Alien: Covenant sequel in trouble?

Covenant's second weekend drop is 70% and not 80%.

As a comparison, Prometheus had a 60% second weekend drop.

http://www.boxofficemojo.com/showdowns/chart/?id=covprom.htm

Relevant info (04 06):

Domestic: $67,2 million so far (estimate)

Foreign: $106,6 million so far

Worldwide $173,8 million so far (estimate)

The movie opens in China on 16 06 2017, in Japan in September.

To sum it up, we can jump to a reliable conclusion in September.

Thanks for the added info, Ati! I've also fixed the typo to 70%.

I think they'll let Scott do this next one, and if it bombs then call it quits, but I think Scott will knock it out of the park.

Can we as a community organise some type of social media campaign to try and help boost interest in the film? 

Even if everyone on here shares articles from this site for a week or two the organic reach would be staggering. There are a lot of members here from all over the world. Im happy to help coordinate. 

Surely even those who didn't enjoy A:C as much would still like to see more films made, and not let the franchise die?  

You're welcome, Chris!

I hope it will bring plus 30 million domestic, plus 50 million from China and Japan, plus 20-40 million from other countries.

260-280 would be OK, I think...

I agree.

Lack of foresight by FOX and big mistake, at least Scott is a very confident as director, all the missing holes on Prometheus is trickier with Alien Covenant now. Bad screenwriters choosen this time and David/Walter no fit definitely on the history. A lot of leakage material from previous teasers. Good marketing but high budget for a very unambitious script for such big movie and expectation. 

As for the line 'Dwayne Johnson comedy Baywatch managed to dethrone Ridley Scott's Prometheus sequel', we should look at its domestic opening weekend box office: 18,5 million.

Again: only 18,5 million! And it refers to a 4-day-weekend!

Realistically ALIEN: Covenant is doing extremely well considering what it's competing against.

jfkwcb4464 Ridley Scott never wrote a script. And I don't think he would be crazy about following up on Newt's exploits. At this point, I think he would happily erase the legacy of Aliens if he could.

Alot of you have very optimistic wishful thinking and I hoping it will cross the 200 million worldwide mark.  At this point, it seems dire.

The movie made only 10 million dollars over the four-day Memorial Day weekend in the United States and Canada.  That is pathetic for North America in its second week in release for a supposed high-caliber film like Covenant.  Next week is Wonder Woman and it sits currently at 97% rotten tomatoes.  

Read this Forbes review that came out 10 hours ago.  Mendleson knows the box office.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/scottmendelson/2017/05/30/box-office-alien-covenant-suffers-record-71-memorial-day-weekend-drop/#3fd41fa66a32

I think A:C will do big business in China and Japan.  I wouldn't be surprised to see it take in around 300M plus by the time it's all over.

colonialsoldier It is not just that. Suppose it barely makes 250, how many of the people who actually watched the movie are going to be interested on the sequel?

This review clearly expresses why Covenant has not done well:

"The most obvious of Ridley Scott’s motivations for continually making these movies seems to be that the money he gets for them spends well enough. But, the only slightly less obvious explanation is that the Blade Runner director wants to make a movie about androids and the meaning of life but the studios won’t let him unless he punctuates the dialogue with a certain xenomorph monster that the kids will pay to see."

http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/448092/alien-covenant-review-androids

@iraptus - totally agree with you

From what has happened due to the release of the new pirates movie, i'm not surprised that it didn't go well. Just bad luck from the looks of its release.

Hi = D
Hello, everyone from foreigners around the world.
I am sorry for the bad english that depends on machine translation.
I've been enjoying fun conversations, discussions and considerations filled with love for all of you aliens.

Japanese fans were really looking forward to the foreign agreement really in Japan.
I was waiting.

However ... sorry, the publicity on September 15 was too late.
It was fun until May.
I was thrilled to be together with new information and video as well as fans around the world!

In the middle of May, there will be no official trailers and so forth coming out
I will naturally know the contents of a movie by watching information and videos from overseas.
There are many fans who are disappointed or disappointed with knowing the contents of the movie first, being interested in watching movies with videos captured stealing without being tolerable ... ...
Since DVDs and Blu-ray are also released overseas before the release date, fans who go directly to the movie theater may be few.

I also saw the movie shot, but I intend to buy genuine Blu-ray which is sold overseas.

And it is not a movie that contains even the sound of camera shake, nose and fart
A black shadow like a huge engineer is not satisfied with the movie that goes across the screen to go to the bathroom
It is not a low-quality movie that crosses the front of the screen again with popcorn with one hand
I want to enjoy a powerful large screen, excellent sound in a movie theater.

However, I can not expect box office performance in Japan.
Too much too late.

As for the voice of the fans, anger to Japanese "FOX Japan" is conspicuous.
In Japan's original official trailer, there are unnecessary adaptations
"escaped from the destroyed earth, ... people"
"We survived the human race ... the first first step of the plan for resettling humanity, that is c.o.v.e.n.a.n.t."
... and Japanese narration are included.
You can not forgive such a lie on your own with the official trailer.
I feel like being stupid.
It is disappointing.

That translation, in the last message, has been done by a machine learning algorithm. Makes me wonder, if you apply a reverse transformation, a convolution, will you get back the original message or you will get another cache poisoning when you try parse the ciphertext.

I NEVER see a movie twice in the theater.  The only 2 times I did that was with 'The Matrix' (only because a theater was closing and showing it for $1!) and 'Prometheus'.  As big of a fan of this franchise as I am, I will not be seeing 'Alien: Covenant' in the theater twice, so I'm not going above and beyond to help.  Imagine those who aren't as big of a fan... they're not going at all because I think they did not like the direction of 'Prometheus' or were disappointed in its shortcomings or because they are hearing that 'Alien: Covenant' is not worth seeing.  I think the Rotten Tomatoes audience reaction is worth noting, not the critics.  At 61% "liked it" compared to 68% "liked it" for 'Prometheus', and for ALL of the faults of 'Prometheus' (which were many, and I still thoroughly enjoyed it), we can see pretty plainly.  'Alien: Covenant' is not liked nearly as much by the regular movie-going public.  I hope we can get at least one more movie in so it can all be tied together.  Maybe they'll even somehow redeem both 'Prometheus' and 'Alien: Covenant', but they need some fairly creative writers.

Great information everyone!  If I remember correctly, Prometheus had a budget of 250 Million.  Covenant had a budget of 1-150 Million?  Fox should be making a profit soon enough-

The movie will profit eventually. I truly dislike these reports calling it a flop. That's really unfair and disingenuous of people to report that ****. The ****ing movie hasn't even opened in China yet for Christ's sake? Now, with that said I think Sir Ridley has really pleased ALIEN fans this time around. However, those of us who really enjoyed PROMETHEUS like myself are really disappointed we didn't get more of that story told. It's like he's trying to please one camp or the other with these movies instead of concentrating on the story as a whole. Maybe it needs to be longer than two hours? An epic tale such as this truly deserves it! I loved it but it should've had at least a three hour running time. I guess I'm trying to say that he's catering to the audience rather than the story and it's backfiring. He's also moved further away from Giger's biomechanical wishes for the franchise too. That's not to say that may be coming up in the next movie but it's a clear case of "less is less" versus "less is more". We've also got some really popular franchises coming out just a week after Covenant's premier such as Disney's Pirate's of the Caribbean and the unwatchable ("IMO") Baywatch and the real croaker of the bunch still...GOTG2 (which I love as well). These are huge kiddy friendly and/or check your brain at the door flicks which I'm sad to say is the majority of John Q Public (including myself, lol!). All these variables factor against "Covenant" in one way or another, but it will make a profit eventually. This is just my opinion now but I'm sure that perhaps a few of you would agree...

Prometheus made $403 Million.

I am still trying to understand why we went away from that story?  It is obvious it is not about money, because FOX is going to take a bath on this one.  I am bummed!

@Cerulean Blue, there is a recent interview with Ridley Scott at Yahoo! Movies where he indicates the reason why the Xenomorph was now front and center and why the change in direction from 'Prometheus'...

“What changed was the reaction to ‘Prometheus’, which was a pretty good ground zero reaction.  It went straight up there, and we discovered from it that [the fans] were really frustrated. They wanted to see more of the original [monster] and I thought he was definitely cooked, with an orange in his mouth. So I thought: ‘Wow, OK, I’m wrong’.  The fans, in a funny kind of way – they’re not the final word – but they are the reflection of your doubts about something, and then you realise ‘I was wrong’ or ‘I was right’. I think that’s where it comes in. I think you’re not sensible if you don’t actually take [the fans’ reaction] into account.”

So, like many things in this world, the ones who complain, no matter how small a minority they might be, typically are the loudest, thus altering the perception for those who are outside of that world, that the majority must feel the same way when in fact they do not.

@Membrane - I am in total agreement with you.  The brats always get what they want, so the parent can end the bickering!

The sequel will be made...

@Membrane, I was completely taken aback when I first noticed that what was once called "Prometheus 2: Paradise Lost", had just been turned into "Alien: Covenant". And I followed Sir Ridley's interviews after that with increasingly concern for everything showed he had to reconsider his original approach to satisfy the bug fans.

In the end, I think he found a nice way to please everybody to a certain extent. But haters will be haters, and if there's a sequel - or prequel, as he mentioned "Awakening" - I hope he sticks to his guns.

ScorpioStar I have a better idea. Ridley Scott should have his sequel to Covenant funded by Kickstart and let a proper Alien film go forward with another director. Everybdy happy.

@Cerulean Blue, as a parent of 2 young children, I understand the pull to just appease the whining kid and give in, but it is truly for the better if you stand your ground.  The end result is usually a better child as they grow up and an easier time for the parent.  This can't be applied to everything, but many things.  In other words, the best path is not always the easiest. :-)

Sir Ridley did not please me with this version of Alien.  But good news, Covenant passed 60 million domestic today lol.

obviously the xenomorph fans screams the loudest and they got what they wanted, but the figures speak for a thinner audience, and everyone who liked prometheus was so eager to this sequel, and got nothing in return for a 5 year wait- the way prometheus ended was so exiting- and the way AC ends is just stupid, who cares what happens after this. If fox makes another bughunt movie, i think they put the final nail in the coffin for the franchise.

Joylitt , I'm in your boat in a general sense too. I'm not too hyped about blomkamp A5 but this film just needs SERIOUS oversight if it gets a sequel. I fear Ridley is surrounded by yes men and fans like myself and the general public don't appreciate being force fed this pretentious nonsense where religious characters are zealots or fools or its another ROBOT show! I can't stand the super fast jumpy editing and the three acts being merged into a final slush with more illogical actions by the dumbest humans to enter galactic orbit. As of this weekend as the Japanese fellow mentioned the cam version is available free on the interwebs which does absolutely prevent folks from buying tickets. I have been here for a year eating every crumb for Prometheus 2 so as a fan it sucks to be labeled a hater but it is what it is. I would not recommend this film to my sister's family or my best friend who is also a longtime fanatic. I just don't trust Ridley even if he felt forced to comply with the "bug" fans and or Fox. The critic reviews/ youtube videos have spoken and the American audience is not buying into all this esoteric symbolism creationism silly garbage. Half the fan base is pissed about David creating the xenomorphs so what will ridley canabalise in the sequel. He's not hopping off that high horse for anybody and may likely do things just for spite.

Alien Covenant is bombing a bit... thats for sure, but the reason for this is quite simple.... its a ALIEN Movie and like it or not the Alien Franchise is not a Big Hit apart from the Franchise Fanbase... i am not saying its bad, its just that it does not have the impact Star Wars does...

The Problem stems from the Beast being cooked... so to speak, as right after Alien 3 the Franchise had come to its climax, Ripley was dead... The END!

The Franchise enjoyed a lot of coverage as far as Games and Comics etc, but the Big Time it had ran its course and given a send off.....  

Until they resurrected it with Resurrection, which was prior to the expanded universe of what Prometheus opened up, and so they explored the route that LV-426 must have been destroyed and Ridley also gone.... and so the only way to bring the Alien Back was  Clone Ripley  (in hindsight the Prequel route/Space Jockey Race was another avenue).

Alien Resurrection Sadly did not do too well, it just lacked that feel the other Alien movies had, it felt a bit odd in the way to bring Ripley Back this way.. and elements of this movie was simply just not a touch on the First 3

This set up a Bad Rap for the continuation... and hence FOX did not continue with a Sequel but instead they explored the AVP Franchise as the AVP Computer Games and Comics was giving Fans their fix of Marines and Xenomorphs..

Sadly Alien vs Predator was not the same kind of Movie the Games/Comics was based off, this was no 22nd century Space Fairing Human Marines Flick.... and so AVP again did not go down to well....

Then we had AVPR.... after AVP did not seem to please many as hoped it never brought back that WOW Factor of the 1986 Aliens, and it again did not do justice to the Games/Comics... FOX had lost confidence and rushed out a Low-Budget Sub Standard AVP2 and this Movie Sucked... it totally damaged the reputation of the Xenomorph and even had some effect on the Predator.

After this, the Xenomorph became a Bug Hunt, reduced to a Space Monster Zombie kind of threat... to a degree.. it lost its charm...   Then we had a few Disappointing AVP Games Released.  That was not as good as the 2001-2002 Series

At this point the Xenomorph was not that Iconic Beast that it was Originally not in the eyes of the General Public.  And to a degree Casual Sci-Fi Fans...

PROMETHEUS... was a attempt to get back on track as no one ever explored the Origins of the Xenomorph or who the Space Jockey was and after first having a movie that would cover the Xenomorph a bit... and the Space Jockey,  they decided to tone down the Xenomorph Connections feeling that giving clues to the Space Jockey/Engineers played a role in its creation without having to actually show any Xenomorphs was the way to go..

This Split the Fans, the movie had its flaws... and maybe it was in a part a attempt to bring in the Casual Sci-Fi and General Public to see a interesting Sci-Fi flick that maybe not everyone would have known was a ALIEN movie.. maybe because they felt the ALIEN had a Bad Rap... and this movie could pull in some Casual Fans to then find out its actually connected to Alien but its trying to expand and explore the Franchise in more depth...

Again this never worked out as planned, some Casual Fans found it confusing, and Franchise Fans was Split...

So we come to.... ALIEN COVENANT...

Ridley Scott and FOX felt maybe leaving the Xenomorph out was a mistake, and so they then changed the plans they had for a Sequel to Prometheus to loosely cover where this movie was going but to bring it in to showcase Xenomorphs and different versions too... they even threw in a Curve-Ball that Split Fans.... they kind of brushed away the Engineers/Shaw which disappointed some Prometheus Fans...

It was heavily Pushed as a ALIEN Movie, especially with TV Spots and Posters.. it was like LOOK ITS A ALIEN MOVIE!

Sadly it did not give Aliens Fans enough Action, touched upon Prometheus a bit to much for their liking, the whole ITS ABOUT DAVID... did not settle too well...

The Movie was also branded about as a Horror Flick, bringing it back to the Original Alien... The Trailers Teased as Such.... RS even said this will Scare the S&%" out of you..... Sadly it did not do this enough, the Magic of Alien was attempted but the Alien was shown too much and not kept to the Shadows... CGI did not look as Good as the up close Practical effects of Old.  The Whole Xenomorph Scenes seemed Rushed, and nothing Original and just a attempt to Re-hash... Alien vs Dallas and Alien 3 vs Prisoners (smaller scale) feel with the lets blow it out of the Airlock Ending of Alien and Aliens.

so the movie just did not quite deliver what the Franchise Fans wanted, it had too small a budget and too much to try and cover in a limited time-frame too.

This Effected the Re-watch Value for the Franchise Fans for various reasons, and the Negative reviews that came and word of mouth simply did not do well to Pull in the Casual Fan-base..

So as with Prometheus the higher first week  was a majority of Franchise Fans who went to see the movie opening week, and then it seems not as many had 2nd/3rd views as Prometheus had.

Negative reviews and disappointment from Franchise Fans passed about Word of Mouth and this has effected Alien Covenant quite a bit..

Another point is these kinds of reaction have had a effect, combined with what the Trailers Showed... i had spoken to some people who had not seen it yet and their comments was.. "well i have been told the Trailers show all the movie apart from Prometheus things and showing its all about Mad Scientist David the Robot who creates the Alien"

So they therefore dont see the need to see the movie....

Repeat the Last Part for those who dont want to read the full post...

And that Ultimately its the Franchise Fans who went opening Week, and a higher % was disappointed and did not go for as many multiple viewings thats affected the reasons for the lower results the following weeks...

Here is the last part of my previous post.

So the movie just did not quite deliver what the Franchise Fans wanted, it had too small a budget and too much to try and cover in a limited time-frame too.

This Effected the Re-watch Value for the Franchise Fans for various reasons, and the Negative reviews that came and word of mouth simply did not do well to Pull in the Casual Fan-base..

So as with Prometheus the higher first week  was a majority of Franchise Fans who went to see the movie opening week, and then it seems not as many had 2nd/3rd views as Prometheus had.

Negative reviews and disappointment from Franchise Fans passed about Word of Mouth and this has effected Alien Covenant quite a bit..

Another point is these kinds of reaction have had a effect, combined with what the Trailers Showed... i had spoken to some people who had not seen it yet and their comments was.. "well i have been told the Trailers show all the movie apart from Prometheus things and showing its all about Mad Scientist David the Robot who creates the Alien"

So they therefore dont see the need to see the movie....

I do have GRAVE Concerns for the Franchise now...

I hope we dont get another AVPR here.... by that FOX had kind of set up a sequel to AVP, and as this was a disappointment they simply rushed out a Half-Assed job on a way smaller Budget.

Alien Covenants Budget that was about $100M is not enough, i do worry now we will see a AVPR situation where FOX will make a sequel but they will reduce the Budget even further...  and if  RS is only given $70-80M i dont think they can pull off a Good Movie.... and the franchise will be kind of DEAD!

My 2nd Concern is how FOX and RS seemed to have a change of Plan due to Blomkamps Alien 5, and so brought in the Xenomorph.... having see this not really make the movie a HIT... i do now feel and worry they will BRING BACK RIPLEY

Ripley + Alien = $$$$$$

God Help us if they Kill David off, Daniels off, and have TWO Xenomorphs running around and we see a 12 year old Ripley Survive.... but then have counciling to make her Forget about those Horrors....

While this tale is told by a older Ripley re-counting some Memories that have surfaced 20 years after the events of Aliens... 

Thus giving us a Alien Awakening, being a Dream of Ripley from a Traumatic Event on the Colony Ship the Covenant when she was a little Girl....

Then Que.... set up for a Alien 5, well New Alien 3....

And i am being Serious here... i worry this is the route they could now be Forced to take.

Alien is going into a direction that is far more mundane, less biomechanical and a story concerning human issues like who are our creators.

In a word:  BORING!!!!  So boring... Oh dear, dear me so boring.

We need the unending weirdness that is HR Giger's universe!  

BRING IT BACK!!!

THAT was the draw!  And, there is no need to spell everything out.  David Lynch movies can be fascinating and he leaves you to solve the weirdness yourself.  THIS is what makes movies fascinating.  

I have divorced myself from the prequels and sequels.  They are commercial pap, movies that have completely gotten off track from the raw and frightening biomechanical weirdness that is Giger.  Alien will always be a stand-alone film with no prequels or sequels.  Unless Fox and Ridley take the plunge into high strangeness.  And I really don't see that happening.  Ever.

Thank you and goodnight.

Hi, greetings from Poland. I watch the movie 3 times and after first time I really hate the movie, then I start to think about it, go second time to the cinema and I become a real fan of AC. Really I love this movie as much I love prometheus and I hope there will be sequel. 

It's quite worrying that it made so little, and I hope it can pull in a bit more the coming weeks. I do wonder if Ridley Scott had a multiple picture deal in place with Fox or not, since they were working on the script for the follow-up. Writing a script costs money, and unless it came out of the budget for Covenant or Scott's own pocket, it seems that some deal is in place. That doesn't necessarily mean Fox has guaranteed the sequel to Scott, but there is a small chance they are still doing it.

it s better that they to prepare coffin for franchise

I really don't know and don't understand why you people hate AC so much.. It's made by 81 old man with passion who gave us original Alien (79) and we shoud be grateful for a posibility to dig deeper in to alien universe. I think that the sequel for Alien - Aliens was a really bad way for franchise and it's was a stupid slasher for teens who like shooting to xenomorphs, without nothing more to think, and any questions left to consider.  

I'am reading posts from this site since 2011, before Prometheus hit the cinemas. Most of people from here was thinking about many aspects of the future movies , have many ideas, thoughts and now it's only pure hate, what makes me sad. I understand that a lot of people will not like the movie, but still you can like the music, effects, camera job, actors, pictures, practical effects, anything, not just saying "I hate it, it's stupid" etc., because even if you hate AC, we (the fans of Prometheus and/or AC) deserve to know why!

"..why do you hate us...?!"

@DeepSpaceExplorer  The worst of all is to see comments and topics like "Who do you think should replace Scott, so the franchise could be great again?" and things like that. AS IF HE WASN'T THE ONLY REASON FOR THE FRANCHISE TO EXIST. At least if any of the 'non-Ridley Scott' Alien movies was any great... but things like Cameron's Aliens, to me, are the real jokes in the franchise. I don't even consider them canon. I don't even consider them to exist, actually.  

Oh, and there's also that fans into "rewriting the movie", or creating paralel stories to "replace" AC, writing such poor and dumb things that not even their moms would buy it (I'm not talking about fanfiction, which is completely different thing). Even if those were great, WE DON'T CARE, 'cause we're following RIDLEY SCOTT's story. If you can be a crying baby because "Covenant is sooo far away from the original Alien" is only because HE MADE THE ORIGINAL ALIEN IN THE FIRST PLACE.

The last TWO Posts seem to back up what i was saying, this is no disrespect to the posters as everyone has their own opinions and these TWO posts are the different side of the Coin to Galaxy Dave and here is where the Problems lie, the Franchise had started to split fans even at the point of Aliens, and when Prometheus came along it again gave another avenue to bring up problems some Alien/Aliens fans dont like with some they maybe do like.  

And so it leaves a lot of Alien Fans in General (whole Franchise Fans) with some many likes, so many dislikes that FOX/RS could not have made a Movie to Please them all... but it seems they tried to please them all as much as they could with AC.

They in reality should have gone (STUFF THE FANS) Prometheus is where we are going for the Prequels... but take on board some of the Negative Comments....  and Produce a Sequel to Prometheus where we indeed find out the Engineers are just Pawns in a Larger Game for a Very HR Giger Agenda.

Its really hard to please fans though and the idea i have that i would put in the next topic, should maybe be where they should have taken the Movie... however... this would not have been a very Alieny Movie and so FOX/RS may have wanted to reveal the Alien First... but they could have done this, similar to AC but left the door open for a 3rd movie that deals with the idea i will put next.

@Farlander I totally agree, thanks.  Without sir Riddley Scott there would be no Alien movie, no xeno, no franchise. He is a father of whole alien universe we know, so he deserve a little more respect and trust for his hard and great job. 

Since I watched Alien first time on VHS I started to read comic books, play Alien games, watch the others movies and I always had a feeling that something is wrong or missing, I was searching for answers for years, I wanted to know about the origin of xeno, who the Space Jokey is, who and why make the thousands of eggs and why the weyland company wanted the perfect organism,  not watch another movie with Weaver (she's great BTW).  Finally Prometheus and AC gave me everything I wanted to know, see and hear. 

@BigDave. Excellent recap.

I stated this before..I wanted a continuation of "Prometheus" with "Alien" effects that fixed some of the plot holes but instead we got  "Aliens" with a weird liberal dose of the robot Maximillian from the "Black Hole..."

They should have gone back with HR Gigers vision.... this idea could tie into AC, Prometheus via the Mythos.... if we put a Anunnaki Twist to it...

Lets Begin.......

Behold HR Gigers Alien 1979 Mural

Things of note.....

*Derelict shaped Ship, connected to the Xenomorph

*Ship seems to produce the Eggs via worms.

*Humanoid Space Suit wearing beings use Eggs in Self Sacrifice.

HR Gigers Mural was supposed to had been placed above the Egg Silo Chambers above what he called Bio-Mechanical Pregnant Bellies that would Produce the Eggs.  I have pointed them out with the Arrows.

So HR Giger, felt that the Derelict Ships were Actually Grown like a Plant.  And the Egg Chamber actually Produced the Eggs, that was used by a Space Suited Race whos Space Suits are not to dissimilar to the Space Jockey, especially Prometheus Suits.

Behold HR Gigers Face-Hugger 2

This shows us that beneath those Space Suits are Bald Humanoids, and also this Face Hugger does look a bit like the Fresco Xenomorph.... in which this Fresco looks more like Prometheus Punishment.

This all adds up to Potentially these Humanoid beings (Engineers) somehow using the Xenomorph in some kind of Sacrificial Purpose... but for what reason?  its very bizarre if these Beings and Elders are the Top of the Chain and they Created these Horrific Beasts to Self Sacrifice.

But it fits in more if there is some Ancient more Alien Race, who created Engineers to be used for their bidding and as Hosts for their Creations...  And also maybe that they require Hosts to be connected to Machines (Maybe Females) to obtain Eggs from them to then be used by the Derelict/Juggernaught Ships to Produce Eggs.

Or even have it that they needed the Black Goo Nano-Worms to be used by these Bio-Mechanical Machines to Produce Eggs.

Thus this brings in a Higher Power, that is more HR Giger... that Created the Engineers or Elders/Engineers for some purpose and then these Elders/Engineers Rebelled and then Stole the Technology of their Creators and sub-created Mankind to replace them in their Toil....  Much like the Annunaki Tale.

I think then having these Engineers Re-engineer the Ancient Rulers Bio-Mechanical Ships would fit within the Franchise.

Maybe the Space Jockey are the Original Taller Humanoids who are the Elders who are Human looking still but larger who then sub-created the Engineers but show these Elders are bound by a Higher more Alien Power.

Or have it the Space Jockey are Space Suits but inside are a more Alien Race than the Engineers.

Such as like above....

I am sure mixing elements from those 4 could give us a very Alien Humanoid looking Race...  the last image is just a random one off the internet that i felt had a bit of the look of Rob Cobb's concepts for STARBEAST as far as the Giant Humanoids (Space Jockey) and the Star Beast itself... this image looks like it has a mixture of both.

I think Alien needs a lot of Credit from various people...

You think without RS we would not have had Alien? without HR Gigers Influence it would never had looked as Great as it did, very Alieny and Bizarre Totally Unique.

Then without Dan O'Bannon's Star Beast which introduced the whole Story from finding a Derelict Ship and its Giant Dead Pilot, to the Spores/Eggs and the Alien Life Cycle.

I feel O'Bannon and HR Giger are by far the biggest influences for the Franchise.. No Question without them... we would not have ALIEN

David Giler and Walter Hill did change O'Bannon's story to add some interesting additions which included the Synthetic Android and Ridley Scott did a Wonderful job of applying all these people inputs into what we saw on Screen in 1979

Its more of a Team Effort than a One Man Show.

@Big Dave. Yes.

Once again you have literally took the words out of my mouth....

Scary...or sacrilegious...Either one.

Ridley simply put, directed a great movie. Dan O'Bannon gets the concept and H.R. Puffenstuff Giger gets the visual credit. Lots of credit to go around.

Sorry but I feel it different, and yes I think without RS we would not have had Alien but a movie with Alien in it. 

That's obviously not a one man show, and that wouldn't obviously be "the same" without HR Giger, O'Bannon etc. But without them, it would still be a scifi franchise by some crazy guy called Ridley Scott. Without Scott, there would be nothing at all. 

There's nothing wrong with negative opinions about the movie. I just think that "replacing Scott" sort of comments are too much, that's all I said. It's EXACTLY because of the impossibility of pleasing all the fans that, to think the world is coming to an end if the movie is not the way I wanted, has no sense at all. 

Fans before AC release: "Prometheus is a piece of s***. I want a proper alien movie, not this mythos bull****."

Fans after AC release: "Covenant is so fast paced and all about action! I want the mythos from Prometheus back."

Specially in this forum, before AC release, it was like Scott was God and Alien: Covenant was going to be the best movie of all history. After the release, it's the apocalypse, the franchise was ruined, and Ridley is just a director like any other - as I've read around here - that needs to retire. 

That makes me think twice everytime before blaming Scott or Fox for anything...

Once again, there is lots of Alien credit to go around. Dan O'Bannon came up with the Star-beast (later Alien) concept and had most of the script fleshed out before Ridley was brought in as Director. He had the fortitude/foresight to push Ridley for HR Giger to be brought in on as the artist. Some of the producers were looking at more conventional artists and if you do the research on their concepts, it would have made for a weak looking movie.

Dan O Bannon & Giger deserve just as much credit as Ridley.

'The worst of all is to see comments and topics like "Who do you think should replace Scott, so the franchise could be great again?" and things like that.'

Totally true, Farlander, perhaps it is the saddest element of this incredible hatred-spree.

I dunno. I was so disappointed with Alien Covenant. I really, REALLY wanted to like it. I am a devoted Prometheus fan and was expecting a balanced blend of Prometheus and Alien action in AC, but the film seemed to bend over backwards for the fan boys and girls who expressed their disdain for Prometheus. What happened to Shaw was such a giant slap in the face to the fans of Prometheus, the character development was rushed and disjointed, and certain scenes almost had me laughing out of sheer goofiness. I am leaning more towards pretending that AC didn't happen, and would like to think that Shaw is still out there looking for answers, not vivisected on David's operating table. AC wasn't a complete disaster, though. The music and cinematography were excellent, sans the CGI alien scenes. 

I'm sad. I really liked Alien Covenant but feel like most people hate it. Definitely feels like people missed the essence, the details and references in this movie and just wanted more AvP schlock or something. 

Maybe people just aren't ready for Alien Covenant in this age with Guardians of the Galaxy and over vapid Hollywood stuff :(

I also don't get why people keep saying they wanted Neill Blomkamp's Alien 5. That guy's best movie was District 9, which still sucked. 

I don't want Alien to be marines vs bugs again or ****ty social commentary. Ridley took it in the right direction, and even if the movies are flawed I am grateful.

I think we need to maybe consider Ridley Scott was a up and coming Director for sure... And he pulled a lot of weight behind the scenes with FOX.... so if RS had not wanted to do a movie off O'Bannons Alien/Star Beast...  i think the movie would have been made still... it would have happened.

Just maybe it would not have had the Budget it had, and also maybe if O'Bannon pitched HR Gigers works to whoever else would had replaced RS on Alien or indeed pitched to FOX.. they may have said "No we dont like those Ideas"... 

O'Bannon passed the work to RS who loved it and RS had a lot of influence over getting FOX to back him and go with HR Giger's designs.

So as far as how influential RS was, i think certainly helped us to get the movie we had as far as ALIEN.

But after Prometheus... i think those at FOX pull more of the strings than before.

Blomkamp just had some good ideas on how to bring the Franchise back as a Sequel, and to bring back Ripley, Newt and Hicks....  and a lot of the Aliens Fans certainly seemed very interesting in this prospect... there seems however to had not been a direct script though.

I dont think FOX would have given Blomkamp Alien 5 though they would have credited him for the Story, and maybe had him on board to do story boards and concepts... but they would have got a writer in to re-do his Story and then another Director to had Directed it.

I do wonder if the next 1-2 Alien Covenant Sequels will borrow more than just the Name off Blomkamps Alien 5 though.

I feel like a significant number of intense scenes in AC were diminished by having them present in the trailers. I thought Prometheus had one of the best trailers of any movie, ever, right next to Alien's. What thrills me and gets me stoked for movies are seeing snippets of random scenes that don't tell us what's about to happen, but instead makes really think about scenarios that could be happening and leaves me wanting more. For example, I thought the back burster scene in Covenant was one of the film's bright monents. I didn't seek out any images that gave away too much in terms of spoilers before seeing the film, so when the NeoMorph busted out of that guy's back and it plopped on the floor I felt that if this was going to be the continued tone throughout the movie, the 5 years I had waited for AC to come out were totally worth it...but after the back burster scene my intrigue dropped sharply until it spiked as we're being shown David's lab, and then dropped again. I think if I wanted to see a movie about AI's losing their minds I would watch Bladerunner instead. Alien was able to portray Ash in a way that made his big reveal a significant moment in the film, and it came as a complete shock for many first time viewers.

AC was utterly predictable...the old switcheroo at the end of the film, Aliens being sucked out airlocks and crushed by machinery (made me think about Aliens when the loader Ripley fights her in falls on her right before she gets sucked out into space)...it just didn't wow me like Prometheus did. The two most memorable scenes in those films - the original chest burster and MedPod self-abortion scene  - were original, intense, and weren't spoiled by trailers.

I'm just going to throw this out there.  Maybe RS decided to ride Blomkamp's Xeno wave for his AC movie plot to detract from the sequel Blomkamp was wanting to make.  It sparked a lot of interest, makes sense, the timing was right and it was totally about the monsters this time, not about the story.  It goes back to movie politics and something we're not privy to behind the studios closed doors.

 Here's what I would have done, or wish would have happened. I like Prometheus and I like A:C as well. However, they aren't without their faults. 

I'm personally not huge into the whole creationism exploration aspect. That said, these should really be two different things. If Ridley Scott wants to delve into all that, then he should have created a fresh sci-fi concept. One that doesn't attach itself to the Alien franchise at all. I don't know what he was originally thinking - nobody wants an Alien prequel without the Alien. Make your sci-fi space opera about something else, and let someone else do a proper Alien movie. 

I'm not really fond of knowing where the aliens came from. I preferred them to be mysterious, parasitic colony creatures. I don't like them to have a rhyme or reason or explanation. I certainly don't love that a bored, spiteful robot created them. Now we're in God vs man vs robot creationism, and while it could be a very interesting sci-fi concept, I wish it wasn't blended with the Alien mythology. 

I want them to make another Ripley Aliens movie. Apply the basic idea of the Force Awakens, in that some of the "old guard" is there, and introduce new characters as well. Failing that, these creatures can be anywhere and can menace anyone. We don't even NEED a Ripley-centered story. Or write something like Alien Isolation, with Ripley's daughter searching for her mom, between Alien and Aliens. 

Again, I liked A:C, but I do feel like it tried to bite off too much. Be an Alien movie, or be a sci-fi thinkpiece on life and creation, but not both. Just my 2 cents. LOL

This is a bad idea I had. But, Covenant "made me do it."

Imagine a Blu-ray box release ten years from now, if there will be such a thing ten years from now. It's everything Alien, in a new chronological order.

Prometheus / Covenant / ? / Alien / Aliens / official 3rd canon movie / 4th canon movie. Set also includes Alien3, Resurrection, and the two AVPs. Fun for completists.

Alien3 and Resurrection never happened. A new Ripley film shows her on Earth, struggling with newfound or recurring memories of the events in A3 and Resurrection. She made it back home. Hicks is still her friend, if not husband. Newt is alive and well. It all works because a very big, believable mystery is building.

Ripley has heard no more from the Company (but she knows they watch her). Newt is a scientist. Ripley knows the ultimate bioweapon is not the only method the Company can use to advance their agendas.

Since the prequels are going to be canon, bring some elements of them into what the older Ripley is experiencing. Why the dreams, or memories? Something is wrong. Could Ripley be a synthetic? Sigourney Weaver can ramp up that tension.

Now, connect David or the Engineers and the Prometheus and Covenant events.

Make lemonade out of lemons. A good movie is a good movie. Make us care and we're there. Give us an Aliens-style epic with suspense, intelligence, and new questions about synthetics and the LV-426 Space Jockey. Add in the surviving Bishop, or Ripley's memory of him. Something is wrong. David or Ash (or David-Ash) has fooled everybody. But this is Ripley's story. Her last. And she will get sent off properly. The universe will still have its gods, engineers and monsters waiting for new examples of humanity's hubris. We'll get some worthwhile mysteries back.

Ripley can kick ass with her mind, not just her body, now advancing in age.

Maybe she thinks the Company is silencing or punishing her with the Alien3/Resurrection thoughts. And maybe some honest source could read her dreams and expose Weyland-Yutani. Or say, "Those aren't dreams."

Alien3 and Resurrection need to be thrown out, like the AVP movies. It will take a Sigourney Weaver Ripley appearance to achieve this. Let her story arc be part of a much broader one.

Covenant is a massive disappointment. Everyone is waiting for "Aliens 2" - and it's been a long wait.

Give us a good story that doesn't fly like an MTV music video from the dark ages. Alien's pace is flawless. Aliens gives us time to care about the whole story.

Save Alien!!!

In my opinion, Ridley Scott and Fox Studios screwed this Movie despite it had much potential to revive the Alien series.

The visuals and bgms are overall good, except of several shots of the protomorph (chest burster scene...and i totally dislike this design) and when it was in the hallways of the covenant, and the scene where the neomorph attacks the girl (Rosenthal?).

Most facepalming came with the extremely stupid behavior of the crew. When i thought Fifield and Milburn were dumb in Prometheus, quite the whole crew in covenant deserves to die for their stupidity.

The characterization in this movie is simply bad. Can't believe it's a Ridley Scott movie. Only Walter and David are interesting characters here and that's a real issue. 

While Prometheus threw in too many questions with almost zero answers, this movie is extreme spoonfeeding the audience, while the fate of the engineers and the design of their homeworld is unsatisfying.

Maybe the budget of this movie was too low?

Having James Franco die at the beginning of this movie is lame, as no one knows about this character at all, unless you watched the prolog video clips online. 

The marketing was also bad by leaking way too many scenes of the alien creatures. 

Remember, that in the trailers of Prometheus, you only saw mutated Fifield from the distance. Neither the adult Trilobite, hammerpedes or the Deacon were really leaked in the trailers. 

With this movie, u sadly must say, my interest for another alien movie has decreased, and I'm actually a big fan of the whole series, except for AR and the Avp movies. 

This movie does not know what it wants to be. Sequel to prometheus? Prequel to Alien? 

Now Ridley cooked the Alien totally. 

Honestly I love Alien Series. Been a big fan since I was a kid. This movie somehow managed to insult my inteligence, how is it possible that the engineers died so easily to David attack? this is at all lights a resource to wipe them off from the plot with the swing of a pen, also the new origin of the xenomorphs is very unsatisfiying, now it turns out the most deadly organism is the fruit of the experimentation of the first psycho synthetic. This doesn´t fit at all. I found all that very unsatisfaying and frustrating among other things.

Seeing AC , the human race seem superior to the "engineers", no wonder they were afraid of us and tried to wipe us out.

Alright, here are my thoughts on AC.

It feels like a dejavue  right now to the Time, when Prometheus came out. It was ripped to pieces by the so called "Critics". People called it completely illogical, badly written, badly cut and so on. And those were only the People who made an effort to at least sound like they knew what they were talking about. And the biggest Group who slanderd the Movie were of course the kiddies who didn't seem to get that this was not an Alien Movie but a Prequel to Alien. And therefore complained, that there was no Alien and how stupid these Creators are and how utterly boring this Movie is *Facepalm*

Well, water under the Bridge.

Fast forward to 18.05.2017.

I roamed through the Reviews, and first comments from People who already had seen the Movie.

Guess what: "This movie is so boring and illogical and why are there no Creators anymore, and i hate David and the Xenomoprh is shown too much and the Cast is boring"---*double Facepalm*

I saw the Movie twice now. I agree with 2 criticisms about AC: The main cast stays a little Pale (apart from Fassbender) and there are (almost) 0 answers to the whole Creator-Theme. Apart from that i really enjoyed the Movie.

Extremely beautifull Pictures, surprisingly much Story for 2 hours, of course more gore and Violence, but not too much. Great underlying Topic of Creation.

The Criticism about the Movie beeing illogical, i don't even know what you mean by that.

The Criticism about the so called "dumb crew behaviour", go ahead and watch the original Alien again and then come back and tell me where they acted more believable or intelligent than the Crew in AC. Then watch Alien 2-4 and tell me where these Crews acted more intelligent and more believable.

"The Story is rushed and Fragmented". Yeah right, they rushed the Story during the last 5 Years. Did it ever occur to you, that RS maybe gave you what ya'll been screaming for after Prometheus? Less Creators and more Alien and Action and to be more like the original Alien, well, that you got. And the next Movie will take place in between Prometheus and AC and according to RS the Script was written simultaniously to the making of AC...draw your own conclusion from that. Hint, it's fairly obvious.

To sum up.

People hated on Prometheus and now they complain why AC is not Prometheus 2. People hate on AC, guess what they'll say when Alien Awakening comes out.

AC is not Perfect, but a very solid Alien Movie with a great Story and impressive Pictures with in parts outstanding Acting (Fassbender). Anyone spouting BS like" this Franchise was killed by RS" or "Bloomkamp and Ripley, thats what we need", just do us ( the People who actually like the Movie and don't need everything spoonfed to understand it) and yourselves a favour and don't watch anymore Alien Movies. It's not for you. Watch Transformers : The last Knight or Baywatch.

P.S.

Sorry for the Rant, but it had to be sad!

P.P.S

I really hope Alien Awakening will happen. And if it does, i bet you, it will contain answers to the whole why did David kill the Creators, what happened to Elizabeth Shaw and so on.

Excellent opinions in this thread that I enjoyed reading.  I just think there will be only one more prequel being made in this series; and then a reboot in about 8 years.

@BigDave - "I think Alien needs a lot of Credit from various people...

You think without RS we would not have had Alien? without HR Gigers Influence it would never had looked as Great as it did, very Alieny and Bizarre Totally Unique.

Then without Dan O'Bannon's Star Beast which introduced the whole Story from finding a Derelict Ship and its Giant Dead Pilot, to the Spores/Eggs and the Alien Life Cycle.

I feel O'Bannon and HR Giger are by far the biggest influences for the Franchise.. No Question without them... we would not have ALIEN

David Giler and Walter Hill did change O'Bannon's story to add some interesting additions which included the Synthetic Android and Ridley Scott did a Wonderful job of applying all these people inputs into what we saw on Screen in 1979

Its more of a Team Effort than a One Man Show."

You are correct and I (as usual) completely agree. Without O'Bannon and Shusset's script we wouldn't have ALIEN and without Giger's input we wouldn't have the unique design which makes the whole film so ALIEN.

The reason Ridley was brought on-board to direct was because they were struggling to find a director and i'm glad he got the job. However, even if they didn't get Ridley onboard or Ridley turned them down, they would have found someone else eventually. So it would definitely have been made Ridley or no Ridley. 

ALIEN was great because it was a team effort. It was great because of O'Bannon's and Giger's input, NOT because Ridley was directing.

Ridley has made a complete mess of the whole ALIEN prequel thing imo. It's very sad!

You guys go watch "Furious Gods, Making of Prometheus" and try to tell me that Ridley Scott is NOT balls deep meddling/screwing with the writer!!!!!! It's Ridleys show and by God his Android fetish w creationism is going to takes its place EVEN if it undermines the films characters like making them seem "STUPID" and or "Pretentious". The perfect example is Oram and saying "David, I saw the devil as a child".  WTF who talks like that¿???? Ridley is not a team player as you can see in that do***entary which ends up screwing up the Storytelling! Covenant did not need that opening with Weylen, I'm sorry but the mass audience I think would agree! But who the hell on that production is gonna "say NO", that messes up talking about Shaw or the magic goo, engineers. It's ridleys way or the highway and this is the second prequel in a row to have "THE DUMBEST *******S IN SPACE" If I were a betting man and Alien Awakening was coming out, I'd bet money that Ridley would over use David in sake of the story and have stupid characters that you don't care about. This is the problem with Ridley because the writers did not make the "map guy get lost" or the giant horseshoe that vickers can't run sideways. It will look great but be mostly trite nonsense because Ridley edits and shows what he wants not what the story calls for. Fans here blaming "bug" fans for this poor reception at the box office is bull****, because Ridley ran into the ditch with this tired garbage about David this and Walter that. Love the guy but he does not give two ****s what fans want, it's his show and it's not a democracy.

Very well said Capt. Torgo.

Some Prometheus hardcore fans are blaming Aliens franchise fans for the fail of this movie.

Stop defending Ridley Scott. He screwed this up by not knowing what this movie should become. Instead of a successful mix of Prometheus and Alien, it does not satisfy both audience but focus too much on David in his creative mania.

Ridley now even changed the fact,  that David now is the original creator of the Xenomorph instead of only recreating them, hence the less biomechanical look...

@Capt Torgo...Geez, and I thought I was a hard-ass...

I mean, you are right and all...Ridley has this fascination with an Andriod AI running amuck (I wish he had gotten a Blade Runner sequel to get this out of his system...). If he could have found a way to snuck one into "Gladiator" he would have...

And because of this preoccupation, he can sometimes overlook other things. Now we are (seemingly) stuck with Engineers being stupidly written away, no explanation of why we were invited to LV-223, Dr. Shaw turned into Kibbles & Bits, and "I-Robot" creating the Xeno...

As an accomplished, in-demand director, Ridley gets his way more often than not, so most of this Dumpster fire of a plot is on him.....

I just pray he can get this ship on the right track for the next movie...focusing on David alone isn't going to get it done and no, we don't want to see David (or Walter) ending being the Space Jockey, either...

I just got this crazy thought about David being PVT Hudson's great-grandpappy....{Shudder}

I think this movie could have been showing shaw and David arriving on paradise. While they reveal themselves, one of the elder explain to them about their dissatisfaction with mankind and want to evolve them with the black goo. Shaw then gets captured and being subject of their experiments. Disgusted by the cruelty to shaw who became a friend to David,  he decides to eradicate the engineers by unleashing the black goo in the city. While the city is cleansed, more engineers unit are coming,with suits and weapons. While david has already unleashed all goo during his attack he found in a lab of the engineers some xeno eggs protected by a blue  barrier (referring to the egg chamber in alien). When several engineers look for any survivors and the intruder, david deactivates the barrier and several engineers get face hugged despite they wore the helmet.

The offspring looks then like a mix of the Deacon and the protomorph being rather blue than black and not biomechanical yet. 

Then 10 years later when the covenant arrives due to space fare damages (the erruption) and requiring to refill oxygen and water due to a scan on paradise as the next only planet with earthlike atmosphere.

When they landed they first see beautiful landscape. Later when they explored it further they find a biomechanical fortress. Inside they encounter david. David explains about what happened since the Prometheus mission and shows Oram and some others his experiments. As Oram is a Christian believer he finds David's playing god disgusting and said he should have them all destroyed. 

He also blames David for shaws death despite it was not him.

Filled with anger again, david begins to dislike human again and decides to unleash his xeno eggs,which are now containing more bio mechanical xenos after he used bio mechanic technology at the engineers home world.

Xeno scenes should be cut briefly having them atrack from corners and shadows.

Anyway, it's too late, we have The Covenant movie out and it's hard to ignore it from the Alien canon (was easier to ignore the Avp movies).

Now hearing rumors of other Directors showing interest! I'm sorry but I have no confidence that ridley Scott can focus on a coherent story with good characters. One more flop and the beast will be cooked but it won't be "It's" fault, that will land solely on the lap of Fox Studios for allowing a rogue director who is now lost in the wilderness! Give anybody a shot! Hey, somebody has to fight for this critter. The box office has spoken so I'm not *****ing in a vacuum. 

@Capt Torgo. Any sources for other Directors want to take a hack at this...?

Don't get our hopes up unnecessarily...

We will get a sequel, for one simple reason. EVEN if Fox were to lose money on this project, the franchise is theirs and they are trying to revive it with Predator as well. Though that project isn't going very well from what I am told from my source. Which is sad. But Alien has been given the golden ticket, I can't tell you the insider actual term, but it's safe. The Franchise is being rebooted in a new way. Prometheus was a mistake they are trying to fix with THIS story but rather than ignoring it, they are manoeuvring around it and including the best parts of it. ALIEN is a monumentally big franchise that literally is ripe for a rebirth as it is able to move forward into new territories. But Fox has laid out a very careful plan to bring it all back to where it should start from. Will they succeed? I don't know, all I know is that they were unhappy with Prometheus and thought it wasn't the best start for the refresh of this franchise. We will see how the next instalment will go as this is where we will see if Fox will make it or break it. The next instalment is going to be closer to Ripley's story and it will be interesting to see how they will solve it. Fox has big plans for this. Numbers shouldn't frighten you... the direction of the franchise on the other hand should...

@Xeno, they need a new director with a new vision.  It is fixable at this point.  Just say both movies were a dream lol.