Alien: Covenant

[Kotowboy]

For me it was the moment he and walter were fighting and it cut away.

[gmillerdrake]

For me it was the moment he and walter were fighting and it cut away.

Well....yeah.....they sealed the deal but the moment David found Walter and was teaching him the flute I pretty much expected what happened to happen. Davids interest and questioning the mission prior To that sparked the thought as well.

[Kotowboy]

But the android at the end IS Walter - but David has imprinted on him.

So now it's David in an upgraded body.

[gmillerdrake]

But the android at the end IS Walter - but David has imprinted on him.

So now it's David in an upgraded body.

Huh? Imprinted?

I just took it as David 'killed' Walter....chopped his hand off to fully portray Walter and that was that.

[Kotowboy]

He doesn't have the hole in his chin. Ergo Walter.

[BlackInk]

Finally saw this last night. Alien is the franchise that got me interested in film making, so obviously I was hyped about this one.

My overall thoughts is that is was definetely good, but not as good as it could have been. It has some issues, most of which have been posted here already.

I agree that the final showdown with the Alien was too quick. Which also made it so that there wasn't really a sense of desperation. They found out there was a xenomorph on board, made a plan immediately, and it pretty much worked exactly like they planned on the first try. The sense of desperation in the original is incredible because they have all these ideas about how to deal with the Alien and none of it works. I understand that the movie was wrapping up and there wasn't more time for a lengthy showdown, but the xenomorph, the "perfect organism" being dispatched to quickly lessens the threat and impact of its presence a bit.

Speaking of the xenomorph, it was too fast, as in how it moved. This is more of a nitpick, but it's a detail that's important to me given my long love for the creature. Part of what makes it so scary in the original is that you can't really find it, it sneaks up on you. It's dead quiet until it's suddenly right behind you. Having it scream constantly and showing it run around with that speed makes it not as scary. I thought the shower scene was a perfect example of how they should have done it. It doesn't charge screaming into the shower and slaughter them. It sneaks up in the dark, does some really creepy shit, and then kills them.

I loved the opening scene with David and Wayland. And I thought everything up until landing on the planet had excellent pacing. It really took it's time with setting up the story, and it was great. But then the second half of the movie, while certainly entertaining, started to rush things, which is a shame because there's some really cool stuff going on. Like the time period from the captain getting the facehugger treatment to the first chestburster scene felt like it might have been 10-30 minutes, whereas in the original that thing felt like it took days to grow enough to burst out.

Pretty much everything having to do with David was great, easily the most interesting character and also the scariest of all the antagonists. Not monster-scary, but scary as in a much more sophisticated and calculating threat. Don't think there was anything wrong with the flute scene, I found it really interesting. Realizing David made the xenomorphs was a really cool moment.

And for all those saying that they "saw the twist coming", I honestly didn't even consider it a twist. Of course it was going to be David. Everything about how they filmed those scenes screamed it, so I don't really think it was supposed to be a secret, other than for the characters in the movie.

I'm sure I have more to say, but this is what I got right now.

At the end of Prometheus, she is bent on wiping the Engineers out so they cannot attack earth.  I think she was definitely all in on the xenocide.

Shaw went on to continue searching for the answers they came for in the first place, not to wipe them out.

[Phoenix87x]

^^^ I agree

Her words at the end of prometheus were something like  "they wanted to destroy us and I want to know why". She wanted answers, not massacre. My thoughts are that David put her to sleep and she never woke up.

[Zantera]

But the android at the end IS Walter - but David has imprinted on him.

So now it's David in an upgraded body.

The way I understood it Walter (as an upgraded model) had self healing (when his hand got lost and when he was stabbed with the flute by David) and one of the clues that it was David coming out of the temple and not Walter was that David didn't have that self healing. Hence he was stapling his wounds on the ship.

[Phoenix87x]

I liked Alien 3 (The assembly cut) up until Charles Dance died. The dynamic between him and Ripley was engaging and his death came way too early. Besides that, the film is a depressing mess.

[Dream Team]

Looks like this has officially bombed, only $10 mil the second weekend; who knows if they'll green light another.

[TioJorge]

Sucks but not too surprising. I saw it twice, the opening day and a couple days after and both times (in very popular theaters in highly populated areas) the theater was fairly dead. Really going to bummed majorly if there isn't at least another film. I know there are a few more planned but really I think if they had to stretch their dollar, the stories could be linked from prequels to the first movie in the next film and quite frankly that's all I'd really want. I wouldn't say no to more by any means but if it continues to bomb...that isn't going to happen from the looks of it.

[Kotowboy]

Not quite. Still hasn't opened in a few territories including china.

Plus so far it's made $160m on a $97m budget. Roughly 1.5x its budget.

It's only been out like 2 weeks. May as well wait and see what the total haul is.

[soupytwist]

I thought the movie was pretty weak, but it's sad to see the franchise falling on it's arse in the boxoffice like this, and this film does seem to have it's fans - so I wish no ill on it at all.   It seems to be roughly in the same place as the Terminator franchise now.

[MrBoom_shack-a-lack]

I remember the first time I heard that Ridley was involved in a new Alien movie, the original creator. I was so excited for that but looking back now it just feels kinda sad.

https://www.google.se/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/film/2017/may/02/ridley-scott-alien-5-covenant-neill-blomkamp

Reading this it seems like Ridley didn't have any say in the final decision but I still feel bummed that he says Alien 5 was never going to happen.
I think with Neills vision and a great writing team it could evolve into an interesting Alien movie but yea who knows, it probably won't happen now anyway.

[BlackInk]

It seems to be roughly in the same place as the Terminator franchise now.

Maybe, but despite Covenant's flaws it's nowhere near as bad as Terminator Genysis was.

I would be so sad if this was the end of the Alien franshise. It means a lot to me and is what got me into film overall in the first place, so I'm hoping there will be more.

[soupytwist]

It seems to be roughly in the same place as the Terminator franchise now.

Maybe, but despite Covenant's flaws it's nowhere near as bad as Terminator Genysis was.

I'd say it was as bad, neither film did anything for me.   But I feel your pain - I've just seen Pirates 5 this weekend and my God it's drab - I genuinely adored the first movie, it's hard to believe how woefully inept that franchise has become

[Kotwoboy]

I got this on Blu Ray today. Really good in-depth Making-Of. Which is always a good thing.

I enjoy some good extras as much as the movie usually - sometimes more - as i'm very interested in how films are made.

[Kotwoboy]

I would be so sad if this was the end of the Alien franshise. It means a lot to me and is what got me into film overall in the first place, so I'm hoping there will be more.

What I want is one more film with Fassbender going crazy and all hell breaking loose - which leads directly into Alien 1979 - then no more prequels.

[TioJorge]

Yeah one more film I think would be perfect. That's kind of what I imagined anyway when Prometheus came out. A film after that one to explain the engineers, and one more after that one explaining the true birth of what we now know as "Xenomorph". I was surprised when I heard he had a few more planned out and it seemed to me to be a bit excessive.

I'll be really surprised and saddened if there isn't at least one more. I know this tanked but I wouldn't think it'd be a total waste to do, if only for the hardcore fans.

[Zantera]

Yeah I don't think they need another 2-3 movies to tell this story. Just have the next movie set on Paradise, some humans wake up/escape the ship but David has already begun operation Xenomorph and aliens vs humans is a thing, then engineers show up (they want revenge for what David did to their city, and I doubt all of them met their fate there), have a aliens vs humans vs engineers type battle on Paradise, movie ends with one of the engineers in a ship with the alien eggs in the cargo and it crash lands and sets up Alien. The final part could either be an engineer getting greedy thinking "hey we can use these eggs ourselves to destroy planets" and then just foolishly underestimating the xenomorph, OR just an engineer fleeing the planet on a ship not knowing about the cargo at all.

[The Trooper]

As for the Aliens geek in me, only 1 more needs to be made. I think anyone that knows whats playing out, as was previously said by another poster.

[faizoff]

Finally got to see this movie and am really kicking myself for not seeing it in the theater. What a visual treat. I found the story a ton better than Prometheus, having the focus on David was excellent and I wish they did include more material about the Engineers but what we got was good though.

I'm not sure if I should wait to pick up the Bluray since Prometheus came out with a deluxe edition that had even more extras. I noticed there's no 3D version of Covenant so it's probably a hint that there may be another edition lurking.


Edit: So I did a bit of searching and apparently this movie wasn't released in 3D at all which is surprising. So there may not be a super deluxe edition, I may pick up the Target edition of the bluray, it comes with a sweet booklet.


I watched the two prologue videos after the movie and sort of wished they were in the movie, it would've given a little more context. The first one is a great introduction to the crew, the second one I'm so glad I didn't watch before the movie came out. It would've ruined my enjoyment of the setup of the second half.


Looking back at some of the comments, many are disappointed that the final confrontation was quite short. I'm honestly glad it was that short, it was already echoing the final confrontation in Aliens. I would've liked that the 2nd half of the movie ended on the planet rather than the Covenant but I'm happy either way. Barring a few things here and there, I was incredibly happy with the movie.


Hopefully the final movie(s) in this trilogy has a satisfying conclusion to David's arc.

[bosk1]

I finally got to see it this past weekend.  I thought it was pretty good.  I didn't find it quite as scary as I thought I would, but that's fine.  Overall, I think that is my reaction to it as a whole.  It was "fine."  It wasn't great.  It had flaws.  But it was fine for what it was.  And I think it ultimately improves on the series as a whole.  If we had simply been left with Alien and Aliens, it would have been just about perfect.  The mystery of the Aliens' origins didn't NEED to be explained.  But starting with 3, the series just went off the rails.  By the time we get to Resurrection, many felt it had been ruined.  And then by the time we get to Resurrection, I think many felt it was ruined twice over.  Ridley's films get it back on track, even if they do feel like the story is taking a BIG step down from the first two films.

As for this film itself, yeah, there are problems.  As in Prometheus, the crew did some REALLY stupid things a crew in their situation just doesn't do.  We could have still had the same outcome in a more intelligent way, IMO.  For example, they stay suited up to protect themselves from whatever unknown dangers a completely unknown and unscouted alien planet might be harboring.  But something fairly innocuous happens to where someone's suit is compromised, and the pathogen particles get inside.  Boom!  Flaw of "crew is stupid by going out into an alien environment unprotected" is fixed.  Second, stretch out the timeline a bit so the incubation period from the first and second films lines up.  We don't have to see everything in real time.  It's okay.  But things don't have to happen instantaneously so that we feel rushed and the whole thing ends up feeling too make-believe.  Third, either have them not know dude is infected when he gets back inside the drop ship or have it be his significant other with him who emotionally overrides quarantine protocol, or have some other somewhat realistic way that he gets back inside the drop ship other than just stupidly ignoring protocol.  I mean, I think Ridley was trying to go for the fact that they were in fact aware of quarantine protocol, but were acting emotionally and "it all happened so fast" because dude was convulsing, etc.  But I just didn't feel like it came across well. 

As far as the final confrontation, I'm generally with faizoff.  It didn't need to be drawn out.  But I did have two issues:  (1) How did it get on the Covenant to begin with?  There was only one.  And we saw it die and get spit out by the claw during the whole sequence with Daniels outside.  Maybe this was explained in the commentary.  I didn't have time to check that out.  Anyone have any insight?  (2) Daniels and Tennesse knew too much about the xenomorph.  If everything had happened as rapid-fire as we saw in the film, they shouldn't have been able to process all the facts about the xenomorph so quickly.  The confrontation could have been more realistically haphazard and still have worked just fine. 

Anyhow, flaws aside, it was a good film.  I really like this comment someone posted here:

Ridley Scott's Alien prequel films have definitely been flawed so far, but I also find them deeply interesting, both thematically and in the way that they exist as a strange compromise between pure artistic vision and the financial needs of a studio. I understand why people dislike them, and for most of the reasons given, I won't attempt a counter-argument - but for me, both Prometheus and Alien: Covenant have (inadvertently?) ended up being two of the more fascinating science fiction films of the decade so far, and I can't wait to see how Scott concludes the story.

[Zantera]

(1) How did it get on the Covenant to begin with?  There was only one.  And we saw it die and get spit out by the claw during the whole sequence with Daniels outside.  Maybe this was explained in the commentary.  I didn't have time to check that out.  Anyone have any insight?

Apparently the scene when the mexican guy got a facehugger on his face for 5 seconds (before he got it off) was enough to put an embryo in him (before he got his face burnt). Which feels like a bit of a contradiction to how it went in the original Alien. Why did the facehugger in the original movie have to stay on the face for hours/days when all that was needed was a few seconds to plant the embryo?

[faizoff]

Another thing I read is that when the xenomorph was crushed not all of its body pieces were thrown out and I think with David having experimented so many types, this particular one can regenerate from the other parts. Yup, found it on IMDB trivia.

According to Ridley Scott's director's commentary, the Planet 4 variant of the Xenomorph is able to regenerate from would be fatal injuries like being crushed and dismembered, making it virtually "Indestructible".

[MrBoom_shack-a-lack]

To celebrate the 40th anniversary of Ridley Scott’s groundbreaking sci-fi horror film Alien (1979), six visionary filmmakers were selected to bring their Alien-inspired stories to life. From terrifying escapes, to Facehuggers and Xenomorphs, these captivating shorts brings forth an exciting new narrative for fans while paying homage to the original film.

Alien: 40th Anniversary Shorts | Official Teaser

Will definitely check this out!

I'm hoping Blomkamp is one of them.

[bosk1]

Wow, those look pretty good.  Hard to tell from just the really short clips.  But they all seemed to have the tone and flavor of the first two films at least.

[gmillerdrake]

yeah...i saw that. Looks awesome....can't wait!!

[Zook]

Holy crap, this movie is 2 years old already?!

[MrBoom_shack-a-lack]

Alien 40th Anniversary Short Film: "Containment"

It's pretty good, I mean it's a celebration of the franchise so nothing original about it. Cool though, looking forward to the other contributions.

Here's some info about the shorts:

With the classic as inspiration, each of these original shorts capture iconic franchise moments and have unleashed the potential of the Alien universe to thrilling new heights.

Alien: Harvest - Directed by Benjamin Howdeshell
The surviving crew of a damaged deep-space harvester have minutes to reach the emergency evacuation shuttle. A motion sensor is their only navigation tool leading them to safety while a creature in the shadows terrorizes the crew. However, the greatest threat might have been hiding in plain sight all along. 

Alien: Containment - Written and Directed by Chris Reading
Four survivors find themselves stranded aboard a small escape pod in deep space. Trying to piece together the details around the outbreak that led to their ship’s destruction, they find themselves unsure to trust whether or not one of them might be infected. 

Alien: Alone - Written and Directed by Noah Miller
Hope, an abandoned crew member aboard the derelict chemical hauler Otranto, has spent a year trying to keep her ship and herself alive as both slowly fall apart. After discovering hidden cargo, she risks it all to power up the broken ship in search of human life. 

Alien: Night Shift - Written and Directed by Aidan Breznick
When a missing space trucker is discovered hungover and disoriented, his co-worker suggests a nightcap as a remedy. Near closing time, they are reluctantly allowed inside the colony supply depot where the trucker’s condition worsens, leaving a young supply worker alone to take matters into her own hands. 

Alien: Specimen - Written and Directed by Kelsey Taylor
It’s the night shift in a colony greenhouse, and Julie, a botanist, does her best to contain suspicious soil samples that have triggered her sensitive lab dog. Despite her best efforts the lab unexpectedly goes into full shutdown and she is trapped inside. Little does she know, an alien specimen has escaped the mysterious cargo, and a game of cat and mouse ensues as the creature searches for a host. 

Alien: Ore - Written and Directed by the Spear Sisters
As a hard-working miner of a planet mining colony, Lorraine longs to make a better life for her daughter and grandchildren. When her shift uncovers the death of a fellow miner under mysterious circumstances, Lorraine is forced to choose between escape or defying management orders and facing her fears to fight for the safety of her family.

[gmillerdrake]

Finally got around to watching Containment. Pretty neat. Like MrBoom)chack-a-lack says.....there's nothing 'new' about it but it's cool to see some other aspects of 'what ifs' the zenomorph were in this or that situation?

Also, liked how there was another strong character that knew she was dead....no use in lying to herself......and just takes her final moments alive to try and save others rather than waste it on a lost cause to extend her life.