Alien covenant
Like Prometheus, Scotts recent forays into the Alien universe are somewhat problamatic for me to review. I'm immediately biased wby my opinion that the alien craft that appears in the first act of Scotts original film is in no way in need of an explanation. The storm blasted planet and utterly alien design of the craft the crew of the nostromo stumble across is perfect without an explanation. The utter strangeness of the ships pilot, the bizarre bio-mechanical design that seems to go against all pre-concieved notions of industrial design, as well as how utterly ancient it looks helps generate a sense of cosmic dread. Something happened to the ship long ago, now its desolate. It lends the film an atmosphere not disimilar to what Lovecraft tried to convey in his stories, a sense that in the grand scheme of things humans are utterly insignificant.
Now it appears that the franchise is mererly a sci-fi horror thriller. A parable of creation and destruction where the main villain is mans own creation David. In Covenenant he's grown to utterly detest his creators, driven to expermentation in order to create his own lifeform and we can see where this is going...
Overall its imperfect, better than prometheus but hamstrung by a weak script. The scenes of horror when they occur are actually better realised than some of the films harsher critics have made out and ends on a note almost as bleak as 2017's other flawed sci-fi horror release Life. The acting is mostly good, Fassbender steals things but a lot of credit goes to Danny Mcbride who manages the transition from comedy to 'straight' roles very well. As you would expect from Scott the film is mostly a visual treat, thought the aliens themselves suffer from some iffy CGI. Its better than the AVP films (not hard) and the mess that was Alien ressurection, its somewhere on par with the third film for me. I've managed to compartmentalise the series to make these films non cannon for me, that way I can at least enjoy them as trashy B-movie nonsense with a studio budget. On that level I can enjoy them.
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