After the Covenant
I know it’s a bit late to talk about the Alien franchise’s latest outing in theaters, Alien: Covenant, but I’m not exactly here to just review it. To be clear, I’m here to simply talk about it, to ramble on about the movie and the franchise in general. So, without further ado, let’s start with the most recent movie first.
To tell you the truth, I’d have to say that I liked Alien: Covenant. Now, I wouldn’t say that it’s one of the greatest movies ever made, nor is it one of my favorites, but I do admit that I find it very entertaining. And I’m not talking about this sole installment either; I think what Ridley Scott has been doing with the latest entries into the Alien franchise are far and away better than all the sequels that preceded it. Barring the first movie, I think both Prometheus and Alien: Covenant deserve to be high up on the list of the best installments in the franchise. I say this with no regard for what some of you might think, as I’ve seen some headlines and heard some jokes and digs about both Prometheus and Alien: Covenant before. I don’t, however, hear anyone saying how much of crap storm Alien VS Predator was or that other Alien movie where Topher Grace played a soldier or some such uniformed character. I mean, come on, Topher Grace? Seriously? You’re going to let Eric Forman go face to face with Xenomorphs? I guess cocaine really is one hell of a drug.
Going back to Alien: Covenant (and to some extent, Prometheus ), I do think that this is the proper direction the Alien franchise should be taking, especially when you consider how it retains just even a bit of the genre or theme the original Alien movie had back then. You see – and this is pretty much an unpopular opinion –, all the movies that came out after the original and up until Prometheus felt like an afterthought. What I mean to say is that it seems like they were created solely to rake in the cash without any regard for retaining what the original had, which is that sweet, sweet horror. And I’m talking about not just any kind of horror; I’m talking about horror in space! This is where the most recent couple of movies excel at. Without even mentioning the all-time favorite tropes like chestburster scenes and the like, both Prometheus and Alien: Covenant deliver the kind of science fiction-themed claustrophobic horror the original did.
The thing is, much like Star Wars, you could go watch the original Alien movie and find that it is a self-contained story. So much so, that you won’t be wrong to think that the studio meant it to be that way. You know, so it won’t be embarrassing to assume there’s going to be a sequel if it had turned out to be a flop (for reference of this kind of shame, watch 2011’s Green Lantern movie). But, thankfully, I think the franchise is finally on the right track now.