Ridley Scott Returns (Again) to Alien Universe in Alien - Covenant

Marter

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Ridley Scott Returns (Again) to Alien Universe in Alien - Covenant

<youtube=H0VW6sg50Pk>

In space, no one can hear you scream.

It was all the way back in 1979 that Ridley Scott [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alien_(film)].

You may remember Scott as the man who tried to reinvigorate the movie franchise with Prometheus [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/escape-to-the-movies/5917-Prometheus], even if that movie only kind of, a little bit, barely touched on the Alien portion of its existence. Covenant, meanwhile, is a full-blown Alien movie, although it is still technically a sequel to Prometheus. Will it fully bridge the gap between the Prometheus and Alien? We shall see.

Alien: Covenant is scheduled to be released May 19, 2017.

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MonsterCrit

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Yawn...
Aliens much like predator, is a franchise with a monster that doesn't know where to go. Seriously Scott, why try to make us remember Prometheus. That didn't work. Back story gets less interesting the further back you go.

You know what might have been interesting. THe story of that asteroid colony. The one that the marines get sent to in Aliens 2.
 

fix-the-spade

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Well it looks as gorgeous and horrifying as ever, but not terribly interesting.

A bunch more idiots in space behave like idiots and get predictably murdered by forced movie tropes.

You would think in a movie about a group stranded on the homeworld of ancient God-like aliens who not only created life (and possibly Humanity) but accidentally created sentient biological weapons that overran and destroyed their entire eco system, that the unfortunate Humans discovering it could at least be moderately smart.

Seriously, hazmat gear, drones, advanced medical facilities and weapons, they're walking into the graveyard of their Gods, it's not going to be enough against such Lovecraftian horrors, but at least make an effort.

I demand a smarter movie than gore porn!
 

fix-the-spade

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MonsterCrit said:
You know what might have been interesting. THe story of that asteroid colony. The one that the marines get sent to in Aliens 2.
Spoiler, they all die.

The trouble with any prequel is you know where it's going before the opening titles roll. Whether it's Prometheus, Rogue One or a prospective Hadley's Hope movie everyone already knows the ending.

It rather spoils any kind of tension to know that the heroes will/won't succeed and will/won't survive because their story and it's aftermath has already been established in the preceding tale.

On that note, it just occurred to me how awesome it would have been if Rogue One had played with this trope. If the Rogue One crew had utterly and miserably failed in their quest, while Princess Leia quietly carried out the real theft of the Death Star's plans. It would explain why they were never mentioned in the original trilogy, they weren't some great self sacrificing heroes, they were bunch of idiots who inadvertently provided cover for a history defining act of espionage by noisily getting themselves killed.
 

SirSullymore

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Yeah, kind of looks like more of the same. I wonder what Neil Blomkamp's flick would have been like.
 

Hawki

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MonsterCrit said:
You know what might have been interesting. THe story of that asteroid colony. The one that the marines get sent to in Aliens 2.
It's a moon, not an asteroid. And that story's already been covered in EU material.

fix-the-spade said:
You would think in a movie about a group stranded on the homeworld of ancient God-like aliens who not only created life (and possibly Humanity) but accidentally created sentient biological weapons that overran and destroyed their entire eco system, that the unfortunate Humans discovering it could at least be moderately smart.

Seriously, hazmat gear, drones, advanced medical facilities and weapons, they're walking into the graveyard of their Gods, it's not going to be enough against such Lovecraftian horrors, but at least make an effort.
You do realize that the Covenant crew has no way of knowing that this is the Engineers' homeworld, right?

Unless you're referring to the events of Prometheus there, in which case LV-223 isn't their homeworld.

SirSullymore said:
Yeah, kind of looks like more of the same. I wonder what Neil Blomkamp's flick would have been like.
With any luck, we'll never have to find out. ;p
 

fix-the-spade

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Hawki said:
You do realize that the Covenant crew has no way of knowing that this is the Engineers' homeworld, right?

Unless you're referring to the events of Prometheus there, in which case LV-223 isn't their homeworld.
In either case they are being spectacularly stupid.
<spoiler= Here's why>
Both ships are expressly hunting inhabitable worlds, one for 'exploration' and one is a colony ship. If you're going to a world that can support life, work on the assumption you will find life on it. In human history explorers reaching new continents has frequently ended in the discovery of horrific new diseases and the arrival of new fauna to biomes with often disastrous consequences. Billions have died of infections, eco-systems collapsed, cultures starved or wiped out, that's just on Earth with good old carbon based life.

Up that to a planetary scale, years from home and with no chance of re-supply or reinforcement. You need methods of exploring and taking/testing samples geological, biological and chemical that you can use without leaving the ship, without the samples even entering the ship, then you stay in the ship until that equipment has established that it's safe for you to leave.

You need equipment for hazardous environments in case you have to leave the ship early, it needs to be able to withstand a lot of punishment, then you use it when outside anyway, because the probes might have missed something.

You need quarantine and disease control facilities in case that HEV equipment fails, or in case of regular illness and injury. You need weapons both for internal security and in case the planet's critters are unfriendly, you need ship scale weapons in case the planet's critters are big or smart enough to attack your ship. You need the means of growing food and manufacturing equipment and parts within the ship.

Even if you arrive at the planet and it's a ball of dead rock with no atmosphere, you still need all of that equipment just to survive and operate the ship for extended periods.

Of course this requires a level of attention to detail and planning in the script, the writers have to think about exactly how The Engineer's home world has become so dangerous that all of humanity's technology is powerless to stop.

It's much easier to have the allegedly 'smart' humans calmly open the door and file out into an entirely unexplored eco-system, breathe in it's dusts and spores, touch every single thing that's got menacing spikes or slime on it and have them be infected without them realising it (wave your hands and make spooky noises here). It would be much funnier if one human opened the door, walked out and promptly died of anaphylactic shock as the local pollen entered his lungs and made them swell to ten times the normal size.

It comes down to lazy script writing, they haven't put any serious attention to detail into the heroes, which bodes poorly for the rest of the film, especially when the trailer has gone to such great lengths to spoil and play up the blood and gore over the awe and mystery.

Ironically Alien: Resurrection took a smarter approach than this. In that film plenty of precautions were taken, but nobody anticipated the Xenomorphs understanding their corrosive blood to the point of using it to defeat quarantine. When you can say the writing is dumber than Alien: Resurrection that's not a terribly good sign.
 

RJ 17

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They should just make AvP2 (the PC game) into a movie. :^)
 

Boris Goodenough

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RJ 17 said:
They should just make AvP2 (the PC game) into a movie. :^)
With how games usually get treated when they get the movie make-over, do you really want to utter those words(into writing)?
 

RJ 17

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Boris Goodenough said:
RJ 17 said:
They should just make AvP2 (the PC game) into a movie. :^)
With how games usually get treated when they get the movie make-over, do you really want to utter those words(into writing)?
It's an interesting beast. The reason I picked that one in particular is because it's a game that's already based off of a movie (well, movies). And while it does have 3 distinct campaigns, they're all intertwined with each other to form a single cohesive plot...one which, considering the setting/universe/what-have-you that we're dealing with, actually works pretty well.

So yeah, if they actually stuck to the plot of the game, I think it would make for a fun movie.
 

Tsun Tzu

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Looks like a slasher film with an Alien coat of paint.

I mean...a god damned shower sex scene interrupted by the monster?

May as well throw a Jason mask on the xeno.
fix-the-spade said:
Hawki said:
You do realize that the Covenant crew has no way of knowing that this is the Engineers' homeworld, right?

Unless you're referring to the events of Prometheus there, in which case LV-223 isn't their homeworld.
In either case they are being spectacularly stupid.
<spoiler= Here's why>
Both ships are expressly hunting inhabitable worlds, one for 'exploration' and one is a colony ship. If you're going to a world that can support life, work on the assumption you will find life on it. In human history explorers reaching new continents has frequently ended in the discovery of horrific new diseases and the arrival of new fauna to biomes with often disastrous consequences. Billions have died of infections, eco-systems collapsed, cultures starved or wiped out, that's just on Earth with good old carbon based life.

Up that to a planetary scale, years from home and with no chance of re-supply or reinforcement. You need methods of exploring and taking/testing samples geological, biological and chemical that you can use without leaving the ship, without the samples even entering the ship, then you stay in the ship until that equipment has established that it's safe for you to leave.

You need equipment for hazardous environments in case you have to leave the ship early, it needs to be able to withstand a lot of punishment, then you use it when outside anyway, because the probes might have missed something.

You need quarantine and disease control facilities in case that HEV equipment fails, or in case of regular illness and injury. You need weapons both for internal security and in case the planet's critters are unfriendly, you need ship scale weapons in case the planet's critters are big or smart enough to attack your ship. You need the means of growing food and manufacturing equipment and parts within the ship.

Even if you arrive at the planet and it's a ball of dead rock with no atmosphere, you still need all of that equipment just to survive and operate the ship for extended periods.

Of course this requires a level of attention to detail and planning in the script, the writers have to think about exactly how The Engineer's home world has become so dangerous that all of humanity's technology is powerless to stop.

It's much easier to have the allegedly 'smart' humans calmly open the door and file out into an entirely unexplored eco-system, breathe in it's dusts and spores, touch every single thing that's got menacing spikes or slime on it and have them be infected without them realising it (wave your hands and make spooky noises here). It would be much funnier if one human opened the door, walked out and promptly died of anaphylactic shock as the local pollen entered his lungs and made them swell to ten times the normal size.

It comes down to lazy script writing, they haven't put any serious attention to detail into the heroes, which bodes poorly for the rest of the film, especially when the trailer has gone to such great lengths to spoil and play up the blood and gore over the awe and mystery.

Ironically Alien: Resurrection took a smarter approach than this. In that film plenty of precautions were taken, but nobody anticipated the Xenomorphs understanding their corrosive blood to the point of using it to defeat quarantine. When you can say the writing is dumber than Alien: Resurrection that's not a terribly good sign.
Nailed all of my issues with it.

The lack of protective gear, in and of itself, ruins the suspension of disbelief and, by extension, the movie for me.
 

wulfy42

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Aliens has already been done to death.

I'd like to see more predator movies, both on their world/worlds, and perhaps a full scale human invasion or something (since they have decided we are now worthy advesaries).
 

Marter

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wulfy42 said:
Aliens has already been done to death.

I'd like to see more predator movies, both on their world/worlds, and perhaps a full scale human invasion or something (since they have decided we are now worthy advesaries).
The Predator is scheduled for a March 2, 2018 date, although it hasn't started filming yet, so we'll see if it meets it.
 

Boris Goodenough

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RJ 17 said:
It's an interesting beast. The reason I picked that one in particular is because it's a game that's already based off of a movie (well, movies). And while it does have 3 distinct campaigns, they're all intertwined with each other to form a single cohesive plot...one which, considering the setting/universe/what-have-you that we're dealing with, actually works pretty well.

So yeah, if they actually stuck to the plot of the game, I think it would make for a fun movie.
I don't disagree on the source (played the hell out of AvP2), the itch comes from how poorly games have been handled up and until now.
 

Arnoxthe1

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RJ 17 said:
They should just make AvP2 (the PC game) into a movie. :^)
I just want AvP2, the game. Period. There's been no remaster of it whatsoever. No one's selling it digitally. And AvP3 just isn't good... Ugh. :(
 

RJ 17

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Arnoxthe1 said:
RJ 17 said:
They should just make AvP2 (the PC game) into a movie. :^)
I just want AvP2, the game. Period. There's been no remaster of it whatsoever. No one's selling it digitally. And AvP3 just isn't good... Ugh. :(
Eh, the sequel wasn't terrible...but yeah, AvP2 was frickin' awesome. Great campaigns and a broken multiplayer that was fun because of how broken it was. I really do miss that game.
 

Arnoxthe1

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RJ 17 said:
Great campaigns and a broken multiplayer that was fun because of how broken it was. I really do miss that game.
I don't know about broken... Except for the auto-aiming Predator disc. That was some bullshit. But besides that, I found it pretty darn balanced. And even if it wasn't, as you said, it was just way too much fun for some reason. Going out there as a human with a shotty or an AR or what have you in the middle of the arena fending off as many aliens as you could was awesome. Being the alien was awesome... Gahhh... WTH. I want it back now really bad.
 

RJ 17

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Arnoxthe1 said:
RJ 17 said:
Great campaigns and a broken multiplayer that was fun because of how broken it was. I really do miss that game.
I don't know about broken... Except for the auto-aiming Predator disc. That was some bullshit. But besides that, I found it pretty darn balanced. And even if it wasn't, as you said, it was just way too much fun for some reason. Going out there as a human with a shotty or an AR or what have you in the middle of the arena fending off as many aliens as you could was awesome. Being the alien was awesome... Gahhh... WTH. I want it back now really bad.
See the Disc could be dodged by bunny-hopping around as a Marine or just doing a high-jump over it as a Predator or Alien, the Predator's main cheese was the Pistol and Shoulder Cannon. But Marines had the all-purpose Grenade Launcher, what with their EMP's that stun for 10 years and their Spider Mines, or the rapid-fire Sniper Rifle exploit, or on the more open maps there was the guided Missile Launcher...if they locked onto you and fired, you're dead. I'll never forget it. I was a predator on top of a building and there was a marine on top of another across the map. He fires his rocket, so I jump off the building and run inside...the rocket flew over where I originally was, made a 90 degree turn downwards, then another 90 degree turn into the building I ran into and blew me up.

So yeah, there was plenty of cheese to go around in that game, but god damnit did I love it.