Aliens living on Earth has been a common plot device in many movies, TV series and more. Normally, the aliens have to hide from humans to prevent themselves from being dissected. On Solar Opposites, the situation is much different, with a group of aliens living openly in a typical, suburban neighborhood. And no one seems to care in the least, not even the United States government.
From the mind of Justin Roiland, one of the co-creators of Rick and Morty, Solar Opposites focuses on a “family” of aliens who have crashed on Earth. When their original home planet of Shlorp was destroyed, they were one of 100 teams sent out to establish a new home planet. Earth was not their intended destination, but they are making the best of it until they can leave and continue their mission.
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When Solar Opposites starts, Korvo and Terry — along with their young replicants Yumyulack and Jesse — have built a life in an unnamed Middle American city. They have been living there for a year with a being called The Pupa, which is either a pet or a baby. Regardless, when it matures, it will reputedly destroy all life on Earth and terraform the planet into a suitable new home for the Shlorpians. It’s an endgame all four aliens would like to avoid.
But the strange part about the series is that no one in the community is remotely phased by the presence of aliens. The Shlorpians are not hiding in plain sight as humans the way the aliens from Third Rock from the Sun did. Nor do they secretly live with a human family as was done on Alf or wear a lot of disguises to go outside the way Roger does on American Dad!. They’re just kind of there.
Refreshingly, the Solar Opposites, as the aliens refer to themselves, live their lives out in the open and are engaged in the community. Their human neighbors generally don’t like the aliens’ personalities, but they seem to have accepted them as aliens. It might have something to do with all of the high concept science fiction rigmarole that has descended on their city since the Shlorpians showed up.
This is most prominent at the kids’ school where the principal, teachers and vast majority of the students openly hate them. But the adults have acclimated to society, as well. Season 2, Episode 2 shows Terry going to a lot of dinner parties with humans. And in Season 1, Episode 2, Korvo and Terry run for co-presidents of the Home Owner’s Association. It didn’t go well thanks to Korvo infecting everyone with nanobots.
While it’s odd that humans aren’t phased by the existence of alien life, the premise is key to Solar Opposites‘ comedy. It still seems strange that no government officials are breathing down their necks, though. One would think that the government would want access to their knowledge and technology. Instead, they live their lives as relatively normal people who just happen to have the ability to destroy the entire world.
Created by Justin Roiland and Mike McMahan, Solar Opposites stars Roiland as Korvo, Thomas Middleditch as Terry, Sean Giambrone as Yumyulack and Mary Mack as Jesse. Season 2 is available to stream on Hulu.
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