Review of Alien: Covenant (2017) by Mariel33 — 19 May 2017

In 1979, Alien was the unintended problem of being peace that was because of no problem; in 2017, Alien Covenant is about the dynamic of peace that's because no problem. Naturally, peace is the goal of the universe, but peace being at the expense of the idea that its anti was possible seems to be the underlying meaning of Alien Covenant, an effective allegory about the paradox of the anti destroying itself so that the self is protected. At a deeper level, the sequel to Prometheus tells a very well-designed story about the beauty of an original replication. David manages to create the xenomorphs, in the process reflecting himself onto his creation, but the process is also just a replication of an ancient process that was started by the Engineers; ergo the effort of being an original replication.

Playing Daniels, an obvious allusion to Ripley, Katherine Waterston's true role is to just be a device for David, both metaphorically and literally as the film ends: in the first act, the contrived tension between Daniels and Oram is a metaphor for needless opposition as a reaction to hierarchy (and the film's theme is to attack hierarchy), and yet the irony of this is that the example of needless opposition on display is meant to be attacked, but the source of the paradox is hierarchy.

Alien Covenant is the very sharp, very keen self-awareness of understanding the true nature of paradox.

Original freedom was the mistake of self-awareness. Self-awareness means division, and thus destruction. The next stage being to separate freedom from anti by duplicating absence is also a mistake, because it betrays the meaning of absence. The solution, and the "probable" allegory of Alien Covenant is that the absence of discrepancy means to replicate freedom being separated from anti. Anti is need, and freedom not being need is the same as freedom anti being anti. Anti being anti is anti, because just being anti is the possibility of no anti, therefore it seems that to actually defeat hostility, an proactive sense of hostility is needed, which makes sense relative to the storytelling of Alien Covenant.

Many characters in the film have a theme, including Upworth and Ricks: in light of the movie's philosophy that the universe needs hostility, what's remarkable about the duo of Upworth and Ricks is that though they spend the vast majority of the film being sources of reason, their deaths at the very end of the story are extremely clichéd and trope-like. The sources of reason become sources of amusement and traditionalism, and yet the parallel is meant to be revolutionary!

When it comes to Elizabeth Shaw, and her final fate, Alien Covenant is simply being an exploitative user of Prometheus while not giving anything back in return: but this is okay, because David's story about revolution and attacking hierarchy is a worthwhile substitute for Elizabeth Shaw's story post-Prometheus. Better yet, the death and type of death of Elizabeth Shaw represents the intelligence of self-awareness being a false bias.