Sci-Fi Alien: Romulus (2024)

[AVEITWITHJAMON]

I do like Alien 3 and for me it's probably the scariest the Xenomorph has been in the movies out of all of them.

I will always hate them killing off Newt and Hicks though. All they had to do for Newt was saying the Sulaco was drifting through space for a few years so she aged in her cryp pod.

 

[blueharvest]

I wasn't sure whether to put this in SPOILER tags or not. Thought I'd better, just to be safe.

 

[Zantera]

I do like Alien 3 and for me it's probably the scariest the Xenomorph has been in the movies out of all of them.

I will always hate them killing off Newt and Hicks though. All they had to do for Newt was saying the Sulaco was drifting through space for a few years so she aged in her cryp pod.

Doesn't that go against its own rules since Aliens shows Ripley drifting in space for 57 years without aging?

Alien 3 had such a fascinating production though. Like you read about all the different ideas from the Hicks and Bishop on some space station with 200 powerloaders taking on 40 Alien Queens (or whatever the number) or the wooden planet. That really was the golden age of "what ideas do you have for a sequel?" followed by someone taking a handful of drugs and coming up with the weirdest concepts. I love the Alien 3 we got (assembly cut at least) but it's a shame that some things didn't turn out better, arguably because it was a rushed mess and Fincher wanted to quit directing.

 

[AVEITWITHJAMON]

Doesn't that go against its own rules since Aliens shows Ripley drifting in space for 57 years without aging?

Alien 3 had such a fascinating production though. Like you read about all the different ideas from the Hicks and Bishop on some space station with 200 powerloaders taking on 40 Alien Queens (or whatever the number) or the wooden planet. That really was the golden age of "what ideas do you have for a sequel?" followed by someone taking a handful of drugs and coming up with the weirdest concepts. I love the Alien 3 we got (assembly cut at least) but it's a shame that some things didn't turn out better, arguably because it was a rushed mess and Fincher wanted to quit directing.

Ah yes of course it goes against that. I am a dummy

 

[kguillou]

Yeah, for me it's still a perfectly functioning movie. I just find it hard to revisit especially after this moment at the end of Aliens encompassing everything Ripley and Newt went through:

God that gif alone is just classic Cameron visuals and mood. I miss this James Cameron.

 

[AVEITWITHJAMON]

Oh man, I enjoyed this even more than I thought I would. I didn't feel the callbacks to the other movies were too bad. I liked that we got to see a fully functioning colony on another world, something we only briefly saw in the Aliens DC.

I liked how everything was back to feeling lived, and I absolutely loved the effects. The only exception being the wonky CGI for a certain character. Though he wasn't in it too much.

I liked that the Xenomorph was back to being a hunter here which had some intelligence to it. And I thought there were a couple of really cool set pieces in the movie we hadn't scene in the franchise before. The facehugger was also made scary again.

And then as someone who likes Prometheus, I loved the nods to it. And that 3rd act was bonkers in all the best ways for me.

I have very few complaints really. The aforementioned CGI character looming wonky. And considering this is Fede Alvarez, I thought the gore factor was a little too low. It would have been nice if we got a couple more characters to die in gruesome ways.

The cast were really good though. Spaeny and Johnson were the standouts, but I liked Merced as Kay also.

8/10.

 

[TheVileOne]

Man, Noomi got hosed in Covenant. She absolutely should've been a secondary protagonist or got a direct sequel to Prometheus.

Spoiler

Also just thought about this. Can't remember if I saw the comment in here or on Reddit but someone had mentioned the one good thing about Romulus was that it retconned David being the creator of the Xenomorph. Now I've never interpreted it that David in Covenant created the first Xeno ever (just learned the recipe to bring them back), but if one subscribed to that, I don't think anything in Romulus contradicts it right?

How did it retcon that?

 

[AVEITWITHJAMON]

David was never the creator of the Xenomorph. The mural and statue in Prometheus showed that.

 

[TheVileOne]

David was never the creator of the Xenomorph. The mural and statue in Prometheus showed that.

Yet Ridley Scott says he was the creator of the modern Xenomorph.

 

[Zantera]

I'd say that's my main gripe with Prometheus/Covenant is that the new lore added just feels too messy. I like the idea of the black goo and that it changes the host it infects and I don't even mind that the xenomorph gets an origin (even though i think it would have been better to just leave that mysterious and unknown to us). But between the deacon at the end of Prometheus and the neomorph and praetomorph in Covenant it's like why does it have to be so complicated. Call me old fashioned but all i really need is the queen > egg > facehugger > xenomorph and i'm happy.

 

[AVEITWITHJAMON]

Yet Ridley Scott says he was the creator of the modern Xenomorph.

Yet in Romulus, which Scott produced, we see that the Black goo is used to create Xeno's.

Then there is the deacon in Prometheus, and the ship/engineer in Alien being thousands of years old.

 

[TheVileOne]

Yet in Romulus, which Scott produced, we see that the Black goo is used to create Xeno's.

Then there is the deacon in Prometheus, and the ship/engineer in Alien being thousands of years old.

Yes, which they got from Big Chap

They reverse-engineered the Accelerant from Prometheus and Covenant using Big Chap.

 

[Monsieur Xavier]

From what I understand, the "stuff" in Romulus is not like the black goo, it is a compound made from the xeno big chap DNA, the scientist extracted the genes that make the xeno super resilient.

 

[AVEITWITHJAMON]

Yes, which they got from Big Chap

They reverse-engineered the Accelerant from Prometheus and Covenant using Big Chap.

So if they reverse engineered it the black goo existed before the Xenomorph did and created the Xeno

 

[henzINNIT]

Speaking of goo, I literally never watched this before today:



Casually drops a ton of lore. I'm not a fan of those Scott prequels, but David is excellent.

 

[Captain Tired]

Man, Noomi got hosed in Covenant. She absolutely should've been a secondary protagonist or got a direct sequel to Prometheus.

Spoiler

Also just thought about this. Can't remember if I saw the comment in here or on Reddit but someone had mentioned the one good thing about Romulus was that it retconned David being the creator of the Xenomorph. Now I've never interpreted it that David in Covenant created the first Xeno ever (just learned the recipe to bring them back), but if one subscribed to that, I don't think anything in Romulus contradicts it right?

Noomi getting relegated in Covenant was what took me soooo long to even getting around to watching it.

 

[Zantera]

That's the unfortunate part with Covenant is that it skips over all the interesting parts - like David and Shaw arriving and wiping out the population (only shown in a short flashback), David experimenting and creating Alien eggs and what happens with Shaw. Instead what we get is a crew of maybe the dumbest characters in any Alien movie arriving at the planet after these events and a majority of deaths aren't scary as much as they're slapstick comedy.

 

[AVEITWITHJAMON]

That's the unfortunate part with Covenant is that it skips over all the interesting parts - like David and Shaw arriving and wiping out the population (only shown in a short flashback), David experimenting and creating Alien eggs and what happens with Shaw. Instead what we get is a crew of maybe the dumbest characters in any Alien movie arriving at the planet after these events and a majority of deaths aren't scary as much as they're slapstick comedy.

Yeah Covenant is the worst in the franchise for me for this reason. The stuff that happens before the movie is more interesting than what happens during the movie.

 

[Gothamsknight]

Planning on rewatching this a second time on Sunday!

 

[blue scholar]

Just saw this.

The filmmaking was inspired. The script, not so much.

Although I already like the score. I feel like Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross would have been perfect for it.

Also, Im starting a petition for David Jonsson to be cast as Dr. Hank McCoy in the X-Men Reboot

 

[Another_Fool]

How did it retcon that?

Not sure, which is why I was asking. It seemed like nothing was said or shown

Spoiler

regarding whether David created the Xenos or not,

and I couldn't find the comment or post to see what scene would've retconned it.

 

[Pennywise]

 

[Another_Fool]

Yet Ridley Scott says he was the creator of the modern Xenomorph.

No Ridley no. Well I'll pretend it's not canon like I pretend Hicks being alive is canon.

 

[Zantera]

Ridley Scott also says that Deckard is a replicant in Blade Runner which is also pure hoppycock. The man has made some fantastic films in his career but he's also all over the place as a person.

 

[TheVileOne]

Just saw this.

The filmmaking was inspired. The script, not so much.

Although I already like the score. I feel like Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross would have been perfect for it.

Also, Im starting a petition for David Jonsson to be cast as Dr. Hank McCoy in the X-Men Reboot

Considering that Fede Alvarez co-wrote this, I wonder how much of this were the ideas he wanted versus servicing the things Ridley Scott wanted. But there was a definite disconnect to me how great this movie looked and how well directed it is versus how weak the script is from a writing standpoint.