So I saw Alien: Romulus hear my thoughts: SPOILERS AHEAD!!!… SPOILERS AHEAD!!!… SPOILERS AHEAD!!!… SPOILERS AHEAD!!!… don’t say I didn’t warn you lol
So there’s a bunch of young adults who live on this planet with no sun, tons of diseases, and crappy, hard labor corporate jobs, who sneak up on a space station to steal sleeping pods so they can escape this nice planet nine years away (hence why they need the pods so they can just). They run into some face-huggers in Aliens… and, shenanigans ensue.
So I really loved the opening scene during the credits, it felt like creepy 70s Steven Spielberg, à la Close Encounters, you can tell Fede Alvarez has a deep love for Alien and went over every detail with a fine toothcomb because he is gotten every little aesthetic choice to feel like that original film and the direction was just so on point to feel like when were classic films but also bring a modern creepiness to it… I will say, while the rest of the film is never on that level, it’s not that much of a step down, It’s still very high in quality, and the aesthetic never wavers. I am convinced there was a substantial amount of miniature work for the spaceships and such, and I really appreciated that.
The best character in this movie was Andy, the actor gave a great performance, he was likable and the subtle changes to the “updated” version were very well done, and there’s a lot of tension with wondering if you could trust him or not after a certain point. I also like Rain (the main girl), it took me some time to like her since throughout the movie she’s just sad, which I would be to living on this planet but it’s like she was hitting the same note over and over and it just got repetitive, but I eventually came around to her, she had some pretty cool moments, and by the end, I was rooting for her, so I must’ve liked her if I want her to live… And the rest of the cast is fine, nothing bad and they all gave solid performances, but the characters are just underwritten and feel very one note. You have the handsome leader dude, the jerk guy, the nice lady, and the pilot girl… Notice I didn’t use any names because even when you’re watching the movie, you’ll probably forget them.
So when the second android popped up, I saw from the back of my head and thought… that kind of looks like Ash from the original, that’s probably a fun Easter egg. Then they go and restart him and at first you kind of see him in shadow and far away and I’m like “Oh, cool, they’re doing the in-world thing of the robots looking like, so of course one looks like Ash from the original, clever use of continuity”. And it’s good at first… They like to show him directly with good lighting and it’s like “Oh we’re in the uncanny valley”… now I will say overall, I thought the effect looked good, whenever it was far away, his face was in shadow, or on a monitor screen, I thought wow this is really convincing but whenever they showed him with like good lighting straight on, you can definitely tell it was CGI fakery. It was cool to see that Easter egg, but I thought maybe they could’ve filmed it in a way so it wasn’t so obvious with the CGI. I will say they do get the worst shots out of the way first so the more the movie goes on the better it.
I liked a lot of the creepy imagery like all the weird sexual vagina penis interconnective goopy alien anatomy was very well done with the special effects, I’m telling you this guy has to direct a Clive Barker movie, he gets the feel of those movies perfectly.
A lot of practical aliens, and they were always shot to be the most creepy, I love that shot of them all running towards that one guy with the strobe lights, plus I really felt like the haunted house creature, the aliens always look scary, top-notch
They were a lot of fun set pieces, I would not be surprised if during Halloween Universal did some of these as a haunted attraction, like walking through, and not making noise while things jump out at you, you are trying to avoid getting misted by “Acid”, I feel like the attraction writes itself
I will say the movie does have a little bit of throwback kinks… Like reusing certain lines, or plot beets and Easter eggs, not the worst I’ve seen and mostly good, but there are definitely some moments that I was rolling my eyes. “Yes, I get the callback.”… in space no one can hear you scream, but they can definitely hear you roll your eyes lol
The movie also has a bit of a “greatest hits feel”, like it wasn’t a bad story or badly told, but it was a lot of things we had seen before just remix in a new way so not bad, but just nothing too fresh feeling.
There was one thing in this movie that I thought was ridiculous, so the jerk guy tries to destroy this like “vagina cocoon” the alien is in and it doesn’t go well and acid starts falling on Jerk Guy and he eventually dies… but he’s just laying there while acid is falling on him for a few good seconds. So you’re just sitting there going “dude roll!!!! Why are you just laying there? Get out of the acid”. Maybe you can make the case that he was just in a lot of pain and couldn’t move, but I feel like at a certain point with all the acid falling on him, his animal instinct would kick in and he just get out the way for self preservation.
So let’s talk about the ending… Wow… I can’t believe it. I can’t believe it. They pulled an Alien Resurrection with that ending…
So I’ve been hearing some reviews about mixed feelings at the climax, nothing particular, but I know it was divisive, so I guessed maybe it was either gonna be revealed that this girl was Ripley’s daughter, or maybe the long shot of David (Michael Fassbender’s character from previous movies) popping back up for a cameo… so when they introduce the idea black life goo and it mutates people I thought “maybe they were going to retcon this is where the queen alien came from like humanity accidentally created the Queen and made them with a Xenomorph more dangerous by creating a creature that reproduces with a Xenomorph”. Plus, maybe they were trying to explain how in the director cut of Alien, where they show that humans who are captured by the alien become eggs that aliens are born from, so this is like a meta-way to patch up how that version can be in canon but also line up with Aliens. So it’s an interesting idea (greedy corporation wants some kind of ultimate weapon, but they end up making the weapon more powerful and turning against them. Monkey's paw twist, kind of way) but I know that kind of lore meddling could upset people, so in like “maybe that’s what is divisive”.
So the nice girl is pregnant and is hurt during the escape and takes that life and puts it into herself and then her body starts to mutate and then her baby is born in an egg… so when the egg hatches, see a little baby white face coming out. Then once we saw the face of the baby in the egg, I’m like “Wait a minute, are they going where I think they’re going?” Then, when you finally see the creature, I realized they were doing the same white-skinned Human/Alien hybrid idea from Alien Resurrection, just nuts
I mean, I like Alien Resurrection, but that kind of killed a franchise for a while, and when the series came back they did separate movies to distance themselves (Alien vs Predator, Prometheus), so bringing back the same wild white baby Human Alien idea that follows the original idea so closely would be like if they bring Kid Cudi to play a reality TV host to kung fu fight Michael Myers in the next Halloween movie, or Warner Brothers made a Batman movie that’s a little more lighthearted, where Batman, Robin, and Batgirl have to fight Mr. Freeze, Poison Ivy, and Bane… it’s like wow we’re doing THIS again, the thing you lost big on, you’re going to give it another shot… but I think I respect it, and take some tenacity to try a controversial idea again so points to you.
I do like the look of the creature, it’s a creepy and creative design, and the overall scene is fun but it’s again one of those backs of Rain in her skivvies, then having to put on a spacesuit and fighter creature after she thought she got away… Like in the original. Now that’s one of those callbacks where it’s it feels like “we’ll We’re in an Alien movie so we have to hit these beats on a checklist again”, like when you’re watching “The Godfather” movie and we have to have some sort of opening ceremony where we meet all the characters, not necessarily because it needs to be, but that’s what The Godfather movies do… You know what I mean?
So overall, I had fun with this movie for its aesthetic, the craft put into it, the creepy horror with the phallic imagery, the haunted house in space, cool alien creatures, and even somebody's body horror elements. I thought the cast was fine, but the two standouts were Cailee Spaeny & David Jonsson, and while feeling like a bit of the greatest hits and had more Easter eggs in it than an Easter egg hunt at church, it didn’t hurt the overall story too badly. Overall it was entertaining, it certainly was a fun ride and will give any alien fan what they’re looking for… I give four stars ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
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