WARNING: MAJOR SPOILERS forward for Alien: Earth episode 3.
Alien: Earth episode 3, “Metamorphosis,” options the cyborg safety officer Morrow going to nice lengths to guard the alien specimens on the crashed Weyland-Yutani spaceship.
Following the occasions of Alien: Earth episode 2, which noticed Morrow shoot Joe, the brother of the world’s first-ever hybrid being, Wendy, Morrow has confirmed to be a harmful menace. When he finds two Prodigy hybrids, together with Adarsh Gourav’s Barely, goofing round subsequent to a number of Xenomorph eggs, he has various questions, together with a riddle: “When is a machine not a machine?“
Morrow’s “Machine” Riddle In Alien: Earth Episode 3 Defined
The core concept behind Morrow’s “When is a machine not a machine” riddle appears to be {that a} machine stops being a machine when it stops working. Extra particularly, a machine stops being a machine when it ceases performing its designated particular activity and when it not has an operator or grasp who can flip an on/off energy swap to provide it life.
When a machine with consciousness, intelligence, and self-awareness has the flexibility to easily exist, kind an identification, and never comply with orders, it’s arguably not a machine as a result of each machine has a major, usually singular, operate. Barely and the opposite Misplaced Boys could not understand it but, however Boy Kavalier and Prodigy actually have a objective for his or her hybrids.
This riddle additionally pertains to Morrow’s inner wrestle, which clearly pits his humanity in opposition to his equipment. He has freedom of will, however it’s in accordance together with his cyborg programming. Defying his code is sort of a human being betraying oneself and going in opposition to their nature. Morrow calls the alien specimens his “life’s work” to Yutani solely as a result of he serves her.
Why Morrow Desires To Be Barely’s “Good friend”
Morrow needs to be mates with Barely as a result of he needs to know what Prodigy is as much as with their synths, particularly after the point out of their mother and father, not realizing they’re hybrids. It feels like Morrow plans to kidnap one of many hybrids, probably Barely, to be able to make an trade between Boy Kavalier and Yutani for the alien specimens.
Whereas Morrow was telepathically speaking to Barely, he was wanting up background information on Kavalier. Odds are, Morrow is attempting to show Barely in opposition to Prodigy and Boy Kavalier by changing into his “good friend,” which is able to assist him achieve perception into Prodigy’s top-secret hybrid improvements, in the end serving his Weyland-Yutani grasp.
Within the basic Peter Pan film, the character Barely remembers extra about what life was like earlier than coming to Neverland than the opposite Misplaced Boys do. This feels like a superb indication of Morrow’s technique to win Barely over by reminding him that though he feels alive in his synth physique, he is not human. This might freak Barely out to the purpose of revolt in opposition to Prodigy in future episodes of Alien: Earth.
