{"id":8056,"date":"2024-08-22T11:59:39","date_gmt":"2024-08-21T23:59:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/morgue.isprettyawesome.com\/?p=8056"},"modified":"2024-08-22T12:12:39","modified_gmt":"2024-08-22T00:12:39","slug":"alien-romulus-2024","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/morgue.isprettyawesome.com\/?p=8056","title":{"rendered":"Alien: Romulus (2024)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Alien: Romulus<\/em>: I liked it and it worked, except for the bits that didn\u2019t, three stars. Mark it down to two point five stars for the surprise cast member.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

More? Okay strap in. Spoilers ahead.\u00a0(BTW I did one of these for Prometheus too.<\/a>)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Facehuggers\u2026 why\u2019d it have to be facehuggers?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Right about the middle of the film there\u2019s a set piece that pays off the swarms of facehuggers we saw earlier on. They\u2019re sitting around like scorpions and our heroes need to get through the room. What to do? Lets infer they hunt by heat and sound (sure, they don\u2019t have eyes, why not) and then we just need to make the room body temp (ugh that would suck) and walk real slow and quiet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And they do. And the facehuggers sit around, tensing up when the characters gasp at a dead body or scrape against furniture. Slowly, slowly through this room\u2026 it\u2019s a good tense sequence, a thoroughly engaging moment. Don\u2019t breathe or they get you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But it\u2019s also, on a deeper level, kind of inert. It takes the nightmare of a spidery alien thing that latches on to your face, and makes it a video game obstacle. It\u2019s tense, but not uncertain: the idea is good so it\u2019s obviously going to work, and it\u2019s obvious they\u2019re not going to keep it going all the way because that wouldn\u2019t be exciting, so you\u2019re just waiting for the moment when they drop the ball and run and just make it, because it\u2019s obviously not time for any of these characters to die. And so it proves. But the development and resolution to this set piece, while absolutely matching expectations, is executed well so you have to respect it anyway.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That\u2019s Alien: Romulus<\/em>. Make exactly the right moves, the safe moves, match the temperature. Then a mad sprint for the end.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Stars My Destination<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

But morgue what did you THINK of it??<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I liked the babby.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I liked the ship manoeuvring around the facility to different airlock connection points.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I liked the solves: Rain\u2019s smart ideas in desperate situations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I liked the cold equations. That was a game that felt new, even though it was using old material, going right back to Alien<\/em>. (But here\u2019s a trick: in Alien<\/em>, Ripley was the one who refused to open the door. In this film, Rain was desperate to open it. What the significance!)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I liked the characters. Cailee Spaeny\u2019s Rain was a nervy centre of gravity and David Jonsson\u2019s Andy was superbly layered. The wider ensemble were perhaps thinly drawn, but also engaging and well-performed, even the requisite Annoying One. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I liked how they were believably smart, and they made good choices. The characters are teenagers but they\u2019re not dumb teenagers. (I also note that the perplexingly widespread view that a proper alien film needs middle-aged protagonists disappeared without trace on the day of release.) They take risks but they\u2019re, mostly, not foolish risks, they\u2019re reactions to a desperate situation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I loved the mining colony. Perfect.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And there were plenty of grace notes that felt sweet on the screen. Walking in bare feet on the sand in the cargo bay. Seeing the sun for the first time. The moment that quietly revealed the identity of the baby\u2019s father. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It delivered a solid story with proper stakes and I was on board the whole way. I liked it and it worked,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

except for the bits that didn\u2019t.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

(It was an Alien <\/em>film with too much Alien <\/em>film in it.) <\/p>\n\n\n\n

(We\u2019re not going to disturb anything. We are exactly the same temperature. We\u2019re taking every single step with such great care. Don\u2019t you see this is exactly what you want?)<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Three stars.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

i contain multitudes (derogatory)<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Me: I just want creators to take big swings! To do stuff we haven\u2019t seen before, to try and go to new places, even if it doesn\u2019t work I want to see it!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Me after seeing Prometheus<\/em>: not like that<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Me after seeing the Romulus <\/em>trailer: squeeeee<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Me after seeing Romulus<\/em>: huh. Hmm. huh.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

factor analysis<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The setup is this: a bunch of scientists set up a space lab to study the aliens, to try and domesticate them, and of course they end up getting absolutely monstered as the creatures run rampant and kill everyone. The film is actually about the folks on an independent ship crew who get caught up in the mess because they were willing to cut corners and end up buying a lot more trouble than they bargained for. Soon they have to find a way from one side of the infested station to the other, as time ticks down on them. There\u2019s an ambiguously heroic synthetic, alien underwater POV shots, and a major set piece in an elevator shaft, but the final act of the film swerves in a completely different direction with the birth of a human\/alien hybrid baby, pale and tall and weird as hell. Then it gets sucked through an acid hole into space, and the survivors get to contemplate an entirely new life together.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I am of course describing Alien Resurrection<\/em> (yes I know you guessed it at line one shush). Alien Romulus<\/em> is a remake of Alien Resurrection<\/em>, and an accidental one, it seems, from some of Fede Alvarez\u2019s comments. Which is fascinating, right? Because it shows that the water flowing downhill from Alien<\/em> and Aliens<\/em> leads to a consistent place!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Personal anecdote of relevance: In December 1997 I coordinated a big roleplaying game event set in the Aliens<\/em> universe TM. A bunch of scientists had set up a space lab to study the aliens, and of course they got absolutely monstered as the creatures run rampant and kill everyone, the folks on an ethically shady independent ship crew had to find their way from one side of the infested station to the other time ticks down major set piece in elevator shaft ambiguously heroic synthetic ALL OF IT WAS THERE (except the babby). A bunch of us who were part of the game went to see Alien Resurrection<\/em> on its NZ release one month after the game and there was widespread amusement that so much of what we\u2019d created turned up there too. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

But it\u2019s not a surprise, it\u2019s just what follows from Alien <\/em>and Aliens <\/em>and Alien 3<\/em>. It\u2019s what has<\/em> to follow. The scientists finally get the alien and it kills them and then i guess some nice people need to go across a spaceship. And maybe there\u2019s a babby. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

(Prometheus<\/em> did not do this. It did not follow from Alien<\/em> and Aliens<\/em> and Alien 3<\/em>. It is best understood as a remix in which the big horseshoe from Alien<\/em> was in fact an attempt to assassinate Jesus.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

(No, really, that\u2019s actually the plot of Prometheus<\/em>.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This film tries to follow the water-downhill path from the Prometheus<\/em> stuff too, but it couldn\u2019t assassinate Jesus a second time so surprise, it ends up with Babby again. (GIANT BABBY! We\u2019ve made TOO MUCH NOISE and the facehuggers know we\u2019re here RUN RUN RUN FOR THE END!!)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So this feels promising! We have the messy data of Alien<\/em> being resolved down to distinct variables. We\u2019ve solved it, the true meaning, this is a star map, and it points the way to – no wait wrong film – this is the distilled core of Alien<\/em>, the special juice, the black goo – no DAMMIT – <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Another day older and deeper in debt<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

FILMMAKER: I want to explore the nature of humanity itself in the context of a hostile universe and strange alien life inimical to our own, and the ways in which our own societies enact and succumb to structures that treat us with the same indifference,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

THE STUDIO, ENTHUSIASTIC: yes and then something burst out of chest?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

A few years ago a Kiwi journalist sparked a big round of twitter discourse by wondering if Alien <\/em>was a horror film. I said it was, but only because of the company sending the workers into danger. Otherwise it was a science fiction film with monsters. This argument was not mounted in entirely serious fashion, but it has something serious at its core: the Alien<\/em> film series is about work.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s about working a shitty job for a big company, it\u2019s about working as a soldier and going where you\u2019re told, it\u2019s about working at a prison with nowhere else to go, it\u2019s about working freelance and taking dubious contracts that eventually bite you in the arse. The alien is just an expression of the bosses failing to take your safety seriously.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

(Prometheus<\/em>, of course, is also about work, presenting the answer to the question \u201cWhat if everyone was highly paid but extremely bad at their jobs?\u201d)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

(Alien Covenant<\/em> is not about work, that film is about \u201cwhat if two Michael Fassbenders kissed?\u201d)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Alien Romulus<\/em> begins on a mining colony that is a grimy, crowded nightmare of industrial labour exploitation. Rain is an indentured worker, trying to earn her way out of the planet. The company can just change the terms of the deal. It\u2019s brutal, and honestly it feels like an excessive caricature until you remember, like, history. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

So this is the Alien <\/em>film most about work since the first one. But really it isn\u2019t actually that much about work? That\u2019s the context for the desperation of the protagonists but it doesn\u2019t really shape the narrative other than that. Rain doesn\u2019t actually do any work that we see, and it\u2019s not clear what the crew of the Corbelan<\/em> do either. This mining outpost seems incredibly cut off from anywhere, nine years from resupply, and beset by illness and lack of care that mean workers die easily. More tellingly, there\u2019s a super-strong robot on a hard-labour work site where everyone keeps getting sick, and it is left in a junk heap because *checks notes* it reliably follows simple instructions? These are details, little handwaves that make the plot go, but they feel off. You have the company in the mining colony trying to get the most value from everyone, you have deadlines and quotas and warnings, you have Andy overexploited not derided, you have someone take notice that a hauler is burning a bunch of fuel on an unauthorised mission\u2026 that\u2019s how you make it about work. And Romulus <\/em>doesn\u2019t.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Look who\u2019s talking now<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Alien <\/em>isn\u2019t about WORK you idiot it\u2019s about REPRODUCTION. It\u2019s about hard organs penetrating orifices and vulval openings and something alive kicking the inside of your ribs. It\u2019s a man having a nightmare imagining what if he was pregnant instead of his wife. It\u2019s about the irreducibly gross content of our bodies, all that bone and intestine and teeth, and how that\u2019s what life is, and what if we remixed life so it was just bone and intestine and teeth, what would that look like, oof, pretty freaky, *riiiip* <\/p>\n\n\n\n

There are two babies in this film. Three female characters and two of them give birth. There\u2019s also a weird bit where the annoying guy sticks an instrument into the giant alien vagina and tries to electrocute what\u2019s inside it which is, i\u2019m pretty sure, not actually a political commentary but it felt pretty weird.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The big babies then eat their mums. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

So this is the Alien <\/em>film most about reproduction since the first one. But really it isn\u2019t actually that much about reproduction? The baby in the lady is a motivation to go see the sunrise\/to open the door PLEASE, but the biggest plot clang in the movie is when Kay decides to inject herself with black goop because the weird android who just let her get taken by monsters said it might be useful, when Rain who she trusts was like NO DON\u2019T. The film could have sold this beat, but they didn\u2019t take the time to do so. If Kay is struggling to get to cryo, bleeding out, her body failing her, she\u2019s fading on the floor everything going blurry and she touches her belly because that\u2019s her motivation not to give up and THEN she takes the goop and injects it and with that coursing through her system she rises up and SURGES to the cryo chambers\u2026 An easy solve. Its absence is just another of the ways this is all not deeply felt. It doesn\u2019t feel right.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

See also Navarro\u2019s experience as a host for an alien creature. She gets grabbed by a facehugger, it gets yanked off her but maybe she\u2019s already got one inside her? She and Bjorn make a break for it then, what, six or seven minutes later there\u2019s something coming out of her chest?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The rapid gestation time of the alien is very different to what was presented in the first three films (although in Alien Resurrection<\/em> a similarly rapid gestation was seen, there\u2019s that film again). Obviously, this process needs to move at the speed of the plot: Romulus<\/em> is on a tight countdown, and you can\u2019t do a slow gestation that fits. (A famous deleted scene from Aliens<\/em> was removed for this exact reason.) And you know what? It doesn\u2019t actually matter that it\u2019s different. Let it be different! Gestation time of an alien creature is the kind of detail that should not be held sacred, it does not need to be slabbed in canonical perspex! Except.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The problem with a rapid gestation time is it undermines the whole sensibility of this kind of body horror. Maybe just at a subconscious level, but still in a way that can be felt. The horror of the facehugger laying an embryo inside you and that bursting out your chest isn\u2019t just that something\u2019s in your throat and then something punches out your ribcage, it\u2019s that you are a host for this thing. It is using you, parasitising you, growing from you, using you as part of its own reproductive cycle. Kane was so hungry, but apart from that he seemed fine to everyone, even to himself. That\u2019s part of it, that\u2019s important.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The incredibly short embryo time is a dramatic necessity to make the thrill ride work, but it takes away the sense of process. Gestating inside the body for less than ten minutes? What can any organism get out of that? Sure, black goo accelerated life cycles accumulating mass from the air itself etc., but it feels wrong. It feels weightless. Navarro should feel hungry. Her baby should use her, not just wreck her. That\u2019s how you make it about reproduction. And Romulus<\/em> doesn\u2019t.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Okay fine so what is it about then mr clever brain<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The company creates a gigantic and incredibly well-resourced space station science analysis centre and conducts elaborate experiments there that could change the nature of human existence<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And then it goes wrong and whoops i guess that\u2019s the end, it just floats there and is forgotten, no distress beacon no company ship going to investigate no automated check in noone who knew about it and wanted to go find it nothing, \u201cWell it was a secret project\u201d but even secret projects like EXIST \u201cand then they lost it because it was so far away in space\u201d well yes but why would you set up your secret project nine years or whatever from company oversight that makes no sense you can put a space station anywhere you\u2019d make it more accessible than that just for supplies, \u201charumph harumph it drifted\u201d ok yes that explains everything except doesn\u2019t the film begin with a mission that manages to find one Nigerian visual artist floating in the vastness of space, even if he is nearly 7 feet tall that signals a bit of commitment to finding things that are drifting,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And the facehugger chestburster timeline, and Andy being ignored, and the crew just being able to fly up there without anyone noticing, and how does any of this square with Aliens<\/em>, if this whole Romulus <\/em>thing has happened and the company not only got an alien it managed to breed and cryo store huge numbers of aliens and figured out how to synthesise the black goo out of them, it did the full science and won the prize ring and hit the hammer to ding the gong, if this all happened BUT THEN a bit later on Carter Burke and Ellen Ripley are facing off over whether the same company will get its hands on an alien\u2026 doesn\u2019t that make those stakes, the ones in Aliens,<\/em> the ones Ripley sacrifices herself for in Alien 3<\/em>, doesn\u2019t it make them feel a bit\u2026silly?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When you start looking at it, all of it, carefully, none of it makes sense, not without a lot of special pleading. That\u2019s the problem with plugging stuff into gaps. When you have a gap, and you stick something into the gap, if you zoom in you have just created a bunch of new gaps all around the thing filling the gap. (I think this is called ZeNo More Gap\u2019s paradox.) (No More Gaps is a popular gap filling product here in New Zealand, this is a very good joke, thank you.) (If you think the joke should be Xeno\u2019s Paradox you have committed a nerd reference and you have to sit in the corner.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So why plug this story into the gap between Alien <\/em>and Aliens<\/em>? Nothing in Romulus <\/em>needs to be before Aliens<\/em>. Right? All of it could come later. All of it. But it\u2019s in between. So why do it whyyaa]ggh<\/p>\n\n\n\n

we must hold godfather part 2 responsible<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

FILMMAKER: We begin in deep space, the cold expanse of stars, and a space-travelling ship enters our field of view, its metal curvature and hard corners a mighty achievement of humankind, our ambition reaching so very far yet dwarfed and humbled by the immensity of <\/p>\n\n\n\n

THE AUDIENCE, EAGER: when does burst a chest tho<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

There have been five* films with gigerian (please pronounce both gs as in GIF) aliens in them since Alien Resurrection<\/em>, and a new TV show on the way, and every one of them is set in the past.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*no i\u2019m not going to talk about those two**<\/p>\n\n\n\n

**they are in fact in a separate continuity***<\/p>\n\n\n\n

***hahaha sob no really they are officially in a separate continuity and if you know what \u201cin a separate continuity\u201d means i\u2019m so so sorry we have to sit in the corner with the other nerds<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Five films and a telly series gone backwards. Plus the only one of the video games anyone ever cared about. backwards. (some of the other video games do go forward but only by a tiny tiny increment so you can also be colonial marines shooting aliens wheeeee)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So much backward. What makes it so hard to go forward?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here\u2019s part of the answer: the aesthetic attractions of the original. Setting Romulus <\/em>between Alien <\/em>and Aliens <\/em>gives you unselfconscious access to the design specifics of those films. When you see in a five star review of Romulus <\/em>the phrase \u201call the love and care that went into it\u201d it means \u201cthey made the console buttons big and chunky and different colours like in Alien<\/em> and they used the pulse rifle sound effect like in Aliens<\/em>\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here\u2019s another part of the answer: fandom, in the aggregate, doesn\u2019t want to go forward, it wants to plug gaps. It wants to mark out the edges of the Thing Fanned, then fill every tiny inch of it with precise\/baroque detail, expunging all ambiguity and uncertainty. Full perfection will be achieved when the Thing Fanned is completely explicated, when no CinemaSins video is possible. In 1977 the clone wars was a phrase that fired the imagination and imbued everything with rich potential, and in 2024 the clone wars is an incredibly dense page on wookiepedia. Of course Full Conceptual Saturation can never be achieved, see ZeNo More Gaps\u2019s paradox above, ah but the journey! Also the very important business of complaining online when it seems like stuff from outside the edges might get in, like yuuzhan vongs or woke.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here\u2019s the biggest part of the answer though: Alien<\/em> is a bad IP.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I do not like Alien Day you cannot make me like it<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Alien<\/em> is a phenomenal film. It puts a great character in a vivid environment facing off against an extremely memorable creature. Everyone thought it was brilliant. Let\u2019s do another one. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Unfortunately, that construction doesn\u2019t allow for an easy sequel. If you want to keep the great character, how do you contrive them back into the same narrative? If you keep the creature, does it just do the same stuff all over again to a new bunch of spaceship dwellers? Sure it\u2019s not easy like Star Wars 2<\/em> where you just say Darth Vader builds another death star, but come on it\u2019s not rocket science, look at Jaws 2<\/em>! Roy Scheider vs A Shark Again! And pretty soon we\u2019ll have Jaws 3<\/em> and Jaws 4<\/em> and the idea of the eternal Jaws<\/em> franchise is so obvious and undeniable that it\u2019ll be the premise of a hilarious visual gag in the hugely popular sequel to the hit family film about mummy-son incest vibes! <\/p>\n\n\n\n

So we\u2019re gonna do Alien Twosies<\/em> and it\u2019s going to be great!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

(SIDETRACK: The only good franchise IPs are about JOBS. If it\u2019s a job, you can keep making new stories. If the story is an interruption to a job (Alien<\/em>) then repeating it is going to be hard work. Good job IPs in films:<\/p>\n\n\n\n