Prometheus - Ridley Scott's 'Alien Prequel' (or not)...
Discussion
Guffy said:
Mark Kermode gave Covenent a good mauling, story that makes no sense, terrible script, too much pontificating, it's all about the visuals!
I listened to his review - an pretty much agree with his analysis.The biggest problem with Covenant is that it doesn't really build on the potential that Prometheus set up:
The engineers seem to have been cast aside as the main protagonists - to instead focus on David. Covenant doesn't really tell us anything more about them and I suspect they will become largely an irrelevance in any future movies. It feels like they will always be on the periphery and we'll likely end up with some half arsed explanation as to how one of their ships full of Xenomorph eggs came to reside on LV426 - shoehorned in just to tie up a loose end.
That will be a real shame as I think their backstory is potentially more interesting than that of the Xenomorphs who may have been better off remaining enigmatic.
Thought it was good but preferred Prometheus, daft scientists and all, especially the feel Prometheus had. I was more interested in the back story than something too directly familiar with an Alien film to be honest. Going the route of another Alien film makes things feel like a bit of a re-hash.
Fassbender is a don though so it's worth watching for him regardless.
Fassbender is a don though so it's worth watching for him regardless.
Moonhawk said:
I listened to his review - an pretty much agree with his analysis.
The biggest problem with Covenant is that it doesn't really build on the potential that Prometheus set up:
The engineers seem to have been cast aside as the main protagonists - to instead focus on David. Covenant doesn't really tell us anything more about them and I suspect they will become largely an irrelevance in any future movies. It feels like they will always be on the periphery and we'll likely end up with some half arsed explanation as to how one of their ships full of Xenomorph eggs came to reside on LV426 - shoehorned in just to tie up a loose end.
That will be a real shame as I think their backstory is potentially more interesting than that of the Xenomorphs who may have been better off remaining enigmatic.
Have a read of this-The biggest problem with Covenant is that it doesn't really build on the potential that Prometheus set up:
The engineers seem to have been cast aside as the main protagonists - to instead focus on David. Covenant doesn't really tell us anything more about them and I suspect they will become largely an irrelevance in any future movies. It feels like they will always be on the periphery and we'll likely end up with some half arsed explanation as to how one of their ships full of Xenomorph eggs came to reside on LV426 - shoehorned in just to tie up a loose end.
That will be a real shame as I think their backstory is potentially more interesting than that of the Xenomorphs who may have been better off remaining enigmatic.
http://www.alien-covenant.com/news/ridley-scott-sa...
I liked Prometheus. The parts people moaned about the most I didn't find too jarring at all - there's a couple of leaps, but if you've bought into the movie and your imagination does mind filling in some gaps, it's a good film.
This one... this one was one of the f
king stupidest movies I've ever seen in my life. I feel for Fassbender - his David, acting, character, and themes, were superb - but the rest of the movie was utter ste.
This one... this one was one of the f
king stupidest movies I've ever seen in my life. I feel for Fassbender - his David, acting, character, and themes, were superb - but the rest of the movie was utter ste.Boring_Chris said:
I liked Prometheus. The parts people moaned about the most I didn't find too jarring at all - there's a couple of leaps, but if you've bought into the movie and your imagination does mind filling in some gaps, it's a good film.
This one... this one was one of the fking stupidest movies I've ever seen in my life. I feel for Fassbender - his David, acting, character, and themes, were superb - but the rest of the movie was utter ste.
I was disappointed with both.This one... this one was one of the f
king stupidest movies I've ever seen in my life. I feel for Fassbender - his David, acting, character, and themes, were superb - but the rest of the movie was utter ste.Prometheus couldn't decide whether it was an Alien prequel or an Engineer origin story - so what we ended up with was a mishmash of both. We had 'aliens' and 'facehuggers' but not the ones we know and love - and we got the periphery of a story about the engineers - but with little or no elaboration.
Scott should have been more decisive from the start - either making Prometheus a true xenomorph origin story - or disregard them pretty much entirely and use Prometheus to expand on the engineers backstory.
Covenant's problem is that it tries to be the xenomorph origin story that Prometheus could have been, but does so at the expense of expanding the parts of the engineers backstory that we do know. IMO it doesn't really pull it off in a convincing manner - and certainly not in a way that fits with the existing canon.
I fear that the next movie(s) will simply end up trying to fix the potential continuity problems and plot holes introduced in Prometheus and Covenant.
Rather than Prometheus and Covenant getting us closer to understanding the setting of the original Alien - I feel we are actually further away from a viable explanation and the backstory has become so muddled, i'm not sure that whatever Scott comes up with will be convincing in the final analysis
Mcphisto said:
Just back from it, as someone said earlier, it's what Prometheus should have been, I liked it, just what I was expecting really, had the wife jumping on quite a few occasions (mind you she jumps when someone knocks at the door 
)
One thing I got lost at was How did the Alien in the digger claw die, was it crushed or did they throw something in with it? in all the quick edits I missed that
Not sure, it did happen a bit quick and I assumed it was crushed. She didn't have any explosives on her ) One thing I got lost at was How did the Alien in the digger claw die, was it crushed or did they throw something in with it? in all the quick edits I missed that
Frimley111R said:
Mcphisto said:
Just back from it, as someone said earlier, it's what Prometheus should have been, I liked it, just what I was expecting really, had the wife jumping on quite a few occasions (mind you she jumps when someone knocks at the door )
One thing I got lost at was How did the Alien in the digger claw die, was it crushed or did they throw something in with it? in all the quick edits I missed that
Not sure, it did happen a bit quick and I assumed it was crushed. She didn't have any explosives on her ) One thing I got lost at was How did the Alien in the digger claw die, was it crushed or did they throw something in with it? in all the quick edits I missed that
Another thing that makes no sense.
The poster released for Covenant shows Engineers being overrun by xenomorphs and facehuggers.....
Yet that had absolutely no link with the movie's plot since the first facehugger and the xenomorph that resulted only emerged during the course of the movie itself - and from a human no less. All of this happened long after the engineers had been killed by the black goo.
The poster released for Covenant shows Engineers being overrun by xenomorphs and facehuggers.....
Yet that had absolutely no link with the movie's plot since the first facehugger and the xenomorph that resulted only emerged during the course of the movie itself - and from a human no less. All of this happened long after the engineers had been killed by the black goo.
tankplanker said:
I remember watching a documentary about the making of Alien, the main cast stated that Ridley wasn't really interested in directing the cast and was more interested in the world building (much like Lucas), which is frankly some of the best bits of Alien, for example: https://typesetinthefuture.com/2014/12/01/alien/
Ridley was lucky that the cast were good enough to carry the film without direction and that the core script was good enough to stand on its own legs.
Apparently Ford needed/wanted more direction, and Scott failed to offer it - concentrating on being an artistic director and "building a world", which obviously in the case of BR worked very well and luckily Ford's performance pulled through and was perfect for the film/character.
Whilst I love much of Scott's work, it seems he's a complete egotist and has finally disappeared up his own arse. Perhaps it's just as well he isn't directing 2049, though it concerns me how much input he'll have had, and I worry that it too is going to be another big disappointment.
Gassing Station | TV, Film, Video Streaming & Radio | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff