Green Goblin Reviews: Alien Covenant
I’d say it’s pretty common knowledge that a horror film franchise becomes less and less scary the more you’re exposed to it. Rather, any given scary element in film becomes less so with each additional exposure. It’s the reason why Freddy Kreuger evolves into a cartoon character as the films progress. Or why franchises like Friday the 13th or Final Destination eventually turn into twisted games of comedic sadism, coming up with more creative ways to mutilate screaming idiot teenagers like a demented game of mousetrap (Exception for Final Destination 5, which was pretty good I guess). Point is, once the monster is revealed and the rules established, it’s very hard to scare your audience again, as they know what needs to be done and how to fight back. The Alien franchise knew that initially with its main enemy, the Xenomorph. That’s why the second film, Aliens, centered around action. “Yeah, we know what these things are. We know their strengths and weaknesses. Now, let’s introduce them to our fucking guns.” Obviously, that didn’t go smoothly, but it still established them as a threat that can be taken down head-on if need be. So when director Ridley Scott wanted to go back to the horror roots of the franchise after two subpar sequels, two non-canon spinoff films and a shitload of 90’s era edgelord extended universe nonsense, people thought that he might be able to successfully put the cat back in the bag, by expanding out knowledge of the origins of the creatures as well as their original creators/hosts, the Engineers. What we got instead was a bloated, illogical, confusing prequel to the franchise that attempts to implement Zoroastrian origins into mankind’s history, while forgetting to actually be about something until the final scene. That was 2012’s Prometheus. The film I saw today, Alien Covenant, is a direct sequel to it. That’s right. It’s Prometheus again, ladies and gentlemen.
Our story takes place on a colonizing ship, called the covenant, in which 2000 civilians, 114 embryos, 12 crew members are all traveling in cryosleep to a new earth-like planet. A synth named Walter (Michael Fassbender) is recharging the ship using solar sales, when an unpredictable solar flare spikes, triggering damage throughout the ship and killing 44 civilians, 17 embryos and the ship’s captain. Newly awoken, the crew cope with the loss of their captain (including his widow, Dany, played by Katherine Waterson) and repair the damages to the ship, as they are still 7 years away from their intended destination. While doing orbital repairs, Pilot Tennessee (Danny McBride) encounters a signal coming from a local star system that is clearly human. They trace it to a planet that is actually a better match for Earth than their intended destination and plot a course their to investigate both for the origin of the signal as well as possibly setting up shop. Once they touch down, two of the crew members become sick, due to inhaling spores from a peculiar pod, which festers into their system rapidly and spawn proto-Xenomorphs. After the initial confrontation, the plot leaving off from Promethius immediately resumes, when you run into familiar characters and realize exactly what planet they’re on.
The actual horror elements in this film have the potential to work for the most part. One of the ways you can reempliment horror properly is to make the protagonists weaker that previously established characters or give them a benevolent altruistic goal to fight for (this film does both). But it’s still just hindered right out the gate by the fact that we know so much about this species already. Even in their spore form, it’s enough of a clue to the audience what the hell is going on, that it feels almost silly to see the crew of this ship (having just experienced a big “space is scary” moment with that solar flare, mind you) don’t think to implement quarantine immediately, or even bother wearing atmospheric protection against viral contagions, when first touching down. The tension when the outbreak actually happens is pretty intense and it does it’s job well, despite the glaring incompetence. And the performances are all well done, including McBride who I grew to surprisingly like as arguably one of the more level-headed characters (even when he’s doing dumb stuff). But there’s just a lingering feeling that despite trying to stay fresh, this entire thing has just been done too much to ever be genuinely seen as scary again. Here’s an interesting example: The audience I was with full-out started laughing and taunting the screen when a crew member decides to lean over and stare directly down into a Xenomorph pod. That lightning with the Facehugger is just not gonna strike twice, guys. I’m sorry, but we already know the score. Same thing with the Xenomorphs’ acid blood and their double mouths. Make no mistake, the aliens still appear threatening and dangerous. They just stopped being scary. And if your goal is to make a horror film, then that’s a problem that can’t be avoided.
We get more extended looks at the works of the Engineers and the designs are legitimately cool and take you in, but you just can’t help but feel as if the whole “ancient astronauts” plot wouldn’t just be better served in its own film, completely separated from the alien franchise as a whole. Back in 2012, Guillermo Del Toro was tapped to do a cinematic take on “At the Mountains of Madness“, an ancient astronauts story that most people will know as the origins of HP Lovecraft’s Cthulhu mythos. Just hearing that sounds soooooo very right, doesn’t it? But Prometheus’s stagnation at the box office put the plan on ice, permanently. It was a case of a film actually bringing down the potential of other films around it. I feel that holding on to this franchise with such zeal may continue to that in the future. I would LOVE to see more Zoroastrian films. But the works of Ridley Scott should have maybe stayed in the realm of action after its debut.
5.5/10
Maybe check it out on Netflix down the road, but unless you really enjoyed Prometheus, it can wait.
Prometheus was NOT supposed to be about the zenomorphs. I wish Scott had never included that scene and continued with his idea of not going back to that.