Alien: Covenant - Nothing New In This Film But Worth Seeing Anyway

Alien: Covenant

***Spoiler Alert***

Following on the heels of Prometheus, Ridley Scott brings us this second film in what is to be a trilogy of films that are slated to serve as prequels to the original Alien movie of 1979.

Following a prologue in which Peter Weyland speaks with the synthetic crewmember of the Prometheus, who promises that one day they will search for mankind’s creator together. The film moves on to a colonization ship called Covenant with over two thousand colonists and a thousand embryos aboard, all in stasis. They are bound for a remote planet known as Origae-6. All is proceeding as planned when Walter, the synthetic assigned to Covenant detects that she ship has been hit by a neutrino burst damaging the ship and killing some of the colonists. Walter orders the ship’s computer to wake the crew from stasis. During the awakening process, the captain’s stasis pod malfunctions killing him and leaving the first officer, Oram in charge.

While the crew makes repairs to the ship, a radio communication is picked up from a nearby planet. Against the protests of Daniels, the original captain’s widow, Captain Oram decides to investigate.

Leaving the Covenant, a team takes a lander down to the surface where they trace the radio transmission to an Engineer ship. While on the surface, two members of the team are infected with alien spores and become sick. Those two are then quarantined in the lander’s medical bay. It isn’t long before a creature, a Neomorph, bursts from one of the infected crew’s back and kills another member of the crew. Another crewmember attempts to shoot the Neomorph but misses and hits a tank of volatile gas causing an explosion that destroys the lander. The Neomorph survives the explosion and escapes to the planet’s surface while the other infected crewman has another such creature burst from his body.

Together, the Neomorphs attack the remaining crew of the lander and kill yet another member of the crew. The rest continue to fight until David, who has survived the failed Prometheus mission, arrives on the scene and rescues what is left of the lander’s crew. He leads them to a city full of Engineer corpses. David then explains that when he and Dr. Shaw from the Prometheus arrived in the Engineer ship they had commandeered, the black liquid bio weapon was accidentally released killing the native population, David further claimed that Shaw died when the ship crashed.

As the remaining crew tries to contact the Covenant, the remaining Neomorph attacks, killing another member of the crew. David tries to communicate with the creature and is appalled when Oram kills it. Oram then turns his weapon on David and forces him to explain that the aliens are actually the result of experiments he has been performing with the black liquid bio weapon to create a new species. David then takes Oram into an incubation chamber and tricks him into being grabbed by a facehugger and implanting an embryo in Oram. It isn’t long before a Xenomorph erupts from Oram’s chest.

While the remaining members of the lander’s crew go in search of Oram, Walter confronts David after learning that David had deliberately released the bio weapon on the Engineers. David tries to justify his actions by explaining that humans are an inferior race that should not be allowed to colonize the galaxy. Walter disagrees so David disables him and then captures crewmember Daniels and reveals that Shaw didn’t actually die from a crash, but was used by David as a test subject for his experiments. Walter manages to reactivate himself and engages David in combat while Daniels escapes and another member of the crew is attacked by a facehugger. Daniels, Walter, and the infected crewmember are rescued by another lander, but not before yet another crewmember is killed by the Xenomorph.

The crew of the second lander manages to kill the Xenomorph before they dock with the Covenant, but yet another Xenomorph bursts out of the chest of the infected crew member and kills two more crew. With Walter’s help, the ship’s pilot and Daniels corner the Xenomorph in the ship’s airlock and flush it into space.

The Covenant resumes its original course to Origae-6 and the remaining crew go back into stasis. As Walter is putting Daniels back under, she realizes that Walter is actually David, but falls asleep before she can do anything about it. David then regurgitates two alien embryos and places them in stasis with the human embryos.  Then, in Walter’s name, he records a log entry stating that all members of the crew, save Daniels and the ship’s pilot, were killed by the neutrino blast.

On the downside, I found the film wholly predictable. There was really nothing new to this film and it might fit into a “this has all been done before;” same song, different verse.  I knew as soon as the members of the crew headed for the planet that most of them would die, save one or two survivors, and one of those survivors would be infected with a Xenomorph embryo that would threaten the remaining crew of the Covenant itself. Later in the film, when the two artificial lifeforms came face to face, I also knew that Walter would be replaced by David which would be revealed at the very end of the film. It is pretty much the same trope that has taken place in all of the films in the franchise.

However, that is not to say that the film is not entertaining and worth a watch, if not in the theater, at least when it comes out on BluRay. I enjoyed the film because of the performances turned in by the main characters, especially those of Michael Fassbender as David/Walter and Katherine Waterston in her Ripley-like role as Daniels “Dany” Branson.

It is no secret that the synthetic people on missions in the Alien franchise have been somewhat problematic, mostly because they had some agenda that the humans were not aware of. In the original Alien films, it was known that the corporation wanted the Xenomorphs for their value as weapons. The ship’s computer (known usually as Mother) and the synthetic worked hard to try to make sure that a creature was captured to be returned to Earth for exploitation. Failing that, the corporation sent a human in Aliens. In the case of David, I am not positive on what his motivation is. Was he programmed by the corporation to look for dangerous life, or is it a project he took on because he could?  David was quite advanced and it is mentioned in the film that Walter has been dumbed down a bit. So we have two identical appearing characters with different behaviors. This would be a challenge for any actor; be the same, but different. Fassbender pulls it off quite well. Along with that, he becomes increasingly more sinister as the film unspools.

In this franchise, any strong female character is going to be compared to Ellen Ripley. So far, we have Dr. Elizabeth Shaw, the extremely tough character from Prometheus, and now Daniels Branson, the terraforming expert aboard the Covenant. Dany Daniels is another intelligent, tough, and driven character that deserves as much respect as Ripley, but they are not the same, they are indeed their own characters.

So, while there is really not a lot new in this film, I would recommend seeing it anyway, it does answer a few questions raised in Prometheus, and raises a few more questions that I hope will be answered in the next film in this long-lived franchise. Despite the predictability of the story, it is a very good Sci-Fi Thriller and will give you a scare every now and then.

Well, there it is…

Qapla’!

Edited By Benjamin Arrowood

The Martian - A Must See Film For Manned Space Flight Fans And SciFi Fans Looking For Something Fresh

The Martian (2015)

Back in March of 2014, I finished reading and blogged about Andy Weir’s book, The Martian. In the last line of that review I wrote, “now if only someone  would pick this (the book) up and make a movie.” It wasn’t long after that it was announced that there was indeed going to be a film made from one of the best SciFi novels I have ever read.

Now I am not going to say that the film based on the book that I saw this past weekend is the best SciFi film I have ever seen, but I will say that it would be very near the top, that is if I were given to making lists, which I usually do not. Nevertheless, I found The Martian appealed to me on many levels.

The film follows quite faithfully to the events depicted in the book. While exploring Mars, a potentially dangerous dust storm is found to be headed toward the Ares III landing site. After a short period of deliberation, the mission commander decides that conditions warrant scrubbing the mission and getting off of the surface. The storm hits full force as the astronauts head back to their launch and ascent vehicle and astronaut Mark Watney is hit by a piece of debris that is dislodged from the habitat. Watney is carried away by the impact and the wind and there is a brief effort at a search, but with the urgent situation, the rest of the crew must lift off before they are all stranded. They give Watney up for dead.

Watney is most certainly not dead, but is injured by the debris that has hit him. Now, for the lone astronaut, it becomes a game of survival. After at first realizing that he is as good as dead, he later decides that he is not going to give up without a fight. He uses his wits and his knowledge of science to set himself up to survive. Without communications capabilities, he has to survive four years until the Aries IV mission arrives.

Back on Earth, a person in Mission Control sees pictures of the Aries III site taken by an orbiting satellite and notices that equipment has been moved around and it is determined that Watney must still be alive. A way to communicate is found and options for rescue are considered.  It is finally determined that the transport vehicle that is returning to earth with the rest of the crew can be sent back to Mars on a free return trajectory using the Earth as a gravity assist and a resupply mission is launched.

Watney is rescued and returns to Earth to become an instructor for future astronauts.

There is much in this film that appeals to me. One of the first things that comes to mind is the performance of Matt Damon as Watney. He plays the thinking scientist/astronaut very well. Much of this is most likely thanks to Ridley Scott who seems to understand what an astronaut would do in a hopeless situation.

That leads me to the story itself. While well written by the author, a lot of credit has to be given to the screenwriters who masterfully preserved the spirit of Andy Weir's book as well as the most essential story elements. There are a few things in the book that were not included in the film, but it doesn't diminish the story whatsoever. I have to admit that even though I knew that everything was going to be okay, I still felt tense at several points during the film. Having read the book should not diminish your viewing experience.

The visuals were also very stunning. I seriously believed that the set that the movie was filmed on could have been the planet Mars. The filming for the Martian landscape took place in the Jordanian desert that gave an incredible impression of what I would imagine it would actually look like.

Be warned though, there is one sequence in the film that might be disturbing to some audience members. It had me curling my toes in sympathetic pain as I watched it. Right after Watney wakes up, he has to make his way back to the habitat and treat his own wound from being struck by the communications dish. This scene is quite graphic and bloody as he cleans his wound and staples it closed.

On the other hand, The Martian also has a good sense of humor. In their haste to leave the surface of Mars, all of Watney's colleagues are forced to leave things behind. One item was the mission commander's laptop which was loaded with 1970's Disco music. Watney made several references to his hatred for this genre of music which broke the tension and added some appropriate comic relief. There were also several exchanges between characters in the film that were quite humorous and added to the overall realistic feel of the movie.

All in all, everything about this film was remarkable and is a must see movie, especially for fans of the manned space program. It seems like it would quite plausible that something like this might happen. I hear many fellow SciFi fans complain often that everything we are currently getting from Hollywood is either a prequel, sequel, reboot, or remake, so it is important that we send a message to Hollywood that we want more original and new material. So get out there and see The Martian in theaters! You will not be disappointed.

Well, there it is...

Qaplah!