Anyway, Alien: Romulus is the seventh film about these particular monsters. According to the producers, the film takes the franchise ‘back to its roots’. So we get a group of grimy crew-mates piloting a big rust-bucket of a spaceship who pick up an extraterrestrial stowaway and end up having to use their wits and courage to survive as it gobbles them up, one by one.
And it’s not a bad film. It’s nicely creepy, the special effects are good, the acting is perfectly serviceable. In fact, I could give you a normal review of Alien: Romulus, but just writing this is making me feel a little crazy. It’s not a bad film, but it’s also a direct copy of a much better film that already exists. That film is called Alien, and it came out in 1979. It had Sigourney Weaver in it. It hasn’t vanished. If you have a Disney+ subscription or a torrent client, you can watch it tonight. Why have we made it again? What’s the point? Why have we spent the past 45 years – which is longer than I’ve been alive – making seven different versions of the same film? What on Earth is going on?
Now that I’m significantly less drunk and combative than last night (YEESH), I can react a littl better. I actually agree! 100 percent, I thought the inconsistencies involving the severely expedited gestation period and rapid growth was a bit of an ask from the audience. The callbacks got to the point where I was starting to wince over their abundance. Not the perfect Alien movie, (the first two already exist) but I thought it was fine and feel that it course corrected the trajectory of the franchise. People are actually excited for Alien movies again, that’s wild to me
I can agree to that. As bad as I think it was (heightened expectations) it was miles better than the absolute garbage fire that was alien 3+.