements as a result, or played too much into the existing lore without developing enough original material. Luckily, that is not the case forAlien: Earth.
In a sense, every TV show or film is a balancing act. Creators have to determine how to keep audiences engaged with the plot and pacing, create compelling characters without giving away too much too soon, and, in the case of theAlienfranchise, balance the tension of the aliens' existence with the horror of actually seeing them onscreen.
Numerous reviews forAlien: Earthexpound that Noah Hawley manages to do just this. In fact,THRcalled the series “a heady, sprawling, occasionally unwieldy but eventually thrilling epic about personhood, hubris and, of course, the primal pleasure of watching people get absolutely rocked by space monsters,” making it everything anAlienfan could want.
5Noah Hawley’s Vision For The Series Stands Out
Hawley’s Work Feels Like A Love Letter To Alien
Noah Hawley, who is perhaps best known for adapting the 1996 filmFargointo a TV series of the same name, has once again proven that he is adept at putting his own spin on a beloved film. Hawley has previously made it clear that making the series feel authentic to the spirit of the originalAlienwas themost important part ofAlien: Earth.
This goal has certainly come through in critics' reviews of the upcoming series, withCollidernoting that Hawley “beautifully melds all the different forms of the Alien franchise into one cohesive narrative.” As a result,Alien: Earthfeels like a true fan’s love letter to the best aspects of theAlienfranchise.
Reviewers also note that the world thatAlien: Earthcreates feels tonally and stylistically most similar to the first two installments in theAlienseries. Going back to the strongest entries givesAlien: Eartha solid starting point, yetHawley’s series is still distinctive and fresh.
4Alien: Earth Respects The Franchise’s History
The Show Feels Like A Natural Continuation Of The Beloved Series
Perhaps the most frequently repeated praise forAlien: Earthis how well it fits into the existing canon of the franchise. The series knows that its viewers are likely fans who have a sense of what anAlienseries should look like, as well as understanding the basics of theAlienfranchise’s timelineand key players.
To this point,Movieweb’s review highlights that “Alien: Earthgets the little details right, using them as ways to remind the viewer of the world they’re in,” without going into a dull recap of every aspect of the universe’s lore. In other words,Alien: Earthtreats its audiences intelligently, and the show is better off for it.
Likewise,Colliderargues that Hawley “tapped into every facet of what has made Alien a tremendous and always surprising series of films.” The essential elements ofAlienare all present inAlien: Earth, and the series does not attempt to retcon big pieces of existing lore; instead, it molds itself around what came before.
Across theAlienfranchise’s various installments, different directors have attempted to institute their own elements into the existing universe, for better or worse. It is impossible to create a good addition without saying anything new at all, so this is necessary, but Hawley has clearly played within the established bounds of the universe more successfully than some of his predecessors.
3The Series Format Is Well Suited To Explore Concepts More Deeply
Alien: Earth Is Thematically Rich
Given how wellAlienhas done as a movie franchise, it is understandable that critics and audiences would be skeptical of how a TV adaptation might fare. However,Alien: Earthhas proved that the franchise’s themes can be explored just as well in a lengthened series format.
Ross Bonaime ofColliderargues that, unlike the franchise’s films, which “have largely centered around a group attempting to survive the attack of a xenomorph…Alien: Earthhas the opportunity to take these larger details of its futuristic world and make them the focal point.” This makes the show’s universe and themes far more expansive.
The film series has always grappled with topics like technological advancement, corporate greed, and even what makes someone human. The extended runtime of a TV series quite simply givesAlien: Earthmuch more room to explore those themes, though.
Especially because many of the show’s characters are synthetics or hybrids, ideas of humanity and progress are explored very deeply. This is equally true ofAlien’s exploration of corporate greed as the series sets up five main companies that control the Earth and vie for limitless power through any means necessary.
2Alien: Earth Expands The Alien Canon
The Show Brings Something New To The Franchise
In addition to respecting the franchise’s history and long-built-up lore,Alien: Earthis also being praised by critics for creating something new within the universe. Not only does the show feel faithful to the early movies in its appearance, but it also expands upon the world that those original films take place in without changing things.
Alien: Earthis set two years before the 1979 original movie takes place, but crucially, because it is set on Earth, audiences are treated to an entirely new perspective on the world that Ripley and her crew came from. On this,CBRnotes that “Alien: Eartheasily divulges the political status of the world, without overloading the audience with exposition.”
Their review argues that, in contrast to many of the previousAlienmovies, which don’t quite have a ton of worldbuilding,Alien: Earthtakes the time necessary to show audiences the state of the world and where the characters fall within it. The franchise’s lore can be confusing, butAlien: Earthdoes a great job of keeping things clear and interesting.
1The Show’s Alien Creatures Are Truly Impressive
The New Alien Species Add Something Unexpected
Undeniably,Alienand its sequels are best known for their killer titular creatures. Xenomorphs are a recognizable feature of the franchise, and anAlienmovie wouldn’t be anAlienmovie without them. Naturally,Alien: Earthincludes them as well, but excitingly, the show also introduces new creatures.
The series involves a mission to recover the contents of a crashed spaceship, andAlien: Earth’s trailer has already revealed several new, deadly creatures are among this wreckage. Though introducing new creatures in a franchise with such an iconic enemy was a bit of a risk, reviews show that it paid off.
CBR’s review states that fans of the previous movies will enjoy “watching various terrible species of creatures bring havoc to the humans and synthetics alike,” and that the new species sets up the future of the franchise. Luckily, though, for fans of the series' classic monster,Alien: Earth’s xenomorph is still the perfect killer alien.
