Whenever Alien: Earth ’s narrative drifts away from the franchise’s sci-fi-horror chassis toward Wendy (Sydney Chandler) and the hybrids, it starts to feel less evocative than tedious. Photo: Patrick Brown/FX The pleasures of Alien are fairly straightforward: Take a doomed pack of squishy humans, put them in a bad situation, throw in a Xenomorph or two, and you’re good to go. Yes, the franchise has endured over the decades because of all the ideas and academic interpretations it’s inspired off