Alien: Covenant

[appetite4illusions]

I like how they've started a trend of naming characters after US territories. First we had Dallas, now we have Tennessee, maybe next time if we're good, we'll get Kentucky.  

[Dazey]

10 minutes ago, appetite4illusions said:

I like how they've started a trend of naming characters after US territories. First we had Dallas, now we have Tennessee, maybe next time if we're good, we'll get Kentucky.  

@Len Cnut's mum Rhode an Island.

[Len Cnut]

20 minutes ago, Dazey said:

@Len Cnut's mum Rhode an Island.

For the right price  

[Silverburst80]

Yeah it's a good film and i enjoyed it. Ties in great with Prometheus, adds much to the Alien lore and opens up many possibilities for further films. I mean the Alien itself, we know what it's all about by now and it does what it does best in this film unsurprisingly, but our old slobbering friend is hardly the most evil or terrifying villain of the piece here.

Edited May 12, 2017 by Silverburst80

[AtariLegend]

Does Noomi Rapace get more than a cameo or do they Newt or her i.e Alien 3?

-edit-

Nevermind already got the answer.

Edited May 13, 2017 by AtariLegend

[bucketfoot]

On 12/05/2017 at 3:14 PM, AtariLegend said:

Does Noomi Rapace get more than a cameo or do they Newt or her i.e Alien 3?

-edit-

Nevermind already got the answer.

You almost did a politics-free post there, mate........................................................................................................................................................................ almost.

Edited May 13, 2017 by bucketfoot

[bucketfoot]

Going to see this on Tuesday, can't wait. I've avoided the reviews.

[Silverburst80]

On 12/05/2017 at 10:14 PM, AtariLegend said:

Does Noomi Rapace get more than a cameo or do they Newt or her i.e Alien 3?

-edit-

Nevermind already got the answer.

I didn't want to spoil anything for you! On the subject of spoilers alot of the footage in the previews isn't even in the movie, especially the crew stuff on the Covenant spaceship.

Edited May 14, 2017 by Silverburst80

[bucketfoot]

Saw it today and really enjoyed it. It plays like a greatest hits mash up of all of the previous Alien movies while continuing the bigger ideas/back story from Prometheus. It does veer towards Alien:Resurrection territory at times though and contains some unintentionally hilarious dialogue, at one point, Fassbender actually says something along the lines of "blow on the hole, watch me.... I'll do the fingering" Just don't expect a masterpiece like the first two movies and you probably won't be disappointed. I'd give it a solid 7 or 8 out of ten.

[RussTCB]

13 hours ago, bucketfoot said:

Saw it today and really enjoyed it. It plays like a greatest hits mash up of all of the previous Alien movies while continuing the bigger ideas/back story from Prometheus. It does veer towards Alien:Resurrection territory at times though and contains some unintentionally hilarious dialogue, at one point, Fassbender actually says something along the lines of "blow on the hole, watch me.... I'll do the fingering" Just don't expect a masterpiece like the first two movies and you probably won't be disappointed. I'd give it a solid 7 or 8 out of ten.

Good to hear. I've got a packed weekend but I plan on working it in at some point. 

[Black Sabbath]

Okay, so my viewing was skewed for a few reasons. First, two guys were whispering very loudly for the first 10 minutes of the movie, and someone in the row in front of them ended up telling them to "Shut up. Please.", and that didn't go over well and things got awkward for a bit. In addition to that, I couldn't wait to see it and went at a late showing on release night after being up for close to 18 hours, so I was very tired. Admittedly I dozed off once or twice early on, before they got to the Engineer planet. And finally, the auditorium I was in is notorious for projecting films very dark, so my copy was very dark and hard to see a lot of things most of the time, all the while, the sound was not incredibly loud. So while my viewing experience didn't exactly get ruined, it could have been a whole lot better. I'll be trying to see it again on Tuesday.

All that said, I'm still letting it sink it. Loved some things and frustrated with other things.

I'm glad they touched on the engineers, but they didn't do it in the way I was hoping. Obviously they show the flashback of David getting to the planet and unleashing the parasite (and did they say how he managed to have it deploy the way it did, in it's controlled, spiraling manner?) on the Engineers, and they say why he did it. But it seems we'll never get an answer as to why the Engineers wanted to destroy mankind with the goo/etc.

I also wish they would have explained a bit more as to how David was conducting the experiments he had been for the last several years, as that seemed very broad.

As far as gripes so, yeah, certain things could have been done better, but they weren't movie-ruining. Having James Franco in the movie was pointless lol I hope he did it for free. Tennessee was the best and most likable character. Daniels was OK, but thankfully it doesn't necessarily seem they're trying to make her into another Ripley. The scene where David kissed Walter (or just that bit, at least), wasn't necessary. I'm extremely opened minded and liberal, but the scene just felt extremely forced and awkward.

 

I'm going to wait until I see it again before I actually give it a rating.

[Dan H.]

What a frusterating film. Its a movie about nothing. Stuff happens, and then more stuff happens. It looked nice, some performances were fine, and the creature design was on point as always.

But tons and tons and tons of movies look nice, have fine performances, and neat sets, props, and CG. You need a story to have a good film. This one felt hollow, nothing special, nothing I cared about.

If you're tryna see new images of Aliens killing people, it serves that purpose well. If you wanna watch a fun blockbuster movie with tension, good writing, and a good story, then go see Guardians of the Galaxy 2 instead.

Promethius could have been excellent, it has great bones, but just tries to be smarter than it really is and becomes confusing. This one does the same thing turned up to 11. Lotta poorly handled existential and biblical concepts that could have been excellent and refreshing for this series, if they hadn't have made it so fucking stupidly complicated.

On a bitchy side note I just don't get why Ridley Scott made these new films as part of the Alien series. Remove all ties to Alien, change the monster design, and tighten up the writing and we could have had a completely new and formidable sci fi series

Edited May 21, 2017 by Dan H.

[Dan H.]

22 hours ago, Black Sabbath said:

Okay, so my viewing was skewed for a few reasons. First, two guys were whispering very loudly for the first 10 minutes of the movie, and someone in the row in front of them ended up telling them to "Shut up. Please.", and that didn't go over well and things got awkward for a bit. In addition to that, I couldn't wait to see it and went at a late showing on release night after being up for close to 18 hours, so I was very tired. Admittedly I dozed off once or twice early on, before they got to the Engineer planet. And finally, the auditorium I was in is notorious for projecting films very dark, so my copy was very dark and hard to see a lot of things most of the time, all the while, the sound was not incredibly loud. So while my viewing experience didn't exactly get ruined, it could have been a whole lot better. I'll be trying to see it again on Tuesday.

All that said, I'm still letting it sink it. Loved some things and frustrated with other things.

 

  Reveal hidden contents

I'm glad they touched on the engineers, but they didn't do it in the way I was hoping. Obviously they show the flashback of David getting to the planet and unleashing the parasite (and did they say how he managed to have it deploy the way it did, in it's controlled, spiraling manner?) on the Engineers, and they say why he did it. But it seems we'll never get an answer as to why the Engineers wanted to destroy mankind with the goo/etc.

I also wish they would have explained a bit more as to how David was conducting the experiments he had been for the last several years, as that seemed very broad.

As far as gripes so, yeah, certain things could have been done better, but they weren't movie-ruining. Having James Franco in the movie was pointless lol I hope he did it for free. Tennessee was the best and most likable character. Daniels was OK, but thankfully it doesn't necessarily seem they're trying to make her into another Ripley. The scene where David kissed Walter (or just that bit, at least), wasn't necessary. I'm extremely opened minded and liberal, but the scene just felt extremely forced and awkward.

 

I'm going to wait until I see it again before I actually give it a rating.

 

Dude that sounds like shit. Sorry about your experience. We have a theater here in town that screens everything in just completely awful contrast for no reason. Even the college $1 theater literally two blocks down has excellent picture and sound quality.

[bucketfoot]

22 hours ago, Black Sabbath said:

Okay, so my viewing was skewed for a few reasons. First, two guys were whispering very loudly for the first 10 minutes of the movie, and someone in the row in front of them ended up telling them to "Shut up. Please.", and that didn't go over well and things got awkward for a bit. In addition to that, I couldn't wait to see it and went at a late showing on release night after being up for close to 18 hours, so I was very tired. Admittedly I dozed off once or twice early on, before they got to the Engineer planet. And finally, the auditorium I was in is notorious for projecting films very dark, so my copy was very dark and hard to see a lot of things most of the time, all the while, the sound was not incredibly loud. So while my viewing experience didn't exactly get ruined, it could have been a whole lot better. I'll be trying to see it again on Tuesday.

All that said, I'm still letting it sink it. Loved some things and frustrated with other things.

Sounds like you had a great time.

22 hours ago, Black Sabbath said:

Admittedly I dozed off once or twice early on

Spoiler

The James Franco thing was just weird, I'm wondering if there's more scenes with him that were cut from the beginning of the movie, for pacing reasons, or whether it was purely a cameo?

 

[Black Sabbath]

Haha, I dozed off NOT because of the movie, but my own exhaustion

And yeah, usually I only go to this theater for IMAX showings, but they weren't showing this in IMAX due to Guardians 2 still on the throne. Most of the auditoriums are fine, but this one I lucked out to see the movie in is one I've been in before where the movies are always very dark. I saw the latest Evil Dead movie in the same one when it came out years ago, so imagine how dark that was

Oh well. I'm seeing it at a different theater on Cheap-O Tuesday for $5, so I'm not too upset.

[bucketfoot]

7 minutes ago, Black Sabbath said:

Oh well. I'm seeing it at a different theater on Cheap-O Tuesday for $5, so I'm not too upset.

I saw it on Cheap Tuesday over here in the UK, good to know it's a worldwide thing.

[RussTCB]

Saw it this morning and enjoyed it overall but I did see some of the gripes that have been mentioned. My biggest thing with this series is that no matter how these movies end, the next one always ends up being the same; some disaster will have befallen a ship, a random crew will come out of cryo, they will end up heading somewhere they weren't supposed to, someone will touch something they weren't supposed to, an Alien will be born, chaos will ensue, 1 or 2 people will survive and go back into cryo.

[bucketfoot]

20 minutes ago, RussTCB said:

Saw it this morning and enjoyed it overall but I did see some of the gripes that have been mentioned. My biggest thing with this series is that no matter how these movies end, the next one always ends up being the same; some disaster will have befallen a ship, a random crew will come out of cryo, they will end up heading somewhere they weren't supposed to, someone will touch something they weren't supposed to, an Alien will be born, chaos will ensue, 1 or 2 people will survive and go back into cryo.

Rinse, repeat.

[Axl_morris]

This film was fucking crap!

This is Ridley Scott. I expected so much more..and i enjoyed Prometheus. This is the guy who made Alien and he has brought out a film on par with Aliens vs Predator.

I'm not going into details, you guys have seen it. Its full of rediculous action scenes and CGI aliens, plot holes and 2Dimensional characters you have no empathy for. 

This is the guy who made Gladiator. He should be ashamed to even consider a sequal to this.

Michael Fassbender was the only good thing about this movie, but was it really necessary to have him making out with himself?

Edited May 21, 2017 by Axl_morris

[bucketfoot]

17 minutes ago, Axl_morris said:

Michael Fassbender was the only good thing about this movie, but was it really necessary to have him making out with himself?

The Fassbender on Fassbender action was very sexy.

[Black Sabbath]

1 hour ago, RussTCB said:

Saw it this morning and enjoyed it overall but I did see some of the gripes that have been mentioned. My biggest thing with this series is that no matter how these movies end, the next one always ends up being the same; some disaster will have befallen a ship, a random crew will come out of cryo, they will end up heading somewhere they weren't supposed to, someone will touch something they weren't supposed to, an Alien will be born, chaos will ensue, 1 or 2 people will survive and go back into cryo.

Well if the next one is the direct sequel to this, it'll have to be somewhat different since there's only 7 years in between Covenant and Alien.

Next movie will likely have David get to the planet and start things up and start the colonization while implanting the Xenos, but something will happen and he'll be killed/destroyed.

[appetite4illusions]

I can see that I was right on the nose about this film, all along...

 

Many months ago I read a plot synopsis that some trigger-happy fans posted after a sneak preview. They broke the film down, pretty much by beat. I tried not to let it bother me, but it was hard to give the film a fair shake when I knew it jettisoned the interesting ideas that were the reason it existed in the first place. It solved the engineer issue with one deft moment and made it obsolete to the new directive; David's Little Shop of Horrors.

Ah, David...Such a brilliantly written character in Prometheus. Neither good nor bad, he had such a neat role as provocateur and curious child. Maybe Ridley didn't understand that what made David so great was that they didin't swing too far either way with him, the first time. Maybe they just needed him to crank out a cookie-cutter story. Somebody had to be the bad guy. Only, he's beyond bad, beyond evil. He's so fucking mustache twirling in this movie that I expected him to tie Katherine Waters to the train tracks.

I guess, in the end, the sequel with David and Shaw in Paradise was just toooo ambitious in concept. Think about it. It would have involved one human character and the head of another on an Alien planet with no other human characters to interact with. Try carving a movie out of that! I always thought that the tone of the franchise should shift into something more like Planet of the Apes, with Shaw as a prisoner on planet that was in the middle of some kind of civil war. That's how I wanted to see Ridley go about it. 

 

There's still the confounding and pretzel knotting lineage to the original Alien, to consider. That engineer ship that the Nostromo finds was sitting on that planet surface for thousands of years, enough to fossilize the engineer in the cockpit. If it was there for thousands of years, how did David's children find their way into the cargo hold? Since the Aliens were never a product of the engineers.

In the end, the presence of this particular ship on this particular planet was the only question fans wanted Ridley to answer. I don't think any answer, if he even cares to try, will satisfy that curiosity. 

[maynard]

Haven't watched it yet but read AVPGalaxy and your posts here. Guess we can all agree that the timeline nos is just screwed up and the main questions from Prometheus and Space Jockey will never get a satisfying answer right? I love all the discussion the Alien/Prom saga generates, it's fun to read all the theories but some official answers would be nice. Major screw up from Ridley.

[rocknroll41]

So over the weekend I watched Alien (1979) and Aliens (1986) for the first time and....WWWWWOOOOOWWW!!!!! I sure was missing out!!!! Those two movies are fucking amazing!!!! The second one might actually be my new all-time favorite film now.

 

Then, out of curiosity, I read the plots for 3, 4, AVP, AVPR, Prometheus, and this new one and...yeahhhhh they all sound like crap! Especially this new one with it's supposed xenomorph origin bullshit. I won't bother with any of them. Alien and Aliens are the only canon ones for me!

Edited May 22, 2017 by rocknroll41

[bucketfoot]

37 minutes ago, rocknroll41 said:

I won't bother with any of them. Alien and Aliens are the only canon ones for me!

Good decision. While the rest of the Alien movies are entertaining in their own way, none of them really add anything to the 1st two, they're all you need. The two AVP movies are utter garbage.

Edited May 22, 2017 by bucketfoot