Alien: Covenant *Spoilers from post 747*

Drumpot

Just reflecting on the movie..

The second time I mentioned I enjoyed it more and there really are some great moments. I actually loved the whole face hugger scene with David revealing his secret plans to Oram. Then Oram wakes up has a casual chat with David and wham....

I enjoyed the iconic moment more the second time, the music signalling the birth of the first xenomorph. David looking like a proud father... I thought it was a beautifully shot scene, the gravity of which I could only appreciate the second time.

I also particularly loved when there are only two left and the throw out the beacon for Tenesse to find them. Everything is moving fast and the score just ramps up the tension.

Just as they get on the ship, the alien looking down at them is superb. Then going into full gallop!!! I mean what's not to love?!!! This is just a ridiculously entertaining movie.

I really hope it does well and want to see more Scott Aliens..

Beechwoodspark

Did David crash the space ship into the mountain after he flew over the city dropping the "virus" on the engineers?

Beechwoodspark

constitutionus wrote: »

i disagree with the bit about david. his progression is pretty much the best thing to come out of this to me.

he's now up there with skynet as a creation in my mind. one of the nice bits in covenent was his discussions with walter and how they made him "inferior" cause they knew - either consciously or unconsciously- what a threat david posed.

all our strengths as a race and immortal? thats just asking for trouble.

all too often in a sci/fi flm "robots" are portrayed as wanting to be human. its nice to see one that thinks "fuk that im superior"



on the idiocy thing again i cant believe yer wan going for a wash is getting such flack. yes theres a side of me screaming "feck aliens ,have you NEVER seen a horror film in your life ? feck the bleeding smell stick with the group !

but IMO is pales in comparison to the idiocy by the acting captain who followed david down into the caves to stick his head in an alien egg. i dont give a monkies if he said it'd be grand. after that tour of his "little shop of horrors" upstairs and the general psycho behaviour of the bot i'd be halfway to the mountains !

THAT whole scene was unbelievable

That was the scene that made me give up on the film.

Bowlardo

It was a poor poor movie

Cloudio9

Beechwoodspark wrote: »

Did David crash the space ship into the mountain after he flew over the city dropping the "virus" on the engineers?

He asked Shaw to park it :pac:

Mickeroo

Probably one of the most predictable films I've sat through in quite a while. Every beat telegraphed long before it happens. No tension, no surprises.

The scene where david leads Crudup's character to the eggs was nonsensical, there was no character or plot reasoning for him not to gun david down on the spot and the xenomorph birth scene just made most of the audience laugh.

Only saving graces were Fassbender and the fact that it looked pretty bar some poor CG for the monsters.

Prometheus was bad but at least it had a bit of ambition . This was just a shallow imitation of previous films for the most part.

klose

bullvine wrote: »

Did all the engineer bodies not look like they had been consumed by fire inside the city? Would that imply that some sort immolation had occurred?

Yeah it did, but it was just the black pathogen that descended upon them. In Prometheus when Holloway is infected via drinking a small amount mixed with water it slowly turns him and impregnates shaw with the big facehugger, it seems to suffocate the engineers when David dropped it on them and then it somehow impregnates the humans with neomorphs. It seems to act differently each time.

BlitzKrieg

Cloudio9 wrote: »

Maybe I'm missing something obvious but

when David dropped the "bomb" why did that not result in the creation of millions of back-busters which would still be running around?

there does seem to be some genuine confusion but if you take the events of the crossing and the dates given in the film, I think I can put forward a theory.

Its confirmed by dates in the film to be 10-11 years after the prometheus (2093 - 2104)

We dont know how long it took David etc to reach the planet, we do know from the crossing that it was long enough that Shaw had to get into a sleeping pod.

But not longer then 11 years.


So assuming the engineer's ship is faster then humans but Shaw still needed to be in stasis then lets be generous and say it took a year or two for the ship to arrive to the engineer planet and for david to launch his biological attack.

Which then proceeded to wipe out all life on the planet rapidly.

So let's say that by even 5 years before Covenant David had successfully wiped out every life on the planet.

With nothing left to sustain them all the neomorphs die out after a time.


I genuinely think the film touched on this but its in a rather confusing bit of exposition dump by David. In the same point he's explaining the parasitic nature of the weapon he also touches on one of the issues with the virus was that it rapidly burnt itself out and by the end of its life cycle it only existed in the form of fungus plants (the one's we see in the film)

I'm not 100% on the following but I think he also touches that the virus doesnt stop mutating and keeps changing constantly (Prometheus also touched on this as we saw numerous variations)

What I think is not made clear but is big bloody lynchpin to the whole of *understanding* David's plan is that the original weapon is not permanent. It was created by one biological species to wipe out another biological species so the intention is that it burns itself out within a decade and the planet can then be re-purposed.

Consider that in less then a decade a crew of 10 can land and march around what was the epicentre of the virus and only 2 get infected. Give it another 5 years and you could repopulate the planet.

It's also clear in Prometheus as the only cannisters to survive where the ones that were sealed (the room they first open was airtight sealed, as was the ship) that anything left to the passage of time dried up without a trace.

I think from David's perspective this is a flaw in the virus as he's not biological so he'd much rather a weapon that is permanent, that will not die out, that will survive any environment.

Enter the less subtle but much more resilient xenomorph design. It's already known to audience members that these can survive decades, possibly even centuries in any sort of hostile environment and will always react to a biological entity, they can survive in a vacuum or storm bitten planet, survive a crashing ship and are intelligent enough to hunt down biological lifeforms even in its parasitic form.

Essentially it fixes what David saw as a flaw in the original virus, once deployed the effect is permanent, biological life will never return the planet is defacto dead to biological life. long live the machines!

It was a bit naff in many many ways. That flute scene? Yea, I get what it was trying to say, but it went on for far too long.

Then you have that small baby alien that David makes raise its arms and my very first thought was, "oh hey, it's Baby Groot... Er. Xenomorph"

The aliens themselves were killed far too quickly and easily... The use of the crane, for me, harked right back to the iconic, "get away from her, you bitch" with claw hands that looked near identical.

It relied too heavily on telegraphed scares, on CGI, and on gore - a surprising amount of gore for a 16s certificate.

And it got so very heavy on the philosophical side.

So, yea, could have been better.

Also makes you wonder about Mother... How did she not detect a difference between Walter and David? She was capable of detecting the alien on the ship.

Also why oh why do they constantly get Fassbender to do accents? Especially his American one. He's a great actor, but I can't think of a single movie of his where it didn't go for American to Irish to German.

bullvine

The way I see it, Alien and Aliens are both great movies. Aliens might well be the film of the 80s certainly for adult viewers. These are might shoes to fill and its never gonna happen but Covenant is a very enjoyable romp with some silly moments but left me craving more and thats what you want from an Alien movie.

Drumpot

bullvine wrote: »

The way I see it, Alien and Aliens are both great movies. Aliens might well be the film of the 80s certainly for adult viewers. These are might shoes to fill and its never gonna happen but Covenant is a very enjoyable romp with some silly moments but left me craving more and thats what you want from an Alien movie.

Agreed..

Movies like Covenant really split opinions and the danger can be that we don't get to see anymore of these kind of movies.

I am not annoyed at any of the gripes people have with this movie because I think these kind of gripes exist in all Alien moves. People explaining away stupid decisions by characters in Alien/Aliens are just trying to justify their feelings for this movie.

Alien - Quarantine - Even if you let him on the ship, put him in sleep mode until you get home. Put him in quarantine in the ship. Put him in quarantine when he wakes up . . WTF!!! The actions of the crew were ridiculous. . One of them had an alien attached to its face and they have dinner with him straight after he wakes up . . Seriously, how is that any less retarded then anything anybody did on Covenant?!

And how is the Alien choosing to goto sleep on the escape ship (as opposed to anywhere else on a massive ship) any less convenient than any plot device on Covenant to move the movie forward ?

Aliens - Marines going into extremely hostile conditions knowing they practically have no protection - The shuttle leaving its doors open while docked so anything can walk in - not leaving one person on the mother ship (even a synthetic) in case of emergency and by extension completely relying on the ship to get them home (they are going into potentially hostile territory they don't know what to expect). These are just the things I can think of off the top of my head and I haven't seen that movie in many years.

These were marines, not colonists . . Explaining it away by saying "they had an incompetent commander" is just as convenient as saying the captain of the Covenant was conveniently stupid or your one wandering off having the shower doesn't make sense. . Its a cop out explanation for the idiotic actions of the marines , but most people didn't let these idiotic decisions ruin Aliens.

People do stupid things and in stressful situtations people can lose their sh*t and do irrational things that to the outside observer don't make sense. Just because its happening in a horror movie should not mean its bullsh*t or cliché. Even trained marines, prepared for stressful environments, fall to pieces once the violence starts..

If you heard the podcast "seriel" you would know the second season factual story is about a Soldier who does the stupidest sh*t (not even under pressure) and literally walks alone into enemy lines to prove a point. If it happened in an action or horror movie you would say it is unrealistic because its stupid. But people do stupid things, intelligent people make stupid choices.. Watching a story unfold means we have information the characters do not. Knowing this is an Aliens movie , I know that the crew of the ship are going to stumble upon something nasty, they don't.

They understand that their journey is hazardous and that they are taking a huge risk just by taking the journey. Even though they have scanned the targeted planet, that could just as easily be full of Aliens or black goo. As far as they are concerned, this planet is habitable and there is littls to suggest they are on high alert when they touch down. Hell the captain is already deciding where to setup villages!

These are normal people who have competency at how to colonise a planet. They are following basic protocols but like Columbus are kind of making things up as they go along. . As the captain put it "doing the best with the information as it unfolds"..

Taking a piss on the planet, touching a plant - no problem with these things. How they should expect demon spores to jump out of them is beyond me.

Acting stupid in stressful situations as opposed to the way everybody always thinks straight when being hunted by the most frightening thing imaginable. PTSD and other mental reactions to stress would suggest that the cognitive behavior of people is severely effected in these conditions.

mewso

Drumpot wrote: »

These were marines, not colonists . . Explaining it away by saying "they had an incompetent commander" is just as convenient as saying the captain of the Covenant was conveniently stupid or your one wandering off having the shower doesn't make sense. . Its a cop out explanation for the idiotic actions of the marines , but most people didn't let these idiotic decisions ruin Aliens.

I think the point is how well each film does the characters. It was very clear that Gorman was new to command whereas there is nothing to suggest Billy Crudup is stupid. Lacking in confidence and over-compensating maybe. I thought Crudup was quite good actually as the doubting leader but it still doesn't explain why he would look in an egg.

bullvine

mewso wrote: »

I think the point is how well each film does the characters. It was very clear that Gorman was new to command whereas there is nothing to suggest Billy Crudup is stupid. Lacking in confidence and over-compensating maybe. I thought Crudup was quite good actually as the doubting leader but it still doesn't explain why he would look in an egg.

I am not so sure, i felt from the moment Oram gained control as leader that he had little faith in his own ability to lead the crew and I guess with his decision to go to the planet was made to satisfy his own ego by making a statement. It was a foolish thing to do and a mistake.

Telecaster58

Anyone know why James Franco ended up on the cutting room floor? There was more of him in the trailer than in the actual film!

Mickeroo

bullvine wrote: »

I am not so sure, i felt from the moment Oram gained control as leader that he had little faith in his own ability to lead the crew and I guess with his decision to go to the planet was made to satisfy his own ego by making a statement. It was a foolish thing to do and a mistake.

That doesn't explain why he followed David down there after seeing the severed head of his crew member and David playing horse whisperer with the creature that removed that head. I can forgive the usual "I gotta take a leak..." or "I'm going to go clean up...." stuff, it's lazy and derivative but feck it it's par the course. The scene with Crudup and David just made absolutely no sense to the point of pulling me out of the film, genuinely some of the worst screenwriting I've seen in major blockbuster.

Sad Professor

Crudup's gullibility is interesting given that by his own admission he's a "man of faith". The other notable person of faith in these films was Shaw, who we discover met a similarly grim end after foolishly placing her trust in David. People who believe in a benign God are particularly ill-equipped to deal with the threat posed to humanity in these films. It adds to the sense that has always been in these films that humans have strayed too far from where they belong.

This also addresses something which really bothered me about Prometheus. Scott/Lindelof were trying to evoke a Lovecraftian sense of cosmic horror but were unwilling to crack the mind of their main character in doing so. Despite everything she discovers, Shaw never loses her faith. It would have been interesting to see a direct sequel in which her faith finally cracks, but I guess finding where it led her serves much the same purpose.

These movies have always had weak or arrogant characters who lead everyone else to their doom. Whether its corporate stooges like Burke or rich a-holes with God complexes like Weyland. Crudup's character is in the same tradition.

bullvine

Mickeroo wrote: »

That doesn't explain why he followed David down there after seeing the severed head of his crew member and David playing horse whisperer with the creature that removed that head. I can forgive the usual "I gotta take a leak..." or "I'm going to go clean up...." stuff, it's lazy and derivative but feck it it's par the course. The scene with Crudup and David just made absolutely no sense to the point of pulling me out of the film, genuinely some of the worst screenwriting I've seen in major blockbuster.

I agree, it was completely ridiculous, that entire scene was, I probably didnt put too much thought into that scene because you could see it was coming from the minute he confronted David.

Drumpot

mewso wrote: »

I think the point is how well each film does the characters. It was very clear that Gorman was new to command whereas there is nothing to suggest Billy Crudup is stupid. Lacking in confidence and over-compensating maybe. I thought Crudup was quite good actually as the doubting leader but it still doesn't explain why he would look in an egg.

The only training Gorman got was from a tactical and war point of view. This is literally everything he trained for and he made a balls of everything. Its totally believable that this could happen to an inexperienced soldier but unlike the crew of the Covenant, there was plenty of experience in the marines to make more informed choices that cannot be completely excused by Gorman.... The primary training this crew had was how to terraform a planet and fly a ship there. They were completely unprepared for what happened, had zero training in how to deal with this kind of danger and made stupid decisions under ridiculously stressful circumstances . I have no problem at all with the course of events or character decisions because I believe rational debate is pointless if people cannot really factor in the circumstances the characters find themselves in. The "ah sure nobody would do that in that situation" opinion is a ridiculously lazy assumption that people react the same in these conditions. . Incidentally all the crew didn't react the same , the fact that mistakes and stupid decisions cause the deaths of some is , again, plausible.

Oram was clearly out of his depth, making really silly decisions, poorly managing staff and the actual employer didn't even trust him to be captain. He coppd that David was off but . . But . . David is a synthetic . . Remember the reaction of the crew of Aliens when Ripley flinched at Bishop ???? They all expect Synthetics to not hurt humans. I don't think people believed Ripley that "Ash" went rogue, so its not hard to believe that people would find it unbelievable that a synthetic would have a devious plan to lead a human to death.

David's behaviour was odd, but growing up in a world where Synthetics cannot hurt people (Walter represents current models - cannot invent or have sort of personal objectives that put humans in harms way), why would Oram think that David is leading him to his doom or be capable of lieing at "something to look at"?

I am not saying he shouldn't of been suspicious (he already was) but I think its believable that he had a sense of "no, sure robots cant hurt humans". He had a gun on David and followed him to see what was going on. . Silly move, but I don't see why he should anticipate the trap. A room full of eggs, why should that worry Oram ? They could be cadburys cream eggs for all he knows. He still has his gun on David and is not sure that David has done anything wrong . . Yeh, he should be cautious of the eggs, but then why don't people have a problem with Kane doing the exact same thing in Alien?

Mickeroo

Drumpot wrote: »

The only training Gorman got was from a tactical and war point of view. This is literally everything he trained for and he made a balls of everything. Its totally believable that this could happen to an inexperienced soldier but unlike the crew of the Covenant, there was plenty of experience in the marines to make more informed choices that cannot be completely excused by Gorman....

But Oram was clearly out of his depth, making really silly decisions, poorly managing staff and the actual employer didn't even trust him to be captain. He coped that David was off but . . But . . David is a synthetic . . Remember the reaction of the crew of Aliens when Ripley flinched at Bishop ???? They all expect Synthetics to not hurt humans. I don't think people believed Ripley that "Ash" went rogue, so its not hard to believe that people would find it unbelievable that a synthetic would have a devious plan to lead a human to death.

David's behaviour was odd, but growing up in a world where Synthetics cannot hurt people (Walter represents current models - cannot invent or have sort of personal objectives that put humans in harms way), why would Oram think that David is leading him to his doom or be capable of lieing at "something to look at"?


I am not saying he shouldn't of been suspicious (he already was) but I think its believable that he had a sense of "no, sure robots cant hurt humans". He had a gun on David and followed him to see what was going on. . Silly move, but I don't see why he should anticipate the trap. A room full of eggs, why should that worry Oram ? They could be cadburys cream eggs for all he knows. He still has his gun on David and is not sure that David has done anything wrong . . Yeh, he should be cautious of the eggs, but then why don't people have a problem with Kane doing the exact same thing in Alien?

Because he knew David was an older model and his behaviour was strange and erratic, not to mention his complete lack of concern for the dead mutilated crew member and the horse whisperer stuff.

Either way, your explanations are perfectly plausible but the fact that you had to come up with them yourself rather than the film makers illustrates how badly done it was. Gorman's incompetence was made clear from the get go and the more experienced marines were shown being both uncomfortable with and ignoring his orders ("I keep this handy for close encounters"). As for Kane acting similarly around eggs, well he hadn't seen half his crew slaughtered by the local wildlife at that point....

I'd also point out that even though I feel it was the worst scene in the film by a long shot I felt the lack of tension and the sheer predictably of every single thing that happened in the film were bigger issues.

Drumpot

Mickeroo wrote: »

Because he knew David was an older model and his behaviour was strange and erratic, not to mention his complete lack of concern for the dead mutilated crew member and the horse whisperer stuff.

Either way, your explanations are perfectly plausible but the fact that you had to come up with them yourself rather than the film makers illustrates how badly done it was. Gorman's incompetence was made clear from the get go and the more experienced marines were shown being both uncomfortable with and ignoring his orders ("I keep this handy for close encounters").

I'd also point out that even though I feel it was the worst scene in the film by a long shot I felt the lack of tension and the sheer predictably of every single thing that happened in the film were bigger issues.

David being an older model doesn't mean he should automatically assume he is capable of killing humans. David did just save them from the Aliens in the field, why would he presume David did it to bring them back to his lair ? A movie does not have to spell everything out for its audience and not all of us like it that way. I enjoy movies that leave some explaining or ambiguous plots. I don't think its important why characters acted like they did, only that its plausible that people might act that way.

I think the problem people have with this movie isn't the characters decisions (highlighted by stupid decisions from earlier Alien movies), its that the movie didn't meet their expectations and the characters actions FEEL more stupid/annoying.


Gorman's incompetence was clearly defined, but so was Oram's. What character strength was defined that made Oram's actions/decisions seem odd ? What strength or foresight do you think his character showed that leads you to believe he wouldn't of gone down the stairs with David ? His employer didn't trust him. His crew didn't trust him.. The only person who did trust him was his wife and she died because he left her to explore an unknown planet while he wandered further into the unknown. They couldn't of made Oram look any less competent if they tried . .

In terms of tension, I believe you are getting more to why people were disappointed with this movie. We had the original maker of Alien make an Alien movie that lacked the tension of Alien and the complete action of Aliens. It was sort of somewhere between which I think is the problem.

If you watch the David scene with the facehugger, the second time around I was trying to focus not on what was going on, but the fact that I was about to see the original of the Xenomorph. It made the scene so much more enjoyable. It didn't need the tension from Alien because the movie was about the birth of the Xenomorph and the chaos surrounding its creation.

People complained about Prometheus and Scott foolishly tried to appease them at the expense of focusing on the movie he wanted to make. He alludes to that in interviews. So what we get is a movie that is a bit of everything.

Why did I really enjoy it and why am I defending it? Because I want to see more of these movies. I think critically analysing movies like Alien is over rated. People putting "real life" character motives/actions to the unrealistic scary scenarios portrayed in these movies is setting yourself up for a fall. I also think we have a choice, to either try and focus on the entertainment side of the series , to go along for the ride .. Or to put earlier movies up in a pedestal (ignoring similar character defects) and expect the same experience/feelings from future Alien movies. People want it to be different, but want the same feelings/tension/action and complain if one or all of these things are not met!

I thought Prometheus was bold because it had massive ideas that weren't just about a sh*tty horror origin. It tried to be more meaningful.The look of that and Covenant are amazing. The worlds and creatures created are fascinating. Some of the action and horror sequences in this movie are the best you will see this year. The scene where the Alien looking down on Tenesse trying to pickup the crew, followed by it getting into a Gallop , passing the dead engineers, is breathtaking. You will be hard pressed to see a better set piece all year then that.

Mickeroo

I don't want to be spoon fed either, indeed one of the issues with these films is their sole purpose is to remove any ambiguity from the story in the first place.I don't think that scene was ambiguous, it was just a badly written scene involving a badly written character.

Of course good film making will make people more likely to forgive standard horror movie tropes, as I said I can forgive that sort of thing, but this wasn't one of those instances. The scene didn't work on any level for me. I don't want real life reactions I just want them to make sense within the context of the film without mental acrobatics being required on the part of the audience.

As regards tension, they tried to make it tense and failed because we know everything that's going to happen before it does, if that was deliberate on Scott's part then he's lost it. I don't want the same as the old films, tension and a compelling plot are things I look for in any film in this genre.

I don't agree Prometheus was bold, ambitious sure, but it was just standard history channel ancient aliens/space jesus stuff shoe horned into the Alien universe along with a magic goo that could change what it does to suit the requirements of the plot at any given time. it was a better film than this by a long shot though.

I've no issue with the set pieces, they weren't anything special but were well staged though the Alien itself looked pretty poor.

Fassbender kissing Fassbender. What more do you want. 10/10

dadad231

Good video by Kermode
https://youtu.be/PitTXwbhx5U

while I really enjoyed Covenant , he makes a lot of good points here.

pinksoir

dadad231 wrote: »

Good video by Kermode
https://youtu.be/PitTXwbhx5U

while I really enjoyed Covenant , he makes a lot of good points here.

100% agree with Kermode. I know it doesn't have to, but it taints the original. Probably because it's the same director. 

Covenant just feels entirely pointless. It sucks that everything has to be tied up in a neat little package with humans at the centre of it. The mystery of Alien and Aliens is precisely what gives them their potency. It doesn't need backstory. The little glimpses into what might be going on, the conspiracy with the Company, the general sense of unease: these are what make it interesting. You put together what's going on yourself. We don't need every little detail explained to us; we have our own imagination which is more powerful than knowing for definite.

There's a general rule of writing that if you're explaining through backstory, you're making up for bad characterisation, story, etc. A story should pull you in with what's happening right at that moment. Alien did that. Covenant feels like adding backstory after the fact to paper up cracks that don't exist. 

It just kinda spoils the simplicity and mystery. It's unnecessary. I don't want or need to know all this stuff. 

I liked Prometheus and watched it just before going to see Covenant. It's full of flaws, most of which are centred on terrible characters. If Holloway, the punk biologist (wtf?) and the other scientist dude were written differently it'd have been a much stronger film. Covenant was somewhat enjoyable. But I left the cinema feeling very let down. I haven't left a film this disappointed for as long as I can remember.

Drumpot

dadad231 wrote: »

Good video by Kermode
https://youtu.be/PitTXwbhx5U

while I really enjoyed Covenant , he makes a lot of good points here.

He admitted he can't objectively review covenant because of a pre conceived resentment on the mere idea of a back story!

We all knew Prometheus and Covenant were going to be all about the origin of the aliens. Everything he said in that perfectly explains why he didn't enjoy Covenant but it also suggests that he wouldn't of enjoyed it whatever Scott did because he didn't want a back story! Therefore his review of the movie is based on an opinion he had made before he even watched it. He then watched the movie, looking out for the parts that would further reinforce his desire to dislike it...

I wonder what a person going into view Covenant , without seeing any other alien movie, would think of it.

pinksoir

Drumpot wrote: »

dadad231 wrote: »

Good video by Kermode
https://youtu.be/PitTXwbhx5U

while I really enjoyed Covenant , he makes a lot of good points here.

He admitted he can't objectively review covenant because of a pre conceived resentment on the mere idea of a back story!

We all knew Prometheus and Covenant were going to be all about the origin of the aliens. Everything he said in that perfectly explains why he didn't enjoy Covenant but it also suggests that he wouldn't of enjoyed it whatever Scott did because he didn't want a back story! Therefore his review of the movie is based on an opinion he had made before he even watched it. He then watched the movie, looking out for the parts that would further reinforce his desire to dislike it...

I wonder what a person going into view Covenant , without seeing any other alien movie, would think of it.

Films could have been made within the alien universe (as was originally intended) but which don't tie directly to Alien. Prometheus worked for me because it did this to a degree. The seeding of life on Earth, the Engineers, these are interesting stories to tell which could expand the mythology without handholding and backstory.

Drumpot

pinksoir wrote: »

Films could have been made within the alien universe (as was originally intended) but which don't tie directly to Alien. Prometheus worked for me because it did this to a degree. The seeding of life on Earth, the Engineers, these are interesting stories to tell which could expand the mythology without handholding and backstory.

I agree completely and would love to see some of those other ideas explored. But Scott made it clear exactly what he was doing. Its not like he kept the ideas secret and fooled people into going into an Alien movie that they shouldn't of expected. .

So people knew exactly the premise of the movie and now are complaining that the movie has gone the way the filmmaker said it would go... How can you enjoy a movie , the idea of which (backstory) you hate before you have seen? This guy is not reviewing the movie, he is just confirming that he didn't want it to be made . .

BlitzKrieg

Drumpot wrote: »

I wonder what a person going into view Covenant , without seeing any other alien movie, would think of it.

They would be massively f*cking confused as the film tells you next to nothing of David or the events of prometheus but relies on them heavily for most of its plot points.

When you consider outside of David there is little to no character development in the film and most of david's character building is heavily laid on top of what we know from prometheus which makes the film quite inaccessible.


As for kermodes thoughts (which other critics have also flagged) I'm a bit torn, I dont disagree that filling in the big answers can weaken another film.

but filling in tones or changing them can make returning to the original films more interesting

To me Covenant has established a few retcons that dont take away from the horror from the original but do make it refreshing to revisit them (as I did during this week)

1. The role of synthetics in all the alien films has been changed as their relationship to the alien has changed, it raises questions how much of Ash in the orignal was haywire and how much was perhaps part of his code.

2. The role of the company at least in alien has changed as we are now accutely aware that the only communication with them we see in alien is either through Ash or Mother both of which are now comprimised as shown in Covenant. Which raises the question was it really the company that set them on this route or some directive left by David.

3. The alien lifecycle is quicker then originally shown. Covenant (sadly) confirms AVP's version of the alien lifecycle and makes it quicker, happening over a period of an hour or two vs the day or two shown in alien. But a rewatch of all the alien movies does establish a common thread in the long term gestation period. Medication. Both in Alien and Alien 3, the person suffering a long gestation was heavily medicated. In fact in Alien 3, the alien attacks the doctor medicating Ripley. In Covenant the captain chestbursts rapidly after being facehugged. But the soldier takes morphine when they are on the lander for his injuries so doesnt chestburst until they are well on the ship.



Yeah I get people might not want to know these things, but they are not the origin of the species sort of reveals and just tonely changes which I kind of like.

The other sequels did them too,

Aliens changes the tone of alien's ending by its opening revealing that ripley remained adrift for 60 years. If you watch alien and ignore aliens it's actually a quite hopeful ending, but watching it with aliens in mind there is a depressing tone of futility to its ending.

A lot of people give alien 3 sh*t with its opening and killing of newt and hicks, but its actually just returning the favour of what aliens did to alien. Aliens has a very positive ending with the 3 going to sleep and alien 3 much like aliens shatters that with the same message. Sleeping in space = despair = death = tragedy. It's a bit more harsh then aliens but the end result is the same. Ripley wakes up on the other end alone and a stranger in a new place.

I actually like that the 3 films organised themselves like that, it actually makes the original alien trilogy actually work as a trilogy because they all tie up together nicely. It works as one of the better trilogy's out there.

pinksoir

Drumpot wrote: »

This guy is not reviewing the movie, he is just confirming that he didn't want it to be made . .

That could well be true of Kermode, but I didn't watch any promo materials for this and was kind of expecting a follow up to Prometheus. I knew Rapace wasn't in it, however. 

It was only right after Covenant, when I reflected on it a bit, that I began to think 'this is not needed, it's just filling in gaps that don't need to be filled in, and it's kind of negatively affecting what went before'. By all means, explore the mystery of the Space Jockey. I'm even on board with the seeding the Earth, regretting it, and setting a plague loose to kill mankind. The whole 'David made the Aliens' is just a bridge too far.

To be honest, all the stories that need to be told have probably been told in Alien and Aliens. You'd need a pretty stellar idea to come close to the first two and make it a worthwhile venture. As has been said on this thread, one is a haunted house in space, the other is a war movie... also in space. With aliens. We never really learn what's going on except for some sort of nefarious designs on the part of the Company. Maybe the reason there hasn't been a good movie since Aliens is a sign that there's nothing more to plough in that particular field.

Drumpot

pinksoir wrote: »

That could well be true of Kermode, but I didn't watch any promo materials for this and was kind of expecting a follow up to Prometheus. I knew Rapace wasn't in it, however.

It was only right after Covenant, when I reflected on it a bit, that I began to think 'this is not needed, it's just filling in gaps that don't need to be filled in, and it's kind of negatively affecting what went before'. By all means, explore the mystery of the Space Jockey. I'm even on board with the seeding the Earth, regretting it, and setting a plague loose to kill mankind. The whole 'David made the Aliens' is just a bridge too far.

To be honest, all the stories that need to be told have probably been told in Alien and Aliens. You'd need a pretty stellar idea to come close to the first two and make it a worthwhile venture. As has been said on this thread, one is a haunted house in space, the other is a war movie... also in space. With aliens. We never really learn what's going on except for some sort of nefarious designs on the part of the Company. Maybe the reason there hasn't been a good movie since Aliens is a sign that there's nothing more to plough in that particular field.

I get what you are saying . . I suppose it boils down to what you want (if anything) from any future Alien movies. . The Prometheus story was dropped because of the backlash, I am guessing that is why Shaw is gone and David is really the only remnant from the movie. But in the process of trying to appease those who wanted a more Alien like movie, he has sort of divided people even more.



I just enjoy the worlds that Ridley creates and think some of the action sequences were brilliant. I also think they are entertaining movies if you don't take them too seriously or benchmark them against the originals.



I get the impression some people wanted an Alien Isolation type of movie. To be honest, that game was superb and it felt like Alien 1.5 and I think it would of made for a very satisfying movie . Ripley's daughter looking for her and ending up on a spacestation - very much like a mixture of Alien Suspense and Aliens action. .

But, I can enjoy these movies because they were IMO entertaining on their own.

pinksoir

Yeah, I agree. Don't get me wrong, I mostly enjoyed it for what it was, mostly. Great world building, for sure, and some lovely shots. Just not very good overall, in story or in horror/suspense, though.

TerrorFirmer

I feel like you're trying to give the movie a free pass simply because it's entertaining, while trying to rationalise why other people don't like it with rash assumptions.

From my perspective, it's not a great movie because it's not a great movie - it's badly paced, the script meanders, there's poor continuity, illogical character behavior lifted straight from an 80's slasher feature, etc.

It's certainly not because it wasn't enough like the original film or its sequel, or because Scott tried to paint both sides of the fence, nor because it wasn't the masterpiece we apparently wanted (I don't think anyone expected a masterpiece to be frank) and most certainly not because it wasn't like Alien Isolation the game.

It's just not a good film, no more and no less. Is it watchable? Also, yes. But it's neither a good Alien film nor a particularly good sci-fi film either, it's merely a servicable albiet lacklustre production. I fully accept that people like it because it's entertaining, but yet some people can't seem to accept that a lot of people consider it very poor without having to suggest that they expected too much, are too nit-picky, or simply want to find things to pick at, or are even being hypocritical.

For all it's flaws I liked Prometheus, what it tried to do and the fresh direction it took. It was it's own movie and I have a lot of time for it - it's a well crafted and compelling story, despite the considerable chinks in the armour but it remains, on the whole, a pretty decent movie. Covenant is not that - it's just a slap-dash cliche fest that does nothing particularly well except prove itself watchable and mildly entertaining.

I mean I found the Star Wars prequels very entertaining and excellent popcorn flicks with some great individual scenes but I still recognise objectively, like most people, that they are not particularly good films, and ultimately were totally reckless squandering of the huge potential of such a rich universe.

Covenant is just like that for me - Ridley Scott is churning out a prequel franchise that seems to be totally losing the run of itself and hasn't a clue what vision it wants to follow. It's as disappointing for me again as George Lucas' ambitious but ultimately deeply, irrecoverably flawed prequels because once again, it's the same director who kick-started the whole franchise with the ageless original film and you would reasonably like to expect a lot more from these directors who once has such revolutionary vision.

Most people feel the same about Covenant when they voice a dislike of the movie. It's nothing to do with the actual core story (which is inherently fine), or the fact that the movie isn't Alien or Aliens 1.5, that there wasn't enough shooting, or Aliens, or whatever else.

The whole thing is just assembled and executed poorly.

DoozerT6

I just saw the film (as a casual fan who is not really invested in the franchise) and my first thought when I saw David appear was 'oh crap, we're gonna have the two synthetics fight and we'll be left in doubt as to which one wins...' which is exactly what happened.

I did enjoy the film, the cgi was good but shaky in a couple of parts I thought, but I'm sure technology will sort that out some day. I did wonder how the crew, who would have known of the disappearance of the Prometheus years earlier in *roughly* the same region of space, give or take a couple of bajillion miles or so, never even seemed to think of the possibility that the transmission might be coming from them.

Also just a point of casting, some of the crew seemed young - not kids, but certainly people who I wouldn't necessarily think had the years and years of expertise and training a mission like this would require. I know James Franco only had a cameo appearance, but I thought he would have been a little young to be the captain on such a mission. Also Daniels and a couple of the other secondary crew seemed at least a decade too young for their roles on the ship. But i guess a ship full of middle-aged crew isn't quite as marketable They can't run fast enough for starters!

Sudden Valley

I'm not sure where are going to go with Alien franchise from here. I dont want to see another film with Fassbender in it and aliens themselves have become interesting many films ago. The whole cast for this movie were forgettable especially the young actress playing Daniels. Enjoyable dumb horror movie

Bacchus

Got round to seeing this last night. Gotta say, I really enjoyed it. That's not to say it reached the highs of Alien or Aliens but it's a solidly entertaining Alien movie with a good story continuing from Prometheus and laying the path down for Alien. It doesn't have the horror of Alien, nor the gung-ho action of Aliens, nor the tension of either but it sits somewhere in between all that. The back-burster for instance was a pretty horrific body-horror scene and was highlight of the movie, and up there with the original chest-burster scene. That was about it as far as the horror went though. There were a couple of decent scenes later on but nothing that came near that. Action-wise, again there were some cool scenes the xenomorph attack on the crane, the back-burster aftermath, and the attack in the long grass... but not much beyond that.

I suppose trying to fit it in to the Alien or Aliens mold isn't going to work. It's its own beast and really what it is is the origins of the Xenomorph and David's rise as the villain of the story. He was in grey territory in Prometheus, here he's full on genocidal. He was the highlight of Covenant, not only in the performance but in how David's actions completely change the tone of the Alien universe. The Synthetics are the puppet masters, unleashing their new improved bio-weapon on the universe. It was a bold move that could have been a massive mistake to make but I think it works beautifully when you think of Ash in Alien. It's quite possible that he was following up on David's work once his mission went wrong leading to the crashed Engineer ship full of the eggs.

I've seen some comments here about stupid behaviour from the characters (something Prometheus suffered from) but I didn't get that. Oram is clearly shown from the start to be a nervous leader and as things go wrong he is scrambling to hold things together and get answers. The whole facehugger scene wasn't out of character IMO. He's cautious of David but at the same time he's conditioned to know that Synthetics are servants to humans so doesn't realise the danger. Obviously too, he's never seen an Alien movie before so that big pod means little to him. Another "character acting stupid" moment seems to be the woman going to clean up. It doesn't look like she wandered too far off and again, David told them all it was safe here. I thought the way all the characters behaved in this was quite measured and deliberately done in a way that avoided a "making friends with a hissing snake alien" moment.

One issue I do have though would be how they handled the David - Walter switch. They sort of half committed to an "is he / isn't he David" mystery with lingering shots of the severed hand, David slightly smiling on the monitors but helping Daniels and T. I mean, it was obvious it was David, not Walter but it felt a bit like the director was trying to make us question that a bit... which seemed silly. I did love that final moment though when Daniels is already locked in the sleep chamber and asks about the cabin. David, in his sick twisted mind, gives that look/reaction and lets it sink in with Daniels that he's Walter.Obviously he could have just said "of course" but no, he lets it linger until the penny drops and it's too late. What a downbeat ending.

El Duda

Alien Covenant - 6/10

Firstly, I should preface this by saying that the original Alien is my favourite film of all time. I consider it to be a flawless work of art and Ridley Scott's masterpiece. Aliens is also one of my favourite ever films so whenever I hear there is a new film to be added to this franchise, I'm always excited for it.

I also really like Prometheus which I think was a very ambitious project and I was big fan of the direction it was heading.

After avoiding all marketing and trailers for the last 5 months, I finally got to see Covenant in glorious iMax with no knowledge of plot etc...

I was thoroughly entertained throughout but it is generally a bit of a disappointment. Much like Prometheus, this film just constantly throws plot holes and stupidity at you;

There are no memorable human characters. The creatures are on screen too much. Characters are constantly doing and saying ridiculous things. Some of the CGI reminded me of the stop motion figurines used in Alien 3.

There were just too many flaws for me to enjoy it fully.


SPOILER TERRITORY

I think it's probably easier to explain my problems in the form of questions;

Why cast James Franco?

How did Tennessee manage to pick up a signal from his space suit that the big ****ing spaceship couldn't?

Why no space suits or means of protection when exploring a new planet?

If you land on a new planet and immediately start feeling ill, you wouldn't just say "i'm fine". Why don't they communicate more?

Why didn't anyone question the 1000's of dead bodies on the way to David's hideout?

How did David synthesize a full sized, 'queen laid' egg?

Why did they put the mentally retarded Oram in charge of anything? Why did he stick his face in a ****ing egg?

Why didn't Daniels notice that 'Walter' had lost his healing abilities?

Why doesn't Tennessee at any point seem to be freaked out by this mental ****ing alien thing? Why do people stop reacting to it? By the end they're all just like "Where is it?" without any sense of fear.

Why did David greet the newborn but doing a star jump?

How did "let me do the fingering" get into the final script?

How did that final facehugger lay its egg when the guy didn't lose consciousness? Did he not feel an egg get forced down his throat?

Why is the gestation period a million times quicker?

How did the black goo become integrated with nature on that planet? If it was already there, why would the engineers choose to live on a planet with evil black goo everywhere?

Who planted the corn?

Bacchus

El Duda wrote: »

There are no memorable human characters.

That's a pretty good point. Tennessee was probably the only one. He was very good though I though. I guess this was mostly about David.

El Duda wrote: »

SPOILER TERRITORY

I think it's probably easier to explain my problems in the form of questions;

Why cast James Franco?

There was a different opening prologue involving him that was cut. Also, it was probably a bit a fanboy in him wanting a small part.

El Duda wrote: »

How did Tennessee manage to pick up a signal from his space suit that the big ****ing spaceship couldn't?

They explained this, there was some sort of shielding effect from the power sails that disrupted it. Tennessee was outside that zone when he received it. Bit of a weak explanation but good enough for me.

El Duda wrote: »

Why no space suits or means of protection when exploring a new planet?

I guess with the atmosphere being ok they felt they didn't need them and just weren't expecting any sort of biohazard.

El Duda wrote: »

If you land on a new planet and immediately start feeling ill, you wouldn't just say "i'm fine". Why don't they communicate more?

Didn't personally have a problem with the initial reactions here. Soldier guy get cold like symptoms and shakes it off. By the time things are getting more serious they are frantically trying to get him to med-bay. Seemed reasonable to me. Communication was kept up quite well and it was Oram again failing to react decisively that cost them time getting to the lander.

El Duda wrote: »

Why didn't anyone question the 1000's of dead bodies on the way to David's hideout?

Shock and fear I imagine. They did ask once they thought they were safe.

El Duda wrote: »

How did David synthesize a full sized, 'queen laid' egg?

Yeah, I'd like to know where he was getting the organic material to do that too.... maybe from the crashed Engineer ship?

El Duda wrote: »

Why did they put the mentally retarded Oram in charge of anything? Why did he stick his face in a ****ing egg?

Harsh. He was a weak leader for sure though and was too trusting in faith. While he wasn't the captain he was still a poor choice as 2nd in command. He mentioned something near the start about the company not even liking him. I feel like a few character setting scenes were left on cutting room floor that would have filed us in a bit more. Pity.

El Duda wrote: »

Why didn't Daniels notice that 'Walter' had lost his healing abilities?

We saw him repair himself to reboot and plug the hole in his neck but who knows, maybe his skin doesn't heal the same way? Less critical system?

El Duda wrote: »

Why doesn't Tennessee at any point seem to be freaked out by this mental ****ing alien thing? Why do people stop reacting to it? By the end they're all just like "Where is it?" without any sense of fear.

I thought he did react... quite strongly. In the final act then it was a fight or flight mode, they'd both lost everything (their partners) and they fought. I do somewhat agree though that the final act was a bit weak. Again, just from looking at the trailers there was a good bit cut from here. Again, a real pity because the cat and mouse chase through the corridors could have been so much more intense.

El Duda wrote: »

Why did David greet the newborn but doing a star jump?

It was his proudest moment. His perfect creation. He was in awe of it.

El Duda wrote: »

How did "let me do the fingering" get into the final script?

That was very cringe alright. Awful line. The whole flute scene was a bit odd in general.

El Duda wrote: »

How did that final facehugger lay its egg when the guy didn't lose consciousness? Did he not feel an egg get forced down his throat?

Why is the gestation period a million times quicker?

Not sure how I feel on those two to be honest. On the one hand, I enjoyed it all in the moment and noticed the lingering shot of the facehugger shriveling up when pulled off yer man so I twigged that it had laid it's egg. On the other hand, it is messing around with the life-cycle of the alien so... from a consistency point of view it does grate a little.

El Duda wrote: »

How did the black goo become integrated with nature on that planet? If it was already there, why would the engineers choose to live on a planet with evil black goo everywhere?

David dropped it on the planet, there was no goo there before this. It was explained that it did two things.. 1) kill life it came in contact with and 2) mutant existing life to attack other life. The little pods were a result of the latter.

El Duda wrote: »

Who planted the corn?

It was wheat btw. Either David (and possibly Shaw) or the Engineers (seeing as they seeded life on Earth, it's perfectly fine that wheat was growing there).

Bacchus

How did David synthesize a full sized, 'queen laid' egg?

Bacchus wrote: »

Yeah, I'd like to know where he was getting the organic material to do that too.... maybe from the crashed Engineer ship?

You see Shaw with her abdomen cut open. I presume David managed to create these eggs from her reproductive bits. That black goo has bizarre properties with whatever it comes in contact with. That is my take on it anyway.

[Deleted User]

[Deleted User] wrote: »

You see Shaw with her abdomen cut open. I presume David managed to create these eggs from her reproductive bits. That black goo has bizarre properties with whatever it comes in contact with. That is my take on it anyway.

I agree. Look at shaws face, she looks like a Giger character, completey mutated. Huge gaping hole in her. The Eggs are huge as they possibly grow just like the actual neo and xenomorphs grow.

Geiger character?

[Deleted User]

[Deleted User] wrote: »

Geiger character?

giger, her face looks like one of giger's designs

Sad Professor

Re: the transmission only being detectable from outside the ship, maybe this was the result of company meddling? In Alien, the company sent the Nostromo to the LV-426 without the crew's knowledge to investigate the signal emanating from there. Maybe in Covenant they were actually attempting to cover up David's transmission (and what happened to the Prometheus) but in an ironic twist of faith the colonists ended up hearing it and going there anyway. Might be an interesting plot point to pick up in the next film.

Sad Professor

Sad Professor wrote: »

Re: the transmission only being detectable from outside the ship, maybe this was the result of company meddling? In Alien, the company sent the Nostromo to the LV-426 without the crew's knowledge to investigate the signal emanating from there. Maybe in Covenant they were actually attempting to cover up David's transmission (and what happened to the Prometheus) but in an ironic twist of faith the colonists ended up hearing it and going there anyway. Might be an interesting plot point to pick up in the next film.

This is what's great IMO about these movies, so many questions that gets people wondering and talking, not plot holes :-)

Some questions I have are, why is the city surrounded by a huge wall, and a gateway that only allows humanoid sized people to squeeze through. I know it's not part of the story, but I'm sure whoever came up with the concept had their own story/reason behind it

The humanoids that David kills with the bombs don't look like engineers, they are more human looking, not pale milky white and don't have black eyes. are they just another creation of the Engineers?

Why did the ship David was flying crash?
Did Shaw try stop David? Where they shot out of the sky?

Where did that big scorpion tail craft go?

I dont believe we have seen the end of the Engineers, I hope we haven't.

have we seen the end of Walter?

Was it really a neutrino blast from a star? Or a weapon of some kind?

Have seen it twice now. Enjoyed it more the second time as the "anticipation" aspect wasn't there so I could just chill and watch. Looking forward to the blueray with hopefully some commentary, as the Prometheus commentary was class.

It's not perfect, and it's not what I had hoped for, but it's different and filled with some cool ideas. I personally thought the pacing was perfect. The start was slow but surprising, and while the trailers made it look like it would start very familiarly, it was the complete opposite, instead of waking up out of hypersleep they where thrown out of it, or incinerated.

Hope we don't have to wait too long for the next one. Deffo will avoid any teaser trailers, extended trailers, prologues, TV spots for the next one :-)

Sad Professor

Yeah, I don't think they were the Engineers from Prometheus. They were too primitive for a start. It's at least a couple of thousand years since the Engineer spacecraft crashed on LV-223, right? So maybe they were the leftover descendants of whatever war or accidental plague destroyed the rest of their kind. I assume that unlike Shaw, David wasn't interested in who they were or what they wanted, just saw that they were defenceless and proceeded to destroy them. However, they obviously had knowledge of the original Engineers, enough to recognise the ship. David was in what looked like a library which I assume is how he learned to create the Xenomorph.

Have you seen Promethues recently? Shaw and David were en rout to the engineers home planet. I thought we're definitely the same engineers.

BlitzKrieg

Sad Professor wrote: »

Re: the transmission only being detectable from outside the ship, maybe this was the result of company meddling? In Alien, the company sent the Nostromo to the LV-426 without the crew's knowledge to investigate the signal emanating from there. Maybe in Covenant they were actually attempting to cover up David's transmission (and what happened to the Prometheus) but in an ironic twist of faith the colonists ended up hearing it and going there anyway. Might be an interesting plot point to pick up in the next film.

well considering how this film ended you need to question if it was even the company that sent the nostromo anymore.

TheDoc

Having watched Alien and Aliens over the weekend, what Covenant distinctly lacked was any dread, fear or kind of suspense.

Still thinking back, reading everyones opinion, still really liked and enjoyed the film. Still feel there was some weak CGI on the Alien itself which looked weird, and that the Alien itself being on the Convenant should have been a larger part. There was no suspense or dead, was just boom, boom, boom.

Definitely be a bluray purchase for me, but looking back on Alien and Aliens it nearly feels like we are missing what made them so incredible. Like Alien was such a fearful, dread filled horror. And while Aliens was obviously so distinctly different, it was adrenaline pumping, investment in characters you didn't want to die and make it, even watching it this weekend for the what must be 500th time, still the same emotions and feelings. Covenant didn't really elicit anything from me, but thats not to say I still didn't enjoy it would look forward to a new one.

I watched Aliens last night. It's head and shoulders above Covenant. To say I enjoyed Covenant is doing a disservice to actual good films, but I did enjoy it because I'm a fanboy of the universe.

Tony EH

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=klsy8PiscEw

Actually thinking of not bothering with this film at all.

Joeface

Saw this last night , Delighted to find when we went in it was just the two of us in the whole cinema for it .

For me the film was OK , Fassbender is very good in his role . and Katherine Waterston and Danny Mcbride are also well cast (from my point of view anyway) . The main issue for me was there was only connections formed with these 3 characters , the rest were under used and just there for the death sequence . I am sure somewhere there is a or will be a longer Cut .

I know it will never be a patch on Alien or Aliens nothing can be . but as part of at world/franchise/universe .. I enjoyed it .

I kinda want a Direct sequel to it . there is potential there .

I now get to watch the prologue stuff .........that some how I missed when avoiding the trailers