“It’s more than just your name going up on the call sheet, and becoming ‘Number One’, as they say,” says Tudyk in a recent Den of Geek livestream. “There is a lot to it; it seems like people care what you think more, which is not necessarily a good thing … Why is everyone listening to me? I’m just talking. I’m not used to people actually caring what I have to say.”
And Tudyk literally has a lot more to say in Season 2 of Resident Alien. The show’s episode order has increased from 10 to 16, and gone is the alien body double used for some scenes involving reflections in mirrors or windows. Now, Tudyk says, it’s all “me doing rubber face,” thanks to a new pull-over alien mask.
Plot wise, the show likewise has more to say in this outing. After a Season 1 finale where it is revealed in flashback human Harry was the one who murdered town doc Sam Hodges, alien Harry eludes the secret military agency, finally escapes Earth, and abandons his plan to kill all humans (since that would also mean killing Sara Tomko’s Asta). Unfortunately for him, the season ended with a signature “This is some bullshit” when young Max (Judah Prehn) is discovered stowed away on the space bound ship.
At the top of the Season 2 premiere, alien Harry is back in Patience, Colorado, suffering amnesia, Max has been returned home, and there’s a slight mystery as to how they crashed back on Earth. Meanwhile the trailer for the season teases an expanding world for the show with a side quest to New York City, growing suspicions about Harry from Sheriff Mike and Deputy Liv (Corey Reynolds and Elizabeth Bowen), more involvement from Linda Hamilton’s General McCallister, and an off-world threat from aliens who will eventually arrive to complete his failed mission.
“We do leave Patience, but the world this season starts to come to Patience,” says Tudyk. “The world is visited upon us, and not just the world, the universe, the beyond.”
However, Tudyk says the core of the show remains Harry’s “infection” of human emotions, and how to deal with them. Calling it a “big driver” this season, the actor equates Harry’s emotions to a child who doesn’t know how to regulate new feelings and says the alien attempts to counteract them.
