The original horror of the Alien was its mystery and the harsh truth that the universe doesn't care about Human curiosity. We aren't owed any answers. The universe is vast, dark, cold, and ultimately we are insignificant in its presence. The Alien was ancient when it was discovered. The ship and crew, fossilized. It was everything beyond our comprehension. It was the Lovecraftian Mountains of Madness, deep time, cosmic horror. Humans were just nothing. We were just food and breeding stock. Beyond the flesh tearing and gore, *that* was what made them truly terrifying.
@@KesselRunner606 the harsh truth horror aspect is maintained in my opinion, specifically in Prometheus. we finally lay eyes on our supposed creators only to be met with violent hostility and/or indifference. It’s almost more terrifying when you think about it
@@Thebabybadass101 and with Prometheus I felt that the original wonder of the first Alien movie is gone. The Engineers and the black goo ruined the wonder. Why answer the question of 'where is that space jockey from?' We didn't need to know all that.
@@Thebabybadass101 It's funny to me that people keep claiming that with Prometheus & Covenant the series lost it's cosmic horror roots because it shows where the Aliens (& humanity) comes from, despite those themes being very much in keeping with Cosmic Horror stories. In fact, the whole "Alien beings created humanity and experimented on life forms to create superior beings" is so reminiscent of At the Mountains of Madness that Prometheus is often cited as one of the primary reasons behind the cancellation of the At the Mountains of Madness adaptation of Guillermo del Toro, as the studio thought it was too similar.
It's funny you mention the Mountains of Madness as an example of what Alien "used to be", that's the one Lovecraft story that does actually delve into cosmic answers and specifically where humans and some other famous Lovecraftian beings come from as the Elder Things in the story are revealed to have been behind the creation of Shoggoths and actually humanity itself was a byproduct of one of their experiments. Ideas that are also explored in Prometheus, which very specifically seem to take inspiration from At the Mountains of Madness.
I searched for this video only a few hours ago only to find you hadn't done it yet, and voila, now here it is. These Retrospective films are pure quality and one of my favorite things on RUclips. Thanks Mr Harper!
Not going to lie, I saw this movie for the first time a few months ago and just assumed it was only a couple years old, maybe 2019 at the latest, but when I saw it came out in 2017 I just went like "WTF?!" lol
David didn't create the Alien. He only created those aliens. The mural in Prometheus is proof that xeno like creatures existed before plus the space jockey ship was crashed long enough to fossilise the pilot. The timeline doesn't fit.
Have you looked into that you can find the script the engineers apparently were infertile and one of them sacrifice themselves somehow to give birth to the Deacon in the portrait and that made them fertile for a while and eventually the Deacon died and then they tried to synthetically recreate the black goo and that's what led to that black site getting screwed up on lv 422. Apparently the original Deacon some couple billion years ago gave the ceremonial blackout to the engineer that seated life on Earth and the synthetic goo that is in Prometheus is what was a complete failure catastrophe if you read the script
I’ve had arguments about this. You’re not the only person who actually remembers what they’ve seen and can point it out. It’s like people don’t understand it.
All I wanted was a legit Prometheus sequel. You know, a little more exploration of the Engineer culture and more adventures with Shaw and less insane David.
Insane David was great in Prometheus but he had no one to play off of naturally in Covenant since they took out Shaw off camera in between movies. Covenant had a massive continuation problem and lacked the natural dynamics of Prometheus which demonstrated the worst and best of humanity in its last act with good actually winning out but bought with intense heroic sacrifice. Covenant abandoned this bitter sweet formula for an incoherent mess. All the options and dynamics of the crew didnt seem to matter by the second act. Covenants nihilistic story can be summed up as: no matter the world view and no matter the flavor of intention everyone will eventually succumb to the devil bringing inevitable destruction to the world.
While I positively hate any and all implications of David actually making the Xenos, I do like the kind of Gothic Horror tone the movie delves into around the halfway mark. Creepy phantoms haunt the moors at night, so the crew has to go follow a mad scientist to his spooky castle in the middle of a graveyard.
Solid point, I actually enjoyed that side of it too....but always show TOO MUCH of the xeno. I did like that single shot in the hanger bay where the xeno is just walking...totally creepy and awesome
@DorisDay-lw4xs But Ridley doesn't make this fully clear to the audience through his movie, so that's his failure there. It caused so many Fans to get really angry and was what led the movie to received some backlash and bad reviews. I like the idea that David was like John Hammond, managing to recreate the already existing, ancient Xenomorph species, and those Facehugger eggs are on LV-426 all this time. Infact it works better that the Engineers themselves DID NOT CREATE them, but simply came across them, and when one of their own got infected by one of the Facehuggers, sent a warning beacon out; and the Engineers then decided to use the Xeno DNA, contained within those Ampules/Urns; as a more easier way of carrying the bioweapon cargo. The Xenomorph's own Origins should NEVER be explored or answered, they should stay a mystery forever, just the same with how Yoda's species are never touched upon in the starwars franchise. You have to keep some level of mystery to keep things interesting.
The biggest flaw these movies have in my opinion is that they are linked to alien. If prometheus and covenant were it’s own things they would be amazing
What is it with modern Alien movies wanting to speed-run the incubation process? The second guy to get bursted had that thing on him for less than a minute; not even long enough to knock him out. Alien: Romulus has that one girl who didn't have it on for all that long either and hers incubated inside probably even faster than the one in Covenant.
It just shows weak storytelling. If they can't work out a realistic timeline for this to happen then they should go back to the drawing board and start again.
The Alien is a bit of an unknown quantity and has always been pretty variable genetics wise. Could always explain it away by saying certain strains of it incubate more quickly than others.
You didn't watch the film lmao, he gets goo in his nose at the opening to the ship, after exploring it he starts to feel sick, then after the multi hour trek down to the lander at the beach the alien bursts out his mouth, they literally say the ship was at considerable elevation multiple kilometres away from the beach. Even if it's not clearly communicated that's what happens.
I don't know of another movie that strikes such a perfect balance between very enjoyable and incredibly frustrating. Killing Shaw between movies is just infuriating.
I agree. I felt this way with Alien 3. We spent most of Aliens watching Newt being rescued and yet she is already dead at the start of Alien 3. Watching that in the cinema immediately annoyed me. Having said that over the years I have grown to enjoy Alien 3. I don't think I will feel the same with Alien Covenant.
I absolutely agree, killing Shaw OFF SCREEN and setting up David as the sole *Creator* of the Xenomorphs was sheer sacrilege. Especially when he had already shown a mural in Prometheus, and the idea was meant to be that the Facehugger eggs were already on LV-426, long ago, and the Engineers had just simply recreated, synthesised the Xeno DNA, into a viral bomb, in the form of those Ampules contained with the Urns. For Ridley Scott to set up Shaw and everything she had been through in Prometheus, leading us to eagerly follow her to the next place, where the Engineers supposedly come from, to "get her answers". Then he goes and just dodges all that and kills her off, that's the most idiotic, cowardly thing for a director to do. He totally deserved Covenant underperforming for doing what he did there, and basically him losing control again of the Alien franchise.
Alien: Covenant is a film that really needed to have been a more in depth continuation of Prometheus than the Alien plot shoehorned in due to fan backlash. Its clear Scott wanted to go more into the engineer planet and David shown in film, but I think he just went "the fans and producers want this". Next thing you know, there's an alien scene while a couple have sex in a shower. That's beneath you Ridley Scott! I think he should have just done the big idea sci-fi with Covenant and then have the Alien: Romulus film as the standard Alien horror film. I think I agree with Matthew Buck when he said at the time that the film's big problem was overly explaining the aliens when they are at their best being an unknown entity.
Because of critics like Mathew Buck going hard on Coverant, I skipped seeing the film theaters. Prometheus, I personally didn't feel compelled to revisit it again. Honestly, I think I don't think I care about this Prometheus as it does nothing for the Alien series.
In the novelization, Alan Dean Foster gives enough wiggle room that David Jurassic Park’d the Xenomorph. The idea of a Xenomorph arms race would be a fun idea. David’s wolves against the real XX-121 Star Beast from the original.
Great retrospective as usual. I remember in the theater when Walter and David did the switch and I could not get over how, to use your words, clumsily it had been executed.
Oram watching creatures kill the crew and people he loved, then shortly after having David show him that he had been experimenting with and growing the alien parasites, and proceeds to just stick his head over a giant egg because David said to was one of the most egregious character decision making I’ve EVER seen in any movie. Completely lost me. For all the complaints Prometheus crew gets for bad decision making this movie blew it out of the water.
I never saw it like that...I saw Oram as a naive religious man who wants to see the good in everyone. He was clearly depicted as such. His natural impulse was just to hesitate or be passive in the face of evil. And David's confident in saying to him "hey come over here, look at this" is a type of Satanic hypnotism. Evil is like that and naive people are like that. Hats off to Scott for capturing this.
Even moreso, just before when he shot the alien and David fiercely screamed "NO!" for doing so, you'd think he might be a little supicious why he's mad that he killed the monster. But no, doesn't even think a thing about it and just goes with him down in his creepy lair with little prompting. It's like it's high minded ideas have to be saddled down with B-Grade Horror writing.
My 10 year old son (at the time) said he was stupid and nobody would trust David at that point. When a 10 year old is pointing out bad plot ya got problems.
Oram is easily one of the Top dumbest characters in horror film ever. And I thought Kane was keen and stupid in Alien, and Bjorn was annoying in Romulus 😆
The visuals and set design is second to none, in both Films they do honestly look beautiful. I even like Prometheus' "Ancient Astronaut" themes and big ideas, I like the first half of Covenant but after that it just devolves into tired cliche and David being the creator of Xenos contradicts Prometheus and hurts the Alien lore.
@@CoNnOr5899 It's literally the plot to Frankenstein. Nature is alien and ancient; go shoot it. Cameron's big yawn-fest, Aliens, doing Vietnam revenge fantasies for Ronald Reagan.
I've been a huge fan of your channel for almost a decade Oliver, and your craftsmanship and care in telling the full story of every movie you cover is what inspired me to start my own series of "Take 2 Retrospectives". You inspired me to want to tell the full stories of movies I felt had gotten an unfair or undeserved reputation amongst fans or critics. My very first video on my channel is a retrospective for Alien: Covenant. I just wanted to acknowledge this full circle moment and say thank you for the years and years of invaluable movie, gaming, and film history. Nothing but love... - The Lone Wolfe -
I think what a lot of people seem to forget is that back in 1979 when Alien arrived Ridley Scott had one movie under his belt, a low budget historical film called The Duellists. He was simply a hired gun director. Alien, its concepts, the look and the feel were created by Dan O'Bannon and Ronald Shusett, the writers. But once the movie became the huge hit everyone seemed to forget the guys who developed the movie and assumed it was all done by Scott. His ego allowed him to take that false praise and run with it. I'm not saying he isn't a good director, he absolutely is, but he did NOT create Alien, he was just there doing a job and getting a pay check. However by the time Prometheus and Covenant came around he had built his reputation to a high level and used that power to get what he wanted. Now in charge of the Alien 'history' he went away from the classic horror to more high brow storytelling, something the fans quickly told him they did not want forcing Fox to rein him in.
YES! Thank you for saying this im so tired of people constantly feeding into Ridley’s own ego narrative. I mean how much work went into making Alien, how many artists, in the production design, sets, props, storyboarding, concept art, of both human ship and alien stuff. Or the cinematographer, the composer, the visual effects supervisor, the person in the alien suit, the THREE writers, Dan O’Bannon plus Hill and Giler who made alterations. Hell ALL THE ACTORS too?? Ridley Scott is just ONE cook in the kitchen here and yet years later he still acts like he was the sole creator, the sole reason for the film’s brilliance, he’s become such a narcissistic asshole, and his lack of input into the writing of his own films are showing so often now with how often his films end up being subpar and shit because he doesn’t spend a second looking at the quality of the writing. We need to STOP acting like its ‘Ridley Scott’s Alien’ he didn’t even write the script like James Cameron did.
It really is just this He drank someone elses coolaid and got paid alot of money for doing so Take the A L I E N name off his sequels and theyre b tier run of the mill sci fi movies
Only partially true, a LOT of the groundwork was laid by O Bannon and Shusett - but hiring Giger was all Ridley Scott, and casting was him too. Its true he was hired with no expectation of being anything other than a journeyman director, but he turned out to be alot more than that. The thing is this, if you look at O Bannon's subsequent work, unless he collaborates with a director with a great style (like Verhoeven for "Total Recall") his work tends to have been low budge, b movie schlock, whereas Ridley scott has ...........NOT had that career path.
I am just reminded of how good the soundtrack is with your intro. Those hollow sounds are pure horror and it has a lot of intensity, it could have been ICONIC had the film being more popular. This film had A LOT of potential. If they had expanded more on the creatures especially Neomorph, and how they lead up to the eventual Xenomorph, and get rid of that stupid CGI (that replaced the original practical effects for some reason), give the characters a bit more depth and not treat them like idiots, it could have been awesome. It needs significant script rework and re-review, and really could have been reworked into a much better and popular installment, shame it turned out the way it was. Very frustrating installment.
I absolutely love the Big Ideas and I'm so heartbroken that we will probably never see the end of David's story on the realm. I loved Michael Fassbender and his birthday or David probably one of my favorite villains in all of movies so I do hope that one day we get to see that last one
Scott doesn't like the concept of an Alien Queen, because Cameron came up with it without asking him first. That means there technically are 2 Alien universes now. In Scott's ALIEN, Prometheus and Covenant universe, Alien Queens don't exist and any speculation about one being in those films is mute. I agree with Scott actually. Sure, the Queen is a cool "end boss" for ALIENS, her existence does cheapen the Alien mythos to some extend though, turning them from something truly alien and otherworldly to just giant space ants/termites. It makes it all very mundane and pedestrian and I understand why Scott wanted to get away from that again.
Yeah honestly there being a queen xenomorph definitely takes away from the mystery of the creatures xenos are way more dangerous and terrifying when they reproduce asexually
@@taylorgordon2570 Yes. It isn't just the reproduction though. Just the whole concept of the thing was originally way more mysterious and interesting. Unfortunately some scenes where it moves really weirdly were cut out of the original movie and you certainly have heard of the originally planned, alternative ending. I heard about 2 different versions, one where the Alien kills Ripley and then makes a radio call with the voice of Captain Dallas and the other one where it eats Ripley's head and then starts talking with her voice. Sure, it would have been sad to lose a great character like Ripley and it would have been a downer ending, but the creepiness would have been nice.
I feel like there’s a way you could do a sequel that is equal parts a follow up to Prometheus, Covenant, and Romulus, by having the Xenos and the black goo be naturally occurring, and maybe even the precursor species to the Engineers. The revelation being that they were just fucking around as much as the human were, stripping away their divinity, and also that the Xeno is the natural endgame of organic life (the perfect species), undermining all the work that David thought he was achieving, throwing him into chaos. It could also mainly be from the perspective of Rain and Andy, and linking up with Daniels and Tennessee.
Ridley Scott's done some great work in the Alien franchise, but the notion that the xenomorph was 'played out' shows how disconnected he was from it. And the perils of being so powerful in Hollywood that nobody says to you 'no, that's a bad idea, don't do it..'
Wrong! Check out the leaks about a script for "Paradise Lost", the movie Scott intended to make, but was forced by Fox to course correct when the studio got cold feet over a bunch of idiots wanting more aliens.
"Micheal said for his approach for Walter, I I always thought that Mr Spock was a good reference for me for this character. Completely logical and devoid of emotion..". Wow. Did Fassbender not understand the character of Spock.
@@GuineaPigEveryday My point. One would think that were one an actor, wishing to base their character on another character, that they would do a study of said other character.
Fassbender was excellent as David and Walter I've always thought he could make a great "James Bond" he has charisma and can do cold/calculated effortlessly too.
I was very annoyed when the crew just land without breathing equipement/masks and just assume it's safe, so when they get infected I was fuming. It was a frustrating first watch.
the whole film they seemed to have no sense of self preservation, except maybe the woman in the ship who locked the door on the first two victims. (harsh, but sensible). But then goes back in, leaves the door open... sheesh! and don;t get me started on the captain following David around when everything is screaming out alarm bells.
The thing is, people think that David invented the concept of the Xenomorph. And that's one of the reasons they're so mad. But they don't remember Prometheus where there was a wall mural with a xenomorph type creature on it. So no, he did not invent the Xenomorph, he was just the first person to make, not create, but to conceive a xenomorph close to the one we have in the original film. The thing is, that specific type of xenomorph requires a human host to exist in the first place so there's very little chance that the Engineers would have been the ones to create the Xenomorph as we have it today, because there were no humans to make it. So no, David did not invent the Xenomorph he was just the first person to arrange one to be made. And even then, that is not the xenomorph as we know it today that is the protomorph it lacks the biomechanical features
This is one of those films where you know the plot is broken in many places, the characters are beyond logic in their decisions, and the answers are bleak, but somehow you still enjoy it. I believe they call that a guilty pleasure. I believe most of my enjoyment stems directly from the soundtrack however. It was fire. I wish I'd gotten it on vinyl when it first dropped. I will say however that any sort of lashing this films gets it rightfully deserves.
What I really hate about Scott's prequels is that everything feels completely unnecessary and inconsequential. With "Prometheus" we finally revisit the crashed derelict from the first movie, BUT NOT REALLY, it's just s different planet where coincidentally exactly the same things happened. With "Covenant" we finally see the Engineer's home world, BUT NOT REALLY, it's just a random planet that also has relatives of the Engineer race. There David finally creates the Xenomorph, BUT NOT REALLY, since its biology existed before, so he just conducts random DNA experiments until one looks like the Alien we know. Utter bullshit and a waste of time, since the movies themselves have no story and most of the characters suck. What am I to invest here, just the pretty images and the very basic and vague theme of creation, that's executed like a student's first screenplay?
I really love the mystery of where the Xenomorphs come from, however when I saw the scene where he created the Xenomorphs, I wasn't mad as many others since, I always saw the Xenomorph that David creates is his variant that he crated by experimenting with the black fluid and some of the surviving engenieers, and maybe some of the disecated leftovers of the Xenomorphs specimens found by the enginieers, so in way David only made his version of the Xenomorph species with an extra dose of the black fluid to speed up the growing process. The scene where David takes out Walter with the flute, has some Blade Runner aspects on that scene since it was very similar to Roy Batty killing of Eldon Tyrell. And the POV vision of the Alien, even though it didn't make sense in terms of the organism, but a someone who has played the Aliens vs. Predator videogames it was a nice touch after the POV shot from Alien 3. I also get mixed of some of the decisions made for Alien Covenant, but not exactly makes it into the worst Alien film on my list, that place is reserved only to AvP Requiem.
I really, really wish we would get the third movie in this prequel trilogy. The movies aren't perfect, but I i love the high concepts and philosophy this movie and Prometheus have. Plus they are so beautiful to look at and I absolutely love David as a villain and character concept.
I agree, Michael Fassbender really owned the part of David in both films and I wanted to see the end of his story. Perhaps David would have been taken out by either a new band of humans or a lone engineer looking for revenge, but his mutated creations live on and fill in the gap between Covenant and the original Alien. For what it's worth, Romulus has been a decent film and I'm hoping to see more from the series if they can conjure up some fresh ideas.
@@robcain8865I really hope Ridley Scott gets a chance to finish off the prequels as it’s an incredible story which deserves to have its ending. Sadly Scott is not got time on his side! I hope he can make something to end it off
@@glibfacsimilenot really it’s still a mystery as to why. It’s just a personal story that explored the bizarre nature of organisms beyond our understanding. You can still easily dismiss these films which was something I would say but Alien Romulus looks to have abruptly abridged the two off shoot films with the rest of the franchise.
If I was to make an Alien movie the lore would be that the black goo is made from Xenomorph DNA. "Raw life" or whatever they call it in Romulus. Engineers use it to seed planets, thats how they created us. Maybe there is a theme in there about playing god, controlling nature and the hybris of mankind. Im sure you can shohorn some biblical references in there to stick with the Riddley theme aswell.
I dont understand the fascination of these "engineers" and them creating human life. They just seem to add bloat and get in the way of the humans and xenomorphs. I feel theres a well of untapped potential that just involves these two but instead we get a boring game of join-the-dots. meh
Name a franchise other than Alien where the final product consistently has all the lunacy of a script that should've seen the bin but instead somehow got to see the screen...opposed to scripts that did get scrapped.
I liked Prometheus and hated Covenant when I left the theater. I finally rewatched it and really enjoyed it. I wish we could get a direct sequel and setup to the original Alien... Upon rewatch, I don't think David created the xenomorph, but rather, reengineered it. The only complaint I have is how stupid the characters behave when they arrive on the planet.
Its a lack of respect from Ridley to have a crew that acted so stupidly throughout the movie, almost as if he thinks the audience is foolish enough not to recognize it
This movie’s science fiction lack of logic is astounding. Landing on an unexplored world and exploring the environment without any helmets and hello hello, deadly xeno parasites infecting their respiratory systems.
As if killing off Newt and Hicks wasn't enough, Elizabeth Shaw also had to meet her end? Don't these script writers get that we don't want these characters to die? Especially if done OFF-SCREEN! 😡
Pretty much agree with Oliver, I find Prometheus and Covenant very watchable but they're both frustrating. There's a lot of things I like about them, but also a lot that I don't - mainly characters doing inexplicably dumb things, the messing up of the back story of where the Alien originally came from, and as a result of that the progressively convoluted ideas that don't make sense and pose questions that are left unanswered
I think they honestly should have been their own movies instead of being in the alien universe. While I dont like the movies Id at least be able to ignore them if they werent part of the alien universe plus they wouldnt be ruining alien lore
Look up the TV spot "She Won't Go Quietly". This preview is made up almost entirely of deleted footage that all seems to take place some time after the survivors return to the Covenant. - The crew playing cards with Daniels winning with a straight flush. - Daniels goes to the armory and grabs a shotgun while asking Mu-Th-Er about more ammo - Daniels opening a powered down door into what I presume is anorhwe med bay and telling Mu-Th-Er she needs pain killers (Speculation: Could this imply that she was in the med room with Dan as he was having the chest burster tearing through him and left him to find pain killers to see if that could help? She doesn't need any herself throughout the final act) - Daniels entering the crew cryostasis room hunting the alien. She asks Mu-Th-Er where the alien is, who tells her that it's four meters above her.
I don't know if that was deleted footage or was like the 'promo shorts' filmed as it's own thing [especially the ending as it doesn't fit with the final film].
They should probably have two different series within the franchise, keeping the horror xeno movies, like Romulus, separate. But I also get the feeling they didn't know where to go with the ideas they set up in Promethius.
Let’s be honest, anyone only remembers the names of Daniels and Walter/David. The fact that most people will remember Elizabeth Shaws role more than any of these characters names is a testament to bad writing/cinematography
32:28 Agree and I find that to be a serious problem nowadays with this type of franchises: nothing can be left as mistery as opposed to creating that mistery to make it more interesting and not waste time and efforts trying to explain every single detail and "lore" thing, which kinda ruins the whole purpose of these stories.
I remember watching Alien: Covenant on opening weekend and quite enjoying it, despite the killing of Shaw offscreen (still sad that we didn't seen her one last time outside of the marketing, which should have been kept in the film for full context which honestly would've have made it easier to process) and it's shaky union of the big ideas of Prometheus (a film I adored) and the formula of an Alien film (a formula that's still super effective and can me be made fresh as evidenced by the incredible Alien: Romulus). I finally did a second watch of the movie right before seeing Alien: Romulus and I found a film that's more interesting and thought provoking than I remember, with some genuinely smart and deep ideas. It still has groan inducing stupid crewmate decisions, but I found the stupid decisions a little more believable considering how feral and terrifying the Neomorphs are (doesn't mean it's not dumb, but it's by no means deal breaking for me). The technical craft and music even impressed me more than ever, with some really solid effects and scale and a good score by Jed Kurzel. I like the movie more than most people despite it's problems. It's a firm 7 out of 10 for me.
I was very surprised that in the movie the scientists are running around in unknown terrain without face and breath protection. The most incompetent bunch ever, who would go into an unknown environment before doing background work and proper protection. Well, yeah, it's just a movie, but the movie is full of such inconsistencies.
they did it alot on Stargate SG-1 too with the same results, but it is not only a stupid thing to do, its a stupid plot device simply to save time to have some unexpected chest bursters happen, except we all saw the trailer, so it wasnt even a surprise !!!!
I actually began to like Covenant after watching it three times. Yes it suffers from many issues mostly feeling like two different films smashed together and the last act is rushed and a poor rehash of Alien. It suffers mainly because you can see Scott caved in over peoples issues with Prometheus that there wasn't enough xenomorph. The Walter/David plotline was the best thing about it.
then why not show an ancient alien Queen or something we havent seen before? instead he just shows a drone, which is literally the most basic form that we've seen over n over
@@astronaut8917 Ridley dislikes Aliens and the Queen. You can see in all his adaptations he tries to distance himself from the additions in that movie as much as possible.
@@Ergeniz i like Prometheus & Covenant but I also think Ridley Scott is an arrogant asshole, who very rarely acknowledges the work of others that made ‘his’ films so great, he always acts like Blade Runner and Alien was his sole brilliant creation. And yeah the way he acts so insecure and petty about James Cameron’s additions reflect this, Ridley Scott has this whole George Lucas complex surrounding himself with yes-men, but unfortunately he is much more of a narcissistic than Lucas ever was, which is why his movies alternate between shit and decent becuz he just changes screenwriter with every film and never does quality control and refuses to allow anyone to correct him
@@GuineaPigEveryday I wouldn't say Scott ignoring Cameron's additions is 'insecure and petty' honestly-given Aliens is set after his films he basically chose to not to use them [similar to how Alien 3 back in the day pretty much discarded Alien 3 bar Bishops brief appearance]. The clip with Cameron talking about the death of Shaw comes from an interview where he was complimentary about Covenant so he doesn't seem bothered about it. Unlike George Lucas with Star Wars, Scott does have to work within a studio-the history of this film shows he originally wanted to make 'Prometheus 2' but had to change it to an 'Alien' film.
Perfect timing Oliver! I recently revisited Covenant and have had it weighing on my mind ever since! The more I sit with it the more I think there’s parts of it I really love.
When filmmakers choose to work with an established franchise, so they can benefit from an already built-in audience, they have to realize they will be stuck navigating the challenge of meeting the expectations of fans who have been passionate about the franchise for years, or even decades. And the balancing act of staying true to the original material while introducing fresh elements to keep the audience engaged can be quite the challenge that few film makers seems to master.
Alien: Covenant and Prometheus both start out as interesting stories about scientists exploring other worlds, both of them have good first hours. They both fall apart when the narrative explains stuff that really should remain unexplained. They further suffer from additional needless nonsense (corporate politics and the nature of androids) which enhanced the first two Alien films but feel out of place in the prequels. Both films should have fully embraced the cosmic, almost Lovecraftian horror of the first half of the first Alien film. They should have just had teams of intelligent people (and maybe androids) finding all manor of terrifying constructs, ruins, ships and hostile life forms beyond human comprehension. The Engineers being human was one of the biggest disappointments in cinema history and I hope they can find some way to retcon it; so the universe feels big, cold and terrifying again.
As a Diehard Prometheus fan.... I HATE this Movie. We got nothing we were promised. The characters were idiots. The Protagonist a Ripley ripoff however most importantly nothing we as fans were promised was given. This movie was a betrayal.
I second this. I love the Alien movies! But I came to accept the Prometheus was going a slightly different direction given that it didn’t have “Alien” in the title. It was just those fan boys who didn’t seem to get the memo. Bummer Ridley caved. Covent was just a weird fever dream mesh of the two and you could totally see the pivot that was made.
The original horror of the Alien was its mystery and the harsh truth that the universe doesn't care about Human curiosity. We aren't owed any answers. The universe is vast, dark, cold, and ultimately we are insignificant in its presence. The Alien was ancient when it was discovered. The ship and crew, fossilized. It was everything beyond our comprehension. It was the Lovecraftian Mountains of Madness, deep time, cosmic horror. Humans were just nothing. We were just food and breeding stock.
Beyond the flesh tearing and gore, *that* was what made them truly terrifying.
@@KesselRunner606 the harsh truth horror aspect is maintained in my opinion, specifically in Prometheus. we finally lay eyes on our supposed creators only to be met with violent hostility and/or indifference. It’s almost more terrifying when you think about it
@@Thebabybadass101 and with Prometheus I felt that the original wonder of the first Alien movie is gone. The Engineers and the black goo ruined the wonder. Why answer the question of 'where is that space jockey from?' We didn't need to know all that.
Beautifully said.
@@Thebabybadass101 It's funny to me that people keep claiming that with Prometheus & Covenant the series lost it's cosmic horror roots because it shows where the Aliens (& humanity) comes from, despite those themes being very much in keeping with Cosmic Horror stories.
In fact, the whole "Alien beings created humanity and experimented on life forms to create superior beings" is so reminiscent of At the Mountains of Madness that Prometheus is often cited as one of the primary reasons behind the cancellation of the At the Mountains of Madness adaptation of Guillermo del Toro, as the studio thought it was too similar.
It's funny you mention the Mountains of Madness as an example of what Alien "used to be", that's the one Lovecraft story that does actually delve into cosmic answers and specifically where humans and some other famous Lovecraftian beings come from as the Elder Things in the story are revealed to have been behind the creation of Shoggoths and actually humanity itself was a byproduct of one of their experiments. Ideas that are also explored in Prometheus, which very specifically seem to take inspiration from At the Mountains of Madness.
I searched for this video only a few hours ago only to find you hadn't done it yet, and voila, now here it is.
These Retrospective films are pure quality and one of my favorite things on RUclips.
Thanks Mr Harper!
2017....??!??!
And Prometheus was 2012?!
Where has the time gone?
I swear this film only came out 2 years ago 😭😭 pain
Not going to lie, I saw this movie for the first time a few months ago and just assumed it was only a couple years old, maybe 2019 at the latest, but when I saw it came out in 2017 I just went like "WTF?!" lol
I almost erased Covenant from my memory.
Same man, same. Freaking scary.
Same.
What have I been doing with my life?
David didn't create the Alien. He only created those aliens. The mural in Prometheus is proof that xeno like creatures existed before plus the space jockey ship was crashed long enough to fossilise the pilot. The timeline doesn't fit.
Have you looked into that you can find the script the engineers apparently were infertile and one of them sacrifice themselves somehow to give birth to the Deacon in the portrait and that made them fertile for a while and eventually the Deacon died and then they tried to synthetically recreate the black goo and that's what led to that black site getting screwed up on lv 422. Apparently the original Deacon some couple billion years ago gave the ceremonial blackout to the engineer that seated life on Earth and the synthetic goo that is in Prometheus is what was a complete failure catastrophe if you read the script
I’ve had arguments about this. You’re not the only person who actually remembers what they’ve seen and can point it out. It’s like people don’t understand it.
Exactly. Romulus proves this.
@@RockyRoyale84proves what?
@@anthonymartensen3164 Knowledge is Power!💥
All I wanted was a legit Prometheus sequel. You know, a little more exploration of the Engineer culture and more adventures with Shaw and less insane David.
Insane David was great in Prometheus but he had no one to play off of naturally in Covenant since they took out Shaw off camera in between movies. Covenant had a massive continuation problem and lacked the natural dynamics of Prometheus which demonstrated the worst and best of humanity in its last act with good actually winning out but bought with intense heroic sacrifice. Covenant abandoned this bitter sweet formula for an incoherent mess. All the options and dynamics of the crew didnt seem to matter by the second act. Covenants nihilistic story can be summed up as: no matter the world view and no matter the flavor of intention everyone will eventually succumb to the devil bringing inevitable destruction to the world.
While I positively hate any and all implications of David actually making the Xenos, I do like the kind of Gothic Horror tone the movie delves into around the halfway mark. Creepy phantoms haunt the moors at night, so the crew has to go follow a mad scientist to his spooky castle in the middle of a graveyard.
Solid point, I actually enjoyed that side of it too....but always show TOO MUCH of the xeno. I did like that single shot in the hanger bay where the xeno is just walking...totally creepy and awesome
Yes I'll give it that too i did like that, i guess it kind of harkened back to Hammer Horrors there.
@DorisDay-lw4xs But Ridley doesn't make this fully clear to the audience through his movie, so that's his failure there. It caused so many Fans to get really angry and was what led the movie to received some backlash and bad reviews. I like the idea that David was like John Hammond, managing to recreate the already existing, ancient Xenomorph species, and those Facehugger eggs are on LV-426 all this time. Infact it works better that the Engineers themselves DID NOT CREATE them, but simply came across them, and when one of their own got infected by one of the Facehuggers, sent a warning beacon out; and the Engineers then decided to use the Xeno DNA, contained within those Ampules/Urns; as a more easier way of carrying the bioweapon cargo.
The Xenomorph's own Origins should NEVER be explored or answered, they should stay a mystery forever, just the same with how Yoda's species are never touched upon in the starwars franchise. You have to keep some level of mystery to keep things interesting.
The biggest flaw these movies have in my opinion is that they are linked to alien. If prometheus and covenant were it’s own things they would be amazing
What is it with modern Alien movies wanting to speed-run the incubation process? The second guy to get bursted had that thing on him for less than a minute; not even long enough to knock him out. Alien: Romulus has that one girl who didn't have it on for all that long either and hers incubated inside probably even faster than the one in Covenant.
It just shows weak storytelling. If they can't work out a realistic timeline for this to happen then they should go back to the drawing board and start again.
At least Romulus slowed down the growth phase a bit. That was nice to see and made for a very tense scene.
The Alien is a bit of an unknown quantity and has always been pretty variable genetics wise. Could always explain it away by saying certain strains of it incubate more quickly than others.
You didn't watch the film lmao, he gets goo in his nose at the opening to the ship, after exploring it he starts to feel sick, then after the multi hour trek down to the lander at the beach the alien bursts out his mouth, they literally say the ship was at considerable elevation multiple kilometres away from the beach. Even if it's not clearly communicated that's what happens.
@Samsonfs i think he meant the second guy that got the facehugger/chestburster combo at the end? That's what i assumed from the comment at least.
The score by Jed Kurzel is highly underrated, give it a listen!
Couldn’t agree more, one of my favorites!
I own the score on CD. It's a cool score for sure.
It's so good they should have used it or a piece at least in Alien:Romulus
It's one of the few aspects of the film I enjoy.
Great reprise of the Jerry Goldsmith track.
I don't know of another movie that strikes such a perfect balance between very enjoyable and incredibly frustrating. Killing Shaw between movies is just infuriating.
I agree. I felt this way with Alien 3. We spent most of Aliens watching Newt being rescued and yet she is already dead at the start of Alien 3. Watching that in the cinema immediately annoyed me. Having said that over the years I have grown to enjoy Alien 3. I don't think I will feel the same with Alien Covenant.
100% agreed. Shaw was a good character and I was eager to watch her story continue.
they kill off Shaw only to make a new Shaw proxy.
I absolutely agree, killing Shaw OFF SCREEN and setting up David as the sole *Creator* of the Xenomorphs was sheer sacrilege. Especially when he had already shown a mural in Prometheus, and the idea was meant to be that the Facehugger eggs were already on LV-426, long ago, and the Engineers had just simply recreated, synthesised the Xeno DNA, into a viral bomb, in the form of those Ampules contained with the Urns. For Ridley Scott to set up Shaw and everything she had been through in Prometheus, leading us to eagerly follow her to the next place, where the Engineers supposedly come from, to "get her answers". Then he goes and just dodges all that and kills her off, that's the most idiotic, cowardly thing for a director to do. He totally deserved Covenant underperforming for doing what he did there, and basically him losing control again of the Alien franchise.
Like killing off Newt and Hicks after Aliens....
Alien: Covenant is a film that really needed to have been a more in depth continuation of Prometheus than the Alien plot shoehorned in due to fan backlash. Its clear Scott wanted to go more into the engineer planet and David shown in film, but I think he just went "the fans and producers want this". Next thing you know, there's an alien scene while a couple have sex in a shower. That's beneath you Ridley Scott! I think he should have just done the big idea sci-fi with Covenant and then have the Alien: Romulus film as the standard Alien horror film.
I think I agree with Matthew Buck when he said at the time that the film's big problem was overly explaining the aliens when they are at their best being an unknown entity.
Because of critics like Mathew Buck going hard on Coverant, I skipped seeing the film theaters.
Prometheus, I personally didn't feel compelled to revisit it again. Honestly, I think I don't think I care about this Prometheus as it does nothing for the Alien series.
True i hate what Ridley done to Shaw and caving in to make "Alien"
Alien fans in 2012: Prometheus sucked! We want Aliens!
Alien fans in 2017: Covenent suck! We want more Prometheus!
@@NostalgiNorden pretty much what happened.
@@NostalgiNordenSimply not true, been a fan since 1 came out, hated Prometheus and Covenant. They're not canon imo.
The best thing about Alien: Covenant is without a doubt, the score.
Yep
I like alien covenant tho I think it’s good fun but the music is god tier
Gorgeous soundtrack.
In the novelization, Alan Dean Foster gives enough wiggle room that David Jurassic Park’d the Xenomorph. The idea of a Xenomorph arms race would be a fun idea. David’s wolves against the real XX-121 Star Beast from the original.
Great retrospective as usual. I remember in the theater when Walter and David did the switch and I could not get over how, to use your words, clumsily it had been executed.
Oram watching creatures kill the crew and people he loved, then shortly after having David show him that he had been experimenting with and growing the alien parasites, and proceeds to just stick his head over a giant egg because David said to was one of the most egregious character decision making I’ve EVER seen in any movie. Completely lost me. For all the complaints Prometheus crew gets for bad decision making this movie blew it out of the water.
I never saw it like that...I saw Oram as a naive religious man who wants to see the good in everyone. He was clearly depicted as such. His natural impulse was just to hesitate or be passive in the face of evil. And David's confident in saying to him "hey come over here, look at this" is a type of Satanic hypnotism. Evil is like that and naive people are like that. Hats off to Scott for capturing this.
Even moreso, just before when he shot the alien and David fiercely screamed "NO!" for doing so, you'd think he might be a little supicious why he's mad that he killed the monster. But no, doesn't even think a thing about it and just goes with him down in his creepy lair with little prompting. It's like it's high minded ideas have to be saddled down with B-Grade Horror writing.
He was blinded by faith
My 10 year old son (at the time) said he was stupid and nobody would trust David at that point. When a 10 year old is pointing out bad plot ya got problems.
Oram is easily one of the Top dumbest characters in horror film ever. And I thought Kane was keen and stupid in Alien, and Bjorn was annoying in Romulus 😆
No matter how poorly recieved Prometheus and Alien: Covenant were, they're truly stunning to look at.
Yes technically they're just perfect
The 80% shots of black metal walls?
Amazing scores as well. Jed kurzel did amazing with his covenant score, shame the movie sucks.
The visuals and set design is second to none, in both Films they do honestly look beautiful. I even like Prometheus' "Ancient Astronaut" themes and big ideas, I like the first half of Covenant but after that it just devolves into tired cliche and David being the creator of Xenos contradicts Prometheus and hurts the Alien lore.
My timeline ended after Alien and Aliens 🏅
I like the idea of The Xenomorph's origins being unknown, ancient, and natural.
Ya same, it was kind of a let down (SPOILERS) that the goo/engineers were in Romulus. Ridley just keeps doubling/tripling down on his bad ideas.
You mean Cartesian dualism and the process of abjection. Epic barf.
@@PersephonevanderWaard huh?
@@CoNnOr5899 It's literally the plot to Frankenstein. Nature is alien and ancient; go shoot it. Cameron's big yawn-fest, Aliens, doing Vietnam revenge fantasies for Ronald Reagan.
@@PersephonevanderWaardin English ?
Hooray! A new review! Hot and fresh! We love your retrospective reviews! Best on the net! Thank you for the hard work you put into each one!!!
It has become very cumbersome to be an Alien fan. The knowledge one must gather outside of all the movies to just make sense of everything
I stop after the second one and pretend a proper sequel will come along eventually
The black goo from the x-files, data and lore from star trek & the pilot from Dr. Strangelove all combined to make Covenant.
Never in my my life on YT I’ve ever click on a video this fast before!
25:46 '... and then, I made Terminator: Dark Fate"
Have you got brain damage?
Yes.
Get this man a space ship
I've been a huge fan of your channel for almost a decade Oliver, and your craftsmanship and care in telling the full story of every movie you cover is what inspired me to start my own series of "Take 2 Retrospectives". You inspired me to want to tell the full stories of movies I felt had gotten an unfair or undeserved reputation amongst fans or critics. My very first video on my channel is a retrospective for Alien: Covenant. I just wanted to acknowledge this full circle moment and say thank you for the years and years of invaluable movie, gaming, and film history.
Nothing but love...
- The Lone Wolfe -
I think what a lot of people seem to forget is that back in 1979 when Alien arrived Ridley Scott had one movie under his belt, a low budget historical film called The Duellists. He was simply a hired gun director. Alien, its concepts, the look and the feel were created by Dan O'Bannon and Ronald Shusett, the writers. But once the movie became the huge hit everyone seemed to forget the guys who developed the movie and assumed it was all done by Scott. His ego allowed him to take that false praise and run with it. I'm not saying he isn't a good director, he absolutely is, but he did NOT create Alien, he was just there doing a job and getting a pay check.
However by the time Prometheus and Covenant came around he had built his reputation to a high level and used that power to get what he wanted. Now in charge of the Alien 'history' he went away from the classic horror to more high brow storytelling, something the fans quickly told him they did not want forcing Fox to rein him in.
YES! Thank you for saying this im so tired of people constantly feeding into Ridley’s own ego narrative. I mean how much work went into making Alien, how many artists, in the production design, sets, props, storyboarding, concept art, of both human ship and alien stuff. Or the cinematographer, the composer, the visual effects supervisor, the person in the alien suit, the THREE writers, Dan O’Bannon plus Hill and Giler who made alterations. Hell ALL THE ACTORS too?? Ridley Scott is just ONE cook in the kitchen here and yet years later he still acts like he was the sole creator, the sole reason for the film’s brilliance, he’s become such a narcissistic asshole, and his lack of input into the writing of his own films are showing so often now with how often his films end up being subpar and shit because he doesn’t spend a second looking at the quality of the writing. We need to STOP acting like its ‘Ridley Scott’s Alien’ he didn’t even write the script like James Cameron did.
It really is just this
He drank someone elses coolaid and got paid alot of money for doing so
Take the A L I E N name off his sequels and theyre b tier run of the mill sci fi movies
Scott's return to the Alien universe is a bit like giving Da Vinci a marker pen and letting him draw glasses and a moustache on the Mona Lisa
Only partially true, a LOT of the groundwork was laid by O Bannon and Shusett - but hiring Giger was all Ridley Scott, and casting was him too. Its true he was hired with no expectation of being anything other than a journeyman director, but he turned out to be alot more than that. The thing is this, if you look at O Bannon's subsequent work, unless he collaborates with a director with a great style (like Verhoeven for "Total Recall") his work tends to have been low budge, b movie schlock, whereas Ridley scott has ...........NOT had that career path.
He should have stayed out of contributing to the writing of any of his movies.
The purpose of Covenant was to make Prometheus look good. It succeeded. Covenant, like Prometheus, is just a very pretty looking disaster.
The opening to this video is more badass than any of the official trailers lol brilliant editing Oliver.
Oliver, you do an amazing job with these retrospective videos! The editing, voiceover, research…awesome. Thank you for the context
I am just reminded of how good the soundtrack is with your intro. Those hollow sounds are pure horror and it has a lot of intensity, it could have been ICONIC had the film being more popular. This film had A LOT of potential. If they had expanded more on the creatures especially Neomorph, and how they lead up to the eventual Xenomorph, and get rid of that stupid CGI (that replaced the original practical effects for some reason), give the characters a bit more depth and not treat them like idiots, it could have been awesome. It needs significant script rework and re-review, and really could have been reworked into a much better and popular installment, shame it turned out the way it was. Very frustrating installment.
I absolutely love the Big Ideas and I'm so heartbroken that we will probably never see the end of David's story on the realm. I loved Michael Fassbender and his birthday or David probably one of my favorite villains in all of movies so I do hope that one day we get to see that last one
Scott doesn't like the concept of an Alien Queen, because Cameron came up with it without asking him first. That means there technically are 2 Alien universes now. In Scott's ALIEN, Prometheus and Covenant universe, Alien Queens don't exist and any speculation about one being in those films is mute.
I agree with Scott actually. Sure, the Queen is a cool "end boss" for ALIENS, her existence does cheapen the Alien mythos to some extend though, turning them from something truly alien and otherworldly to just giant space ants/termites.
It makes it all very mundane and pedestrian and I understand why Scott wanted to get away from that again.
Yeah honestly there being a queen xenomorph definitely takes away from the mystery of the creatures xenos are way more dangerous and terrifying when they reproduce asexually
@@taylorgordon2570 Yes. It isn't just the reproduction though. Just the whole concept of the thing was originally way more mysterious and interesting. Unfortunately some scenes where it moves really weirdly were cut out of the original movie and you certainly have heard of the originally planned, alternative ending.
I heard about 2 different versions, one where the Alien kills Ripley and then makes a radio call with the voice of Captain Dallas and the other one where it eats Ripley's head and then starts talking with her voice.
Sure, it would have been sad to lose a great character like Ripley and it would have been a downer ending, but the creepiness would have been nice.
Great video mate I love how you highlight the entire production rather than focusing exclusively on the film itself
I feel like there’s a way you could do a sequel that is equal parts a follow up to Prometheus, Covenant, and Romulus, by having the Xenos and the black goo be naturally occurring, and maybe even the precursor species to the Engineers. The revelation being that they were just fucking around as much as the human were, stripping away their divinity, and also that the Xeno is the natural endgame of organic life (the perfect species), undermining all the work that David thought he was achieving, throwing him into chaos. It could also mainly be from the perspective of Rain and Andy, and linking up with Daniels and Tennessee.
"u cant be chased by the monster down a corridor every film, it gets boring"
and then the last 30 mins of Covenant is exactly that. lol
Oh hell yeah, new Oliver Harper Alien content
This is the first & only film i have seen in the cinema all by myself... it was a very strange experience having nobody else in the auditorium 😮
Ridley Scott's done some great work in the Alien franchise, but the notion that the xenomorph was 'played out' shows how disconnected he was from it. And the perils of being so powerful in Hollywood that nobody says to you 'no, that's a bad idea, don't do it..'
The end of your comment reminds me of George Lucas and the prequels.
@@zerocool5395 I agree
Wrong! Check out the leaks about a script for "Paradise Lost", the movie Scott intended to make, but was forced by Fox to course correct when the studio got cold feet over a bunch of idiots wanting more aliens.
Nah. Engineers, David and Shaw >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Xenomorphs, Ripley and the rest of the franchise.
@@consonaadversapars - I would have LOVED to see Engineers on the big screen. That script had some genuinely spine chilling moments in it.
The fact that this film will most likely never get a proper follow-up is criminal
25:46 that’s rich from James Cameron since he came up with the story idea for Dark Fate. Ie killing John Conner in the first 5 minutes.
Ironic😂
this day cant be better when i see new video from the best movie critic about the movie i was expecting the most. Thank you sooo much :)
these retrospective/reviews are perfect.
When I can't watch the movie being reviewed...I listen to Harper's retrospectives!
The 3D in Prometheus was the best I've ever experienced in a theater. It was shot beautifully.
"Micheal said for his approach for Walter, I I always thought that Mr Spock was a good reference for me for this character. Completely logical and devoid of emotion..".
Wow. Did Fassbender not understand the character of Spock.
Okay but 90% of non-Trek fans would and have said exactly this, this is how most people in the mainstream think of Spock
@@GuineaPigEveryday
My point.
One would think that were one an actor, wishing to base their character on another character, that they would do a study of said other character.
Fassbender was excellent as David and Walter I've always thought he could make a great "James Bond" he has charisma and can do cold/calculated effortlessly too.
@@RaikenXion
Yes. He's a very good actor.
I'm just saying that he really doesn't understand the character of Spock.
@@daverobson3084 🫡
I think the xeno does have eyes. The fossilized xeno in Romulus seems to have the carapace missing from his head showing eye sockets underneath.
I was very annoyed when the crew just land without breathing equipement/masks and just assume it's safe, so when they get infected I was fuming. It was a frustrating first watch.
the whole film they seemed to have no sense of self preservation, except maybe the woman in the ship who locked the door on the first two victims. (harsh, but sensible).
But then goes back in, leaves the door open... sheesh!
and don;t get me started on the captain following David around when everything is screaming out alarm bells.
The thing is, people think that David invented the concept of the Xenomorph. And that's one of the reasons they're so mad. But they don't remember Prometheus where there was a wall mural with a xenomorph type creature on it. So no, he did not invent the Xenomorph, he was just the first person to make, not create, but to conceive a xenomorph close to the one we have in the original film. The thing is, that specific type of xenomorph requires a human host to exist in the first place so there's very little chance that the Engineers would have been the ones to create the Xenomorph as we have it today, because there were no humans to make it. So no, David did not invent the Xenomorph he was just the first person to arrange one to be made. And even then, that is not the xenomorph as we know it today that is the protomorph it lacks the biomechanical features
Awesome a new Retrospective/review video I love these.
Damn Walter and David are having a moment……*jams stick in neck* 😮
Third Alien video in my subscriptions today. KEEP IT COMING GENTS!!
David actually plays a bit of the score from Ridley Scott’s legend, which is done by tangerine dream
Or Jerry Goldsmith, depending on which version.
This is one of those films where you know the plot is broken in many places, the characters are beyond logic in their decisions, and the answers are bleak, but somehow you still enjoy it. I believe they call that a guilty pleasure. I believe most of my enjoyment stems directly from the soundtrack however. It was fire. I wish I'd gotten it on vinyl when it first dropped. I will say however that any sort of lashing this films gets it rightfully deserves.
Probably because the most important aspects of a film is its thematic content and how it stands as an audiovisual experience
I wanted to like it but after 3 goes it was clearly a bridge too far
Saw this once. Like Prometheus, it tries to answer questions nobody asked.
What I really hate about Scott's prequels is that everything feels completely unnecessary and inconsequential. With "Prometheus" we finally revisit the crashed derelict from the first movie, BUT NOT REALLY, it's just s different planet where coincidentally exactly the same things happened. With "Covenant" we finally see the Engineer's home world, BUT NOT REALLY, it's just a random planet that also has relatives of the Engineer race. There David finally creates the Xenomorph, BUT NOT REALLY, since its biology existed before, so he just conducts random DNA experiments until one looks like the Alien we know. Utter bullshit and a waste of time, since the movies themselves have no story and most of the characters suck. What am I to invest here, just the pretty images and the very basic and vague theme of creation, that's executed like a student's first screenplay?
I really love the mystery of where the Xenomorphs come from, however when I saw the scene where he created the Xenomorphs, I wasn't mad as many others since, I always saw the Xenomorph that David creates is his variant that he crated by experimenting with the black fluid and some of the surviving engenieers, and maybe some of the disecated leftovers of the Xenomorphs specimens found by the enginieers, so in way David only made his version of the Xenomorph species with an extra dose of the black fluid to speed up the growing process.
The scene where David takes out Walter with the flute, has some Blade Runner aspects on that scene since it was very similar to Roy Batty killing of Eldon Tyrell. And the POV vision of the Alien, even though it didn't make sense in terms of the organism, but a someone who has played the Aliens vs. Predator videogames it was a nice touch after the POV shot from Alien 3.
I also get mixed of some of the decisions made for Alien Covenant, but not exactly makes it into the worst Alien film on my list, that place is reserved only to AvP Requiem.
prometheus and covenant would have worked a lot better if they weren't inside the alien universe
Every time I see the intro to your videos, I think yeah! Let’s go! With a raised arm
I’m a fan of the franchise and really enjoyed Covenant. I haven’t seen Romulus yet, but I intend to.
yep the die hard nerds complained too much >
@bottlewaddle6677
I assume that's how Ripley Scott felt after Prometheus. Not without reason, of course.
Romulus is 💩
@@bottlewaddle6677no we just want a decent alien movie 😂
@@halomultiplayermoments I thought Romelus was decent, did you see it?
As always, exceptional work good sir. And Mr. Chumley Warner sends a special thanks.
I really, really wish we would get the third movie in this prequel trilogy. The movies aren't perfect, but I i love the high concepts and philosophy this movie and Prometheus have. Plus they are so beautiful to look at and I absolutely love David as a villain and character concept.
I agree, Michael Fassbender really owned the part of David in both films and I wanted to see the end of his story.
Perhaps David would have been taken out by either a new band of humans or a lone engineer looking for revenge, but his mutated creations live on and fill in the gap between Covenant and the original Alien.
For what it's worth, Romulus has been a decent film and I'm hoping to see more from the series if they can conjure up some fresh ideas.
@@robcain8865I really hope Ridley Scott gets a chance to finish off the prequels as it’s an incredible story which deserves to have its ending. Sadly Scott is not got time on his side! I hope he can make something to end it off
Lets hope disney is ready to dump another 100 mil down the drain for one
Taken as canon, the fact that David created the xenomorphs kills all the cosmic horror elements of the first two movies (Alien / Aliens).
Having eggs without a queen just doesn't sit right with me.
And is a hedious disservice to Prometheus
I think they fixed this on a blueray epilogue. 😮
While it is certainly an odd addition that I’m not sure I love, I don’t really feel like it kills the series as a whole.
@@glibfacsimilenot really it’s still a mystery as to why. It’s just a personal story that explored the bizarre nature of organisms beyond our understanding. You can still easily dismiss these films which was something I would say but Alien Romulus looks to have abruptly abridged the two off shoot films with the rest of the franchise.
If I was to make an Alien movie the lore would be that the black goo is made from Xenomorph DNA. "Raw life" or whatever they call it in Romulus. Engineers use it to seed planets, thats how they created us. Maybe there is a theme in there about playing god, controlling nature and the hybris of mankind. Im sure you can shohorn some biblical references in there to stick with the Riddley theme aswell.
I dont understand the fascination of these "engineers" and them creating human life. They just seem to add bloat and get in the way of the humans and xenomorphs. I feel theres a well of untapped potential that just involves these two but instead we get a boring game of join-the-dots. meh
Name a franchise other than Alien where the final product consistently has all the lunacy of a script that should've seen the bin but instead somehow got to see the screen...opposed to scripts that did get scrapped.
I liked Prometheus and hated Covenant when I left the theater. I finally rewatched it and really enjoyed it. I wish we could get a direct sequel and setup to the original Alien... Upon rewatch, I don't think David created the xenomorph, but rather, reengineered it. The only complaint I have is how stupid the characters behave when they arrive on the planet.
Its a lack of respect from Ridley to have a crew that acted so stupidly throughout the movie, almost as if he thinks the audience is foolish enough not to recognize it
LOVE the trailer you made at the beginning! ❤
This movie’s science fiction lack of logic is astounding. Landing on an unexplored world and exploring the environment without any helmets and hello hello, deadly xeno parasites infecting their respiratory systems.
As if killing off Newt and Hicks wasn't enough, Elizabeth Shaw also had to meet her end? Don't these script writers get that we don't want these characters to die? Especially if done OFF-SCREEN! 😡
I hated that. Maybe Scott did a ‘it’s like poetry, it rhymes’ by killing off characters we cared for, like Alien 3. Ugh.
About 20 minutes in I realized Covenant was not going to be a good film, and thereafter I had a fantastic time with it.
Pretty much agree with Oliver, I find Prometheus and Covenant very watchable but they're both frustrating. There's a lot of things I like about them, but also a lot that I don't - mainly characters doing inexplicably dumb things, the messing up of the back story of where the Alien originally came from, and as a result of that the progressively convoluted ideas that don't make sense and pose questions that are left unanswered
Love your reviews 🙌🙌
At 31:52 I swear you can see the protomorph's dorsal spines just straight up clipping through the floor when it goes down the ladder.
The Alien Franchise's Lore is such a *MESS* nowadays
much better now.
@@purefoldnz3070 even worse now
@@alterbridgegod better than Covenant for sure.
Well done Oliver for another Banger!!! Thank you!
Love your detailed work
Awesome video! I was amazed by it.
This one and Prometheus would be fantastic movies....
if only ...
There were no xenomorph of any kind.
I think they honestly should have been their own movies instead of being in the alien universe. While I dont like the movies Id at least be able to ignore them if they werent part of the alien universe plus they wouldnt be ruining alien lore
In the novella the xenomophs were a species created by the Engineers, David took what he learned from the x-01 to create his own subspecies
Look up the TV spot "She Won't Go Quietly". This preview is made up almost entirely of deleted footage that all seems to take place some time after the survivors return to the Covenant.
- The crew playing cards with Daniels winning with a straight flush.
- Daniels goes to the armory and grabs a shotgun while asking Mu-Th-Er about more ammo
- Daniels opening a powered down door into what I presume is anorhwe med bay and telling Mu-Th-Er she needs pain killers (Speculation: Could this imply that she was in the med room with Dan as he was having the chest burster tearing through him and left him to find pain killers to see if that could help? She doesn't need any herself throughout the final act)
- Daniels entering the crew cryostasis room hunting the alien. She asks Mu-Th-Er where the alien is, who tells her that it's four meters above her.
I don't know if that was deleted footage or was like the 'promo shorts' filmed as it's own thing [especially the ending as it doesn't fit with the final film].
They should probably have two different series within the franchise, keeping the horror xeno movies, like Romulus, separate.
But I also get the feeling they didn't know where to go with the ideas they set up in Promethius.
I went into this movie with zero expectations and still left disappointed.
Excellent review as always Oliver
Let’s be honest, anyone only remembers the names of Daniels and Walter/David.
The fact that most people will remember Elizabeth Shaws role more than any of these characters names is a testament to bad writing/cinematography
Bad cinematography in a ridley Scott film? U serious ? Alien covenant has “bad cinematography?”
I haven't watched your channel in a while but loving the Canon Group intro! Takes me back to my teens when movies were great! 😊
32:28 Agree and I find that to be a serious problem nowadays with this type of franchises: nothing can be left as mistery as opposed to creating that mistery to make it more interesting and not waste time and efforts trying to explain every single detail and "lore" thing, which kinda ruins the whole purpose of these stories.
I remember watching Alien: Covenant on opening weekend and quite enjoying it, despite the killing of Shaw offscreen (still sad that we didn't seen her one last time outside of the marketing, which should have been kept in the film for full context which honestly would've have made it easier to process) and it's shaky union of the big ideas of Prometheus (a film I adored) and the formula of an Alien film (a formula that's still super effective and can me be made fresh as evidenced by the incredible Alien: Romulus). I finally did a second watch of the movie right before seeing Alien: Romulus and I found a film that's more interesting and thought provoking than I remember, with some genuinely smart and deep ideas. It still has groan inducing stupid crewmate decisions, but I found the stupid decisions a little more believable considering how feral and terrifying the Neomorphs are (doesn't mean it's not dumb, but it's by no means deal breaking for me). The technical craft and music even impressed me more than ever, with some really solid effects and scale and a good score by Jed Kurzel. I like the movie more than most people despite it's problems. It's a firm 7 out of 10 for me.
I was very surprised that in the movie the scientists are running around in unknown terrain without face and breath protection. The most incompetent bunch ever, who would go into an unknown environment before doing background work and proper protection. Well, yeah, it's just a movie, but the movie is full of such inconsistencies.
they did it alot on Stargate SG-1 too with the same results, but it is not only a stupid thing to do, its a stupid plot device simply to save time to have some unexpected chest bursters happen, except we all saw the trailer, so it wasnt even a surprise !!!!
Covenant was creepy the music stayed in my head for weeks even tho I enjoyed Romulus imo covenant is underated
Exactly!
Fantastic review as always. However, I do try and forget Prometheus and Covenant exist.
Yeah mr James Cameroon you don't like characters killed off early hence alien 3 and alien covenant but you gave a thumbs up for terminator dark fate
I actually began to like Covenant after watching it three times. Yes it suffers from many issues mostly feeling like two different films smashed together and the last act is rushed and a poor rehash of Alien. It suffers mainly because you can see Scott caved in over peoples issues with Prometheus that there wasn't enough xenomorph. The Walter/David plotline was the best thing about it.
then why not show an ancient alien Queen or something we havent seen before? instead he just shows a drone, which is literally the most basic form that we've seen over n over
@@astronaut8917 Ridley dislikes Aliens and the Queen. You can see in all his adaptations he tries to distance himself from the additions in that movie as much as possible.
@@Ergeniz i like Prometheus & Covenant but I also think Ridley Scott is an arrogant asshole, who very rarely acknowledges the work of others that made ‘his’ films so great, he always acts like Blade Runner and Alien was his sole brilliant creation. And yeah the way he acts so insecure and petty about James Cameron’s additions reflect this, Ridley Scott has this whole George Lucas complex surrounding himself with yes-men, but unfortunately he is much more of a narcissistic than Lucas ever was, which is why his movies alternate between shit and decent becuz he just changes screenwriter with every film and never does quality control and refuses to allow anyone to correct him
@@GuineaPigEveryday I wouldn't say Scott ignoring Cameron's additions is 'insecure and petty' honestly-given Aliens is set after his films he basically chose to not to use them [similar to how Alien 3 back in the day pretty much discarded Alien 3 bar Bishops brief appearance]. The clip with Cameron talking about the death of Shaw comes from an interview where he was complimentary about Covenant so he doesn't seem bothered about it. Unlike George Lucas with Star Wars, Scott does have to work within a studio-the history of this film shows he originally wanted to make 'Prometheus 2' but had to change it to an 'Alien' film.
Its always a great day when MR Oliver Harper uploads!
I enjoy your retrospectives but I'm not sure I can bring myself to watch that film again lol
29:30 Couldn't stop laughing Greyson. Yes Mr Cholmondeley-Warner. 🤣
The chestburster in Covenant is the goofiest thing in any Alien movie, I laughed out loud in the cinema when it put its little arms up 😂
Amazing Work Oliver a True Alien Fan!
Perfect timing Oliver! I recently revisited Covenant and have had it weighing on my mind ever since! The more I sit with it the more I think there’s parts of it I really love.
I really like Covenant. I mean yeah it's not perfect but Ridley had a lot on his shoulders and it's still pretty damn good.
When filmmakers choose to work with an established franchise, so they can benefit from an already built-in audience, they have to realize they will be stuck navigating the challenge of meeting the expectations of fans who have been passionate about the franchise for years, or even decades. And the balancing act of staying true to the original material while introducing fresh elements to keep the audience engaged can be quite the challenge that few film makers seems to master.
The worst thing a horror film can do is explain it's monster. Every franchise eventually gets to that point. The mystery is so key.
The monster isn’t the alien. RS turned it on its head and fair play to him.
Alien: Covenant and Prometheus both start out as interesting stories about scientists exploring other worlds, both of them have good first hours. They both fall apart when the narrative explains stuff that really should remain unexplained. They further suffer from additional needless nonsense (corporate politics and the nature of androids) which enhanced the first two Alien films but feel out of place in the prequels.
Both films should have fully embraced the cosmic, almost Lovecraftian horror of the first half of the first Alien film. They should have just had teams of intelligent people (and maybe androids) finding all manor of terrifying constructs, ruins, ships and hostile life forms beyond human comprehension. The Engineers being human was one of the biggest disappointments in cinema history and I hope they can find some way to retcon it; so the universe feels big, cold and terrifying again.
As a Diehard Prometheus fan.... I HATE this Movie. We got nothing we were promised. The characters were idiots. The Protagonist a Ripley ripoff however most importantly nothing we as fans were promised was given. This movie was a betrayal.
I second that emotion. It is complete shite !!
I second this. I love the Alien movies! But I came to accept the Prometheus was going a slightly different direction given that it didn’t have “Alien” in the title. It was just those fan boys who didn’t seem to get the memo. Bummer Ridley caved. Covent was just a weird fever dream mesh of the two and you could totally see the pivot that was made.
Just rewatched this, again. I love it more each time I watch it.