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how did it all go down for Alien: Covenant after one of the best opening scenes in a movie?

ikbalCO

Member


this scene is simply, my favorite opening in a movie. ever.

now i know, both prometheus and its sequel covenant are conflicting movies. latter being the worse of the two in my opinion. but unlike most people i liked promethues enough that i was really intrigued by the mystic and the miyth of its world. and i was looking forward to covenant to get the answer of the whole engineer side of the story.

and covenant starts out perfect.

everything about this scene, i find perfect.

acting; amazing.
set design; flawless
camera work, color palette, cinematography; perfect
acting; top notch
and the dialog; from a creationist perspective, which i am one, the back and forth between the creator and the creation is facinating. the places david has free will and the places he has not. the point the conversation end and how it does end, i find very bold and provocative
i probably watched this scene a 100 times solo after seeing the movie in theaters.

even where the title for the director appears, i love. (right above the throne chair where the creator is sitting)

so my question is, after this scene; how do you manage to make one of the most generic and horror thrope filled movies of all time?

if these weren't alien movies, would they be better? is the alien aspect of the movie hurting what ridley scott was trying to tell?

i don't know gaf. what do you guys think of this scene and these two movies?
 
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AV

We ain't outta here in ten minutes, we won't need no rocket to fly through space
Pretty simple, they had 4 writers, one them had only ever written Transcendence - which was bad - and the other had written LITERALLY NOTHING credited before.

Too many cooks.
 

Cyberpunkd

Gold Member
now i know, both prometheus and its sequel covenant are conflicting movies. latter being the worse of the two in my opinion. but unlike most people i liked promethues enough that i was really intrigued by the mystic and the miyth of its world. and i was looking forward to covenant to get the answer of the whole engineer side of the story.
That's the whole issue with Prometheus and Covenant - they took a small side story from Alien (the Engineers) and ran with it to make it a huge overarching plot.

Alien and Aliens worked because of pure terror of xenomorphs. It was us, humans, versus aggressive species only focused on survival and propagation. All old movies drove home the point that aliens cannot be controlled, cannot be tamed, or made pets - in the end they always break out. The only way to survive is not to play.

Prometheus took something that was simple and effective and bloated it while going in a completely different direction.
 

HoodWinked

Member
The first half of Prometheus is incredible. It's part unknown, exploration, murder mystery. But as the movie progresses time starts to run out and it is forced to pick a lane and it devolves into a rote horror flick.

As for Covenant it's not that it's a terrible film, it's perfectly watchable. It's more so that it's disappointing because you saw the untapped potential of Prometheus. If it were simply bad it wouldn't even cross your mind.
 

ikbalCO

Member
Shit movies that completely ruined a brand are now called conflicting??

At least prometheus first part of the movie trick you into thinking that you are watching something worth, covenant is just horse shit, a small scene doesn't change that.
i mean aren't they conflicting? don't they have any quailities to them at all?
i think both had some good ideas that just didn't work within the alien universe.
He really tears into the beginning too. :messenger_winking_tongue:


i like critical drinker a lot but i think he just missed the point with the opening completely. i kinda believe ridley scott wanted make an indie-style movie about ai - creation and godhood but myabe was force to put xenomorphs in it to sell tickets?

i don't know. but my fave thing about these movies are the philosophical questions that they raise.
 

Ulysses 31

Member
i like critical drinker a lot but i think he just missed the point with the opening completely. i kinda believe ridley scott wanted make an indie-style movie about ai - creation and godhood but myabe was force to put xenomorphs in it to sell tickets?

i don't know. but my fave thing about these movies are the philosophical questions that they raise.
I heard it was Scott who chose to make Covenant over the new sequel to Aliens with Newt and Hicks still alive directed by the District 9 dude.
 
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GymWolf

Member
i mean aren't they conflicting? don't they have any quailities to them at all?
i think both had some good ideas that just didn't work within the alien universe.

i like critical drinker a lot but i think he just missed the point with the opening completely. i kinda believe ridley scott wanted make an indie-style movie about ai - creation and godhood but myabe was force to put xenomorphs in it to sell tickets?

i don't know. but my fave thing about these movies are the philosophical questions that they raise.
Agree to disagree, i think they are bad to terrible movies, covenant much more than prometheus that at least has a misterious first part.

Fassbender being good as usual doesn't change that.

Covenant was an assault to my brain for how fucking stupid it was.
 
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Ridley just wanted to make a mean spirited Gothic horror in space with sprinkles of his interest in androids and genetics.
Fans wanted an Epic and Mature investigation of whatever the fuck. It's fucking Alien, you can write the story on a napkin. I blame the pretentious Prometheus trailer for this misalignment of expectations.

i mean aren't they conflicting? don't they have any quailities to them at all?
i think both had some good ideas that just didn't work within the alien universe.

i like critical drinker a lot but i think he just missed the point with the opening completely. i kinda believe ridley scott wanted make an indie-style movie about ai - creation and godhood but myabe was force to put xenomorphs in it to sell tickets?

i don't know. but my fave thing about these movies are the philosophical questions that they raise.

Watch Raised by Wolves! Produced and partially directed by Ridley and his son, it's basically a remake and expansion of the Alien prequels.
 

Gp1

Member
Another point is all the transmedia bullshit that both movies explored at the expense of their script.

I really do believe that both Prometheus and Covenant basically cut their prologues (James Franco scenes, young Guy Richt Apple/Tedx scenes, Shaw's outcome/trip to engineer's world, etc) to use the scenes in their marketing campaigns.

But as someone there said, I've enjoyed the first half of Prometheus.
 

DanteFox

Member
When I first saw Prometheus I was so excited to see what answers we would find regarding the engineers, the creation of life, and why they decided to destroy it. Covenant completely threw that meeting with the engineers away, killed the chick who remained at the end and just ruined the anticipation that was there from Prometheus.
 

Fbh

Member
At least prometheus first part of the movie trick you into thinking that you are watching something worth, covenant is just horse shit, a small scene doesn't change that.

I've never been so disappointed in real time by a movie.
The first part of Prometheus with the great art direction and music really had me thinking I was about to watch something special. Then it starts to get increasingly worse as it goes on :/
 

VN1X

Banned
It's okay as an Alien film but would've much preferred a direct sequel to Prometheus. I'm one of the few that actually appreciated the fact that the lore was expanding.
 

Rentahamster

Rodent Whores
Both movies had a lot of potential but ended up being really fucking stupid and disappointing. At least The Martian was good.
 

Sub_Level

wants to fuck an Asian grill.
Prey shows we can still get a solid 6/10 enjoyable popcorn flick out of these old franchises if the filmmakers just give enough of a damn. Its not a high bar to cross....
 

IDKFA

I am Become Bilbo Baggins
I'm going say it. Alien Covenant is the worst alien movie in the franchise. Unlikeable characters, incoherent story and plot holes my cat could see through. Awful.
 

poppabk

Cheeks Spread for Digital Only Future
Ridley wanted to explore questions that no-one else gave a shit about exploring in an Alien movie, and he gave us nonsensical answers. I enjoyed Prometheus but Covenant was just not really enjoyable at all.
 

///PATRIOT

Banned
Ridley wanted to explore questions that no-one else gave a shit about exploring in an Alien movie, and he gave us nonsensical answers. I enjoyed Prometheus but Covenant was just not really enjoyable at all.
And he also broke the rule of some things in a story need to be left to imagination. You can ruin a story if you explain everything. Mystery is needed.
 

BadBurger

Is 'That Pure Potato'
I think the problem was that the Alien franchise was never heady. Cool, ahead of its time sci-fi with Aliens, sure, but never deep. Simple horror thrillers when you got right down to it.

So they wanted to turn it into something majestic, cosmic, something asking "the big questions". Cool, why not? But who do they tap to write it? Lindelof. So of course we got some nonsensical junk and characters behaving in unnatural ways. Lindelof pretty much either writes something great, or it's trash - there doesn't seem to be a middle ground for that guy.
 
It was probably shot according to the original script and storyboard, then everything else after was designed to cater for the cunts who complained about Prometheus not being enough like Alien.
 
There's glimpses of a potentially great story about an android who developed a God complex and went murder crazy for the sake of his experiments in his quest create life more advanced than himself...but then it also had to be a more "traditional" Alien flick and you sorta got a bad two-in-one compromise movie that didn't even feel like the intended sequel to Prometheus either. =/
 

dr_octagon

Banned



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