What manner of man becomes a Morrow? I don’t mean a cyborg, though this flashback episode of “Alien: Earth” gives us that answer: The chief security officer of the doomed spaceship Maginot was once a “feral street kid with a palsied arm.” He was “taken in” by a long-ago Ms. Yutani, the grandmother of the woman who is currently in charge of her family’s mega-corporation. She, or the company she ran, gave him his mechanically enhanced, transforming arm.
In exchange, he gave Yutani a lifetime. More than a lifetime, in fact.
It’s never been clear what tempts people to take jobs on Weyland-Yutani’s long-haul space flights. By the time the gig is over, you’ll have spent years, perhaps decades in cryo-sleep, frozen in stasis while the world moves on without you. Morrow already mentioned that he had a little girl back home who died long ago; now we know the circumstances.
Morrow clearly joined the mission in order to permanently provide for his little girl, whose painfully cute pet name for him is “Dadabear.” But eight years into the journey, Morrow received word from the Company that his daughter died in a house fire. A printed-out memo indicates 53 years would have to pass between Morrow hearing the news and Morrow returning to Earth to collect his daughter’s belongings. By then he might be the only person alive who remembers she existed.
So for the bulk of his time in the cold recesses of space, surrounded by people he doesn’t like, collecting disgusting and deadly creatures capable of wiping out everyone aboard, Morrow has known he has nothing to return to. All this time, all this loss, is for nothing. I think that might break me too.
But nothing can be turned into something if you try hard enough, or if you need it to badly enough. With nothing else to cling to, Morrow now has only two priorities. He must fulfill his mission to bring back the specimens safely to Earth, or it really will have all been for nothing, and that cannot be borne. And he must do so to honor the trust and care shown to him by the chief executive’s grandmother long ago.
I reviewed last week’s Alien: Earth for the New York Times. (Gift link!)
Tags: alien: earth, horror, new york times, TV, TV reviews