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Kainan is the main protagonist of the 2008 Howard McCain sci-fi film Outlander. He is an alien soldier who became stranded on Earth in the Vendel Period, where he battled an alien predator known as a Moorwen. Externally, Kainan is identical to a human, and is internally red-blooded, as his species is implied to be directly related to humanity.
Kainan was portrayed by Jim Caviezel, who also portrayed John Reese in Person of Interest, Jesus Christ in Passion of the Christ, and Edmond Dantès in the 2002 adaptation of The Count of Monte Cristo. He is a loose adaptation of Beowulf.
Biography[]
Early life[]
Kainan with his son on the Moorwen's planet, examining an alien flower
Kainan is a member of an advanced humanoid alien species, and was born sometime before 709 AD. As his species was one of conquest, Kainan joined his species' military, and participated in the invasion of the planet of the Moorwen, a species of giant quadruped predators. The alien leaders regarded the Moorwen as little more than animals, never learning if they were sapient or not, and thus carpet bombed the planet to exterminate the Moorwen. After the bombings, Kainan overlooked the destroyed landscape, and while he regretted joining the conquest, he decided to suppress his feelings and settle down on the planet with his wife and young son, as he was paid in land on the newly-conquered world. For some time, he lived in a colonist complex with his family, examining local fauna growing in his backyard with his son. In 709 AD, Kainan had to leave on another campaign, but unknown to the aliens, one Moorwen had survived the genocide, and a few weeks after the soldiers left, the Moorwen emerged and slaughtered the colonists, including Kainan's wife and son.
When Kainan eventually returned upon getting the report of the massacre, he and the other soldiers found the remains of the colonists. Kainan, deeply saddened, was assigned to a ship carrying the cryogenically preserved body of his wife back to the alien homeworld for a proper burial, with at least one military officer aboard the ship with him.
Outlander[]
Before they could take off, the last Moorwen snuck aboard the ship, and during flight, it attacked, fatally wounding the officer and sending the ship off-course into the Sol System, right towards Earth, an abandoned "seed colony" of Kainan's species, where it crashed in a lake in Scandinavia. Kainan survived relatively unscathed due to his exosuit, managing to also pull the officer out of the water, although the officer soon died of his injuries, and the Moorwen escaped into the woods. After making it to shore, Kainan passed out, and was awoken sometime after morning by a flashback of finding his family dead. Kainan then took off his exosuit to dive into the water and retrieve cases containing a computer and a gun. Soon, he got both a distress beacon and the computer active, finding information on Earth and downloading local language and culture into his brain. Suddenly, thinking he heard the Moorwen, Kainan fired a shot at a tree, destroying it. Seeing no Moorwen around, Kainan rested until nightfall, then buried the officer under a mound of rocks. By the next day, keeping his gun in hand, Kainan tracked the Moorwen through the woods. Sometime by midday, he found the remains of a human village that was just destroyed by the Moorwen, recognizing its claw marks on a door. Suddenly, a human warrior from another village, named Wulfric, also approached the ruins, being heard by Kainan, but Wulfric managed to surprise attack Kainan on horseback, knocking Kainan's gun into a river and knocking Kainan out, taking him to the fortified village of Heorot.
Held prisoner in Heorot, Kainan was stripped of his last remaining armor pieces, his boots, and was interrogated by Wulfric, who referred to Kainan as "outlander," demanding to know who Kainan was and if he destroyed the other village. Kainan gave his name, and claimed to be a hunter from an island to the north who was stranded after a shipwreck, denying any involvement in the village's destruction. When asked what he was hunting, Kainan noticed a pendant resembling a dragon, claiming he was hunting dragons, which prompted Wulfric to beat him, but Kainan was able to fight back and knock both Wulfric and another warrior with him down, although the humans managed to overpower him and further bind him. However, after being left alone, Kainan saw a metal rod left in a nearby fireplace, with its handle sticking out, managing use his feet to pull it over to his bound hands, using the hot end of the rod to burn away the ropes binding them. Later, at night, a human female named Freya, daughter of Hrothgar, Heorot's king, went to deliver food to Kainan, noticing his wounds, and Kainan kept his hands behind him to pretend he was still bound. He asked Freya for water, just before she noticed that he was free. Realizing that Freya had seen his burned away binds, Kainan was forced to strike her before she could call for help, managing to escape the hut he was held in. However, as he tried to escape the village, pursued by other human warriors, the village was attacked by the Moorwen, which killed a few humans. Kainan successfully evaded the Moorwen, and tried to follow it when it left the village, only to be recaptured by the humans.
Rather than be put back in the hut, Kainan was chained by a well, waking up sometime during the day and seeing a young orphaned boy named Erik, who offered him bread, although the other humans kicked the bread away from Kainan. Seeing how Kainan appeared to recognize the creature, and remembering his remark about hunting dragons, the warriors had him brought before Hrothgar, where Kainan identified the Moorwen. While still skeptical, the humans recognized that the attacker was some sort of beast, and brought Kainan with them as they set out to hunt the Moorwen. When the party split up, Kainan was paired with Wulfric, who kept Kainan's hands bound, and both were soon brought to a cave when they heard other members of the party screaming from within, as they had entered it to investigate and woke a massive bear. Despite being bound, Kainan managed to take up a sword and kill the bear, prompting the humans to cut his binds as a sign of respect. After returning to the village, Kainan was accepted as a part of the community, and attended a feast of meat from the slain bear. During the feast, Kainan was formally introduced to Freya and Erik, and Wulfric challenged him to a game of "shields," where the other warriors held up their shields as platforms for the two to run across. Kainan proved to be skilled in keeping his balance atop the shields, and started to gain Wulfric's respect, although the shields eventually gave out under his weight and made him fall.
Sometime during the night, Gunnar, chieftain of the village destroyed by the Moorwen, returned from business abroad, finding the destruction and assuming it was Hrothgar's doing, his suspicion fueled by a rivalry the villages had. Gunnar and his men attacked Heorot, killing several defenders, but Kainan and the other warriors rallied to fight back, Kainan taking up a sword and killing several attackers, also defending Erik from the enemies. Eventually, the enemy forces were cut down to a size too small to keep fighting, forcing them to retreat with Gunnar. Kainan stayed on the walls after the attack, as in the woods, Gunnar and his remaining men were suddenly attacked by the Moorwen. Gunnar ran to the village with what men survived the Moorwen's attack, calling out that they surrender and not to shoot. Kainan, hearing the Moorwen, managed to get the gates open for them despite Wulfric and the other defenders shooting at Gunnar, allowing them to get through as the village defenders saw the Moorwen glow in the forest. Both human factions decided to unite against the common enemy, also seeing that their weapons were ineffective against the Moorwen. Kainan devised a plan to trap and kill the Moorwen by filling a pit with flammable alcohol, intending on replicating the bombs his species used in the conquest, inspired by the game of shields to use wooden shields as platforms over the pit, allowing humans used as lures to get across and to safety while the Moorwen would fall in.
During the construction of the trap, Kainan and Freya grew closer. Meeting in a cabin given to Kainan as his new residence, Kainan finally decided to explain his connection to the Moorwen, telling Freya of the conquest and the loss of his family, although not directly mentioning any advanced technology and only referring to planets as "islands." While Freya tried to comfort him, assuring him that he was only following the orders of his rulers and was not at fault, Kainan still felt responsible for the destruction the Moorwen had caused on Earth. Freya then gave Kainan a family sword, saying that she would know the right man to give it to, a man worthy of being king. The night the trap was completed, Kainan and Wulfric went outside the village to serve as bait for the Moorwen, which had been stalking the woods outside Heorot. Throwing a torch at the forest, Kainan revealed the Moorwen, which quickly killed a human priest that also went out to confront it. Kainan and Wulfric used the shields to get back into the village, with Kainan narrowly saving Wulfric from being pulled in with the Moorwen, which had fallen into the liquor. The alcohol was then set on fire by flaming arrows from the humans, burning it and rendering its skin somewhat vulnerable to human weapons, but did not kill the Moorwen. Additionally, the Moorwen secretly had an offspring in a cave it took residence in, which attacked the village from a well. The juvenile Moorwen killed several humans before both Moorwen ran off, also killing Hrothgar and Gunnar. Kainan stayed in Heorot with Wulfric, who was now crowned king, as the populace decided to evacuate.
Knowing that failing to stop the Moorwen could result in even more human causalities across the planet, Kainan formed a plan to smelt the metal from his spaceship into weapons, as the metal could be strong enough to harm Moorwen. Accompanied by Freya and Wulfric, Kainan returned to the lake where he crashed, diving into the water to retrieve pieces of the ship's hull while Freya and Wulfric waited for him in a boat, ignoring Wulfric's questions of how a ship went down in a lake. After sending a piece up to the surface, Kainan suddenly noticed the young Moorwen swim by, narrowly avoiding it by hiding within the ship. Getting back to the boat after the Moorwen had passed, Kainan discovered that it had capsized the boat and taken Freya, leaving Wulfric behind. Together, they returned to the village and forged the hull pieces into swords. Finding that the well was full of blood, an indication that the Moorwen emerged from it, Kainan, Wulfric, and the few warriors left with them descended into the underground caves the well led to, where the Moorwen were hiding. They tried to carefully navigate the twisting caverns, soon being attacked by the young Moorwen. After other members of the party were killed, the young Moorwen was blinded by a human, and Kainan and Wulfric found Freya, still alive and held in a chamber where human bodies were brought to feed the young Moorwen. They managed to pass Freya an alien metal sword through a crack in the wall, allowing Freya to kill the young Moorwen, and then Kainan tried to lead them in an escape.
Finding that the cave exit led to a high waterfall, Kainan and Wulfric tried to fend off the adult Moorwen. Wulfric was fatally wounded, but with Freya's help, Kainan was able to cut off one of the Moorwen's legs, and then send it over the side of the waterfall, managing to force it off before it could pull him down, presumably killing it. With the Moorwen gone, Wulfric passed on kingship to Kainan before dying. After helping Freya scale the cliff face above the waterfall, Kainan told Freya to signal the evacuation ships to return, while he went back to the crash site. He first retrieved some last items from his ship, also silently saying his final farewells to his wife's coffin. Finding the distress beacon still active, Kainan saw other alien ships arriving in the sky. Resolving not to return to his homeworld, where there was nothing left for him, Kainan used his sword to destroy the beacon, and the alien ships left after losing the signal. Kainan remained on Earth as king of the surviving Heorot population, taking Freya as his wife and adopting Erik. Although she told no one, Freya had seen the ships in the sky, and believed that Kainan had been sent by the gods.