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I think it’s always going to be awkward as Alien sort of created the genre so it’s going to be hard to come up with something new.
I wasn’t old enough to see it at the cinema as I was too young :-), it was released as an X so you had to be 18+ but that would have been great to see in the cinema.
(Alien was also pretty low budget and they basically went to a scrappy that had lots of airplane parts and built the flight set out of that which made it realistic)
I can’t wait to watch it again on streaming 🙂
I'm officially Excited about this now. It might have to be my first cinema trip in about five years.
There's a multi-page spread in this month's SFX. Their editorials are always positive even if the film gets a shit review later in the same issue, but that said it sounds like they couldn't have done a better job. Half of the crew are the originals from either Alien or Aliens, some dragged out of retirement. It's pitched between the first two films, so they've tried to make it look as if it was filmed between those two movies to a point where they've dug out the original 35mm print of Alien to do frame-by-frame comparisons.
Early days always skew numbers, but it's the highest-rated Alien film on Rotten Tomatoes aside from Alien(s).
It got a bit of a kicking in the Guardian film review*
I am still going to see it next week.
*this is sometimes a good sign 🙂
It got a bit of a kicking in the Guardian film review*
I am still going to see it next week.
*this is sometimes a good sign 🙂
It’s nearly always a good sign, who gives a toss what the Grauniad thinks about SF movies. FWIW, the people behind Alien: Romulus had a lot of help from people who worked on the first two movies, and they were determined to use physical effects, rather than digital, for fairly obvious reasons. There are a great many connections between the three movies, quite apart from Romulus sitting between the other two in the timeline, there’s an actual character connection, with the character Rook, for example, as well as the Weyland-Yutani Corporation. Quite looking forward to it, I took my then girlfriend to see Alien on its first release - she spent most of the film with her hands over her eyes… ?
It got a bit of a kicking in the Guardian film review
But also not a kicking.....Graun film reviews a bit schizo between different reviewers. Bit puzzled about the 4 * in this review as doesn't quite up match with the text.
One's a review from the Guardian film critic; the other is from the Observer.
But yep, it can be frustrating. Much like any Alien franchise film after Alien, to be fair.
I watched it yesterday and really enjoyed it. Felt closer to the original Alien film in atmosphere.
I never read the reviews.
This looks good if you have VR!
Watched it earlier with 16 y/o son. I liked it a lot, he absolutely loved it!
Milking the cash cow or in Hollywood speak reaching a new audience, something something reimagined.
With that being said I will most likely go and see it 😀
TBH Alien was about 44 years ago which is mad and they did wait 7 years till doing the first sequel so it’s pretty old .
I don’t mind the prometheus stuff but it’s a bit too weird compared to the original and similar to the Star Wars prequels when people just wanted to see more Han,leia and Luke but got jar-jar-binks.
I can confirm that I will be seeing this film on the coming Wednesday. My friends and I are now discussing the pros and cons of iMax vs. normal screen. It looks like the more comfy seats in the normal screen is winning right now.
I thought it was great, would recommend!
I went to see this movie last night, I enjoyed it, big fan of the first two, pretending the next 17ish didn't get made. Anyway:
Some notes. No slow warm up into the action, which was a virtue of Alien/s. Painful exposition, whap straight up there for the monsters. Which I get, tik tok generation 15 seconds to get people interested. Very derivative of The Expanse in the early stages but that's not a bad thing SF by it's very nature is derivative.
Lots of vaginas. Just saying.
Also, sorry spoilers but it's been out a couple of weeks now, I think they cut away a bit when the baby/xenomorph went for his mother, breastfeeding surely? Too much nip for a 15 rating?
But aye good film, jump scares might work if you haven't seen the first two and know what is happening.
Also to finish, the female protagonist was super bland, I blame Taylor Swift, can we have some more grr please? You get it's all about angry women and childbirth yes?
Well, saw it.
I have to say that I think the cinema experience has really changed since I last went about 8 years ago. This was a "luxe" screen, but even then I did not expect so few seats with such large leg room and the reclining backs & footrests. So, for that alone, nice!
Film-wise: It's an Aliens film. I love the aesthete of it, the dirt, the old/new technology, the sound design, the music. Many nods to the original two/three films (maybe a bit too much fanfic nodding) and I approve of the casting choice of essentially unknown actors, but it does make the film seem a bit "young adult" and, if I am honest, for an environment where people are allegedly indentured and worked to death, they are a bit clean and healthy.
BUTT... It's not a bad film. I enjoyed it despite the things that made me doubt the reality of the Alien universe in some places (timelines, etc). Overall, worth a watch. I also ate enough pic n' mix to nearly go into diabetic shock
I really enjoyed it but agree with lots of reviews that the last 15mins could do with a re-write or mostly adding to the virtual cutting room floor.
BUTT… It’s not a bad film
It kinda is though, the first 20minutes or so makes no sense. There are flashes of innovation, but the 2nd act is almost entirely fan service and the direction it takes in the 3rd act is just there to shoehorn in some of the Prometheus/Covenant story-lines, and in of itself is bonkers, and while that can be good, in this case it's not really.
Agree the sound scape and sets are great, and at the end of the day - more alien. Not my favourite, but I can see why it's getting generally good press.
The inclusion of the Prometheus stuff was odd. I thought that even Ridley Scott had said that Prometheus was an alternate timeline/universe, so the inclusion by Ash/Rook of that bit was odd to say the least. It also bugs me that, if that is now true, why is ll the tech in Alien/Romulus/Aliens/Alien3 so shit and old compared to the holographic loveliness of Prometheus/Covenant?
One point my friend brought up was that, compared to Alien, Romulus seemed hectic. Alin had a single thread that tied te whole film together, building slowly to the finale with flashes of events that were all part of the build. Romulus had more, more distinct events that made the whole film feel like someone had tried to cram too much into a single film. I agree that this made it seem hurried and a little chaotic, but would just the "Go to station, get in trouble, leave station" part have made a compelling film on its own, with a second film expanding on the [cut] bit about the baby?
The fan service stuff seems to be 'the thing' now for classic IP. I dislike it, but it does make the film happen I guess. A shame it stifles really innovative creative writing and screenplay (or seems to).
Why didn't they stop after Aliens? Because money.
Prometheus was the biggest letdown of my cinema going lifetime.
Covenant was laughably terrible.
At least they gave us a couple of great Pitch Meetings though.
Still, much to my surprise, some people on here seem to like Romulus so I'll give it a go.
I saw it last night with my 20yo daughter - she's seen Alien and Aliens in the cinema, so knows the theme. She enjoyed it, said it was scary. I thought it was such a bland, throwaway film that I'm not sure I'll remember it next week. She said maybe it's because it's better if you treat it as a stand-alone film, but then that doesn't work with all the fan-references to earlier films - Get away from her, you bitch, Ian Holm and all that.
Somebody above said it seemed aimed at a YA audience, and that felt about right - everything was too simplistic, too Marvel-like. I'm amazed that Rain didn't start doing Marvel style chop-fuey on the aliens. Common sense and internal logic was thrown out whenever a good set-piece was deemed necessary. And the fact that they needed a constant narration of what's happening was really poor, That either means that the plot makes no sense - it didn't - or the storyteller doesn't trust the audience.
Sad that this may be the last Alien film I go to the cinema to watch. Most of the others had something good about them - this was just meh. You shouldn't get bored in a film like this, especially one this short.
Seeing it at w/e. Will report back…
Someone showed me the social media ****sters "guerrilla marketing" expecting me to be impressed. I'm not going now.
This load of American look-at-me errugh sick in my mouth cringe tossers
Just saw on SM the actor who played 'The Offspring' - Robert Bobroczkyi - 2.31m (7'7") tall.
Not been to see the film yet.
Saw it. Crap.
No need to expound upon it when Ryan George does it so much better.
Enjoyable actioney romp.
im sure there’s still scope for sequels.
but I miss the more cerebral themes of Prometheus and covenant.
I actually thought it would pick up right where David left off in covenant.
I liked it. Not great, but worth seeing on the big screen for sure.
This day & age it seems there are some folk who have too much time to overthink things, be very critical & yet offer nothing up themselves.
Yep, i liked it....big fan of the originals but went in with open mind, didn't overthink it, didn't try to pick holes in it and came out happy
Watched it on Thursday night. Enjoyed it and thought it was one of the better films since the original two. Definitely a step in the right direction and the third act was a bit of a surprise. Still not sure if I liked it to be honest but the first two acts were great in my opinion. Describing Prometheus and Covenant as cerebral is a bit of a stretch. They were two of the dumbest films in the entire franchise.
3rd best Alien film. Good fun. Best not to overthink the plot.
Worst part is Andy yelling "Get away from her you bitch" for no real reason - I thought the other nods to the franchise mostly made sense and weren't overly in your face, but that just seemed to be there to get excitable Yanks whooping at the screen.
It's a movie about aliens in space.
Amazes me that people get so ****ing high-brow about this sort of thing.
I imagine they're also really fun at parties.
Thumbs up from me. Well worth the ticket price. Scary, fun with sufficient nods to the other films.
Nah, felt like the aliens were phoning it in to be honest. Threat was there, but not visceral.
It's now on Disney. Watched it tonight and enjoyed it. Love the low tech high tech that mirrors the two originals. Not sure the baby scene needed to be in there but they could hardly blow another alien out of the airlock again could they?
really enjoyed it ..... up until the stupid baby gangly alien4 type thing at the end
Yeah I enjoyed it very much like the original, yes almost to the point it was the same, but it’s what I liked about it. I was wondering if it’s leading into the Alien Earth arc.
Just checked, it’s not.
Loved the images of space. Wished I'd seen it at the cinema now just for that.
Fairly rolled along in a familiar-but-updated way.
Ian Holm looked a bit shaky. But then... 😉
Alien baby man was decidedly not scary.
It was OK.
Prometheus and alien 3 are better.
Enjoyed that. The same tech as the original Alien and Ash/Rook especially.
It's no Prey, but it's enjoyable up to a point. That point being when the big gangly chinless hybrid makes an entrance. Entirely tepid, slow and pointless. YMMV
I get that these organisms develop quickly, but Romulus went super overboard with that…last time the parasite is on for maybe a day or two and then eventually the whole explosion thing…this time 10 minutes is enough!!! Then it grows mahoosive pretty much immediately…
I still haven't seen it. I really should rectify that.
It’s no Prey,
Off-topic I know, but there's a Prey 2 in the works.
It's OK, but the best thing about it is that they made it look similar to other (much better) movies, so yeah, no real substance there. Doubt I'd ever watch it a second time. Prey was great, although what I really want now is an AvP movie that doesn't suck!
I get that these organisms develop quickly, but Romulus went super overboard with that…last time the parasite is on for maybe a day or two and then eventually the whole explosion thing…this time 10 minutes is enough!!! Then it grows mahoosive pretty much immediately…
yeah that was silly, I like the idea of the cocoon type thing so it could grow, but theres still a question of where it gets the matter from to get so big so quickly, it was a question the original Alien never answered it was just sped up a lot more this time.
I also dont get how they found the alien in a fused lump of rock? when last we saw it it was just being blasted out of the airlock of the shuttle by ripley
I thought it was better than say Prometheus or Covenant in that the characters didnt do the most ridiculous and and daft things at every opportunity to the point where no corporation would put them in charge of a whiteboard let alone multibillion dollar spaceships,
As a big fan of watching Alien and Predator movies (Aliens was on freeview last night, only recently realised Hicks actor was Reese in Terminator, just like recently realised Gary Dourdain from CSI is Christie in Alien Ressurection), I'm half wondering about seeing if we can do one month sub of Disney+ to watch Romulus and at least Mandarlorian.
Remember this big alien thing at the end wasn’t from the normal gestation they go through, but yes still grew ridiculously quick.
The alien that came from the dog in Alien 3 grew quick too iirc.
I also dont get how they found the alien in a fused lump of rock? when last we saw it it was just being blasted out of the airlock of the shuttle by ripley
backstory is that it was able to cocoon itself when blasted into space thus protecting itself from the subsequent explosion etc. similar to the way they make their hives I guess but it's not actually explained.
@cougar2 without thread hijacking, Prey is tremendous and well worth seeking out asap
Aliens was on freeview last night, only recently realised Hicks actor was Reese in Terminator, just like recently realised Gary Dourdain from CSI is Christie in Alien Ressurection
You should also look up Jenette Goldstein who played Private Vasquez, she was also in Terminator 2 as John Conners foster mum and Titanic as Irish mum, now there's range no wonder Cameron keeps casting her.
@cougar2 without thread hijacking, Prey is tremendous and well worth seeking out asap
Oh, I know.
I meant, I haven't seen Romulus yet. I have watched Prey.
Watched it for a second time last night and I still think the ending is shit. It was just Alien Resurrection but with one of those ridiculous Prometheus chaps. One thing that bugs me is why are mining colonies needed when they have fully functioning robots?
I think the plot would've been better if it stuck to the premise of need fuel cells from broken ship. Uh oh, things have gone sideways and Aliens.
The alien that came from the dog in Alien 3 grew quick too iirc.
Yup, IIRC in Aliens they mention they gestate at different rates.
Watched it on Disney over the last few nights, big fan of the alien and pred movies, but this was really disappointing. I only finished the movie last night, so I could post here, otherwise I’d not bothered.
I would actually prefer to rewatch Prometheus again, rather than this. The script wasn’t great, plot - you can’t really screw it up aliens+space+humans+gore, space landscapes were lame, god it couldn’t have been a lazier reboot if they’d actually friggin tried. Rubbish.
I'd like to see a prequel to Prometheus that fills out more of the backstory, specifically what happened to humans between inventing interstellar space flight and Prometheus to explain why they are all so flipping stupid. I think the event is known as The Great Thickening.
Prometheus is the second worst Alien film by some margin in my opinion. The worst being Alien "you blow and I'll do the fingering" Covenant . Great cinematography and that's it. The big fellas are even the wrong size when compared to their original appearance in Alien. The people, all of them, are just massive ****wits. Lazy, pointless film by a director who's clearly lost his way.
Prometheus to explain why they are all so flipping stupid
This was the big barrier for me.
The entire staff in Prometheus were cretins. In and of itself this would be excusable as a plot device, if the premise had been that they were sending disposable B-Ark morons out into deep space. But it was Weyland's vanity project, supposedly assembling the best of the best.
I've just watched it. Thought it was pretty decent. It's not up there with Alien 3 but what is?
It’s not up there with Alien 3 but what is?
Dental surgery? Magnolia undercoat? A political speech by John Major? Milli Vanilli's greatest hits compilation? A 'russet brown' Austin Allegro? A discount supermarket "meal deal for one"? DIY circumcision with a half-bottle of scotch and a bread knife?
Alien 3 is a good film, the Assembly Cut makes it a very good film.
Prometheus to explain why they are all so flipping stupid
Yeah unlike Alien where they literally take an Alien onboard their ship.
where it gets the matter from to get so big so quickly
At the end? It got some if it by going back and emptying its mother. More body horror for the ladies.
Enjoyed a lot of this one. Andy was well done, but the name…really?
Quite a bit of the middle of the film felt liked they’d built an Alien ride at a film park, and let people run through it pretending they were in the first two… yawn. But unlike others, I thought the end was interesting.
although what I really want now is an AvP movie that doesn’t suck!
One based on the original Dark Horse Comics AvP ideally, where a human colonised planet gets used by Predators as a hunting/training ground for young Predators using Alien eggs from a captive Queen.
I’m not going to apologise for being a massive Brian Glover fan.
You'd be better served watching Tetley Tea adverts.
I posted a thread for that trailer earlier but I just realised I messed up and didn’t select a forum.
I wait with not high expectations but will no doubt enjoy it for what it is.
Prometheus to explain why they are all so flipping stupid
Yeah unlike Alien where they literally take an Alien onboard their ship.
Yeah, but it was the 70s, and the only aliens we'd seen by that point were wookies and black monoliths...
Wow! I never thought this thread would go to 4 pages. I suppose I'd better actually watch the film then 🙂
Wife was away this weekend, so I watched Romulus on Saturday and (off the back of this thread) Prey, last night.
Romulus was ok. I get the comments above (only read the last few pages though) but what did you expect? There’s only so many ways you can make a film about an unstoppable alien than (amazingly) gets stopped.
Prey was good, as long as you can accept the axe on a string nonsense.
Yeah unlike Alien where they literally take an Alien onboard their ship.
Ripley tried to prevent this as it was against protocol but Ash allowed the alien on board because he was following his mission/programming without concern for the human crew.
Ripley tried to prevent this as it was against protocol but Ash allowed the alien on board because he was following his mission/programming without concern for the human crew.
Not wildly dissimilar to Aliens either. That was - spoilers - an inside job too. Thinking about it, so was Prometheus.
Ripley tried to prevent this as it was against protocol but Ash allowed the alien on board because he was following his mission/programming without concern for the human crew.
So just like Prometheus.
I'm getting the vague message from a few of the movies that Weyland Yutani is not particularly inclined towards employee welfare.
Didn't mind Romulus, but it was basically a sequence of greatest hits which didn't leave enough time for the proper introduction and development of one xenomorph, let alone the weird human hybrid monster as well. Then halfway through the denouement we find out that the whole station was already packed with other fully grown xenomorphs (here's some we prepared earlier), so the one that pops out of their mate was totally unnecessary for the plot.
Best bit was the swarm of facehuggers.
The stupidity of prometheus isnt just ' they let an alien on board'
theres so many dumb bits- from the pseudo mystical bobbins from Rapaces character , when asked what evidence she has of the star map being real, she basically says 'I want it to be' so weyland says 'cool' heres a trillion dollar spaceship, off you go and heres a crew of complete misfits to staff it
removing helmets because the airs a bit better in this bit of the cave!!?
cyberpunkpunk geologist who cant read a map gets lost and coz he is the futures biggest rebel, has super high tech mapping gear which he ignores so he he has to spend the night lost in the caves, even though the promtheus crew can see the 3d map and could guide him out
they all ignore the lifeform blips and dismiss them
biologist who gets really upset by a dead headless alien humanoid (literally the greatest scientific discovery ever) but then decides to babytalk a horrific looking alien python that deepthroats him to death
archaeologists obsessed with finding god when the biggest joke in arcaheology is that everything is ascribed to relgion and then she inecplicably gets reallt upset at being infertile
they guy who has an alien eyewormpop out but just ignores it and doesnt tell anyone or get checked out by the high tech medbay, coz, whatevs
the leader ofthe mission who just wants to undermine it and can only run in a straight line, the proposition scene with idris elba is hilariously bad too
the dumbest crew in the history of scifi............until Covenant!!
its just lazy writing, ridiculous and unbelievable actions to move the story along to the next showstopper scene
edit this is better
I think you lot might like this. Befitting it has AI narration 😀
The stupidity of prometheus isnt just ‘ they let an alien on board’
theres so many dumb bits
All of this.
The thing that royally pissed me off - apologies if I've said this before - is that 90% of the stupidity would all be excusable if it was the B-Ark, that they were deliberately sent because they were expendable. But the crew was supposed to be the best Wayland could assemble. I can only assume that the rest of the choices couldn't be trusted not to eat candles.
Hell, even if they'd been told that they were the best when they were plainly all disposable cretins, that could have tied a bow around it in like three lines of exposition.
they've got a good a review of Romulus too
I'm currently watching it and enjoying it. But can't help think that the facehugger should be called a face$$$$er, it's horrible to watch it being removed.