The fifth episode of “Alien: Earth” paused the forward momentum of the hybrid story on Neverland to reveal just what happened in the days leading up to the Maginot crashing to the planet.
At the heart of the issue is Babou Ceesay’s Morrow, who we know from the premiere seemed to ruthlessly lock out the other crew of the ship and set the Maginot on its collision course. Episode 5 winds back the clock even further to reveal there was a traitor on the ship who was tasked with sabotaging the ship and mission. Morrow was tasked with tracking down the saboteur on the confined ship while a number of the smuggled in aliens got loose. Ceesay told TheWrap that confinement, and Morrow’s interaction with the Maginot crew, felt the most like the original “Alien” film.
“It absolutely felt different,” Ceesay said. “We’re more contained on one space being in that ship the whole time. For me, the biggest difference was that I was alone for most of the rest of the episodes. Morrow’s a bit of a lone ranger.”
He continued: “Just as I was really enjoying playing Morrow, the burdened, cold antihero that he is – and suddenly I’m in a ship with other people. I’m like, ‘I don’t want to to play with you.’ At the same time as I love having the cast there.”
Despite the nature of ruthlessly, efficiently hunting down a turncoat aboard the ship, the episode also opens up Morrow’s softer side. Previous episodes had mentioned the cyborg had a daughter who died but Episode 5 showed him opening a box of keepsakes and remembering back before his 65-year mission aboard the Maginot to what was likely one of the final conversations he had with his daughter.
“It’s interesting that he takes a moment to open that box,” Ceesay said. “I thought to myself, he doesn’t open this box often. He does it once in a while when he absolutely needs to. In this moment, he’s woken up to some serious problems on this ship. So this may be the last time he gets to just hope he’s going do it, and once he’s done it’s ‘okay, now let’s go. Let’s go earn it.’”
He added: “I made a very bold choice in discussion with Noah, to the point sometimes people think Morrow’s a synthetic because he’s so cold. I thought this is a moment to flip that on its head. We actually talked about what level of emotion he would go to, and what we settled on is that Morrow’s not going to let himself crumble completely, because I think if he does he’s going to start feeling extremely claustrophobic. He’s just going to want to go home and see his daughter’s grave.”
Morrow’s final moments on the Maginot before it crashes into Prodigy City are also cast in a new light. The cyborg is humming “We’ll Meet Again” with thoughts only for his daughter as a Xenomorph pounds at the hatch door separating them. Ceesay believed Morrow was ready to be reunited with his kid in that moment, but surviving gives him a renewed, vengeful purpose.
“There’s a part of him that has radically accepted that this could be the end, and if it is then he’s back with his daughter in hopefully some sort of afterlife,” he said. “But if he’s saved or spared and he lives, then he must have a higher purpose, and he has to meet it. He’s going to be more determined.”
