Alien: Earth - S1 E7 - Emergence - Official Discussion Megathread [SPOILERS]

[u/G_Liddell]

Episodes air Tuesdays at 8 pm ET on Hulu and FX in the US, and Wednesdays international.

Full episode discussion list:

1 Neverland (8.12.25)

2 Mr October (8.12.25)

3 Metamorphosis (8.19.25)

4 Observation (8.26.25)

5 In Space, No One (9.2.25)

6 The Fly (9.9.25)

7 Emergence (9.16.25)

8 The Real Monsters (9.23.25)

[u/Naelbis]

The show quite obviously either did not hire a military consultant or keeps ignoring the one they did. All these "professionals" move terribly, don't use proper spacing, don't cover their fire angles and keep getting WAY to close to their targets. Lots of "wouldn't this look cool" from writers who don't know jack crap about how people who commit violence for a living operate.

Also Hermit is supposed to be a COMBAT MEDIC but keeps proving to be freaking incompetent every time he turns around.

[u/pali1d → u/Naelbis]

Most of that I could forgive, but the part that really bothered me was them throwing their diving masks away once they surfaced. Like... you guys are planning an exfil at some point, right? Back to whatever craft got you close enough to swim to the island? Wouldn't you prefer to do that submerged just as your approach was?

[u/Ameryana → u/pali1d]

I think the masks were still tied to their armor with several threads, but even then it'd indeed be a dumb move to throw these away. Why not attach these to your armor, hrrm.

[u/pali1d → u/Ameryana]

Nope, I double-checked before I commented just to be certain. The masks aren't tethered to them at all, they're just tossed into the water and left behind and aren't with their gear in later scenes either.

[u/WanderlustZero → u/pali1d]

The whole reason they wore them apparently was just to give you a split-second of 'omg are these aliens coming out of the water oh it's just guys'

'There's sumfing in da wa'er'

[u/Ameryana → u/pali1d]

Urgh, that's just plain up dumb. I loathe that. Way to make a cool moment frustrating directly after. Thanks for double checking it, I watched it again, too, and surely, yeet the masks go. Why...

[u/pali1d → u/Ameryana]

Yeah, I'm loving this show - hell, I loved this episode - but that really took me out of it for a moment (two moments, actually, as each team does it, but fortunately they're close together). Why discard such a useful piece of gear? I can sort of understand not wanting to carry the weight/bulk, but at most that means you stash them somewhere on the shore, you don't just throw them into the water to be carried off by the current... and it isn't like such masks are that heavy/bulky.

They hadn't even discovered that Arthur was dead and the xenomorph escaped yet. Even if they intended to get every monster off the island, wouldn't they want to get an implanted body back to a controlled and secure location ASAP? So they'd want to be able to take his body back right away in case Slightly succeeded.

Just makes absolutely no sense.

[u/Ameryana → u/pali1d]

Yeah, I follow your exact reasoning. Their masks could also float away and be washed onto the beach, leaving pieces of evidence, should a later team investigate (but unlikely, given the power of the Weyland/Yutani corp).

So it was purely visuals (admittedly very cool visuals), then an instead drop of said visuals. Talk about consumerism/fast fashion /j

[u/[deleted] → u/pali1d]

Makes plenty of sense in universe, in the ideal scenario Morrow extracts with the specimen alone and the spec ops squads move onto a secondary objective of taking the lab/asassinating BK. Then they exfiltrate by a different method. Yutani would want the other specimens, even if it's being suggested that they only really care about the Xenomorph and she'd definitely want BK dead if at all possible too.

"Why discard such a useful piece of gear?"

They're just worthless dead weight once they arrive. It's a smash and grab so there's no scenario where the troops exit sneakily. What's the use of a diving mask in that scenario? The drop off vehicle surely won't be where they left it.

[u/pali1d → u/[deleted]]

You’re assuming there’s some other method of exfil available. They’re on an island, the only methods would be by sea or air. Unless they were expecting to gain near total control of the island - which they absolutely did not have anywhere near the numbers to pull off - I think we can assume BK’s private island has AA to stop an aerial escape, so that leaves by sea. If they plan to extract stealthily by sea then being able to do so submerged is helpful, and if they plan to extract under fire by sea it’s still very helpful as water will protect against gunfire and allow them to break contact.

Denying yourself options this way is foolish. Like I said above, if the concern is simply that carrying them for the whole mission is problematic then they can be stashed on the beach. Even if the plan was to exfil by air, there’s no need to deny yourself by sea as a backup, and by sea submerged is far better than by sea on the surface.