I've been asked by several people what my thoughts are on the upcoming 'Alien: Covenant', so I figured I'd answer with a quick post.
I have no interest. And have no plans on ever seeing it.
'Prometheus' changed the alien from a "natural creature" to "mutagenic goo byproduct", and changed the Space Jockey from "alien species pilot" to "giant human" (100% shared DNA, remember)... who seeded life on Earth.
These are facts and there's no getting around them.
And from what I gather, Giger's Alien is now created via experimentation by the mad scientist android David(?). Fuck off.
'Prometheus' ruined everything I loved about the Alien and the Alien Mythos. And 'Alien: Covenant' is literally 'Prometheus 2', so why would I go back for more?
No, I will not be seeing 'Alien: Covenant'. Nor do I plan on watching any future outings, so long as the have any connection to 'Prometheus'.
^ Ridley Scott's Giant Human ripping off my head.
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Maybe I'll chop off the bottom under 'ALIEN' :)
* thanks, Liz!
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15 comments:
'Why would I go back for more?' I don't know, Jim, I felt exactly the same way, and yet there I was handing my money over again to see something that I knew would be awful. What is wrong with me? I keep making excuses for him, saying he'll change, and then Ridley just abuses me again. I hate him, but I just can't escape, I need help.
To be fair, it wasn't as bad as Prometheus, although SPOILER the space flutes are back. But it is just a retread of everything you've seen before, just now with two androids. UK press have gone all gooey eyed over it, for some reason, smells of Fox pay off, if you ask me.
Still, I'm with you on the poster, that was very cool, almost gave me an inkling of hope it might be good, almost. But no, this was made by the same man who made the almost unwatchable Exodus: Gods and Kings. Alien and Bladerunner were all a long time ago.
You have more power than I. I really wanted to support it to get the Blomkamp Alien movie(controversial, I know, but it's for Newt), though I know that movie is dead. But I feel I still need to see it. I also hate that the Space Jockey is a human, hate that so much. But I have to see for myself.
I watched it just for the xeno scenes. It's kinda like a cross between a dog alien and the big chap.
The CGI of it in some places is pretty ropey, but there's a few great shots of it, like the main trailer shot on the craft, and a couple of scenes where it's bipedal briefly.
It's completely the opposite of the big chap in behaviour though. No methodical angel of death here, just a rabid hyper animal. The only scene that's kinda like the original creature is the shower scene.
Jim, I couldn't agree more. Prometheus was a square kick in the jimmy for any real Aliens fans. The lore was completely destroyed, and what's worse, Prometheus as a stand-alone movie was a giant pile of poorly written shiite anyway. I totally agree with Chris above. Ridley Scott is washed up. Alien, Legend, and my all time favorite, Blade Runner is all I can give him credit for. He did a few other movies that are OK (Gladiator, Blackhawk Down, hell, even The Martian was ok) but in general he has done nothing memorable other than the big three above. It kills me how he is touted as one of the greatest directors of all time, while there are other directors who CONSISTENTLY make GREAT films, like Tarantino for example. I hate to say I hate Ridley too, but I do. He totally sucks.
I'm sick and filthy. And Sooooo weak. Shame on me. I watched it two times now, in the hope it would improve, but it actually got worse.
I excused the fuck up of Promifeces as a morning toilet byproduct by dumpshit Lindelpuf. But hey, nevermind a John Logan can still put an fermented cream topping with a pissy ease on it. Well done. Writing for Dollywood must still give you a crapload of Dollar bills to whipe the buttpain away.
Jim, You are a wise man. I salute You.
Talking about Salute. Ridley Skotch should cut it down a bit. No problem with drinking, I love it too. But I don't fuck up a fan franchise and pull a Lucas.
Well anyway. At least ALIEN Resurrection and AVP are good movies now....
If you can do it, Jim, don't see it, but I suspect it's a bit like a car crash, you don't want to look, but, oh no, you have, and now you've seen something you'd rather forget. I was looking forward to the Blomkamp version too, but like you said, it seems like that's dead in the water.
One thing that is confusing me, is that people seem to be loving Alien Covenant. I'm a member of the Giger's Alien group on Facebook (he sometimes has a few cool bits and bobs on there) and I've been checking the scores of most of the people on there who saw it in the US last night and they're usually giving it 8/10. If you're a member of that group, you usually have a bit of nerd inside you, so you would expect the scores to be lower just for the nitpicking and general finger waving if something isn't right (The chestbursters now come out super quick, faster than AvsP, for instance), but no, UK critics are also loving it. So what are they seeing that I'm missing? I'd really love to know.
I could kind of see why people liked Prometheus, it has that similar conspiracy theory feel to it, you can join up all the dots and make something out of nothing, and it looked pretty, and if someone doesn't get it, they're ignorant, or just too stupid to see the truth. But what is it with Alien Covenant? There's nothing new in it, eggs, chestbursters, robots (okay, now there are two) big chap, same basic story cobbled with a half arsed attempt to get some sort of origin idea in there. But it's also kinda dull. Doesn't matter if it's an Alien movie or not, if it's boring, that's pretty much unforgivable.
I also agree with Scott, the Alien as a form is pretty much dead, I mean, we've seen it, what more can it do? What I thought we'd get to see in Prometheus was an expansion of some of those early concepts of the egg silo, they look really weird, there aren't any aliens in them, they're just disturbing; it's the unknown, the strange, which is what I love most about the first movie. So I hoped we'd get something along those lines, maybe some hieroglyphics to the Alien's life cycle as a reference, but that's it; I don't think you need xenomorphs to make an unsettling film about that universe. But instead we got a large room with a big head and loads of high school pondering about the meaning of creation, made even worse by Lindeloff's meddling with the script. Hey, who cares if it doesn't make sense, that's the mystery of space, right? No, Damon, it's not.
So I don't know, I was surprised and saddened Scott kowtowed to the fan boy reaction. He did an live link up interview at my advertising agency once, and according to those that went he was not a modest man, so the studio must've put some pressure on him; I mean, Prometheus wasn't any good, but at least stick to your guns, Ridley. My feeling is that Alien and Bladerunner were made by a collaboration of extremely talented people, Scott using the gifts of Giger, Cobb, and Syd Mead (amongst countless others) to produce two visually stunning pieces of work. But Scott on his own? He didn't write those scripts, or create that Alien. A visually talented film maker, no doubt, but visual niceties alone don't make for a great movie. Even Bladerunner's script sags a bit. (sorry)
Where am I going with this? Not sure, but if it's about Prometheus I'll generally rant for a while. I spent two years checking 'Alien Prequel News' every day for scraps of info, took the day off work so I could watch the first showing of it in London, and was thoroughly disappointed by the end of it. So much potential with David, that great bit with him dying his hair emulating Lawrence of Arabia (a Lindelof idea apparently, so credit due), what does it mean to be human etc.? And then it going absolutely nowhere, so I suppose you could say I've got an axe to grind.
Thing is, as long as punters keep turning up, these movies will continue getting made. And unfortunately, I'm one of those punters who turns up at the front of the queue on the very first night of it opening. So who's to blame? Fuck.
Sorry, that was a bit long.
I ended up seeing it. There were a few good parts, but the whole David revelation irked me. So I've been reading a lot of theories on Reddit LV426, and I think someone sort of nailed it. Spoilers: David did not create them, rather he had time to research the Engineer's data and sort of copy it. The lifecycle of the Xeno (Protomorph) he created was a bit different than the one we all know and love. Knowing this, I can enjoy the film a bit more. But hopefully David does not end up populate the eggs on LV426.
Lastly, I am seeing stuff today that Ridley does not like Cameron's Aliens. That would suck if he just ignores things like the Queen lifecycle.
Jim, I'm sorry you had to see that. But, i guess, like me, the pull was just too much. The only bit I really liked was the reveal as to what David did with Shaw, I thought that was really disquieting. Everything else, I just felt I'd seen before done better. (By Scott, unfortunately)
My hat is off to you for searching Reddit for fan theories, that is one dark, scary rabbit hole that I fell down with True Detective. After that I will not be frequenting those boards again.
As for Aliens, I'd say that Cameron had a clearer vision individually as to what the movie would be (wrote it, designed the Queen, drop ship etc), so a sequel from him would have been a much more interesting prospect (Scott's only as good as the script he's given). I could never really work out how the two egos of Cameron and Scott would have got on with Alien 5, though.
Who knows?
Thanks for chiming in, everyone! I love hearing everyone's thoughts on this!
FYI The Jim commenting above is a different Jim. 😀
To both JIms, I needed to vent!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Thanks!
Yeah, I did not realize the comment only showed my first name until after I posted my second comment! :)
-Jim2
David and Walter. Jim and Jim 2. Aaaaaaaahhh. I can't compute!
Jim was smart to avoid this POS. Prometheus is a masterpiece when compared to ALIEN Covenant. Ridley needs to throw in the towel now before things get worse. There really isn't anything good about this film outside of Fassbender's performance. It's a huge steaming dump on ALIEN fandom. I think this new film is the worst in the series. I hate it almost as much as Star Wars Episode 7 which I DESPISE! I still love ALIEN and ALIENS but The Force Awakens destroyed my love for Star Wars. I don't have high hopes for the new Blade Runner either which Ridley is involved with. The new trailer makes it look like a reshash of the original.
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