Alien Covenant is the follow-up to the 2012 film Prometheus. While the film tries to give fans what they want, it creates even more problems. This isn’t the film most of us wanted, or asked for. I feel like Ridley Scott really mislead the public with this film. More on that in my final paragraph.
The Covenant is a colonization space craft. It’s monitored by Walter, an android model similar to David from the first film. On its voyage to a remote planet, an energy burst in space causes the ship to malfunction. The crew is then woken from stasis. As they repair the ship, & mourn the loss of their captain who burned to death in his malfunctioning stasis pod, they receive a radio transmission from a nearby planet. They ultimately decide to investigate the source of the transmission.
I really did enjoy the first part of this movie. Watching this team explore the alien world really peaked my curiosity. Also, when crew members were exposed to the airborne spores, it really dialed up the suspense. We all know bad things are about to happen, but can’t help but wonder how exactly it will play out. Another great take away from the film is Michael Fassbender’s multi performance as both David & Walter. He really sells both characters in a way that I’m not sure a lot of actors could. He’s truly becoming one of my favorite actors.
Unfortunately, while Fassbender gives a great performance, the story as a whole takes a downturn once David from Prometheus becomes part of the story. For the rest of the film, it’s just David giving deep profound explanations as to why humans suck. That’s fine, but it feels like the writers couldn’t figure out what to do with everyone else. Characters wonder off resulting in cliché searches where people get killed.
As the story progresses, it becomes clear that David has been tinkering with the black liquid from the ship that he and Elizabeth commandeered at the end of Prometheus. As for Shaw, we get a clearer explanation of her demise in David’s house of horrors.
Inevitably, we are introduced to the classic looking facehugger & Xenomorph. The CGI on the Xenomorph as it leaves the host looks horrible! They couldn’t have taken a few extra days to give this scene a little more polish? Why couldn’t they have used conventional effects? Seriously, the chest burst Alien from the 1979 original looks better! Also, I’m always confused about the damn gestation period of the creature inside a host.
Ok, I won’t say too much more regarding this. I’m trying to keep this a simple review, but plot holes are opening up, and too much speculation needs to be made. I could write an entire ranting article. I’m trying hard not to drift into that.
The end is predictable, but still sparks enough curiosity where I would want to see this trilogy conclude and hopefully fix some of this shit!
Alien Covenant tries to give fans what they want, but opens up an entirely new can of worms in the process. Ridley Scott claims the mediocre reception of this film is due to the Xenomorph being tired. While I can’t 100% disagree with this statement, I don’t think it’s the main factor. I’m personally disappointed because I feel like Scott misled the public. I thought he set out to make this trilogy because he wanted to deeply explore the origins of the engineers? While that has been part of the story, its main focus is about an android realizing that he’s better than humans! That’s a disappointment to me.
Score: 6.5 / 10
The Good
+ Fassbender is awesome.
+ James Franco isn’t a factor.
+ The Neomorph is a cool addition to this universe.
+ Danny McBride’s performance was better than I expected.
The Bad
– Bad CGI
– The revelations are a disappointment.
– It has tons of plot holes.
– The ending is predictable.
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