Alien: Covenant - Prometheus 2

[ThisSiteHasLostItsCharm]

i hope we don't have to wait long for the sequel.

[George P Global Moderator]

I think it's safe to say that any Alien related movie after Alien 2, and maybe 3?  Doesn't matter anymore, and that includes the AVP stuff.  Remember that they're going to reboot Predator, well, not reboot, but give it a true sequel from what I heard.   Maybe after that they will bring the two series together again but I think Scott wants to do his own thing and grow the Alien universe with these new movies.  Makes me wonder if they're going to do a true sequel later on, something post-Alien 1 and 2 at least.  

[Syanide]

15 hours ago, Slarlac249 said:

i hope we don't have to wait long for the sequel.

The movie isn't doing that great at the box office, and people are more disappointed this time because at least the first time around they had hopes of sequel filling the holes Prometheus left behind, so I'd be surprised they move along with a new one any time soon. Alien was definitely in need of a reimagination, but unfortunately Ridley Scott shat the bed.

 

 

19 hours ago, Skiver said:

I'm not gonna argue there was some horrible writing in this, however, you seem to be making some massive assumptions...

 

You're assuming David crashed the ship intentionally, given his nature of experimenting something could have forced that situation that was outside of his control. I think Scott has already stated that Awakening is due to fill the gap between Prometheus and Covenant so don't assume we've seen the last of Shaw and David's relationship so I'd bet we find out a little more about what happened in the next movie.

 

The second point regarding the abandoned theorised military installation and bio weapons. You seem to be making an assumption that they didn't check on it, they may have been there, figured out exactly what had happened and chose to abandon/quarantine the facility under the unfortunate belief anyone who did stumble upon it wouldn't survive long enough for anything to come of it.

 

Of course I'm making assumptions, because the movie makes no effort to naturally fill the gaps between plot points. I'm not saying they need to account for every single detail, but there are some massive issues with these movies that are never touched upon. And waiting for another movie to explain anything is out of question. I'm sorry, but Covenant was supposed to answer a lot of questions from Prometheus, but all it did was sweep most of those things under the rug and introduce new set of poorly developed plot points.

 

And I can bet you $5 that Awakening won't happen. I'm actually doubtful they'll make any type of sequel within this timeline, seeing how lukewarm the reception is.

[FloatingFatMan]

21 hours ago, Skiver said:

I'm not sure if anything has been officially stated or if anything from the previous movies strictly pointed it out but this put a firm nail in that coffin. Otherwise, I'm not aware of anything that would say they absolutely have to be.

Are crossovers ever considered canon?

 

[jupe]

I just watched it today, and I also enjoyed Prometheus more than Covenant, the first 30mins or so was pretty pointless IMO and basically the same story line that has been used at the start of countless sci-fi sleep hibernation movies, a recent similar example being Passengers.  It sucks because I was really looking forward to its release, and had just watched the preceding movies in order over the last couple weeks to re-familiarize myself, all I really needed to watch was like the last 5min of Prometheus, but that's just my 2c not that anyone asked.

[Lamp0]

20 hours ago, Hurmoth said:

I don't know if it has officially ever been talked about by Scott,

 

19 hours ago, Slarlac249 said:

i hope we don't have to wait long for the sequel.

Apparently the script was written while Covenant was being produced.

[LOC Veteran]

So I haven't seen the movie yet (probably won't sadly) but I know the plot etc. Not sure how I feel about the way Scott took things. I seriously doubt in 1979 he knew that that was what he had planned if he ever did sequels or expanded the lore. Plus, uh, doesn't he NOT like Aliens? Like literally one of the most loved sequels ever? And very often sighted as better than its original movie? Probably why lol

[patseguin Global Moderator]

I saw it opening night and mildly enjoyed it. What I found was that I was actually TRYING to like it. I've been an Alien fan for years and Prometheus is one of my favorite movies. 

 

I'm left a little confused why this movie wasn't more of a follow up to Shaw's adventures. 

 

I'm a big fan of McBride and he did a fine job acting but he just seemed out of place in this movie. 

 

Lastly, why exactly is David doing this?

[George P Global Moderator]

While it hasn't been a runaway success at the box office, it's not a flop either, the budget was only $97million, small compared to other big name movies that come out.   So it really only has to make $200 million world wide at the box office to make money, give or take.   It's already at $136 million world wide, so it's doable.  I actually think it'll end it's run around the $250 million world wide mark.

[LOC Veteran]

1 hour ago, patseguin said:

I saw it opening night and mildly enjoyed it. What I found was that I was actually TRYING to like it. I've been an Alien fan for years and Prometheus is one of my favorite movies. 

 

I'm left a little confused why this movie wasn't more of a follow up to Shaw's adventures. 

 

I'm a big fan of McBride and he did a fine job acting but he just seemed out of place in this movie. 

 

Lastly, why exactly is David doing this?

Mild spoilers I assume by mentioning that tidbit

 

But I assume because either his programming has gone to the nut house itself, or he just feels like he is superior to his own creators and wants to create the perfect life form.

[+Mirumir Subscriber¹]

On 5/26/2017 at 5:50 PM, Skiver said:

I'm not sure if anything has been officially stated or if anything from the previous movies strictly pointed it out but this put a firm nail in that coffin. Otherwise, I'm not aware of anything that would say they absolutely have to be.

I don't have to prove a negative. But you are welcome to provide a source that may be claiming that they are in the same universe

 

AVP is a cheap spin-off. To think that the events of AVP are taking place in the same universe as the originals or that the AVP is sharing the same production quality with the originals is truly insulting! Just take a look at the running time of the films.  AVP - 104 minutes; AVP: Requiem - 94 min! which is vastly different from the series' usual length of two hours plus per film.

 

The franchise's core instalments are usually called just "Aliens" or "Alien" followed by a colon something. Prometheus is the only exception so far.

[Draconian Guppy]

On 2017-5-27 at 3:21 AM, Syanide said:

 

 

And I can bet you $5 that Awakening won't happen. I'm actually doubtful they'll make any type of sequel within this timeline, seeing how lukewarm the reception is.

Budget$97 million[6]

Box office$158.4 million[6]

 

 

Well, based purely on numbers, maybe they will...

On 2017-5-27 at 0:49 PM, George P said:

While it hasn't been a runaway success at the box office, it's not a flop either, the budget was only $97million, small compared to other big name movies that come out.   So it really only has to make $200 million world wide at the box office to make money, give or take.   It's already at $136 million world wide, so it's doable.  I actually think it'll end it's run around the $250 million world wide mark.

yup, slowly getting there.

VS promethues:

 

 

Budget$120–130 million[2]

Box office$403.4 million[3]s 

[George P Global Moderator]

One thing to note as well, we're also not taking into account the money movies make from sales on DVD/BD and even more so what they make being sold digitally or what streaming services pay to add them to their catalog.   So really, post box office run, and as long as you can find movies still up for sale afterwords, I'd say any big name movie out there probably makes an extra $100 million in the home video market, if not more over time.

[Skiver Veteran]

On 2017-5-28 at 3:28 PM, Mirumir said:

I don't have to prove a negative. But you are welcome to provide a source that may be claiming that they are in the same universe

 

AVP is a cheap spin-off. To think that the events of AVP are taking place in the same universe as the originals or that the AVP is sharing the same production quality with the originals is truly insulting! Just take a look at the running time of the films.  AVP - 104 minutes; AVP: Requiem - 94 min! which is vastly different from the series' usual length of two hours plus per film.

 

The franchise's core instalments are usually called just "Aliens" or "Alien" followed by a colon something. Prometheus is the only exception so far.

No of course not, sorry I didn't mean o come across as trying to argue against you, just that I'm a fan of both Alien and Predator and loved the crossover idea. It's not like AvP has only existed in the cinematic form either.

 

I remember being younger and getting an Alien vs Predator vs Batman (Yes Batman) Comic from the Library and I loved that so much I lost count how many times I got it out to read again and again.

 

No, of course they weren't the same quality but I'd say at least the original Predator movie was, can I at least have THAT predator movie and Alien etc in the same universe?! Please don't take Aliens vs Predator away from me

 

 

 

On 2017-5-27 at 1:44 PM, FloatingFatMan said:

Are crossovers ever considered canon?

 

No, not really, I just always liked to believe they were and until this point, I'm not aware of anything in either movie that says they couldn't be is all.

[PsYcHoKiLLa]

On 5/23/2017 at 0:44 AM, Syanide said:

Just as an example, the ship David and Shaw used to get to that planet is seen crashed in the side of a mountain, even though David was perfectly competent docking it when he dropped the cargo on the Engineer city. Why didn't he just land it somewhere? He could have then used some time to experiment, and then take off on the ship and go to Earth or wherever and wreak havoc there. Nah, better have the ship crashed and him sending a distress signal for 10 years. Such p*ss poor writing.

David woke up Shaw and she tried to park it, woman drivers *shrug*

[PsYcHoKiLLa]

On 5/27/2017 at 7:12 PM, patseguin said:

I saw it opening night and mildly enjoyed it. What I found was that I was actually TRYING to like it. I've been an Alien fan for years and Prometheus is one of my favorite movies. 

 

I'm left a little confused why this movie wasn't more of a follow up to Shaw's adventures. 

 

I'm a big fan of McBride and he did a fine job acting but he just seemed out of place in this movie. 

 

Lastly, why exactly is David doing this?

I thought Danny McBride did a very good job, maybe you're carrying forward other stuff you've seen him in cos he was perfectly fine in this.

[patseguin Global Moderator]

32 minutes ago, PsYcHoKiLLa said:

I thought Danny McBride did a very good job, maybe you're carrying forward other stuff you've seen him in cos he was perfectly fine in this.

Probably. I still see him as Kenny Powers and the vice principal I guess lol.

[ichi]

I read somewhere that Ridley Scott changed his original idea for "Covenant" based on fans' feedback on Prometheus... which to me implies that Scott replaced whatever vision he had for these new movies with fanservice. And it shows.

 

The single fact of the movie being named "Alien: Covenant" instead of just "Covenant" is already telling.

 

This also means that whatever overarching plot Scott might have planned is gone.

 

Spoiler

The movie has two different parts:

 

1) The island planet of Dr Moreau David.

2) The "let's give fans a confrontation with a classic alien in a mix between Alien1 and Aliens, without the appeal, quality or charisma of either".

 

The single most interesting part of the movie is David and the motivation for his actions, but even while being the architect behind all the events that unfold, his whole role gets diluted by how hard the movie tries to appease the "fans" that complained about no aliens in Prometheus.

 

The script is rather poor, with some WTF moments:

 

- A crew of a colony ship that has absolutely no concerns about landing on a completely unknown planet with no kind of enviro-suits whatsoever. But they bring weapons, though.

- An alien is killed on the way back up to the Covenant, and then out of nowhere (or maybe I missed it?) a new one shows up there. Where does that alien come from? We only got to see one egg hatching. And how did it get up there anyway?. Maybe there was something in the patch that David applied to the face of the wounded guy, but that doesn't follow the narrative of how that "new" breed of aliens are born.

- The already mentioned crashed ship, for no apparent reason.

- James Franco. Not sure if that's some kind of inside joke.

- Going from a scared "let me out" to walking back and hugging the convulsing guy which obviously had something horribly wrong going on inside.

 

 

This is a missed opportunity for both diverging from the classic alien plots while exploring the alien universe in new ways (as Prometheus seemed to hint) and for extending the classic alien saga like Blomkamp wanted.

 

It tries to kinda do both, but doesn't really achieve any.

[ichi]

On 2017-5-27 at 8:12 PM, patseguin said:

Lastly, why exactly is David doing this?

I don't think there's much intended depth in the movie regarding those motivations besides "because he wants", although a friend of mine argued that just like humans found their gods, learned that they were mortal and uncaring, and ultimately rebelled against them, so does he.

Also, just like engineers created (allegedly, not clear but I think it's assumed) humans and humans created robots, he develops a creation of his own.

 

Then there's a third part that has a higher assumption component where engineers would allegedly have intended to unleash the black goo on humans to eradicate them and start from scratch because humans wouldn't be working the way they intended... which could be seen as a parallelism with how the David model was replaced with Walter.

[LOC Veteran]

I'm pretty sure it was on record that Ridley Scott said they changed the name because the studio wanted the name Alien in there (for obvious reasons) and he did it because he felt the movie connected to the larger Alien universe more.

[ichi]

Just found where I read about that:

http://io9.gizmodo.com/ridley-scott-admits-fan-backlash-over-prometheus-influe-1795126523

[Draconian Guppy]

13 hours ago, PsYcHoKiLLa said:

David woke up Shaw and she tried to park it, woman drivers *shrug*

nailed it  

[+Mirumir Subscriber¹]

 

 

 

[George P Global Moderator]

This is Scott we're talking about, it wouldn't surprise me if we get an extended cut for sure.

[LOC Veteran]

Well we certainly know of several deleted scenes already - if not stuff filmed for the movie and put in trailers or pre-launch media that never got cut into the movie proper. So, yeah it would seem an extended cut would be more likely. But isn't Scott one of those directors who doesn't like to do extended cuts for DVDs etc?