So I saw Alien Covenant. I am pissed (spoiler free rant)

LoneSage said:

I can't be the only one more curious about the engineers than the alien at this point

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No, you certainly aren't, I think this is precisely why people that enjoyed Prometheus really have a dislike for Covenant.

LoneSage said:

I can't be the only one more curious about the engineers than the alien at this point

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The "alien" was never anything more than a vessel for me...it is a physical manifestation of fear, danger, and a key antagonist. It has no personality, no required backstory. I think that's what Covenant bothered me so much. I am far more curious about the engineers than the alien and the movie got it all wrong.

Explaining the [strikethrough]Engineers[/strikethrough] Space Jockey shrinks the universe. One of the nice things about the derelict in Alien is the way it mirrors the Xenomorph. There's a macro/micro thing going on. The crew of the Nostromo is trapped and alone. First contact wants to kill them and they're getting sold out to it. You get the feeling in Alien for how big and how empty and how silent, silent as God, the universe has turned out to be. The Derelict suggests that whatever was "out there" passed us by a long time ago, and it was so dangerous that even picking over its bones risks our extinction, and it died out because the universe hates life. Even so, there are plenty of us who are dumb and greedy enough to try to get rich off of it (By making it a weapon? A weapon against whom, for fuck's sake?)

Emperor Ming was right. If we had known anything about the true nature of the universe, anything at all, we would've hidden from it in terror.

At this point Red Dwarf has a more challenging universe than Alien.

I get that. I get the fact that if you explain something it loses its appeal. The same way in horror films when you have this monster killing everyone but you get that glimpse of it here and there, it intrigues you, but when you get the full monty shot of it, you realize it's really not that scary after all (see Evil Dead II).

I'd be fine with not having a fully explained story on the engineers and shit, but Alien Covenant didn't even toss a bone to the audience, it just doesn't care about the questions unanswered in Prometheus and just makes up its own ridiculous explanations for questions that weren't really asked and destroying continuity for the series because I guess they never bothered to check how this actually affected the franchises on going storyline???

SML said:

Explaining the [strikethrough]Engineers[/strikethrough] Space Jockey shrinks the universe. One of the nice things about the derelict in Alien is the way it mirrors the Xenomorph. There's a macro/micro thing going on. The crew of the Nostromo is trapped and alone. First contact wants to kill them and they're getting sold out to it. You get the feeling in Alien for how big and how empty and how silent, silent as God, the universe has turned out to be. The Derelict suggests that whatever was "out there" passed us by a long time ago, and it was so dangerous that even picking over its bones risks our extinction, and it died out because the universe hates life. Even so, there are plenty of us who are dumb and greedy enough to try to get rich off of it (By making it a weapon? A weapon against whom, for fuck's sake?)

Emperor Ming was right. If we had known anything about the true nature of the universe, anything at all, we would've hidden from it in terror.

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Well said.

What is starting to kill this franchise for me is the fact that Ridley is basically stating that David "engineered" the Xenomorph. If that is the case, then the mystery of the franchise is out the window for me. Like others have said, it shrinks the entire universe and removes any thought of a derelict spaceship crash landing and a new species being created on LV-426.

LoneSage said:

I can't be the only one more curious about the engineers than the alien at this point

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After I saw the cut footage from Prometheus I was actually fascinated by them.
So much potential for a movie about an extra terrestrial species that wasn't grotesque and violent like the aliens/predators or cartoonish and silly like in Avatar or star wars.

Prometheus left me starving for details about their culture and their way of life....and this copout in covenant pretty much assures me I will never really give a fuck about the aliens universe ever again.

I thought the movie was entertaining but not great. The crew was rather inept to say the least. I mean, at one point they basically made Kenny Powers responsible for the lives of 2000+ people. And you could see the final plot twist coming a mile away.

Poonman that vid in your sig is amazing.

DevilRedeemed said:

Poonman that vid in your sig is amazing.

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YouTube search Mike Diva. His work is amazing.

Well, I've seen Alien and Aliens. Never could sit through any of the other movies. Started watching Alien 3 on video once, long long ago, and quit just a little way in. Seen bits and pieces of the other movies in passing one place or another but not actually watched any of them. Those AVP movies and this new stuff just all looked like crap to me and I never bothered with them. What little bits I've seen pretty much reinforced that belief.

SML said:

Explaining the [strikethrough]Engineers[/strikethrough] Space Jockey shrinks the universe. One of the nice things about the derelict in Alien is the way it mirrors the Xenomorph. There's a macro/micro thing going on. The crew of the Nostromo is trapped and alone. First contact wants to kill them and they're getting sold out to it. You get the feeling in Alien for how big and how empty and how silent, silent as God, the universe has turned out to be. The Derelict suggests that whatever was "out there" passed us by a long time ago, and it was so dangerous that even picking over its bones risks our extinction, and it died out because the universe hates life. Even so, there are plenty of us who are dumb and greedy enough to try to get rich off of it (By making it a weapon? A weapon against whom, for fuck's sake?)

Emperor Ming was right. If we had known anything about the true nature of the universe, anything at all, we would've hidden from it in terror.

At this point Red Dwarf has a more challenging universe than Alien.

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One of the nice things about Aliens was that it took the tone in a different direction, while still respecting the principles you outline. By, I think predictably, trying to overly anthropomorphize the intelligence behind the derelict (through the sudden appearance of giant pale people on the scene) the newer films miss the whole point of something being alien and awful beyond one's understanding. The cosmic horror gets bleached out of everything, and one is left with the usual inexplicably human-like aliens creating life on earth for the umpteenth time while the film producers go on about it like it's a startling new idea in sci-fi. Bleh.

FAT$TACKS said:

Well, I've seen Alien and Aliens. Never could sit through any of the other movies. Started watching Alien 3 on video once, long long ago, and quit just a little way in. Seen bits and pieces of the other movies in passing one place or another but not actually watched any of them. Those AVP movies and this new stuff just all looked like crap to me and I never bothered with them. What little bits I've seen pretty much reinforced that belief.

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I enjoyed avp movies for what they were. If they had Ernest P Worrell they would have been amazing.

Ernest would have improved any of the Alien and/or Predator movies.

SML said:

Ernest would have improved any of the Alien and/or Predator movies.

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Ernest Goes to Jail X Alien 3

This was the first Alien movie I saw in my life.

It was meh. Kinda want to watch the first two now just to see what the hype was all about.

Maury V. said:

This was the first Alien movie I saw in my life.

It was meh. Kinda want to watch the first two now just to see what the hype was all about.

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If you've never seen Alien or Aliens you've been doing life incorrectly.

Don't see any of the other ones, though.

wyo said:

I thought the movie was entertaining but not great. The crew was rather inept to say the least. I mean, at one point they basically made Kenny Powers responsible for the lives of 2000+ people. And you could see the final plot twist coming a mile away.

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That plot twist was so damn obvious.
I was super excited to see this movie. I loved the open world that Prometheus left, and this movie was just messy. What is left to salvage for the next one?

Evil Wasabi said:

There was a theory that has been spread for years now, that the black goo will take on the character of the host. Because humans are vile, the xenomorph becomes what we see in the movies - insatiable destroyers of life. But the engineers, assuming they are perfect, can trigger a perfect genesis. The reason that engineers got wiped out was probably because of human contact with the goo.

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It kinda makes sense that the xenomorph would take on characteristics and traits from its prey to make it a better hunter in its new enviroment. Anyway, even the people like myself who thinks the new movies are kind of alright seem to agree that the lore was better when the xenomorph was just a strange space parasite.

Famicommander said:

If you've never seen Alien or Aliens you've been doing life incorrectly.

Don't see any of the other ones, though.

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I'm terrible when it comes to movies. I didn't watch Back To the Future 1 and 2 until 2010! I didn't see CB4 until 2011!

I managed to see this over the weekend and wow was i surprised (and not in a good way).
Now I love the original 3 movies, not a massive fan of resurrection, really liked Prometheus (it had its problems, mainly Dr Holloway and some plot points but apart from that I quite enjoyed it), I also enjoyed AVP as a standalone movie but hated the AVP:R

So now I sat down to watch Covenant and fuck me what a pile of shit, absolutely nothing is explained, what little information is given out now fucks with everything that has come before it, loved David in Prometheus but totally ruined in Covenant etc.

I actually thought all the problems with Prometheus were down to Damon Lindelof (as I am not a fan of his not wanting to explain everything and leave it to the viewers imagination) but im starting to think that its Scott who is just off his fucking rocker these days and maybe Lindelof calmed him down and made Prometheus work

I dont know but the film was shit regardless

I'm surprised by the love of Alien 3 in this thread. It was an ok movie. Maybe I need to see it again, but I have seen Alien Resurrection more times, probably because Ron Perlman and Raymond Cruz (Tuco from BB and BCS) are in it.

Lets Gekiga In said:

I'm surprised by the love of Alien 3 in this thread. It was an ok movie. Maybe I need to see it again, but I have seen Alien Resurrection more times, probably because Ron Perlman and Raymond Cruz (Tuco from BB and BCS) are in it.

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I think Alien 3 is a good film and in my opinion ties up Ripleys story nicely, i suppose a certain amount of it is nostalgia these days, certainly if you watch the Assembly Cut of Alien3 it adds a lot to the story and explains a couple of things (like what the fuck happened to Golic, as he just disappears in the Theatrical Cut).

however the Egg on the Sulaco just cannot be explained really, you can make up anything you like however I cannot see how it got where it did, I do not like Resurrection very much but through it had some good characters (Ron Perlman does a great performance)

This film seems to indicate Ridley Scott essentially ignoring anything related to the franchise that he didn't have anything to do with. He'd disregarding the massive influence the second film had on the pop culture identity of the monster. I almost feel as though he has legit disdain for everything after the first film, much like the Engineer trying to destroy the humans at the end of Prometheus.

As I watched Alien: Covenant, the first thing I thought of was how incensed the 'canon' loyalists would be about the deviations from established concepts.

Here's what I thought of this movie, in a nutshell:

Ridley Scott wanted to take this franchise in a different direction with Prometheus. He didn't want to just do another film about movie monsters stalking victims. He wanted to try some things and make a more existential film. The ironic twist is that David, the creation of the creation, ultimately becomes the creator and unlike everyone else in the universe, finds a reason to exist when there is no real philosophical reason to exist.

"We created you because we could."-Holloway, Prometheus

Life has no meaning on its own; it's what's done with that life that infuses it with any sense of value. This makes life imperfect. It's implied that perhaps the Engineers discovered the folly in trying to create a 'perfect organism', and I truly believe that at the end of the film when the Engineer tries to kill everyone, it's not simply because it's time for the film to have an action beat (although it surely was sorely needed at that moment); this Engineer has seen how badly his people have screwed up and he intends to correct the mistake by destroying the creation, which is now creating on its own.

However, Prometheus, for all of its vast ideas, is a film whose questions are very much at odds with its clumsy execution. It's a bad film, but in the years since its release I've taken a less harsh view of it. I now enjoy its provocative ideas and intuitive direction. But i cannot forgive the characters for how dumbly they're written.

With Alien: Covenant, Ridley Scott isn't really making an Alien film. He's not even really making a Prometheus sequel. It seems to me that what's happened is that Scott took all the same fundamental ideas and principles from Prometheus and re-interpreted them within the trappings of something that looks familiar to movie audiences. To put it simply, he doesn't want to give up on his philosophical ideas so he communicates them more directly and with less required intuition.

Ironically, in order to have even a chance of liking Alien: Covenant, you have to not care about the franchise.

I liked Alien: Covenant while recognizing its many flaws, some of which have been discussed in this very thread. I'm sort of the inverse of Prometheus fans, although I've taken to appreciating that film for its strengths.

I like the concepts of this movie. They're the same concepts as expressed in Prometheus but through a different lens. By no means am I saying that Alien: Covenant is a good film. Rather, I'm saying I'm tired of Alien movies and if the creature can be used to express compelling sci-fi ideas, then I'm willing to hear them out. I felt that the creator allegories in this movie were more transparent in this film than they were in Prometheus and I liked how David was such a mad scientist about the whole thing.

If there is a real cinematic crime here, it's that Scott should have just made a new franchise. I feel that in Scott's head, Prometheus is a metaphor for going back to the origins of his 'movie life' to mine further meaning from it. But this was always going to be a square peg jammed through a round hole.