# Alien: Covenant opening next month **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [April 28, 2017, 11:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alien-covenant-opening-next-month/785464 "2017-04-28T23:35:41Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Sherrerd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sherrerd/32/8_2.png) [@Sherrerd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sherrerd)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2018, 10:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alien-covenant-opening-next-month/785464/61 "2018-03-06T22:50:39Z")
This movie finally came to television (HBO) two days ago. Having been burned by _Prometheus_ I was disinclined to pay anything extra to see it, even though I love the first two movies in the _Alien_ franchise. So anyway, I finally saw it. To add to what’s been said already: It’s true that characters in the first two movies do things that, in retrospect, were clearly mistakes. But that’s very different from the phenomenon we see in _Prometheus_ and _Covenant_: plots that cannot move forward unless characters do stupid things. In the first two movies, the bad-in-retrospect decisions let us identify with the characters. They make bad decisions for the same sorts of reasons we do: we’ve all been in situations that we misunderstood; we’ve all hoped that the easy way out would work; we’ve all been over-confident. The stupid decisions in P and C are of an entirely different nature. We’re not more inclined to identify with characters who remove their protective suits to make friends with an alien snake or who go down to an unknown planet with no protective suits at all and with no attempt to check out the microbial ecosystem they’ll be breathing in. Those stupid decisions aren’t the type that humanize characters; they are the type that lazy screenwriters come up with to get to the next plot point. And that’s the thing that’s so offensive about both _Prometheus_ and _Covenant_: the contempt for the audience inherent in the lazy, stoopid screenplays. Think of all the money spent on these movies–all the wasted resources. Think, too, of the excitement many fans of the franchise felt about the interesting and intriguing new stories that the new movies might offer. The actual movies were like doors being shut right in our faces. All that ranting aside: on the specific topic of the overtly religious character played by Billy Crudup: my feeling is that the failure to develop the ‘character of faith’ aspect wasn’t due to forgetfulness or even to the general ineptitude of the screenplay. I have a feeling that the way both that character and the Shaw character from Prometheus were dealt with in _Covenant_, was a deliberate thumb in the eye to the writers of _Prometheus_. As many will recall, there was a strong implication at the end of P that the reason Shaw was the sole survivor was that she was a person of faith. What we learn in C is that both that character and the Crudup character died horrible deaths that were also pointless deaths. Again, I have no proof of this, but I just get the feeling that the C screenwriters were making a point. (I don’t actually object to that point, if point it was–the ‘Shaw survives because she loves Jesus’ plot line of _Prometheus_ was not something I respected or liked or was drawn to. I’m just saying that there did seem to be a conscious choice in _Covenant_ to say ‘these characters are not being watched over by their God, no matter what Damon Lindelof may want us to believe about it.’) ---
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2018, 11:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alien-covenant-opening-next-month/785464/62 "2018-03-06T23:49:07Z")
Interesting take. As I’ve said, I really liked “Prometheus” but did not like “Covenant”. However, I’m an atheist and my reasons for feeling this way are therefore certainly not motivated by the stuff you describe. I guess I completely missed the implication that her Christian faith saved her. If I internalize that, I will probably end up liking “Prometheus” a little less! Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk ---
**Author:** ![Typo\_Negative](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/typo_negative/32/484_2.png) [@Typo\_Negative](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Typo_Negative)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2018, 1:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alien-covenant-opening-next-month/785464/63 "2018-03-07T01:14:00Z")
It was dismal. I am sick of movies who have scientists who don’t behave like scientists, military people who do not act like military people, and robots who do not act like fucking robots!!! And can we all agree that the prequels should not have more advanced technology than the sequels??? ---
**Author:** ![Sherrerd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sherrerd/32/8_2.png) [@Sherrerd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sherrerd)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2018, 9:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alien-covenant-opening-next-month/785464/64 "2018-03-07T21:17:45Z")
> [@SlackerInc](#): > > Interesting take. As I’ve said, I really liked “Prometheus” but did not like “Covenant”. However, I’m an atheist and my reasons for feeling this way are therefore certainly not motivated by the stuff you describe. I guess I completely missed the implication that her Christian faith saved her. If I internalize that, I will probably end up liking “Prometheus” a little less! If I can find a review of Prometheus that discusses that aspect, I’ll post it. (This is the sort of thing that makes me miss the IMDb message boards–they were the only place where you could count on finding aspects of actual plots being discussed online. Reviewers, of course, typically try to discuss the plots as little as possible, for fear of being accused of posting spoilers.) > [@Typo\_Negative](#): > > It was dismal. > > I am sick of movies who have scientists who don’t behave like scientists, military people who do not act like military people, and robots who do not act like fucking robots!!! > > And can we all agree that the prequels should not have more advanced technology than the sequels??? Agreed on all counts. These recent ‘Alien’ franchise movies have made much less effort than other franchises do, to disguise the ‘prequels have more advanced tech’ problem. At least George Lucas, back in the day, _tried_ to explain the transition from sophisticated robots in the prequels, to men-in-white-plastic-armor in the set-later (but filmed earlier) movies. I’m not saying the explanation made complete sense, but the effort to address the issue was appreciated. ---
**Author:** ![iamthewalrus\_3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/258eb7/32.png) [@iamthewalrus\_3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iamthewalrus_3)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2018, 11:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alien-covenant-opening-next-month/785464/65 "2018-03-07T23:33:21Z")
> [@Typo\_Negative](#): > > And can we all agree that the prequels should not have more advanced technology than the sequels??? This is very awkward from a filmmaking perspective, though. Alien had stuff that looked futuristic and high tech at the time. Blinky lights, wireframe graphics. If you force all the prequels to be totally consistent with that, you’ll end up with 1970s period-piece retro-future scifi. Which will combine great expense (nobody even does those sorts of practical effects any more) with at best niche appeal, thoroughly confusing any audiences who thought they were going to a science fiction movie and aren’t aware of the full oeuvre. This is probably one of those cases where practicality and finance has to trump the purity of art. And, honestly, I’d rather the movie not waste any time on it unless they do it very well. Doing so is worse than the equivalent ubiquitous “oh no a bear ate all our phones” scene that every modern horror movie has to shoehorn in to keep audiences from wondering why the characters don’t just call for help. ---
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2018, 1:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alien-covenant-opening-next-month/785464/66 "2018-03-08T01:00:53Z")
I agree that it’s okay to update tech. I rationalize this as being that the earlier movies should be seen more like plays that are conveying an approximation of what the background would look like, not a perfectly realistic one. Sherrerd, I agree about the IMDb message boards. I have boycotted Amazon ever since that announcement. You should try [moviechat.org](http://moviechat.org) though. They have the IMDb boards archived, but integrated to their forum so you can still reply to comments from that time. And discussion of newer movies, while not up to the traffic of the old days, is still fairly lively. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk ---
**Author:** ![Unpronounceable](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/9de0a6/32.png) [@Unpronounceable](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Unpronounceable)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2018, 2:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alien-covenant-opening-next-month/785464/67 "2018-03-08T02:28:03Z")
Oddly, I think this is one of the few series where the tech jumps more-or-less _make sense_. Alien was on a mobile mining/refinery ship. Why splurge on crew comfort? Aliens had a military ship, which was actually much better. Alien 3 was a refinery/prison colony. Again, why give them good things? Alien Resurrection was a military ship again, with similar aesthetics. Prometheus basically had a rich guy’s private ship refitted to be a science ship. Fancy! Covenant had a well-financed colony ship - they paid for their nice things. ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2018, 3:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alien-covenant-opening-next-month/785464/68 "2018-03-08T03:47:59Z")
Ok, I just saw A: C on HBO. I have to say, the combination of Danny McBride along with a brief cameo by James Franco as the ill-fated captain kind of pulled me out of the film a bit. Even though McBride was toned down from his usual “FUCK THAT! I’m not going anywhere near that motherfuckin space cockroach! Have fun getting face-fucked LOSERS!” schtick. Here’s the problem I have with A:P and A:C. There’s just too much philosophical “origin of life” stuff. The original films were just about a group of people trapped in a confined space with dangerous space bugs light years from home. The original films also had a very well defined lifecycle for the xenomorphs. The new films have this magic black goo where you can be infected by a few spores that cause whatever horrific creation Ridley Scott can imagine to literally explode from your ass. Why do they even have to be “created” by Engineers or David the Bored Android or whoever? It’s just too much convoluted stuff to try to make the prequels more “profound”. ---
**Author:** ![Omniscient](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/omniscient/32/3290_2.png) [@Omniscient](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Omniscient)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2018, 8:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alien-covenant-opening-next-month/785464/69 "2018-03-08T08:09:33Z")
> [@msmith537](#): > > Here’s the problem I have with A:P and A:C. There’s just too much philosophical “origin of life” stuff. The original films were just about a group of people trapped in a confined space with dangerous space bugs light years from home. > > The original films also had a very well defined lifecycle for the xenomorphs. The new films have this magic black goo where you can be infected by a few spores that cause whatever horrific creation Ridley Scott can imagine to literally explode from your ass. Why do they even have to be “created” by Engineers or David the Bored Android or whoever? > > It’s just too much convoluted stuff to try to make the prequels more “profound”. I agree with you. Ultimately I think Scott really wanted to tell the story of the Space Jockey. Who knows what the original idea behind them was in the first movie, maybe it’s been written about and I missed it, but when you go into these prequels with that bare thread of an idea you start making random shit up. He didn’t want to make “Aliens 5” he wanted to world build. Unfortunately, it got self-indulgent. If he’d have told a much simpler story about the Space Jockeys, maybe one where they are just another race who got wiped out by the Xenomorphs or one where they are mortal enemies of the Xenomorphs, AvP style, or one where they genetically engineered the Zenomorphs the same way we would engineer a ear of corn, then we might have ended up with something that made sense and could have actually been cool. He went too “high concept” with what at it’s heart is a horror movie. ---
**Author:** ![TBG](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c89c15/32.png) [@TBG](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TBG)\ **Post date:** [March 10, 2018, 12:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alien-covenant-opening-next-month/785464/70 "2018-03-10T00:59:57Z")
> [@Cubsfan](#): > > Unfortunately true. I actually liked Prometheus better than this one. Me too. I mean, I appreciated the “real” aliens being there, but their origin being shown here doesn’t quite jibe with how they were discovered in the first film, how’d they get on the Space Jocky/Engineer’s ship if part of their creation wiped out the entire population before that? David seemed to just be a dick for no reason, and the reveal of which artificial made it to the ship was the sort of thing everyone should have figured out if they’ve ever experienced any sort of fiction ever before this. ---
**Author:** ![awldune](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c77e96/32.png) [@awldune](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/awldune)\ **Post date:** [March 12, 2018, 2:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alien-covenant-opening-next-month/785464/71 "2018-03-12T14:44:53Z")
There were some “neat” things I enjoyed in this movie. David’s madness, laboratory, and artwork. Beautiful scenery. White xenomorphs. Waterston’s giant doe eyes. Walter/David interaction. The events of the movie are problematic for the continuity of the series. **Covenant** takes place just 18 years before **Alien** , so: If David engineered the xenomorph lifecycle, how did we get the original (and centuries-old) chest-bursted space jockey in Alien? Plus the eggs with facehuggers. Prior to David’s involvement, xenomorphs don’t come from eggs. Some elements of the film seemed to hint at studio meddling / deleted scenes. As others have noted, the captains faith seemed to go nowhere. A lot of time was given to establishing the crew’s antipathy toward him which was also pointless. An annoyance toward the ending: I have to believe the viewer is expected to know David is the one onboard, but why does David help them kill the xenomorph instead of, say, locking them down in a room and shutting off the life support? A random WTF: While the crew is in hypersleep, why does Walter take out an embryo? What was he going to do with it? Also, why carry these apparently weeks-old fetuses instead of tiny fertilized eggs? Lastly, what a nightmare fuel ending. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alien-covenant-opening-next-month/785464.md?page=3)