PEL Presents PMP#209: Alien Franchised
The Partially Examined Life Philosophy Podcast
Mark Linsenmayer
4.6 • 2.3K Ratings
🗓️ 11 November 2025
⏱️ 54 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
In light of Noah Hawley TV show Alien Earth, Mark, Lawrence, Sarahlyn and Al revisit the franchise through its seven canon films beginning with Ridley Scott's 1979 classic.
While there's plenty of sheer repetition (alien loose, killing people one by one) throughout these properties, the various filmmakers attempt to avoid sure repetition by shifting genres. On the new show, we get a pronounced shift to focusing on the synthetic humans; is that a good thing?
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This episode is sponsored by Claude A.I. Check it out at clod.a.I. slash p.m. All lowercase. |
| 0:15.4 | You're listening to Pretty Much Pop, a culture podcast, no doubt with acid dripping from your |
| 0:20.0 | multiple sets of teeth, |
| 0:21.3 | and we won't hold it against you. |
| 0:22.8 | We're today discussing the Alien franchise that began with Ridley Scott's 1979 film |
| 0:27.0 | and has been newly retrofitted with a TV prequel by Noah Hawley called Alien Earth. |
| 0:32.2 | This is Mark Lintonmeyer, wondering what's in that cool egg-like looking thing. |
| 0:36.2 | Let me dangle my face over it. |
| 0:38.2 | This is Al Baker, severely testing the bounds of credible evolutionary biology. |
| 0:43.0 | I'm Sarah Lynn Bruck, and some days it does not pay to get out of your hametically sealed cryogenic |
| 0:48.8 | sleep chamber in the morning. Wow. Just rolls off the tongue. That was quite a take. We have Wendy and we have the boy who doesn't grow up. And my question is, who is the Captain Hook in this show? Well, it must be you, Lawrence Ware, since you didn't introduce yourself. So there you go. You're introduced. Oh, but they know who I am. You're a legend, Lawrence. You're a legend. |
| 1:11.9 | I'm not a legend, but they know who I am, though. I'm infamous. |
| 1:15.0 | So the original film is, of course, such a landmark and aliens. |
| 1:19.3 | The first sequel is probably a film. People watch multiple times as well. |
| 1:24.5 | And this new show is so good. I know Al at least was coming into this thinking like, I don't have to experience any of the stuff in between, right? I did actually rewatch just about everything. I didn't rewatch the first two films because I've seen those enough. Oh, wow. I didn't remember how some of the others were connected. I didn't remember the lore. I had almost no memory |
| 1:45.4 | of Alien 3 because it's so boring and forgettable. That's a really bad movie. It's a really bad |
| 1:50.2 | movie. David Fincher. Wow. Yeah, David Fincher directed it, but he has disavowed that one because |
| 1:56.0 | there was so much studio interference. He really does not like that movie at all. |
| 2:01.1 | History with the franchise. |
| 2:02.8 | Love it, hate it, indifferent? |
| 2:04.5 | I love the Alien franchise. |
| 2:06.4 | I mean, so going way back, I've always enjoyed them. |
... |
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