On this week’s episode, Sonny Bunch (The Bulwark), Alyssa Rosenberg (The Washington Post), and Peter Suderman (Reason) discussed a strange casting choice in the cons and nons segment before reviewing Alien: Romulus. We also teased this week’s bonus episode about the
I waited to listen to this review until I had seen Romulus for myself. Turns out I, too, was disappointed. I'm a fan of the franchise. I like them all (well, ok... even I find Resurrection to be chore.), and this one just didn't work. I was distracted by the biggest question that I just couldn't get past right from the beginning - these kids could just fly to the station? It had some interesting elements, like the antigravity blood bit was kinda fun, but the film as a whole didn't even come close to the level of tension I've come to love. Nevermind the fact that I didn't care what happend to any of the characters (maybe Andy, a little). I saw it with my 20 year old son who has only seen Alien and it didn't work for him, either.
You perfectly summed it up for me when you said something along the lines of how each individual scene was fine, but putting them together doesn't work.
I really enjoyed the discussion, as well as the other podcast about the whole franchise. Thanks!
Whoa, did you people see the Harry Potter films? Richard Harris played Dumbledore at the beginning with wonderful warmth and compassion. When he died Michael Gambon replaced him, and although, yes, Gambon wore robes like Harris and had a beard like Harris, there was almost nothing else in common between the two Dumbledores. So far as I could see there was no attempt to pretend Harris was still in the role; Gambon brought a completely different energy to the films and nobody could possibly think for a moment that Gambon was trying to imitate Harris in any way. I thought it was brave that they allowed this character to change so much in the middle of a series. Alien evidently (I have not seen it) attempts to reconstruct Ash (or the exact same model) which is a totally different thing.
I was heartened to hear your podcast; most of the reviews for Romulus were pretty good but I was grossly disappointed. I am an Alien-phile and this movie was NOT an homage-it was a ripoff, a clone, a copy. Entire scenes and dialogue were lifted whole cloth from prior films. If there was an interesting story, a new story, interesting characters, maybe it wouldn't have disappointed me so much. But, it WAS TERRIBLE and I felt obligated to watch the entire series again just to get this bad taste out of my mouth. BTW, Sonny, Aliens 3 is great.
Spoilers (sort of): the AI generated face of previous actor in said series really annoyed me. Obviously it looked awful, but just why Hollywood. Stop it.
Other than that, I thought the movie was pretty good. Little heavy on the nostalgia, but it nailed a few things that really made Alien and Aliens work:
- Relative nobody cast
- People who look like normal humans not actors
- Blue collar pro-labor commentary (it's been in the films since 1979 and it fit here!)
- Really nasty looking critters + body horror
The alien looked great. The movie's first two acts really nailed it. Lots of build up, and a really creepy nice lore addition to how the aliens 'molt' and grow through stages of their life cycle. Great stuff. It was all pretty predictable, with a few nice additions. Very comfort-food Alien, like The Force Awakens. Predictable and not offensive, but not shocking or revelatory.
I was mostly fine with the third act (much more action heavy), the weaponry explanation was a nice touch - the characters are just blue collar workers, not marines!
The fourth act is going to be really divisive and it appears it is. I have to admit, I like that Alvarez swung for the fences here. That was just downright disgusting. Body horror A+, which is Alvarez's thing, though it was a bit cliché in terms of how our protagonists handled it. The connection to...less well received films also feels like Scott tacked it on cause he had to make "it all connected!!!!".
Only thing I needed were more Xenomorphs killing humans. Nom nom headbite
If [actor's name spoiler-redacted] gave his official legal-permission prior to his death for his likeness to be used in future films (as well as the probability that at least one of the massive IPs he was involved with during his lifetime would do so), then he totally knew what he was getting into. This may or may not be the actual case here, but many big-name Hollywood stars are already giving their estates instructions on how to handle their particular preferences.
The Alien franchise with Romulus has taken a turn into the horror franchises of Friday the 13th and Nightmare on Elm Street movies. Well done and acted but just another sequel with nothing really new to offer with the actors offered up as monster bait to the audience with occasional clap back, and plot contrivances large enough to drive a semi through. As far as I'm concerned Ripley is still out there on the Sulaco heading home.
Agree about the unfortunate cameo. As always with these long-lived franchises, the extended universe media brings some much needed heft to the world-building, and I wish the films had the time and interest to dig into it. I did get a sense of some of this weight in the production design (and like The Force Awakens the biggest thrill for me was to see this world be "lived in"), and I don't implicitly have an issue with long-tail vignettes about regular people being rolled by some fiendish high-minded pursuit of people or organizations without moral scruples. And unlike Sonny, I'm an obnoxious sort of neoliberal that believes that markets can fail in many ways while still succeeding at being markets, so an evil corporation exacting its will isn't a logical leap (but as a funny aside, in the deleted scenes of Alien 4, there's a line that mentions that Weyland-Yutani was sold to Wal-Mart, apropos of 1997).
My friends and I recently started the pen and paper RPG, and the factional backstories are fascinating when laid over the films. Weyland-Yutani is ostensibly a corpo-state assembled from an alliance of Great Britain and Japan and built on their material strength as terraformers; United Americas is the US-Europe-South American consortium, and the Union of Progressive Peoples is the Sino-Ruso faction, plus all the rogue colonial outfits and weird cultists. These factions are in various states of cold and hot wars, and I think some acknowledgement of this in the films would spice things up a bit.
I waited to listen to this review until I had seen Romulus for myself. Turns out I, too, was disappointed. I'm a fan of the franchise. I like them all (well, ok... even I find Resurrection to be chore.), and this one just didn't work. I was distracted by the biggest question that I just couldn't get past right from the beginning - these kids could just fly to the station? It had some interesting elements, like the antigravity blood bit was kinda fun, but the film as a whole didn't even come close to the level of tension I've come to love. Nevermind the fact that I didn't care what happend to any of the characters (maybe Andy, a little). I saw it with my 20 year old son who has only seen Alien and it didn't work for him, either.
You perfectly summed it up for me when you said something along the lines of how each individual scene was fine, but putting them together doesn't work.
I really enjoyed the discussion, as well as the other podcast about the whole franchise. Thanks!
Whoa, did you people see the Harry Potter films? Richard Harris played Dumbledore at the beginning with wonderful warmth and compassion. When he died Michael Gambon replaced him, and although, yes, Gambon wore robes like Harris and had a beard like Harris, there was almost nothing else in common between the two Dumbledores. So far as I could see there was no attempt to pretend Harris was still in the role; Gambon brought a completely different energy to the films and nobody could possibly think for a moment that Gambon was trying to imitate Harris in any way. I thought it was brave that they allowed this character to change so much in the middle of a series. Alien evidently (I have not seen it) attempts to reconstruct Ash (or the exact same model) which is a totally different thing.
I was heartened to hear your podcast; most of the reviews for Romulus were pretty good but I was grossly disappointed. I am an Alien-phile and this movie was NOT an homage-it was a ripoff, a clone, a copy. Entire scenes and dialogue were lifted whole cloth from prior films. If there was an interesting story, a new story, interesting characters, maybe it wouldn't have disappointed me so much. But, it WAS TERRIBLE and I felt obligated to watch the entire series again just to get this bad taste out of my mouth. BTW, Sonny, Aliens 3 is great.
Sadly ALIEN 3 is bad. I just rewatched it a few days ago. Still bad!
Jerome, don't listen to Sonny on this one. Alien 3 was a nice turn away from the redemptive stuff of the previous film. Life is hard, everyone!
Spoilers (sort of): the AI generated face of previous actor in said series really annoyed me. Obviously it looked awful, but just why Hollywood. Stop it.
Other than that, I thought the movie was pretty good. Little heavy on the nostalgia, but it nailed a few things that really made Alien and Aliens work:
- Relative nobody cast
- People who look like normal humans not actors
- Blue collar pro-labor commentary (it's been in the films since 1979 and it fit here!)
- Really nasty looking critters + body horror
The alien looked great. The movie's first two acts really nailed it. Lots of build up, and a really creepy nice lore addition to how the aliens 'molt' and grow through stages of their life cycle. Great stuff. It was all pretty predictable, with a few nice additions. Very comfort-food Alien, like The Force Awakens. Predictable and not offensive, but not shocking or revelatory.
I was mostly fine with the third act (much more action heavy), the weaponry explanation was a nice touch - the characters are just blue collar workers, not marines!
The fourth act is going to be really divisive and it appears it is. I have to admit, I like that Alvarez swung for the fences here. That was just downright disgusting. Body horror A+, which is Alvarez's thing, though it was a bit cliché in terms of how our protagonists handled it. The connection to...less well received films also feels like Scott tacked it on cause he had to make "it all connected!!!!".
Only thing I needed were more Xenomorphs killing humans. Nom nom headbite
Somebody needs to make a film centered around an actor in the afterlife watching their likeness be used in a movie they never signed onto.
Great commentary!
If [actor's name spoiler-redacted] gave his official legal-permission prior to his death for his likeness to be used in future films (as well as the probability that at least one of the massive IPs he was involved with during his lifetime would do so), then he totally knew what he was getting into. This may or may not be the actual case here, but many big-name Hollywood stars are already giving their estates instructions on how to handle their particular preferences.
If you cant slander a dead person, but maybe you can copyright their face. For awhile anyway because everything eventually goes into public domain.
The Alien franchise with Romulus has taken a turn into the horror franchises of Friday the 13th and Nightmare on Elm Street movies. Well done and acted but just another sequel with nothing really new to offer with the actors offered up as monster bait to the audience with occasional clap back, and plot contrivances large enough to drive a semi through. As far as I'm concerned Ripley is still out there on the Sulaco heading home.
She...still *is*, during the timeframe of this particular movie?
Yes since it takes place between Alien and Aliens but I'm referring to the series entirety absent prequels.
Ah, I gotcha. Misinterpreted your post, there.
Agree about the unfortunate cameo. As always with these long-lived franchises, the extended universe media brings some much needed heft to the world-building, and I wish the films had the time and interest to dig into it. I did get a sense of some of this weight in the production design (and like The Force Awakens the biggest thrill for me was to see this world be "lived in"), and I don't implicitly have an issue with long-tail vignettes about regular people being rolled by some fiendish high-minded pursuit of people or organizations without moral scruples. And unlike Sonny, I'm an obnoxious sort of neoliberal that believes that markets can fail in many ways while still succeeding at being markets, so an evil corporation exacting its will isn't a logical leap (but as a funny aside, in the deleted scenes of Alien 4, there's a line that mentions that Weyland-Yutani was sold to Wal-Mart, apropos of 1997).
My friends and I recently started the pen and paper RPG, and the factional backstories are fascinating when laid over the films. Weyland-Yutani is ostensibly a corpo-state assembled from an alliance of Great Britain and Japan and built on their material strength as terraformers; United Americas is the US-Europe-South American consortium, and the Union of Progressive Peoples is the Sino-Ruso faction, plus all the rogue colonial outfits and weird cultists. These factions are in various states of cold and hot wars, and I think some acknowledgement of this in the films would spice things up a bit.
Actually, that scene establishing that Weyland-Yutani got bought out by Wal-Mart was also reinstated into the film itself as part of the extended cut.
AI/CGI characters are like autotune fine if used judicially, but too much of it takes the life out of a project.