The alien came to Earth from a distant planet, the name of which is not disclosed for strategic reasons. He has a fairly simple task – to go lower on the ship and slam the Earth with a special bomb that will destroy all life on the planet: the Alien’s tribesmen came to the conclusion that the earthlings are too backward and undeveloped, and the Alien’s people need a new planet for development.
However, it so happened that lightning struck his ship, and so unsuccessfully that the bomb unhooked from the suspension and disappeared somewhere in the snowy mountains near the town of Patience, Colorado, and the Alien’s ship crashed in the same parts.
After an accident, the alien came across the house of Dr. Harry Vanderspiegel (Alan Tudyk), standing alone on the shore of a mountain lake, he drowned the doctor in an ice hole, and he himself appropriated his personality: the alien is able to adapt his appearance to other organisms. And he will need Harry’s appearance for a long time: the Alien needs to somehow hold out in human society while he searches for the bomb. And when he finds it, he will destroy everyone and finally return home.
For the next four months, the Alien sits in Harry’s house, watching Law & Order and other films and TV shows, learning the language of Earthlings. But four months later, local sheriff Mike Thompson (Corey Reynolds) appears in his house with his deputy Liv Baker (Elizabeth Bowen): it turns out that in the town of Patience, the only doctor in the whole city, Sam Hodges, was killed. And the sheriff asks Dr. Vanderspiegel to help, because now there is no one in the town to treat people.
So the Alien has to get out of his lair and, in the form of Dr. Harry Vanderspiegel, go to Patience to treat people, as well as study the habits and behavior of earthlings in their immediate vicinity.
***
Great series, very funny. The alien is a concrete asshole from outer space! (Yes, I know that Bublik asked me not to use this expression, but why did he get the idea that I should listen to his requests at all?!) He was sent with a task to destroy all people, and he intends to complete this task. However, when he settled among the people and began to communicate closely with the inhabitants of the town, his indifference to the fate of earthlings began to slowly pass, because he learned a lot about the human race.
The series’ showrunner is Chris Sheridan, co-creator of Family Guy. The script for the series is based on the Resident Alien comic book series created by Peter Hogan and Steve Parkhouse: the first issue of the comic was released in 2012. In United Statesn translation, this comic was called “The Delayed Guest”. The comic was about an Alien who crashed and is now forced to sit on Earth in the guise of Dr. Harry Vanderspiegel, waiting to be rescued.
The main star of the series is, of course, Alan Tudyk, who played Harry the Alien. Tudyk is an excellent actor who became famous for his role as pilot Wash in the cult TV series Firefly, but after that, Tudyk’s film career did not really work out – unlike his partner in Firefly, Nathan Fillion.
Tudyk worked a lot in the voice acting of cartoons, played all sorts of episodic roles in various films such as “Death at a Funeral”, “Train to Yuma”, “President Lincoln: Vampire Hunter” and others.
Then he got the main role in the series “Konmen” (which is not surprising, because he himself was the main driving force of this series: he wrote the script, put some episodes as a director), but the series, in my opinion, turned out to be a complete failure, and good he was only rated by Firefly fans. I’m also a Firefly fan, but Konman is hugging and crying, he’s completely helpless.
But finally, Tudyk got the main role in the series, where he has nothing to do with either the script or the production, and here, as they say, the stars converged exactly as they should! Because here Tudyk was finally able to realize his acting potential and the role of the Alien turned out to be absolutely wonderful!
Alan found the most interesting solutions both with the Alien’s manner of speaking and with his manner of behavior, and his laughter, with which he seems to demonstrate to the interlocutor “I’m joking, joking”, is generally something with something! Cool character, very funny and original, Tudyk is incredibly good in his role!
However, this series is also good in that it is far from everything revolving around the Alien, his work in the clinic, his investigations and his opposition to government agents who are hunting him. Here, the psychological aspects of the relationship of some other important characters are still very carefully and dosed, moreover, their relationship with the Alien and with each other.
The second most important heroine of the series (and comics) is Asta Twelvtrees (Sarah Tomko), who works as a nurse for the Alien Harry. Asta is a First Nations Indian whose father Dan (Gary Farmer) runs a diner in the town. Asta is getting close to the Alien, and there are a lot of good episodes connected with this. Asta also has one serious psychological trauma: at a very young age she gave birth to a daughter and the father of the child forced Asta to give the girl to a foster family. The girl grew up not knowing who her mother is, Asta often encounters her under certain circumstances, and she would like to reveal to the girl the secret of her birth, but she is afraid that after that she will stop communicating with her altogether.
An absolutely wonderful couple – black sheriff Mike Thompson, played by Corey Reynolds, and his deputy Liv Baker, played by Elizabeth Bowen. The sheriff is a tough guy, has a very peculiar pronunciation and manner of speaking of a character from some second-rate action movie, he is terribly self-confident and rude to everyone around, but at the same time, the results of his violent activity are rather modest. Deputy Liv is a charming, shy plump woman, and here she is noticeably more effective in investigations than her boss. They will have a funny conflict there, after which Liv will quit, and then Mike will finally understand how much she meant in their joint work.
Another curious character is the unlucky Darcy, Asta’s friend. She is played by Alice Wetterlund. Darcy once showed great promise in sports, but then she got injured and her life went downhill. Now she works as a bartender in a local pub, periodically gets drunk and gets into all sorts of adventures. Nevertheless, Darcy believes that she will still grab the bird of happiness by the tail, although what such confidence is based on is completely incomprehensible.
Well, not without two funny and active kids. One of them is Max Hawthorne (Juda Pren), the son of the local mayor. Max, under the guise of Dr. Vanderspiegel, sees an alien – he has such a feature. The alien first wants to kill the damn kid, but it’s not so easy to do, and they have a very funny war there. Max is helped by an Arab girl from his school Sahar (Gracelyn Awad Rinke) – she is very smart and tells Max the right decisions. Well, in the end it turns out that the children even begin to help the Alien.
Good series, enjoyed watching it. Finally, Alan Tudyk, almost for the first time since Firefly, performed in all his brilliance, an excellent script, a reasonable balance between black humor and the psychology of relationships, good acting work and great set.
The second season was approved fairly quickly, so the first season finale contains a somewhat clumsy hint of a sequel (Bublik the cat insisted that I use the term “cliffhanger”, but I’m not going to listen to him this time), but in general I’m not the finale disappointed and quite ready to watch another season of the Alien’s adventures in this town, as well as the adventures of other iconic characters of this series.
I’m not sure that this series will appeal to all viewers (not everyone likes black humor), but the high rating shows that a lot of people liked it.
PS Regarding the voice acting in United Statesn. The voice acting, of course, will not allow you to enjoy how cool Tudyk portrays the Alien in the body of a doctor and how colorful the pronunciation of the sheriff is. However, in IMDB HD there is a dubbing by the Cube in Cube studio, and it is traditionally downright good. They tried to somehow convey the features of the speech of the Alien and the sheriff.
Alien from space / Resident Alien movie meaning
Director: Chris Sheridan Cast: Alan Tudyk, Sarah Tomko, Corey Reynolds, Alice Wetterlund, Levy Fieler, Judah Pren, Meredith Autry, Elizabeth Bowen, Keith Arbuthnot, Mandell Maufan, Gary Farmer, Gracelyn Awad Rinke
Series, USA, 2021, 46 min. Black humor comedy, 2 seasons, 10 episodes in 1 season