Review of Alien: Covenant (2017) by Emod L — 23 Aug 2017

Better than Prometheus, with good effects/CGI, and reasonably good tension building. Sadly, the crew make some very blatantly foolish decisions (that are obviously quite silly), and there are several very obvious plot "twists" throughout the film that I saw coming half an hour before they arrived, reducing their impact for me.

I could spend quite a few lines slating the quality of characterisation/writing for the crew, but it's pretty self evident if you watch it for yourself and then stop to think about what you've seen afterwards.

Ditto the fact that outside of David, I have trouble remembering most of the character names, and/or purposes. A strange mix of both too many characters, and too few stand outs, with too little in the way of key characterisation that we saw from Alien and Aliens (you can't forget any of the original crew in Alien, while in Aliens the only forgettable marines are those who got barely any screen time anyway). Of course on this point I can say the same about Prometheus, as the only character I even vaguely remember from that other than David is Shaw.

I saw the ending coming a mile away before the film was finished with the first quarter, and most of the plot "twists" in the middle were also heavily telegraphed, or otherwise quite obvious. It's still a bit of a fun romp if you don't take it seriously at all, but it can't hold a candle to the core trilogy - I'd say even Resurrection is mildly better than this (while still being worse than Alien 3).

It's still better than Prometheus, but also worse than the special/director's edition of Alien 3. I guess that's a very backhanded and punishing compliment for this attempt.