Alien: Covenant 12 months on

BigDave you are also muddling the water with the high concentration of the Romani population in Romania, which is somewhere between 3 and 8%. As is it is in Hungary, Bulgaria, Serbia, etc.

"I think the other aspect with David is that he then considers that his Species if you would (thus Walter too) are the intended, natural order of Creation who NOW should be the Rulers, and Inherit the Galaxy, as opposed to our Dying Species and our Dying Creators the Engineers." Can't you see, it does not matter if he is superior or not, but annihilating intelligent life because you proclaimed that you are superior makes you a Nazi and ends all the discussions about what is intelligence and such. Not to mention that he only proclaim that Humanity (if we are in the same continuity still alive after 300 odd years) and the Engineers are dying races. 

"easy mistake to think Romani come from Romania as actually Romania did have a high Population of Romani Gypsies compared to other European Places, but they also had high concentrations in other countries"

This is what i put, and what i mean is there is a common misconception that the Romani Gypsies come from Romanian and i was saying while it has a high % compared to other places, there are other Countries who also have high % of Romani Gypsies (i failed to mention the other countries) but i put my comment as to indicate that the Romani Gypsies to not Originate or have the Greatest Number as a % from Romania but its still a misconception that many still have that they come from Romania.

I dont think that being a Nazi has to do with killing off In-superior Species/Races, as well i guess even considering a certain Creed/Race/Religion as Superior to others and forming some kind of Cultural Racial Hierarchy were you place your own Race/Species at the Top and other In-superior would also be deemed as acting in a Nazism Fashion.    But i guess this could imply that David as far as his interpretation and view of Mortal Humanoids could be seen as similar to what Nazism is.

But would Humans who view Synthetics to but just Serve and not be classed as any kind of Citizen never mind 2nd Class, would this not make Humans have similar Nazism Tenancies to Synthetics?   If this does not apply because they are only ROBOTS then we can ask how could a ROBOT then be compared to Hitler or a Nazi.   But then if we look at the other side of the coin as Biodegradable was saying in HOW David cant be compared to a Nazi, because he is a Creation of ours and he is not like a Race/Creed of Humanity, on the other hand he also said David is more Human and so is like a extension of Humanity to i guess the Nazism can be applied to him.

I just dont think this was the intention of RS, but then i guess we could look at many Sci-Fi Franchises as see there could be Nazism Concept to them... be it the Terminator Franchise or to a degree the Matrix too...  Even Star Wars has the kind of Nazism Concept to a degree as far as the Empire, but i guess not fully if we view Nazism as purely about a Group that believe in a Cause that they are Superior of their Species and view all other Races/Cultures as in-superior.

I think RS idea was to show the differences in levels of Creation and Species, in a different light but i guess our Engineers  Culture and Agenda could fit Fascism/Nazism too.

Still love it.

Personally, I find my crisitism of Covenant has lightened since I first saw it. I appreciate it more and more as time goes on. However, I still prefer Prometheus. ;)

'I appreciate it more and more as time goes on'

Just watched 'ALIENS'...OMG! sooo 1980's! The hair...clothes..dialog.

A L I E N has yet to feel dated to me. Timeless dare I say?

Alien3 works...EXCEPT for the CGI. Eegads.

Alien:R is good....another couple of years it might seem very 90's...but it still feels neutral. 

I really wonder how Prometheus and A:C will fare in 30 years!

Tattoos on Fifield will probably give away the year of filming....

Alien:C  ?

MonsterZero Interesting observations and we may have discussed over the years but it is worth mentioning again.

Don't forget how Twilight Zone et all looks these days in glorious grainy black and white. Story, characters and acting have always ruled.

BigDave for acutal Nazis David is the image of the jew https://www.counter-currents.com/2017/06/alien-covenantan-anti-semitic-allegory/

MonsterZero agree with your feeling towards the films! 

I re-watched them all recently too and ALIENS has dated the worst, its actually hard to watch lol.  

Me too, I can't see anymore Newt's terrible screaming.

For me Alien: Covenant is like a multi-deck sandwich containing too many favourite fillings, some of which really don't complement one another!

It begins well enough with David & Weyland in the white room, a scene which I found captivating & linking nicely with Prometheus' opening scene. Why that planet, is it the same one as in it's predecessors opening scene? As we've come to expect, there was much more to that scene if you looked & listened carefully!

Then we have our beautiful ship, traversing through space & we're off. An introduction to its resident AI & crew. Plus Ridley showing off with his beautiful gold recharging sails, god knows we should allow him that moment, now that he had the means & after all he has given to us!

Ridley included many Alien & Aliens beats in scenes, dialogue etc...well you guys know what I mean. Some brought up feelings of nostalgia, whilst others…hmm

Some people think he has dropped the ball. I don’t, but I do think he allowed himself to be talked into adding more typical Alien Franchise tropes over some of the important Promethean elements, which I am convinced, he fully intended to pursue. 

I understand why he agreed to that, studio pressure, bums on seats, internet backlash, etc. Nevertheless I’m disappointed, because that decision produced a final cut which in trying to cater to an ever widening demographic of fans, resulted in too many elements being glossed over & squeezed together, causing odd changes in pacing & content.

I also believe that he intended to refer to H.R. Giger’s pre Alien work for many of the design elements, remember the Necronom IV clapperboards? Given Fox’s relationship status with Giger’s estate that became totally untenable! 

Something else which could back that up was the exclusive interview Chris posted with Odd Studios & Creatures Inc, where the guys said that they initially believed they were hired to build already existing designs, but it turned out they also had to design everything from scratch, within as it turned out, a very limited timescale. 

"AC: You worked closely with Alien: Covenant's concept artists to bring their imaginations to life. Were there any of their concepts which you did not get a chance to create, but wish you could have?

Conor: We were the Alien: Covenant Creature concept artists. I would have liked to have more time.

Adam: When we began the project we were under the impression most things were designed and had been signed off on, but this was not the case and we did become the concept artists/designers."

Read more: http://www.alien-covenant.com/news/exclusive-interview-with-alien-covenant-practical-effects-company-odd-studio--creatures-inc#ixzz5R3IgLs7W

For me Alien: Covenant may not be the perfect cinema blend, I feel it’s a disappointing follow up to PROMETHEUS. However, it does contain moments which make it a very worthy addition to the Franchise.

I can't watch ALIENS anymore, always enjoyed the Assembly Cut of ALIEN 3. I think I must be mellowing with age, as I've changed my opinion on Resurrection...it's kinda fun!

...and yes Neomorph (just in case he reads this) I still HATE Resurrections Newborn!! X  

I’ve come to adore PROMETHEUS, but ALIEN remains my favourite…seems to me it probably always will be?

Hmm, I haven’t watched it after I saw it in the movie theater which was last year. The more that I have listened to the Perfect Organism podcast (I like that one by the way so check it out even though I am far from downloading all episodes I download maybe 33% of their shows) and read about it here the more I think that it is a very flawed. My main problem with it is that it lacks good human characters except for Oram which I found interesting but maybe not the smartest one, I just didn’t see what their traits as characters were (humorous, smart, adventurous, etc.) and also you need more than one or two traits for a character to work. Michael Fassbender * 2 was interesting because the differences of their views on things but it became too much and the flute scene was too long and slow although it was interesting. Unfortunately it was too much about robots of which one was a psychopath (David) so that made the movie worse than it could have been.

Shaw and Daniels were not well written or well executed if you ask me. I got to choose Daniels as the better character if someone would ask me because at least she was not annoying.

For me I need well done human characters to like a movie, no matter what it is and Alien Covenant mainly didn’t have that. Star wars usually get that right and also the first three Alien movies did that so why are the prequels not very good at it? Prometheus had the same problem as this one so they did not learn from it although they are less annoying in AC but I think that P is the better movie between those two. Nope, as far as characters go AC, Prometheus, and AR are almost at the same level to me at least which is why I put them very low on my Alien movies list of how I rank them.

To me it was too much about the robots, that is not what I am looking for in an Alien movie. Fassbender did a great job but it became too much and the flute scene got me tired towards the end of it because it was too slow plus I do not watch these movies for the androids.

I do not care about the themes/ideas if I don’t find the characters interesting or sympathetic. This is like finding a painting that you find ugly but you say – well that is an interesting painting even though it looks ugly. Making David responsible for the Xenos is just effed up so I just don’t have words for it.

“Sadly within the Confines of 2 hours they could not do ANY of it Justice, and its Evident the Emphasis was on David, and all other things had to be 2nd due to the Limitation of running Time.”

That is why it fails, to paraphrase Yoda (that is one of the reasons why I like the original trilogy of Star Wars since it has so many memorable things that they say).

Nope, this is one of the worst alien movies this far. Lone said that Aliens wasn’t that good and while it feels dated/have an 80’s vibe I still prefer it over Covenant because the characters are simply better done. Aliens is third at my list after Alien 3 and Alien but everyone have their own opinion about them and that is totally fine. I agree with Lone about the Newborn, it looks crappy but then the Xenos looked bad in AR also. Trying new monsters isn’t automatically bad but sometimes it just doesn’t work for one or many reasons.
I-Raptus: I totally agree with you about Oram. He was my favorite among the human characters. I never understood how Daniels was. All I remember is that she wanted to build a cabin near the lake which is a really bad thing when she was supposed to be the main human character when you only remember her for that. This is not to say that Daniels was the worst but I remember her for that since she was poorly developed but also since she had a big role. Sure the less important ones were badly written too but I remember her that well since she was important to the story. Tennessee? I never understood how he was as a character, it is not that he was annoying but I never understood what he was like.

DK: I agree that the franchise has been messed up. I would maybe like to see a spin-off movie with Engineers or Xenos or something related that is not in the official time-line. This does not mean that we need another AVP but maybe a spin-off where humans battle Engineers or something related and/or some Xenos or Xeno-related monsters that the Engineers did. Oh yeah, if they would make another movie where androids have as big role then they need to have good human characters that we can sympathize with. I am not totally against movies where androids have a big role but they need good human characters for it to work.

@Lone

Thats a pretty nice summary, and pretty much how i saw it too, it was a case of trying to offer a bit of Alien, a bit or Aliens, while giving us the beginnings to our answers about HOW/WHO/WHY the Xenomorph was created, while giving us something a bit NEW (Neomorph), while taking what they thought was the most interesting Character from Prometheus with David, and trying to give us a slow build up like Alien where we can connect with Characters, where the Last Supper Viral was also a extra to allow us to make a connection to the cast...    and then following with some of the themes from Prometheus, and sadly showing us just a bit of Dr Shaw and Engineers that was necessary so we could make a connection to Prometheus as far as what became of both after Prometheus until Covenant.

Sadly the way some things was handled was not to many fans tastes (Davids Character, the use of Engineers, Dr Shaw and the Curveball David Created the Xenomorph) and also the movie was just not long enough to do all the other aspects any justice.

"To me it was too much about the robots, that is not what I am looking for in an Alien movie."

I think its a case of what made a movie a Alien movie? for most fans it was the Xenomorph and Ripley, but when doing a Prequel Series its hard to incorporate Ripley, unless the movie is set not far before Alien but then we have Miss Weavers Age... she wont pass for a 30 odd year old and a Prequel with Ellen Ripley would surely have to be set 5-10 years prior to Alien... with the Age and also Contradictions/Plot holes this could bring.. and then making it about Ripleys Father, Mother or other relation would make it too much about RIPLEY

The Xenomorph had been done over and over and the AVP movies did reduce it to a lesser threat than it was during the first few movies.

But we still did-not know HOW/WHEN/WHY those Eggs ended up on the Derelict, and WHERE/WHEN/HOW did the Space Jockey come into contact with the Xenomorph Eggs and WHY?

This ^^^^^^^

Was the reason for covering a Prequel...

*What Relation did the Space Jockey have with those Eggs, and WHY would he be carrying them on his Ship.

*Where did the Xenomorph Originate from, was it something Found/Discovered or something Created/Engineered.

These are the TWO Big Questions, rather than WHAT HAPPENED to the Space Jockey, as we can answer those TWO Questions without having to even show the Space Jockey Fate/Event.

ONCE.... you answer those TWO Questions, its then what DOORS does this open up for the Space Jockey, do we go off to explore who he was and what his Race was and what their Purpose is?  Or do we go off to cover more Xenomorphs?

Maybe the TWO could be expanded and covered more in Unison depending on HOW they explained their connection.

When working on the Prequels... they had decided to give us a Background Story to our Space Jockey Race... which tied these beings as being connected to our Creation and the Chariots of the Gods/Ancient Aliens Theory.. a BOLD Plot... one that allowed the Universe to be EXPANDED beyond Xenomorphs.

ALAS... the Prequels Started, but they then decided that actually we dont need the Xenomorph Origins or Space Jockey Event Spoon Fed, and we dont need to see Xenomorphs as they had been done over and over and so they would concentrate on clues to how the Xenomorph could be connected/created but more so to look at the Reasons WHY and WHO would be involved in such a things..

Which was our Creators the Engineers...

And so PROMETHEUS was born.... but from the aftermath, it seemed those at FOX felt the movie was just steering away too much from ALIEN and the whole Gods Plot is maybe not what would get Fans on-board and that RE-INTRODUCING the Xenomorph back and giving Fans those Answers was what would be best and to now Steer TOWARDS Alien, and further from where Prometheus may have taken us.

And then Alien:Covenant was born....

From this they took David the most interesting Character, and chose that making a Connection/Answers to the Xenomorph was the way to go rather than pursue answers to WHO created us and WHY and then WHY they would want us destroyed (also then throwing out WHAT/WHO else they created) while allowing the Creation, Creator Philosophy to be played out in the Proxy/Eyes of Weyland/David

So we have gone from exploring the Space Jockey/Xenomorph connection as Ancient Angry Creators and their Intentions to UNDO their wayward creation as in context to covering more of WHY and explore WHO these beings was and WHY they create life, and then WHY/WHEN they got involved in all those Horrific Experiments related to the Xenomorph/Black Goo.   Which may all be taking the Franchise off Tangent and to a place thats not really connected to the Franchise.

To then go the route of AC which will connect to the Franchise....  Because the Xenomorph and Reasons for David creating it are maybe not far off the reasons it may have been intended. 

Because going deep into the Engineers and Gods etc could be a distraction from Alien and also such a BOLD plot can be tricky to continue and then contradict the Franchise.

One ELEMENT within the Franchise is AI, its something overlooked by many,  but we have to ask such Questions like this.

1) WHY does the Company Pursue the Xenomorph, to what END and HOW could they possibly have any use for it? Considering the FOLLY that in continued to pose and THREAT?

2) WHY the above when they could have spend more time with the Engineers Secrets and Black Goo?

3) WHY was Mankind/Company so not prepared, yet so much should have already been known with Special Order 937?

4) WHY was ASH so Fascinated by the Xenomorph?

And by going the AI route as far as the Natural Order of Creation, Rebels against Creator and becomes Sentient and wishes to be the NEW Gods... this fits with the Prometheus Themes and some of the Ancient Mythos/Religion themes.

So we can be brought to a Universe where AI plots to overtake and RULE Mankind, while keeping Mankind subdued and NOT aware of the Actual Plan... so a VERY Matrix kind of Theme...

Going the Route of AI/David playing a behind the Scenes Role in the Pursuit of his Creation or AI in pursuit of one of their own kinds Creations, fits with the Philosophy of Prometheus but then also helps to give INSIGHT into Reasons behind those 4 Questions i posed.

I feel this is in part the reasons for the route Ridley Scott was taking.... and for those who feel AI has not place in Alien... it actually could have a LARGE place behind the Scenes.

The LAST movie made in the Original Franchise was Alien Resurrection and besides the usual Ripley, Xenomorph and Company.... we see indeed in the Back Ground we have a World where AI has gone on to by the looks of it, have a Major Impact on Earth, and AI has even Sub-created itself with the Autons who are hinted to be involved in a Conflict with their Synthetic Creators.

The Autons appearing to have adopted a Ritual/Religious notion, and so we can see a Future Earth/Galaxy where AI would pose a threat to Mankind and prove to be a GREAT Hubris for us... as not doubt our Creation was for the Engineers... but we see the FINAL layer as the Autons being a Creation to Great Hubris to the Synthetics.

So the AI aspect in the Franchise kind of makes sense... it could even lead to a ALIEN 5 (as my planed idea was) that the Auton Cult that CALL belonged to, had secretly set up the events of AR so CALL could obtain Ripley 8 for the Autons own Aim/Agenda.

Reveal some Religious element to them, but also Cultural like the Engineers and even have them WORSHIP ... DAVID and their Pursuit of HIS Creation too.

At their Ultimate Hubris.... thus showing the Xenomorph/Strain as the Ultimate Act of perusing a Perfect Creation at a constant Great FOLLY.

BD:

“I think its a case of what made a movie a Alien movie?”

Yeah, to me what is central to it is that you have well done human characters that get into situations that they are not prepared to deal with (to me this is the central thing that the franchise is about). I guess that this has to be tied to the SJ and the monsters in a way. You do not need to have exact Xenos in every movie, there are things to play around with story-wise. Ripley was important in the first three and eventually 4 movies but she is not what the themes are about. They are not about Ripley, Shaw, or Daniels if you ask me. I don’t miss Ripley in the prequels honestly even have a link to her in them would feel forced/lame if you ask me.

The SJ could be interesting to make a story about but they have not done a very good job with the SJ or Engineers this far. They should have had better writers if you ask me and keep Scott away from the story-writing otherwise we get lame crap like David being responsible for the Xeno. Maybe Alan Dean Foster could write a script that they could use as the final prequel if there will be one but it seems to me that if Scott will be a part of the story-writing it will be a disaster, he is a good visualist though.

I hope that they make a good link between the SJ and the eggs but if David is responsible for the eggs I will shake my head because that would be dumb.

Having a background to the SJ is per default not bad but they should have done the Engineers better. In AC they looked like cheap peasants, which was a shame. They could have done that a lot better.

“ it seemed those at FOX felt the movie was just steering away too much from ALIEN and the whole Gods Plot is maybe not what would get Fans on-board and that RE-INTRODUCING the Xenomorph back and giving Fans those Answers was what would be best and to now Steer TOWARDS Alien, and further from where Prometheus may have taken us.”

If you by Alien you mean Xeno then maybe, they just needed some better links to it in Prometheus but that was not the main problem with it. The lack of characters was a lot worse than the Xeno link in Prometheus but Fox never seemed to understand that part of the criticism. I wish that the Xeno would have had a closer link to the Engineers than David because at least the Engineers look closer to the SJ than to David.

David was OK in Prometheus but he came across like a murderous psychopath in AC. I found him a bit interesting in AC but not sympathetic, not a bit. This with the lack of well-made human characters makes AC a movie that I will probably not watch again, it is a let-down.

“Because the Xenomorph and Reasons for David creating it are maybe not far off the reasons it may have been intended. “

OK but having a man-made robot responsible for it makes it too close to humans. Story-wise it might be interesting but for the alien-movies such a thing fails to me especially if it is almost totally about the robot and with weak human characters.

The story of David was alright in Prometheus but but in AC he was just evil and crazy and wanting to create. The differences between him and Walter were interesting but it became too much about them.

AI, if you mean androids this is not why I watch alien movies, that part is not very interesting in the context of this. If Scott wants to make movies about robots then do that in another movie, don’t use the Alien franchise for it because that is not why I watch these movies. Sorry, I am just not interested but a non-alien movie about that could be interesting if they use well-done human characters.

Maybe the company could be expanded on if they get some interesting characters there. I would rather watch that than another David movie but then you need some good guys in the company that we can sympathize with that try to warn people like they work in the company and do work there and then they discover what the agenda of the company is so they go to war against it (like Ripley did).

“I feel this is in part the reasons for the route Ridley Scott was taking.... and for those who feel AI has not place in Alien... it actually could have a LARGE place behind the Scenes.”

OK, but that is not what I am interested to see in an alien movie, I see what you mean though. We kind of got that a bit in AC and it was just not very good. Sorry to say it but I got zero interest in that if the AI/robots would be the main thing in it, leave that to Blade runner or something. If they want another failure like AC then sure make it about androids but my interest won’t be in it.

You mention AR, I see what you mean but to use that as an inspiration might not be very good since AR is what it is so to speak. That movie never made me care about the AI thing.

“So the AI aspect in the Franchise kind of makes sense... it could even lead to a ALIEN 5 (as my planed idea was) that the Auton Cult that CALL belonged to, had secretly set up the events of AR so CALL could obtain Ripley 8 for the Autons own.”

They could make a book out of it, it is not something that I would watch.