Alien Nation The Newcomers Podcast

The Alien Nation podcast is hosted by bothers Kenny and Michael Mittleider. They both review each episode of the science fiction TV series Alien Nation, a Fox television program that ran from 1989 to 1990. The TV series was based on a movie with the same name and was released in 1988. The podcast also has included reviews of the made for TV movies based on the series. There have been some 33 podcast episodes produced by the two brothers since 2012 and more are planed for the future. Future episodes of the podcast will be periodic since source material is running low.

In each podcast show, the brothers play excerpts from the TV series and give commentary on the plot. They will discuss the interactions between the two main characters, George Franscico and Matt Sikes. Matt is a detective in the LAPD and George, who is also a LAPD detective, is his alien partner. The two men are tasked to investigate crimes in the alien community of Los Angles. The two detectives will argue with each other about the details of case they are trying to solve. This makes for a lot of strife between the two men, especially when both men see things from different perspectives. This becomes a topic of discussion for the two hosts, they will debate with one another about why the two detectives don't see things from eye to eye. This is attributed to the attitudes faced by the Aliens, who are called Newcomers. The brothers relate how some forms of racism affect the Newcomers' walk of life and how it is dealt with. One example the hosts talk about is why the human and aliens are treated at different hospitals. It is simply because the physiologies are different between Newcomer and Human. Both brothers agreed that this was a necessity and was not supposed to be demeaning to the aliens. Also the brothers talk about other subjects from the series. At the end of each podcast, one of the hosts details some behind the scenes information, a little bit of trivia, and the origin of the aliens' unusual sounding names.

The first promo for the podcast was produced on Nov. 30, 2011.

The Television Series

The TV series was first broadcasted on September 18, 1989 with the pilot episode. There were 22 episodes produced and the season finale was aired on May 7, 1990. The second season was canceled after new scripts were written but were never put into production. The unused scripts were later used for a series of made for TV movies that ran during the 1990s.

In the first podcast of the series, the brothers discuss the pilot episode which introduces Detectives Matt Sikes and George Francisco. They are tasked to solve a murder of homeless person who has some strange sores on his body. Also Sikes has a box of papers containing information from his late partner on the Newcomers' slave ship. They both learn to work together and their investigation takes them into some strange places. The host also introduce themselves and state what their intentions are for the podcast. They plan to cover every episode, TV movie, and books of the show.

This podcast episode is entirely about listener feedback. The brothers included e-mails, comments from Twitter and podbean.com, along with iTunes reviews. I would recommend listening to this podcast to get a good idea what the podcast is about if you don't want to listen to the first episode of the series.

The Made for TV Movies

The first TV movie was broadcasted on FOX on Oct. 25, 1994 with the title Dark Horizon. Dark Horizon was the first in five TV movies while the last one was The Udara Legacy which aired on July 29, 1997.

In this podcast, the hosts talk about the first made for TV movie Dark Horizon. The plot of the movie picks up where the last TV episode left off. The Francisco family has been poisoned and in critical condition while in the hospital. The two officers search for who is responsible while the doctors work on finding a cure for George's wife and daughter. Then the two detectives are befriend by a Newcomer who has a cure and helps the Francisco family. However this Newcomer has a strange past and does not seem to be what he is. Matt gets suspicious and starts to investigate who this person is. During this podcast, the bothers take note of the appearances of the cast members. This is due in part that it has been 4 years since the last production of the series. The oldest children in the Francisco family, Buck and Emily, have grown into young adulthood thus requiring some clever script changes. They even comment on Matt Sikes' different hair style as well. He had shorter hair in the TV series, but now the actor wears a much longer cut. The brothers also point out the introduction used in the TV movies are different than the series. It is an extended version used to update the series so any new viewer would understand the storyline.

Why I Loved the Series

I started watching the Alien Nation TV series after I saw a FOX ad for it on TV one day. I had enjoyed watching the movie from the year before and I thought this would be very interesting to tune in the TV show. When I saw the first episode I was not disappointed. The series compared to the movie was much more of a thinking man's type of sci-fi rather than the cop buddy action drama the movie was. The series would touch on a lot of social issues in a manner that science fiction has been known to do. It is easy to talk about controversial subjects with you make it about aliens instead of people.

Where to Find the Podcast and Sources

The podcast can be found on iTunes, podbean.com, Facebook, and Twitter. You can send an e-mail to [email protected]. The brothers can be followed on twitter Kenny Mittleider is @GeekyfanboyProd while Michael is @MasterJedi1975. The Twitter page for the podcast is @AlienNationCast.

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Alien Nation (TV series)

Alien Nation (novel series)

Alien Nation (film)