Alien: Covenant footage was screened. Results are in...

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I'm on board. I liked Prometheus well enough despite the problems I had with it, and this one looks closer to the original, both my favorite horror, and sci fi film of all time arguably. But, who knows. Mr. Scott is very sporadic in terms of film quality, you never know when he's going to drop a a good one. I mean, I thought The Martian was his best since Thelma and Louise, and that was coming off of the heels of Exodus, which I've heard isn't very good.
I liked Prometheus as well; Exodus is apparently a bad one. I think Gladiator is the last really good film he made, but I haven't seen a large percentage of his films since then.



Looks... not bad.

I feel a certain amount of distrust for the prequels.

Ever since I saw Alien in about 1980 I wondered who that big alien strapped into the seat was in the derelict space ship.

In Prometheus, they almost explained it. Big Alien, big chair, straps himself in... I'm thinking aha, so now I know. THEN he gets out of the chair and gets killed in another part of the ship which is completely incongruent with the story line.

I have a feeling this will be another 'predator like' money grab.



Looks... not bad.

I feel a certain amount of distrust for the prequels.

Ever since I saw Alien in about 1980 I wondered who that big alien strapped into the seat was in the derelict space ship.

In Prometheus, they almost explained it. Big Alien, big chair, straps himself in... I'm thinking aha, so now I know. THEN he gets out of the chair and gets killed in another part of the ship which is completely incongruent with the story line.

I have a feeling this will be another 'predator like' money grab.
Aliens is really the only film that can compare with Alien for quality.

I didn't mind Prometheus not connecting directly to Alien. In fact it probably came about because of the non-literal way they went with the Engineers, i.e. the remains in Alien being shown to be a suit rather than the appearance of the aliens themselves. That was clever and the idea of inverting their body colour to white rather than the black of the Alien was also very smart. It will be interesting if Alien: Covenant does link directly to Alien and whether we think it was the right decision to hold off; or, that Prometheus would have been a better story to link to Alien instead.



In the Beginning...
I liked Prometheus as well; Exodus is apparently a bad one. I think Gladiator is the last really good film he made, but I haven't seen a large percentage of his films since then.
For me, Black Hawk Down (2001) and American Gangster (2008) are his standouts since Gladiator, along with The Martian (2015), although that film has Andy Weir's fabulous novel to thank for the source material. Body of Lies (2008) was also very good and, although it wasn't terribly well received, I find Robin Hood (2010) to be a lot of fun.

Gladiator (2000), to its credit, is also a lot of fun... but it should never have won a Best Picture Oscar. It's very superficial, very smarmy, just like his later sword-and-sandal epics. And Joaquin Phoenix, though he did what he could, fell a bit into the trap of overacting the villain. (Miss Vicky will swat me for saying that.)



In the Beginning...
Well, the Coens do that too. Even Spielberg makes stinkers from time to time. By now, I think these guys are more apt to pick risky passion projects because they've reached a measure of success that all but guarantees a studio will fund whatever they want to make.



28 days...6 hours...42 minutes...12 seconds
I'm very surprised that I'm not....excited for this at all.
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Suspect's Reviews



Raven73's Avatar
Boldly going.
The trailer looks like an amalgamation of the first Alien movie and Prometheus, and thus not very exciting.

I'm glad to see in IMDB that the Elizabeth Shaw character is back. I liked her unbreakable faith and Ripley-like intelligence.



The trailer looks like an amalgamation of the first Alien movie and Prometheus, and thus not very exciting.

I'm glad to see in IMDB that the Elizabeth Shaw character is back. I liked her unbreakable faith and Ripley-like intelligence.
I was disappointed that we weren't picking up from the end of Prometheus, or some time after the end. I wonder if the intention is to have Shaw back properly in the third film (though I doubt it)?



A while back I remember some comments about how the 'births' in Alien: Covenant don't make sense –

WARNING: spoilers below
because the Alien we're familiar with grew in the chest cavity so it already had an easier way out. Apparently in this one, embryos grow in a crewmember's back and the other in someone's throat.

I wonder whether the writers have looked to Greek Mythology again here, as I was thinking today about Zeus and two instances where his children are born from his own body – Athena from his head after he has a supposed headache; and Dionysus from his thigh.



Very good, that new prologue/trailer.

WARNING: spoilers below
I found the interaction of the crewmembers very believable and convincing. Clever red herring that I kind of saw coming given the 'Last Supper' tagline. I continue to be very impressed with Billy Crudup, who really I think is on a par with Michael Fassbender – Fassbender made me laugh at the end with that weird little smile Walter does, like the android has trouble making it look naturally human .



Surprised there's not been any further discussion about the prologue scene – anyone else seen it?



You can't win an argument just by being right!
I'm looking forward to this.



This might just do nobody any good.
Trying to keep it at a minimum for this since I got burned badly by Prometheus.

I liked the prologue. It's strangely eerie while also being festive (we know what's going to happen to these people after all) and I like the hints at disfunction between the crew members.

Plus some sly suggestiveness from Walter and Daniels.



Trying to keep it at a minimum for this since I got burned badly by Prometheus.
Fair enough – not an easy task these days.

I liked the prologue. It's strangely eerie while also being festive (we know what's going to happen to these people after all) and I like the hints at disfunction between the crew members.

Plus some sly suggestiveness from Walter and Daniels.
Early days but Crudup's character is

WARNING: spoilers below
giving me an Ash vibe.



This might just do nobody any good.
Hadn't thought about that.

I was thinking Carter Burke.



Little Devil's Avatar
MC for the Great Underground Circus
Will this be Prometheus school of stupid as well?
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Hadn't thought about that.

I was thinking Carter Burke.
It definitely seems like there's more to Crudup's character, but it could also be that he's far too interesting to watch . I remember seeing Paul McGann in his first Hornblower appearance as Bush, where he stole the production just by being enigmatic. I knew nothing about the original story or the character, but even if I had I'd still have wondered whether Bush was an Admiralty plant.



This might just do nobody any good.
Will this be Prometheus school of stupid as well?
Prometheus and school in the same question? Someone's attended.