We can have this disagreement all we want. You think Alex was meant to die. I don't. It was only when Colin Hanks wanted off, they dreamt up the "Tess betrays the group and is the killer". Because the whole season, Tess was becoming likable and was learning to accept she and Max weren't meant to be. And even in Viva Las Vegas, she was secretly thrilled that Valenti made her come with him and Kyle when he busted the gang. Like she was thrilled at the acceptance. And she was even getting closer to Kyle.
Then suddenly everything went warped in the next episode. All the progress it looked like Max and Liz were making was starting to be undone, and countdown was on until Alex died and Tess was revealed to be in this all a long due to a plan 40 years ago with Nasedo. It was to random, the change. Which tells me, it was only after the cut in episode orders and Colin getting another movie offer and the show deciding to write him out with finality that Tess went evil.
Would I love to look back and see that there were hints Tess was in this to enact the master plan. You can probably find ways to indicate it. Tess was definately of the manipulating and evil side in Season 1 as she tried to get Max to notice her before she revealed her to be an elien. But with how normalized she was becoming in the group in Season 2. It came out of nowhere. But that is JMO.
We know that Tess was originally supposed to show up in the finale to Season 1, but was pushed up due to circumstances behind the scenes. So she may have always been intended for Season 2. Emilie has said that she had no idea she was leaving the show, until she read the script that had Tess being revealed as the killer and sent away. But the way they wrote most of Season 2 tells me they never planned to have Alex die. It was only after Colin's schedule became impossible to control, they changed things.
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The fact that the writers had Alex go to Sweden, instead of being absent in a few episodes or visiting relatives or going on vacation with his parents somewhere or taking a short course at a college in the U.S., shows that the writers already knew before Alex returned from Sweden that Alex would die, since Liz’s discovery that Alex hadn’t gone to Sweden is an essential part of the story.
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Sweden only became important when they decided to kill Alex off. Otherwise it was perfect explanation why Alex wasn't around for a number of episodes. We know from comments from Colin and other production people, that they had just written Colin back in when the new offers for Colin came about. Which tells me, Sweden was never meant to be a hoax. But when they decided to allow Colin his out from the show, they came up with this mystery that Alex never went to Sweden. And was really decoding the book for Tess who was mindwarping him until his untimely death. Otherwise, Sweden was a perfect way to write out Alex for a few episode. Say he was away for month due to a school exchange.
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Tess was in love with Max. She thought that Max wanted to be with her and go to Antar someday, until Max didn’t forgive her for what she did and defended Liz.
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Tess was not stupid. She knew he loved Liz. Which is why she said to Liz in Season 3, that he was always dreaming of Liz when he was with Tess. She knew Max wasn't with her out of love. It was because of the baby she schemed to get pregnant with. Now it's on Max that he slept with Tess. As much as I would love for it be revealed to be a mindwarp. But the fact remains, Max was a teenage boy and boys make stupid mistakes. And he had to pay for it. But no way did Tess think Max wanted to be with her because of love. She used the baby was sick to get Max to go with her. Otherwise, Max would have wanted to stay on Earth. He never really wanted to go back to Antar.
So at the end of this debate, you'll think what you want. But I do not think Colin was always meant to die. It was just something that just happened because of behind the scenes drama.