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What do you mean? There never was a completed script for the Blomkamp movie. Ridley Scott and his staff all said so.
Alien: Covenant
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What do you mean? There never was a completed script for the Blomkamp movie. Ridley Scott and his staff all said so.
Mechasaurian
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What, really? I'm going off the article below. in which Weaver explicitly refers to a script she has seen and read:
Sigourney Weaver: Neill Blomkamp's Alien Sequel Gives Ripley An Ending
(Emphasis mine.)
EDIT: if there was never a completed script, maybe she was referring to incomplete drafts?
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I know. In an interview about the production of Covenant, Ridley Scott said the reason that the went ahead with his project instead of Blomkamp's is because the latter didn't have a script ready. Which is complete bullshit according to Weaver, Cameron, and several other people both involved in Blomkamp's project and otherwise.
I just finished watching a recent film on Netflix, only to discover that Ridley Scott was a producer.
Mindhorn features Julian Barratt (you may know him from The Mighty Boosh) as Richard Thorncroft, a washed up actor whose only success was as the cybernetic detective Mindhorn. When a murderer tells the police he'll only negotiate with Mindhorn, Richard decides this is the perfect opportunity to rekindle his stardom and reunite with an old flame, and so returns to the Isle of Man.
Mindhorn features Julian Barratt (you may know him from The Mighty Boosh) as Richard Thorncroft, a washed up actor whose only success was as the cybernetic detective Mindhorn. When a murderer tells the police he'll only negotiate with Mindhorn, Richard decides this is the perfect opportunity to rekindle his stardom and reunite with an old flame, and so returns to the Isle of Man.
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These guy's did not like Alien Covenant.
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Well then. I saw Alien: Covenant as my first Alien movie with a group of friends because I needed to get out more. And social more. And art college is stressful.
It's my first Alien movie because I'm very much not good with horror and body grossness and never really wanted to get in there before. So I'm sorry for being a heretic and also talking some rather uncritical things about the movie which other people seem to hate lol~
While in the theaters, I enjoyed the process of watching but yeah there were definitely issues that I could spot...like immediately. A good amount of confusion cause I had no idea about the context and you probably should watch Prometheus beforehand to actually know things.......
Like, not wearing helmets firstly. But I didn't think too much about the horror cliches that were there, but also the blood slipping scenes were silly. Gross creepy monsters par for the course I suppose~
I first thought about a potential David Walter switch during the aftermath door control scene cause he had a weird Smile thing about the Alien thing. Then was dubious again because of the sigh of relief but kept thinking that that was probably where we were going. Didn't realize from the injuries, since I wasn't paying attention to those bits (also a friend pointed out that Walter wouldn't have needed the staples probably since he seemed to be self healing)
So yeah probably more issues just built on the previous movie which I had zero clue about and couldn't make comparisons. Even if I didn't see it before, I got the idea that Daniels was definitely a Ripley ripoff. (This coming from someone who actually liked her .) and there was a lot of stupidity.
Overall I enjoyed it, but generally, if I don't take issue with something dear to my heart or come in with biases, I'll probably like watching anything. (Even if I hate it, I'll try having fun ripping into a movie with a friend. RIP Percy Jackson films, never shall we remember you, you uncanon trash of falsity)
But watching the movie did make me interested in seeing more of the canon, so I illegally watched the first movie and Alien: Prometheus because I decided it was about time and also wanted to know what the fuck I was looking at for Covenant.
First movie is super solid. It's old but definitely real good. I was like, damn, Ripley, me too, when she talked about how she couldn't take the risk of letting the dude onto the ship. I was concerned looking for the competent crew I was spoiled about via the internet but no, they were overall not holding any idiot balls, except that poor dude looking for the kitty and splitting off from the group. RIP everybody, and I'm glad Jonesy lived. He was a cute cat. It was a pretty happy ending and I'm a sentimentalist too soooooo~ I liked it a lot.
I spoiled myself for Prometheus beforehand lololol. Fanfic and tvtropes ahaha....
....but....
...There's.........some genuinely good David/Shaw fics on ao3........which also biased me into liking the movie vaguely, but also were Better than Canon. And kind of made canon look worse. They spoiled me to hell and also were basically all different takes of an epilogue scene before Covanent came out. Some excellent shit. (Creepy ships are great and I like reading them.)
For me, who had no canon material in me, Prometheus was really,...barebones. They had all this stuff and scenes but a lot of it didn't link up coherently for me. The Engineer awakening scene was boring af, except for David's head being ripped off. Like alright pummeling those humans done. Wow. Boringgggg The crew wasn't a crew really but I liked Elizabeth's and Janek(?) (pilot dude) characters. It's a little eh in terms of, this is totally logical, but I liked how fanatical religious/determined Elizabeth kind of was. David was legit interesting as a dubious character, but again everything was super barebones.
(Sorry not sorry self sacrifices get me every time so I liked those last dudes suicide running the ship.)
Now someone tell me if I for sure need to watch the other movies in the series plz <3
It's my first Alien movie because I'm very much not good with horror and body grossness and never really wanted to get in there before. So I'm sorry for being a heretic and also talking some rather uncritical things about the movie which other people seem to hate lol~
While in the theaters, I enjoyed the process of watching but yeah there were definitely issues that I could spot...like immediately. A good amount of confusion cause I had no idea about the context and you probably should watch Prometheus beforehand to actually know things.......
Like, not wearing helmets firstly. But I didn't think too much about the horror cliches that were there, but also the blood slipping scenes were silly. Gross creepy monsters par for the course I suppose~
I first thought about a potential David Walter switch during the aftermath door control scene cause he had a weird Smile thing about the Alien thing. Then was dubious again because of the sigh of relief but kept thinking that that was probably where we were going. Didn't realize from the injuries, since I wasn't paying attention to those bits (also a friend pointed out that Walter wouldn't have needed the staples probably since he seemed to be self healing)
So yeah probably more issues just built on the previous movie which I had zero clue about and couldn't make comparisons. Even if I didn't see it before, I got the idea that Daniels was definitely a Ripley ripoff. (This coming from someone who actually liked her .) and there was a lot of stupidity.
Overall I enjoyed it, but generally, if I don't take issue with something dear to my heart or come in with biases, I'll probably like watching anything. (Even if I hate it, I'll try having fun ripping into a movie with a friend. RIP Percy Jackson films, never shall we remember you, you uncanon trash of falsity)
But watching the movie did make me interested in seeing more of the canon, so I illegally watched the first movie and Alien: Prometheus because I decided it was about time and also wanted to know what the fuck I was looking at for Covenant.
First movie is super solid. It's old but definitely real good. I was like, damn, Ripley, me too, when she talked about how she couldn't take the risk of letting the dude onto the ship. I was concerned looking for the competent crew I was spoiled about via the internet but no, they were overall not holding any idiot balls, except that poor dude looking for the kitty and splitting off from the group. RIP everybody, and I'm glad Jonesy lived. He was a cute cat. It was a pretty happy ending and I'm a sentimentalist too soooooo~ I liked it a lot.
I spoiled myself for Prometheus beforehand lololol. Fanfic and tvtropes ahaha....
....but....
...There's.........some genuinely good David/Shaw fics on ao3........which also biased me into liking the movie vaguely, but also were Better than Canon. And kind of made canon look worse. They spoiled me to hell and also were basically all different takes of an epilogue scene before Covanent came out. Some excellent shit. (Creepy ships are great and I like reading them.)
For me, who had no canon material in me, Prometheus was really,...barebones. They had all this stuff and scenes but a lot of it didn't link up coherently for me. The Engineer awakening scene was boring af, except for David's head being ripped off. Like alright pummeling those humans done. Wow. Boringgggg The crew wasn't a crew really but I liked Elizabeth's and Janek(?) (pilot dude) characters. It's a little eh in terms of, this is totally logical, but I liked how fanatical religious/determined Elizabeth kind of was. David was legit interesting as a dubious character, but again everything was super barebones.
(Sorry not sorry self sacrifices get me every time so I liked those last dudes suicide running the ship.)
Now someone tell me if I for sure need to watch the other movies in the series plz <3
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The second movie "Aliens" is agreed by most fans to be better than the original, which was itself extremely good as you observed. Alien 3 and Resurrection are pretty lame, though.
I saw this mentioned on SB but the novelization has Walter leave the shuttle first to test the air for any possible contaminants or pathogens and declares the air 100% safe to breathe and so assumes that was probably cut for being considered a waste of time or written out of the script for the same reason under the assumption no one would actually care or take issue with not having helmets on.
Or this was added by novelization's author that looked at the source material and thought it to be immensely stupid.
ZerbanDaGreat
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One of the guys goes "hey look at this cool shit", crouches by some weird spore-looking things on the floor, and prods them. They visibly release a cloud of weird glittering black dust that flies up his nose. He sniffs a bit and stands up to rejoin the group, instantly no longer interested. No one else in the like, eight-person group having noticed nor cared.
Ridley Scott just really does not give a single fuck.
Ridley Scott just really does not give a single fuck.
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Or this was added by novelization's author that looked at the source material and thought it to be immensely stupid.
Yeah, and it doesn't even work as that. Walter can test the air for toxic chemicals, but there's no way he could tell if any given airborne microorganism has the potential to infect humans. And even if he could somehow magically do that, he'd have to trudge all over the forest to test for microbiotic hotbeds.
There's really no excusing this.
VolantRedX
Official Conscience of Worm Fanfiction!
Normally I wouldn't care because it's just a movie and therefore it doesn't really matter. Here it's really noticeable because two of the crew get infected by something and die.
Jace911
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"must have been my imagination"
*wanders off with arrow in head*
ZerbanDaGreat
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"Shall we gather for whiskey and cigars tonight?"
"Never doubt i-BLAUGH" *shits entire spinal cord*
Jace911
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Took @Tomsawyer18 to see for his birthday, was not disappointed.
Motion to add thread tag of "You blow, I'll do the fingering.
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I don't know that 'most fans' think Aliens is better than the original, but it's kind of splitting hairs, given they're both such good films lol
I also really liked the director's cut of Alien 3.
ZerbanDaGreat
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Also courtesy of IMDB's goofs page which does not surprise me;
Daniels prominently stabs David under the chin with a giant carpenter's nail during the (first) climax. He's missing this wound on the ship, rather prominent because while lying in her cryopod Daniels is in the literal perfect position to see it and twig to the fact that he's not Walter.
Jace911
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Okay, I need to do a full unpacking of this fractal trainwreck just so I can stop thinking about it and move on to something else.
All of this shit stands out so much more because this film actually has a lot of really good parts and it uses them more effectively than Prometheus wielded its metaphorical fire.
Prometheus was like 1/3rd cooked, this film was 2/3rds cooked.
James Franco is in this movie. He dies in the first five minutes when his cryopod malfunctions and burns him alive, and we only realize that was James Franco when his wife tearfully watches a video of him rock climbing. That's right; James Franco gets Newt'd and he wasn't even in the previous film.
The entire plot would not have happened if Covenant hadn't been hit by a giant random fucking space neutrino earthquake just as they had unfolded the sails to recharge. I kept expecting this to be a Chekov's Gun, like "oh that was the space farts created when David genocided the Engineers" or whatever but it is literally never mentioned ever again.
When the crew lands their Mass Effect shuttle on Paradise and David opens the hatch my instant reaction was
Apparently David jumped the Engineer ship to Paradise, perfectly parallel-parked above their capitol to unleash the bioweapons, and then decided to crash the ship because ??? Seriously, how the fuck did he go from having a working ship full of deadly WMDs to accidentally smashing it through half a goddamn mountain forest? It's fine, shut up, stop trying to connect things.
The first time I saw someone get infected by the alien spores I thought "aww, Zerban was exaggerating, it's not that dumb" and then I realized "oh no he was literally describing a different scene and it is that dumb" *jazz hands*
The first time someone slipped on the blood in the shuttle it was frantic and horrific, the second time it was goddamn comical. You could shoot that scene to fucking Ragtime Gal and the tone would not change.
I don't know why but when David led the survivors into the temple the sight of the Giant Engineer Sadface statue made me lose my shit. I was literally knee-slapping and having a silent laughing fit at the sight of this giant stone "okay" meme.
I was spoiled on the film so I knew David would be evil but in the scene where he's explaining things to the crew and they mention they're a colony ship, my friends and I could not contain our laughter at how transparently sinister he was. "Oh, you have a ship full of two thousand human popsicles? Do tell," he says in his best George Takei voice.
Captain Bible Boy wins the award for "Most Likely to Have Followed Strange Man into Unmarked Van as Child" for following David into a nest of fucking facehugger eggs, and then at his urging touches one and sticks his face over it to see inside. After just watching said android practically prom-kiss the neomorph that one of his crew puked up an hour ago.
Hey guys, wasn't that climactic fight against the xenomorph awesome? Well now you get to watch the same goddamn thing again, because we have to recreate the only great film in this fucking franchise!
And of course:
"You blow, I'll do the fingering."
The entire plot would not have happened if Covenant hadn't been hit by a giant random fucking space neutrino earthquake just as they had unfolded the sails to recharge. I kept expecting this to be a Chekov's Gun, like "oh that was the space farts created when David genocided the Engineers" or whatever but it is literally never mentioned ever again.
When the crew lands their Mass Effect shuttle on Paradise and David opens the hatch my instant reaction was
Apparently David jumped the Engineer ship to Paradise, perfectly parallel-parked above their capitol to unleash the bioweapons, and then decided to crash the ship because ??? Seriously, how the fuck did he go from having a working ship full of deadly WMDs to accidentally smashing it through half a goddamn mountain forest? It's fine, shut up, stop trying to connect things.
The first time I saw someone get infected by the alien spores I thought "aww, Zerban was exaggerating, it's not that dumb" and then I realized "oh no he was literally describing a different scene and it is that dumb" *jazz hands*
The first time someone slipped on the blood in the shuttle it was frantic and horrific, the second time it was goddamn comical. You could shoot that scene to fucking Ragtime Gal and the tone would not change.
I don't know why but when David led the survivors into the temple the sight of the Giant Engineer Sadface statue made me lose my shit. I was literally knee-slapping and having a silent laughing fit at the sight of this giant stone "okay" meme.
I was spoiled on the film so I knew David would be evil but in the scene where he's explaining things to the crew and they mention they're a colony ship, my friends and I could not contain our laughter at how transparently sinister he was. "Oh, you have a ship full of two thousand human popsicles? Do tell," he says in his best George Takei voice.
Captain Bible Boy wins the award for "Most Likely to Have Followed Strange Man into Unmarked Van as Child" for following David into a nest of fucking facehugger eggs, and then at his urging touches one and sticks his face over it to see inside. After just watching said android practically prom-kiss the neomorph that one of his crew puked up an hour ago.
Hey guys, wasn't that climactic fight against the xenomorph awesome? Well now you get to watch the same goddamn thing again, because we have to recreate the only great film in this fucking franchise!
And of course:
"You blow, I'll do the fingering."
All of this shit stands out so much more because this film actually has a lot of really good parts and it uses them more effectively than Prometheus wielded its metaphorical fire.
"Xenomorphs in the tall grass" was the Mission Status: Sick moment of the movie for me, even after laughing my ass off at the Rube Goldberg machine of the previous scene.
The necropolis was a pretty rad visual the first time it showed up, I kept expecting there to be xenomorphs hiding among the petrified bodies and I'm disappointed that never happened.
As hilarious as David's flashback was in a "fuck you dad!" kinda way, it was still pretty chilling when the camera panned up in the ship's cargo bay and showed hundreds of bioweapon pods dangling over the bomb bay doors. Even if that entire scene never should've been in the film because it contradicts too many things, I appreciated that moment.
Neomorphs are a pretty decent update of chestbursters visually and aesthetically, it's a shame they're the xeno's predecessor and probably won't be in future films.
Best xenomorph kill of the franchise so far: crushed to death by an industrial crane. That should've been the end of the film.
It's a lot more coherent than Prometheus was solely due to the presence of the aliens. Like, at the end of the day I can say "Alien Covenant is about a bunch of dumb fucks in space trying not to get eaten by aliens made by a crazy android", whereas with Prometheus I'm like "a bunch of dumb fucks in space die in bizarre and stupid ways, also some stuff about God, Jesus was an alien, FAAAAAAITH, fuck you dad, and also there's a babby alien after the credits".
The necropolis was a pretty rad visual the first time it showed up, I kept expecting there to be xenomorphs hiding among the petrified bodies and I'm disappointed that never happened.
As hilarious as David's flashback was in a "fuck you dad!" kinda way, it was still pretty chilling when the camera panned up in the ship's cargo bay and showed hundreds of bioweapon pods dangling over the bomb bay doors. Even if that entire scene never should've been in the film because it contradicts too many things, I appreciated that moment.
Neomorphs are a pretty decent update of chestbursters visually and aesthetically, it's a shame they're the xeno's predecessor and probably won't be in future films.
Best xenomorph kill of the franchise so far: crushed to death by an industrial crane. That should've been the end of the film.
It's a lot more coherent than Prometheus was solely due to the presence of the aliens. Like, at the end of the day I can say "Alien Covenant is about a bunch of dumb fucks in space trying not to get eaten by aliens made by a crazy android", whereas with Prometheus I'm like "a bunch of dumb fucks in space die in bizarre and stupid ways, also some stuff about God, Jesus was an alien, FAAAAAAITH, fuck you dad, and also there's a babby alien after the credits".
Prometheus was like 1/3rd cooked, this film was 2/3rds cooked.
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ZerbanDaGreat
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I just want to jump off the 'Captain Bible Boy' comment because I forgot I'd only unpacked him as a character to some friends on irc.
His establishing moments are after the initial incident strands the Covenant and forces him to assume command. Everything about the scene establishes him as rattled, uncertain, and barely qualified for the position. He stammers his way through some parting words for the old captain. He phrases a statement about how many FTL jumps they have left on their journey so ambiguously that Walter is forced to ask if that was a question so he snaps YES THAT WAS A QUESTION at him. Then in his first act as captain he orders the crew not to hold a service for the colonists lost to the storm and their dear departed captain whose wife watched him burn alive in his crypod (and is now his XO) because 'the repairs take priority' even though they had more than enough time to all get together for a meeting and dish about the change in command so if things were on fire that very second they already missed the window for "absolutely ASAP" repairs.
Then after they're done the crew have a small private service for James Franco. I know it's 'after they're done' because it's dark both where they are and in Captain Oram's quarters where he is watching them on the monitors and his wife emerges in the background still wrapped in a bedsheet. He then turns around and whines at his wife about how they won't follow his orders because they're discriminating against him for being religious.
Let's recap to make sure you got all that. Captain Oram;
1. Wastes valuable time stammering out some bullshit about being in command now and how much longer they have to go while time is apparently of the essence.
2. Denies his crew the opportunity to hold a service their fallen captain even though his widow is now his XO.
3. Proceeds to stay up at night angrily watching his crew over the security monitors because he's so pissed they're technically disobeying his orders.
4. Rants at his wife about how he didn't get the job as captain in the first place and nobody respects him all because being a Christian makes everyone see him as a 'fanatic'.
Then after they're done the crew have a small private service for James Franco. I know it's 'after they're done' because it's dark both where they are and in Captain Oram's quarters where he is watching them on the monitors and his wife emerges in the background still wrapped in a bedsheet. He then turns around and whines at his wife about how they won't follow his orders because they're discriminating against him for being religious.
Let's recap to make sure you got all that. Captain Oram;
1. Wastes valuable time stammering out some bullshit about being in command now and how much longer they have to go while time is apparently of the essence.
2. Denies his crew the opportunity to hold a service their fallen captain even though his widow is now his XO.
3. Proceeds to stay up at night angrily watching his crew over the security monitors because he's so pissed they're technically disobeying his orders.
4. Rants at his wife about how he didn't get the job as captain in the first place and nobody respects him all because being a Christian makes everyone see him as a 'fanatic'.
The man reads like he escaped from a fucking PureFlix movie. That or, again, Ridley Scott wrote him as a deliberate parody of how fucking stupidly Shaw combined her scientific and religious beliefs because he doesn't care any more.
Jace911
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The thing about him that confuses me is, his faith is never relevant. As clumsily as Prometheus handled Shaw's belief we at least had the sense that it was driving her, but Oram never came off as someone who was devout in any noteworthy way. To my memory he never did anything because of his faith, or in violation of his faith. Watching his wife get blown up in the shuttle doesn't visibly break or reinforce his beliefs. The movie tells us "he's religious" and then we go "okay" and it never comes up again. It just sort of sits in the background of this film that is already bursting (hurr) with ill-fitting religious symbolism that doesn't really go anywhere.
I was honestly more interested in the Peter Principle aspect of his character IE how he was obviously reading off a training manual during that first crew meeting, because it reminded me of the chickenshit LT from Aliens and that movie actually knew how to use that character. But after the shuttle blows up he takes a backseat to Daniels and the entire setup of "insecure and ill-equipped leader" just sort of sits in the corner.
I was honestly more interested in the Peter Principle aspect of his character IE how he was obviously reading off a training manual during that first crew meeting, because it reminded me of the chickenshit LT from Aliens and that movie actually knew how to use that character. But after the shuttle blows up he takes a backseat to Daniels and the entire setup of "insecure and ill-equipped leader" just sort of sits in the corner.
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VolantRedX
Official Conscience of Worm Fanfiction!
I actually read that exchange as Ridley Scott saying the reason that people don't like his films any more is the religious subtext and they write off any actual creativity in the films due to the religious themes.
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It always seemed to me that there was a weird persecution complex about religion from the characters in both Prometheus and Covenant (moreso Covenant). Like Oram seems so concerned that the crew won't respect him because of his faith* and it seems there's this implication that people are looked down on or mocked by society as a whole for having religious beliefs in the Alien/s film world.
But we never actually see any of this. At no point does anyone in the film call Oram a caveman believing in a sky-fairy or some dangerous zealot. There's also nothing in any of the original Alien movies either to suggest that society has this big problem with people having faith in religion.
All it does is make Oram look like he's carrying a cross around to martyr himself on when no one else actually cares, so he seems as ridiculous as the 'scientists' in Prometheus who go on an expedition across the galaxy because they have faith and that's it apparently.
*I can think of a great many reasons why Oram wouldn't be respected by people under his command, but 'being religious' isn't one of them.
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VolantRedX
Official Conscience of Worm Fanfiction!
Honestly the whole scene of Oram and his wife is so out of place and disconnected it would not shock me if it was added in after principal photography had wrapped just to give him some sort of character trait beyond being really out of his depth. Like he's not even shown praying for his wife after she died. Like I understand time and place but when they get to David's creepy hideout you'd think he'd take a moment to pray. It'd even provide a callback to what's her face's desire to bury James Franco.
Shanejayell
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Honest Trailers does Covenant.