I’ll just be honest. At first I wasn’t that impressed with the latest episode of Resident Alien, called Harry, a Parent. Last week’s blockbuster episode did almost everything perfectly, while this one starts with a slow burn intro and has less laughs overall. But after watching the last 5 minutes of this episode, I may have to revise my opinion. It’s not as big of a twist as last week’s, but it’s pretty darned fantastic, and features what I believe is a stellar cameo.
With that out of the way, let’s start at the beginning of Harry, a Parent. Despite the title, the episode doesn’t feature the alien baby at all. It’s more an analysis of what it means not only to be a biological parent, but to parent someone else. All that aside, it begins with a weird scene. A man comes home late at night, and walks through the door of his house only to hear sexual grunting. He then grabs an axe and walks in on his wife with some random lover. Moments before the husband can bring the axe down on the cuckolder, time suddenly freezes. And just like I had to, you’ll have to wait until the very end of the episode to understand why.
We then see what appears to be Harry in alien form on a couch, talking about his trauma in the Ice Wind Desert, and how he had to kill his siblings just to survive. In reality, this is just Harry daydreaming as he’s giving therapy to Mayor Ben, who surprisingly realizes he’s being ignored. In fact, if anything Ben is his most determined in this episode, but more on that later.
See, Harry is having a hard time. Not just in realizing he’s actually Goliath from an earlier period of time, but in the revelation that means the alien baby is his baby! And though Harry from season 1 might have cared little about such information, this Harry is learning to embrace his emotions. He tries his best to fight it, but he really is becoming, for lack of a better word, human.
Speaking of different species, the revelation of Harry being Goliath helps him and Asta narrow down the identity of the alien species. Apparently only two use portals (side note, I love the way Harry says portal in his language), one of which are the Grays, and the other are called Alpha Draconians. Harry quickly dismisses the former, since they care nothing about humans, and decides the shapeshifting reptilian Draconians are the culprit. Which then leads to him testing if Asta is one by shoving his finger up her nose. Apparently, Alpha Draconians have their pleasure center there. And yes, Harry does this to others in the episode, and it’s slapstick gold.
Liv and Mike don’t have a lot of screen time in the episode, but what is there was actually pretty touching. Liv makes a big effort to convince Mike to stay, offering him a Patience snow globe in the hopes he’ll change his mind. He counters it by saying she should be happy, since without him there, she could be sheriff. Later on, Mike’s dad chimes in, agreeing with Liv that Mike should explore his feelings for Torres. But Mike is stubborn, and it might take an act of god for him to see sense. In their last interaction, Mike and Liv genuinely bond over the loss of his mother years ago, and I got some renewed hope Mike will finally stop being afraid of happiness and realize how fortunate he is to have a deputy like Liv.
Harry, a Parent is much more about D’Arcy’s woes. At first it looks like things are going well, with her and boyfriend Elliot on a morning run. Then she gets touchy when Elliot tries to help her treat her knee pain, and she pushes him away. Later on, it’s quickly revealed D’Arcy has a pain medication addiction, and she’s going through pills way too fast. Lucky for her, she knows Harry’s weakness is food, and she bribes him with churros to get what she wants.
When the competition is finally happening, D’Arcy needs more treatment, and essentially forces Harry to give it to her, with him commenting he hopes the shot will change her back to nice D’Arcy. Despite all that, she manages to qualify for first place in her competition, and gets a glorious welcome from her fan club. I just wonder how long until her new addiction starts to really harm the fiery redhead.
There’s also a side story between Ben and Kate. She finally is trying to convince him to give up on the resort, and he refuses, creating a lot of friction. While I want to give him props for standing up for himself, he’s such a useless man child that it’s difficult. Ultimately I think Kate will win him over, but it’s amazing any woman has put up with Ben for so long.
The other side story involves Asta discovering her dad knew where her birth mother might have been and keeping it from her. On the way to D’Arcy’s competition she investigates the last known address and discovers her birth mom still lives there. Unfortunately, she’s a selfish bitch, and seemingly cares nothing about the baby she gave up. On the plus side, Harry and Asta bond over childish descriptions of her.
The real thrust of the episode happens after Harry makes a crop circle during the trip to the competition. It’s basically the alien equivalent of a middle finger, and he’s sure it will get the Draconians’ attention. And he’s half right. He does get the attention of an alien species, it’s just not that species.
This causes the time freeze, not only for the random husband, but for Harry, Asta and D’Arcy in a jeep. Only Harry is unaffected, and he walks out to find a UFO hovering over the car. Out pops none other than a Gray, who I’m pretty sure was voiced by George Takei. He gives Harry a warning—stay out of Gray business, or those you love will be killed.
That ending really made the entire episode. It’ll be interesting to see how Harry deals with this latest revelation, and whether this means there’s actually three alien species on Earth now. Because I’m pretty sure there’s at least one Alpha Draconian on the planet, played by the wonderful Enver Gjokaj. Stay tuned for The Workprint’s ongoing coverage of season 2!
