Alien: Romulus

Pete Wright:
I’m Pete Wright.

Andy Nelson:
And I’m Andy Nelson.

Pete Wright:
Welcome to The Next Reel. When the movie ends.

Andy Nelson:
Our conversation begins.

Pete Wright:
Alien: Romulus is over. “I can’t lie about your chances, but you have my sympathies.”

Andy Nelson:
Wait, which movie were you quoting? What movie are you quoting? I guess we’ll find out. Oh my gosh.

Pete Wright:
I knew it was. Does it even matter?

Pete Wright:
We’re talking about Alien: Romulus, Andy. Alien: Romulus is Fede Alvarez coming in and saying, “Hey, you know what, all that other stuff that you’ve been talking about for the last two movies — that you haven’t quite figured out how to tell a story that fits into the universe — I’m gonna go ahead and try it myself and see if I can do better than the OG.” And for most of the movie, he does. That’s the setup. For most of the movie, he does.

Andy Nelson:
He doesn’t do too bad. I’ll give you that.

Pete Wright:
He doesn’t do too bad. Compared to Ridley Scott doing the prequels, the first two. That’s what I’m comparing it to.

Andy Nelson:
Ridley Scott gets a lot of grace because of Alien in this franchise.

Pete Wright:
Yes.

Andy Nelson:
But he’s had two clunkers that really have hurt his standings, let’s just say.

Pete Wright:
Yes, really hurt his standings.

Andy Nelson:
So yeah.

Pete Wright:
What is happening right now?

Andy Nelson:
Oh man, yeah. This lands between Alien and Aliens, which I think is interesting — to take it back to that point. And I will say the one thing that I instantly noted in this is, wow, it actually looks like something that took place in that period of time. As a post-Prometheus and Alien: Covenant — both of which look like they take place like —

Pete Wright:
I know, I know.

Andy Nelson:
5,000 years later.

Pete Wright:
What happened? Oh God, yeah. So.

Andy Nelson:
But I did read something — and I just want to throw this out there because it was an interesting point that piqued my curiosity. I don’t know if it sells it to me enough, but what I read was that Prometheus and Alien: Covenant were in a world of corporate excess. We’ve got Peter Weyland, who’s flying on the ship as we find out in Prometheus, and that ship is run by his daughter. It’s a very nice ship. And Alien: Covenant — I guess you could argue it’s a Weyland-Yutani vessel going to populate a planet. So everybody is on kind of the nice, love boat sort of ship that they’re flying across the universe. Alien, Aliens, Alien: Romulus are in a world of the blue-collar workers, of people who are living down in the muck.

Pete Wright:
The dystopia. Yeah.

Andy Nelson:
They’re the ones who are actually doing the work to terraform planets, etc. And the logic that I read was that Prometheus and Alien: Covenant look the way they do because of that — because they’re operating at a much higher budget level in the corporate world as far as what they get to fly in, as opposed to what we’re seeing in this and the films that surround it. Is that something that can help us buy into all of that?

Pete Wright:
Yeah. I don’t think the movies make an overt case for that, because the production design — whether their intention was to make it classist, you know, white collar, first class, top one percent of the one percent versus working class — what they did was they made separate universes. The production design just looks different. It doesn’t look better. I think what they did was create a completely separate design language. It’s not like the top one percent have something great and the lower classes have the same thing but older and dirtier. It doesn’t look like that. It looks like a separate universe. And that’s the problem. It looks like a separate movie, and that’s what makes it feel like such a massive time jump into the future. Their clean past does not look like the old hand-me-down that comes to the working class later. It just doesn’t look like that. It does not succeed. So I get the argument. I think it’s fine to make that case.

Andy Nelson:
I agree. And I think that’s my struggle. Just looking at their interfaces on their computer terminals — I think that alone doesn’t sell it to me.

Pete Wright:
Right.

Andy Nelson:
Like, that alone is like — why does the lower class then look like they’re working on Apple IIc’s?

Pete Wright:
Hey, hey, don’t sleep on the Apple IIc. That was awesome.

Andy Nelson:
They were great. They’re just dated.

Pete Wright:
They air-dated it.

Andy Nelson:
I wouldn’t use one today.

Pete Wright:
I would not use one today. Fair. But it would be — and it’s actually a really good comparison. It would be as if the iPhone or the iPad came before the Apple IIc. Technology doesn’t work in that direction. That’s not how it works. So I think they inverted it. That’s the problem.

Andy Nelson:
All right, well, that was my initial tangent to kick things off.

Pete Wright:
It was a good tangent. It was a good pass.

Andy Nelson:
Yeah. All right, so where should we start? What do you want to lead things off with in this film?

Pete Wright:
Well, all right. So we’ve now done, I think, all of the Alien movies. Is that true? We’ve done them all.

Andy Nelson:
Barring the Alien vs. Predator films, which — you can argue, are they part of this franchise? Is it kind of its own separate franchise? Do we need to cover all the Predator films now also to have actually completed this franchise?

Pete Wright:
Oh my goodness!

Andy Nelson:
I don’t know anymore where the line is, but as far as just strict Alien films, this will be the final one.

Pete Wright:
Okay. So we’re here. And this was, I think, fair to say, a corrective action on behalf of the studio. And so we end up, as you already said, getting this movie that is set between Alien and Aliens, looks like it’s between Alien and Aliens, and attempts to say, “Hey, look over here — not at the Covenant-Prometheus challenge that we’ve had over here for the last several years.” And Fede Alvarez comes in — Fede Alvarez of Don’t Breathe, which I think you and I agree was fantastic — and makes Don’t Breathe in the Alien universe. And by and large, it works. Here’s the thing: these young people come into a space they don’t understand, but they’re overconfident because they think they understand it. And they deal with a predator that they don’t understand — until they realize they’re up against something that they don’t have the skills or experience or capacity to handle. And that conflict, I think, works very well in the context of the Alien universe. I think it is a very effective thriller setup, if not always a horror setup. And I think they captured the atmosphere. I don’t see how this movie isn’t a win for those who were looking for an Alien movie to enter the franchise as a new property. I think this movie succeeds at the foundational level. Your thoughts?

Andy Nelson:
Yeah, I mean, I agree.

Pete Wright:
Wow.

Andy Nelson:
I think what Alvarez did — the decision to put this between Alien and Aliens — made for an interesting time period to set the story. We’re not returning to post-Alien: Resurrection, which would be theoretically chronologically the next story. This is landing at a point that’s still fairly early in the franchise, in the year 2142. And I think what he does is craft an interesting story with great characters that I really enjoy.

I enjoy that he mentioned he had the idea to craft a story with young people because when he saw the director’s cut of Aliens and the whole sequence on Hadley’s Hope — where you have all these kids running around — he thought, that is interesting, these kids are growing up in a world where suddenly there are all these monsters running about. What would it be like for them to continue in that world? So he said, take those kids, put them in their 20s, and that’s the vibe he was going for. And I think it works. He makes for an interesting story with interesting characters.

And similar to the previous film, which focused on couples, this film focuses on siblings, which I think is an interesting follow-up — especially in a story called Romulus, with the whole Romulus-Remus element about the twin brothers. I think that’s an interesting setup because we’re creating a situation where characters are going to be making emotional decisions because of the sibling connections they have throughout the story. I definitely have problems with this and we’re going to get into those, but for the most part I have a lot of fun with it, and I just really enjoy that he went for physical effects and created something that actually felt like an Alien movie.

Pete Wright:
I do too. And I always think about this as Goonies in space, because any time you put kids trespassing — it’s a Goonies movie. Here we are with young people trespassing somewhere they have no right to be, motivated by personal stakes rather than an institutional mission. That is definitely different from every other Alien movie we’ve talked about. And they discover that this abandoned place has a very good reason to be abandoned. The franchise has kind of never done this specific setup before. And the youth of the cast — considerably younger than the blue-collar professionals we’ve seen in the other movies — really changes the emotional register of the movie.

These kids are kids that a system has already failed before the xenomorphs even arrive. We’re already feeling for these kids just because of the lives they lead. And I think that’s cool — I think that’s a really nice take, a very human take on the stakes of an Alien movie, rather than just corporate intrigue and espionage and military science. It’s different. It feels good.

Andy Nelson:
Like, we’ve always had the element of corporate control with Weyland-Yutani — the way they’re kind of behind everything, especially in Alien and Aliens, the first four films largely. That’s really their push to control what’s going on and control everything. And here we have an opportunity to look at the life of people stuck in this corporate-controlled situation.

I love the setup when Rain goes to collect her — to say, “Okay, I’m done, my time is up” — and they’re like, “Mm.” And you can see the woman working at the desk behind her manually changing it to say, “No, you actually don’t.” Sorry, everybody has to work extra time now. You’re not going to leave for another several years or whatever it is. And that’s just a sense of corporate control and how Weyland-Yutani and the system they have created is forcing this world that is very bifurcated as far as the classes. We’re seeing the struggle these lower-class people have — they can’t get out. These blue-collar workers are just stuck here. They’re going to die here. That’s their life: mining and terraforming, and they’ll do it till they die.

Pete Wright:
And so in terms of world building, you’re describing exactly my feeling. It would be a good movie just watching these kids try to survive, and they also run into the xenomorph. I think we have to take as a trope of the franchise — and maybe a trope of alien horror generally — that at some point we’re going to meet the monster. And I think this movie sings that trope well. Just the fact that they’re going onto this abandoned thing and it turns out to be a place where this alien existed — it gets us into the horror part of the movie. I don’t have a problem with that. Where in this place do your problems begin?

Andy Nelson:
Well, do we want to jump into problems right now or talk about the things that we love?

Pete Wright:
Do you have more that you love? I feel like we’re getting into territory where you’re about to unleash the dragon.

Andy Nelson:
Well, no — I just want to say, speaking of things we do love before we unleash the dragon, I gotta say — the way they created the android unit of Andy is my favorite character in this film. Such an interesting way to play it. David Jonsson is just absolutely fantastic. It would have been an award-worthy performance. He should have been more recognized. It’s such an interesting and delicate performance. And that setup of him as the surrogate brother — this found-family terrain — is beautiful.

We have this initial setup where we can tell he’s kind of glitchy, kind of twitchy. As Bishop says, the older models were always a bit twitchy. He gets beat up by people who are just picking on him on this world because they know he’s an android — and Rain protects him. That relationship is such a beating heart of this film. It’s for me everything about what they did with this movie.

Pete Wright:
I’ll go even further than you. The android characters in the Alien movies are some of the most interesting characters in the movies. And I think Andy is not only the MVP of the movie, but maybe the MVP of the franchise. He may be up there with Bishop. His identity is absolutely central to these kids, and the way they use his abilities — and his ability to be upgraded in the field — he is fantastic. Maybe I love this character so much that it is earning credibility in areas that might deserve less. But I agree with you one hundred percent. I think he is fantastic and signature to the franchise at this point. If we’re doing a tier list of best androids — S tier.

Andy Nelson:
He’s way up there. Yeah, absolutely.

So — that’s just another thing I love. And speaking of things I love, I honestly really love how Alvarez crafts the big tentpole sequences. The flooded room with the swimming facehuggers everywhere — absolutely fantastic. The zero-gravity acid hallway and the elevator — that whole thing plays so well. And I like the final battle with the human-xenomorph hybrid, the Offspring. I love the way Alvarez crafts these sequences. I think he’s a sharp filmmaker. Is it ever scary? No. On the horror front, I think he fails. But he does make a great action thriller. That’s where we stand with it here.

Pete Wright:
Well, I’m going to agree with you, but only sort of superficially, because when you watch this with people who don’t consume Alien or horror movies, this is damn terrifying. There are a couple of sequences that are straight-up scary horror sequences for people who are not in that space. So I would never say it fails. I would say that for me, is it one of the peak horror experiences I’ve ever had? No, it’s not. But it is a great thriller. The water sequence — you talk about that — but also the lower-the-temperature-because-of-the-facehuggers sequence is damn thrilling. I think that is a great sequence and builds a lot of tension by slowing everything down. I think it is incredibly well architected.

Andy Nelson:
I mean, I definitely agree. The thing is, coming from Fede Alvarez, who did Evil Dead — the reboot — I’m not sure what we’re even calling that these days.

Pete Wright:
Rebake. Let’s stick with rebake.

Andy Nelson:
Rebake. And Don’t Breathe. Fantastic horror director. That’s where I put Alvarez. And so when he comes into Alien, I’m expecting something on the level of those horror movies that really push things. And I just don’t think this pushes things to that level. I think it works really well, and I agree there are people who would still find it scary. I just don’t think it quite gets there.

Pete Wright:
Sidebar question.

Andy Nelson:
Yeah.

Pete Wright:
Do you think that the fact that it is not scary is driven by a studio that needs to hit more quadrants?

Andy Nelson:
I think so. I think that likely is part of it — that they came in and said, “We need to —” Did I look and see what this was rated? Did you look? Was it R?

Pete Wright:
Oh man. If it’s R, then it definitely fails.

Andy Nelson:
Well, yeah, it was R.

Pete Wright:
Yeah.

Andy Nelson:
I mean, there’s a lot — we’ve got the chestbursters.

Pete Wright:
Yeah.

Andy Nelson:
It’s rated R for bloody violent content and language. Frightening and intense scenes, violence and gore.

Pete Wright:
Even the poster is like a red-band poster.

Andy Nelson:
It totally is.

Pete Wright:
That’s a terrifying image of the facehugger on her face.

Andy Nelson:
Yeah.

Pete Wright:
So, okay. Well, that’s my sidebar. I think the movie suffers a little bit from studio ownership and a misunderstanding of what R is in a conservative ratings landscape. And yet, I think it is a great thriller on that front. Now, is there anything else you want to shout out about how great it is?

Andy Nelson:
We’ll probably circle around to some more. We can talk about problems now if you want.

Pete Wright:
I think that this movie, maybe for me, is unfairly criticized for being a greatest-hits machine of the first two Alien movies.

Andy Nelson:
Of the entire franchise. There’s a reference to every single prior movie in this movie.

Pete Wright:
Of the entire franchise, yeah. All right, let me take that back. I think this movie is fairly criticized for being a greatest-hits machine of the franchise. Now, the bigger question is, do I have a problem with that? I don’t have a problem with it universally. I do have a problem with it selectively. And the big one that’s obviously going to make this show is the AI recreation of Ian Holm. Has that gotten better with you over time?

Andy Nelson:
Well, okay — it’s not an AI recreation. It’s a mask made from a mold of his face that they made during the Lord of the Rings films — one of those, either Lord of the Rings or The Hobbit. They used that face cast to create it, and then they used some digital movement to enhance the mouth and make it sync better. But —

Pete Wright:
That didn’t work.

Andy Nelson:
And this is what we just watched — the fixed version, after the movie theater version where Alvarez was like, “Oh, we still need a little work.” So he said, “We’re going to fix it before it releases everywhere else.” This is the fixed version. Yes. I still have issues with Rook.

Pete Wright:
Here’s the thing. Here’s the problem I have. Fundamentally, we didn’t need it to be Rook. We didn’t need his face. They’ve already demonstrated in this movie that they have other android faces. Andy is another android face. Why do we have to care that this — I mean, this is horrific fan service done badly.

Andy Nelson:
I will disagree with this point.

Pete Wright:
Really?

Andy Nelson:
I actually really like that it’s another Ash model — whatever the model is. It’s the same model that has Ash and Rook in it, just like the model that has David and Walter.

Pete Wright:
Is it a shame that I already forgot Walter’s voice?

Andy Nelson:
This is —

Pete Wright:
Now I’m so glad he’s back.

Andy Nelson:
This is an opportunity to have that same type in here. And I actually kind of like that they did it. I struggle with the look — I definitely have that issue. But I think it plays well for me that it’s the same model we had in Alien, and that it seems to be the model that the corporation has come up with to do all of its most secret, covert, and illegal work. So it plays for me. I really like it. I struggle with the look, but I’m a fan of it being the Ian Holm identity as this particular android.

Pete Wright:
But you know what makes me crazy about it? Just hear me out. They have just one secret-model android, right? Let’s just say that’s true. Then you have all these secret-model androids that all apparently have different names. And now you’re in a position where any time you’re talking to a secret-model android, you have to say, “Wait, what’s your name?” That seems crazy to me — that they’re going to make essentially identical minions when they have the ability to create differentiating features: different skin colors, different faces, different body types. It seems like a crazy loophole. I think it’s a weird choice.

Andy Nelson:
In the world —

Pete Wright:
Now — but hang on. That’s the Watsonian argument, like, in the movie. To me it’s just a ridiculous thing.

Andy Nelson:
But I’m gonna go —

Pete Wright:
I know you’re gonna — The Doylist part is: you try stuff with your effects engine and your fancy masks, and then somebody has to be grown-up enough to look at the team and say, “This isn’t playing. People will be pissed. We have to choose a different actor to make this work. There are better ways to do this. This is broken and it’s not worth the fan service.” I rest my case.

Andy Nelson:
Okay, a couple of things. One — regarding fan service, had this been the only moment of fan service, I still would have been totally fine with it. I think this genuinely plays, and I think it’s an interesting, albeit off-putting element because of the look. But here’s the thing — I also struggle with fake Ian Holm at the end of Alien, when it’s the head and it’s supposed to look like him and there’s that edit where it cuts and it’s like, okay, now it’s actually just Ian Holm with his head through a hole.

Pete Wright:
Yeah.

Andy Nelson:
So I buy it. I can let myself go enough to say, okay, I’ll buy it.

So anyway, that’s the fan service element. In the story — the Watsonian element — it’s like a model. You look at, say, Star Wars action figures: they’re going to put out the same thing for a long time until they come up with a new version and say, “Okay, this one’s going to be different. It’s an upgrade.” Or — for your case — Macintosh computers: they’re going to have a certain look for a while, and then they’ll have the next model.

Pete Wright:
I am thrilled that you’re doing — that you’re putting this on recorded media.

Andy Nelson:
I’m forgetting all my model names. It’s terrible. Anyway, they’re all the different models, but they look the same. And then: “Oh, we need an upgrade. Let’s do a full upgrade. We’ve got all these new things to integrate, and now we’ve got the next model.” In this world, chronologically, it’s going to start with the Ian Holm model, and then it’s going to move to the David Jonsson model — Andy — and then to the Lance Henriksen model. And we’ve got the David model way at the beginning. So we’ve got these different models, and within each model there are various upgrades. Like the David model went through internal upgrades and they got the Walter model. Same thing with Ash, and eventually they got to Rook. And then at some point they said, “Okay, we really need a new model. Let’s redo it all.” And now we’ve got the Andy model. In story, that’s the way that works.

Pete Wright:
Okay.

Andy Nelson:
It’s not like Cabbage Patch Kids where they just make a whole bunch and say, “You’re Ash, and you’re Rook, and you’re Tommy, and you’re Jillian.”

Pete Wright:
Oh my god, there’s a Jillian. Jillian and Tommy — what ships are they on?

Andy Nelson:
You’re right.

Pete Wright:
Okay.

Andy Nelson:
So anyway, that’s my view of the world.

Pete Wright:
So let’s just say I buy that.

Andy Nelson:
Okay.

Pete Wright:
How many years — and your premise is solid — after Alien is this? It’s many years.

Andy Nelson:
Oh, I think they’re going to —

Pete Wright:
Isn’t it like seventy years after, and like four years before Aliens?

Andy Nelson:
It’s not four years before. Alien timeline. Prometheus is set in 2093 to 2094. Well, that’s weird — Prometheus takes place over like a twenty-four-hour period. Oh, that’s right, it’s New Year’s. They celebrate the holiday. Alien: Covenant is 2104.

Pete Wright:
Uh-huh.

Andy Nelson:
Alien: Earth is 2120. Alien, 2122.

Pete Wright:
Yep.

Andy Nelson:
Alien: Romulus, 2142. So this is 20 years after Alien.

Pete Wright:
Okay, twenty years after Alien.

Andy Nelson:
Aliens, 2179 — so 37 years later. Alien 3, same year, 2179.

Pete Wright:
Oh, so Aliens is 37 years after this?

Andy Nelson:
Twenty years after Alien, right. Yeah. And Alien 3. And then Alien: Resurrection jumps two hundred years.

Pete Wright:
Got it.

Andy Nelson:
And then the Alien vs. Predator movies are actually set around 2002. So they’re technically the earliest films in the franchise.

Pete Wright:
The earliest.

Andy Nelson:
Yeah.

Pete Wright:
That’s bonkers.

Andy Nelson:
Yeah.

Pete Wright:
Okay.

Andy Nelson:
So — sidebar. I’m going to do my own little sidebar. Apparently there’s an Easter egg in here that I have never seen, because I wasn’t watching for it. At the beginning of this film, we see them go to the wreck of the Nostromo and pick up — they find the alien, which apparently in space the alien can protect itself by cocooning itself, freezing, and then when it thaws out it can be reborn again.

Pete Wright:
New superpower.

Andy Nelson:
Again. Yeah, new superpower. So they get the alien, they bring it to the Renaissance station where our story is set. Apparently, Pete — if you look carefully — they also caught the pod that Ripley escapes on.

Pete Wright:
What?

Andy Nelson:
Yeah.

Pete Wright:
How have I never seen that?

Andy Nelson:
It’s called the Narcissus — the small star-class sub-emergency vessel. She escapes in the Narcissus. In one of the shots of our space station, we actually see that they not only caught the alien, they caught the Narcissus. They have it sitting there. They’ve left Sigourney Weaver and her cat in stasis. And then when the thing crashes into the rings around the planet, the narcissist — you see it float off into space. I don’t know if it ejects, but it floats off in some crazy direction and floats for another thirty-seven years before it’s picked up again — before Aliens. Like, what a weird Easter egg to throw in as a way to say, “Oh, but they also knew where Ripley was, and now she got away again.” What a weird thing.

Pete Wright:
That’s funny. I thought all of my problems with the movie happened after a certain point.

Andy Nelson:
Oh, yeah.

Pete Wright:
So calling it a fan service vehicle is fair. I just don’t think all of the fan service is bad.

Andy Nelson:
Okay, so we’ve got Bjorn showing Rain how to use the gun, much like Aliens. We’ve got that moment pulled from Aliens.

Pete Wright:
I don’t care about that. That’s fine.

Andy Nelson:
What about “get away from her, you bitch”?

Pete Wright:
I have a problem with that. I didn’t care for that.

Andy Nelson:
Okay. So we’ve got one problem with the glitchy line redux.

Pete Wright:
Yep.

Andy Nelson:
Same thing — you quoted it at the beginning — we’ve got a repeat of Ash’s final line. Now Rook is saying it.

Pete Wright:
Yeah.

Andy Nelson:
What about that?

Pete Wright:
I have less of a problem with that, because again — android language models. It’s not perfect.

Andy Nelson:
You think it was programmed? Like that’s his standard goodbye message?

Pete Wright:
That’s what I think. So he says goodbye to everyone.

Andy Nelson:
Oh my god. You see, you just made it better.

Pete Wright:
You leveled it up.

Andy Nelson:
Whatever. Anyway, it’s so good. Yeah — that’s hilarious if that’s what he always says.

Pete Wright:
Okay. Yeah.

Andy Nelson:
The black goo. Now, granted, it’s a plot element — but we get the black goo here.

Pete Wright:
Yeah. Yes, it is a plot element. And all right, let’s just say I don’t love it, because I don’t love the prequels — I feel like a full reset would have allowed us to separate ourselves from this. But it is a plot element. They do use it and it becomes central to the third-act climactic fight.

Andy Nelson:
Yeah, right. It’s an important part of the story. And as it ties into the Prometheus and Alien: Covenant story logic — what the black goo does, how it’s used, how it’s manipulated — here we get the manipulation of it by the lab to create this thing they inject later in the film. The Offspring is kind of a recreation of both the Newborn from Alien: Resurrection and the Engineers we see, particularly the one at the beginning of Prometheus.

Pete Wright:
Yeah. This is a thing I just keep coming back to with the Alien movies and this film just drives it home — they keep changing the aliens. And if they keep saying this alien is the perfect killing machine, the perfect specimen — is it always the perfect specimen if it keeps changing? Like, is it just the most perfect they’ve ever seen?

Andy Nelson:
And then they go, “Oh, you know what? Now it’s even more perfect.”

Pete Wright:
Now it’s even more perfect. The next movie, don’t worry, it’s going to be more perfect.

Andy Nelson:
Yeah. Although they always beat it, so is it actually?

Pete Wright:
Is it actually perfect? This is a fundamental flaw. And I don’t love how they keep changing it. And — controversial hot take — I think the final form in this movie looks really stupid.

Andy Nelson:
I don’t know how controversial that is. It’s an odd element we have here. I may prefer the funky looking Ian Holm to the weird — I don’t know — Engineeromorph. I’m not exactly sure what they’re going for with that thing.

Pete Wright:
Engineeromorph.

Andy Nelson:
It’s such a weird-looking bébé. I mean, that’s a big bébé that they ended up with. Yeah.

Pete Wright:
It is a big debate.

Andy Nelson:
Alright. Well, anyway — my biggest gripe with this film is that I felt like Alvarez is constantly winking at the audience. He can’t trust the story to stand on its own and feels the need to throw in constant references from all the other films. It makes me feel like I’m not watching an original movie set in this world — I’m watching a greatest hits. And that is incredibly frustrating for me.

Pete Wright:
I can absolutely see that. It is a lot. And I feel like I don’t mind the occasional wink, but this movie is a bit made up of winks. And all the stuff it does well — it does take you out of the movie for a beat. And I think that’s a problem.

Andy Nelson:
Yeah. All right, we’re going to take a quick break, but first you can find the show on YouTube and you can join us live when we record. We’ll even take your questions in the post-show chit-chat. And members get the full post-show conversation and always know what to listen to next. Subscribe to The Next Reel on YouTube. The link to this episode is in the show notes. We’ll be right back.

Pete Wright:
Okay, so we’ve been ranting for a while.

Andy Nelson:
Yeah, good rant.

Pete Wright:
It was a good rant. But let’s take a step back and talk about some of the effects stuff. My goodness.

Andy Nelson:
Yes, so good. I love what they do here. We were just ripping on the big final Offspring alien. It still looks great. The physical effects of that — of that basketball player in the outfit — it looks really cool. It looks physically there. It’s frightening in the way they did so much physically with the aliens — not only bringing old effects teams back who had worked on the previous films and doing upgrades to the suits to actually enhance what they’re capable of, particularly with the facehuggers and the chestburster — everything actually feels like it’s there. And I think it does the job that the two prequels never could, because so much of those films is digital.

Pete Wright:
Yeah, I think that’s right. And this is a note we already made: when you look at the effects, it feels very much like these belong between Alien and Aliens. It feels present in that space. And I think that’s a huge win. Everything feels really grounded — even with all the wonderful work by digital artists to make these effects sing. This hybrid approach works very, very well.

Andy Nelson:
What do you think of the new phase of evolution we see in this movie? It goes from the facehugger laying the egg in the body, chestburster popping out — and we’ve never seen how the chestburster suddenly gets to be so big. Now we have a new phase where the chestburster cocoons itself as it grows into the full-sized xenomorph. We see that when they discover it and try to stick the cattle prod in and it spits alien acid back in his face. What do you think of that new phase?

Pete Wright:
I like it. I like that they’re filling in that gap. It’s a gap we’ve at least subconsciously had since Alien, right? There is a point where it’s fourteen inches long and then it’s nine feet tall.

Andy Nelson:
It’s like — is it eating a lot? What is it?

Pete Wright:
Right. What is it eating?

Andy Nelson:
How does it get so big?

Pete Wright:
Right. But I do want to take a quick trip down Acid for Blood Lane, because there’s a lot of it in this movie and it becomes central to a major action beat. I want to know how it plays for you. They introduce it early. There’s the threat in Rook’s lab where the acid has gone through however many decks. But the corridor scene — where we see the sort of nest, would you call it a nest? The long nest of aliens that have taken over.

Andy Nelson:
They’re always doing something like that. Yeah.

Pete Wright:
At one point she turns off gravity so that she can lay waste to the aliens coming down the corridor, and that leaves a lot of alien blood floating in space. How did this sequence work for you?

Andy Nelson:
It plays really well. I think it’s cool. It’s one of those things where I’m like — okay, I feel like inevitably some acid would probably get pushed toward the floor rather than always just kind of spinning around. So at some point that direction seems plausible. But I buy it. I think it plays well. The concept is fun — because they’re at the very bottom of the space station, and the only thing between them and space is the bottom floor. So if it goes through that, they get sucked into space. I think it plays and it’s kind of fun. Are there times where I’m like, “Is this silly?” Yes. But largely I buy it.

Pete Wright:
It doesn’t take you out of the movie — is what I hear you saying.

Andy Nelson:
No, it doesn’t take me out. I mean, I think it plays okay. It’s one of those moments where I wonder if there could have been another way around it. I really love how the gravity-on, gravity-off element works in the elevator shaft. I think that’s a fantastic way to deal with gravity there.

Pete Wright:
Yes. Oh my goodness.

Andy Nelson:
I don’t know if the hallway is as much a favorite for me as the elevator, but it plays okay.

Pete Wright:
Yeah. The elevator gives us a sense of scale that we don’t really get elsewhere, which I think is great. It’s a giant space station, and that elevator shaft is a big deal. I like it. I think it’s a solid play.

The corridor sequence is great, but the thing that takes me out of it is your point: it is a little unbelievable that there isn’t more acid being thrust and drifting through — just from the propulsion of the aliens as they are being massacred in what is now called the Romulus Alien Holocaust — what she does to this entire species in this corridor. And we don’t have more risk until it leads to an ultimately risky sequence. And for a movie that is super practical, it seems like a risky gambit to put a sequence where everything’s digital. The greatest threat is digital, and all of their acrobatics are moving around between digital artifacts. It starts to look just a little bit created compared to the rest of the movie.

Andy Nelson:
Yeah, I can definitely feel that. I like the action sequence, but to your point, it’s on the lower end for me.

Pete Wright:
Lower end of the action sequences in a movie with some really good action sequences. So — yeah. It’s fine.

Andy Nelson:
Yeah, absolutely.

Pete Wright:
Okay. Was there more you wanted to talk about with the elevator?

Andy Nelson:
I think it’s a great way to play that — them trying to get up and down this shaft with no elevator in anti-gravity, the aliens pursuing them, a gun stuck somewhere. It’s well crafted. I think in the scope of things it’s an action sequence that is well designed and they pull it off.

Pete Wright:
What’d you think — if we move away from the effects and action sequences — Galo Olivares is the DP on this. What’d you think of how it was shot and colored?

Andy Nelson:
I liked the look of the whole thing going more orange as opposed to the bluer tones we had seen in the previous films. I love the production design of this space station — the separate halves, the Romulus half and the Remus half, and how they both have a different feel. And the way they crafted it — could they have done more cinematographically to create more of a horror space as opposed to just an action thriller space? Maybe. But I still think it looks great. It was well put together. Look at the planet at the beginning — it feels very much like a planet where you’re living and you just never see the sun. They pull that off.

Pete Wright:
Yeah, I think so too. I think it’s beautiful and lived-in and threatening in its own sort of civil way. And I thought the whole package in terms of the look and feel of the movie is a success.

Andy Nelson:
Yeah, for sure.

Pete Wright:
Let’s see — anybody else? So Cailee Spaeny as Rain. What do you think of her as our lead? This is coming off of an experience with the female lead in the last movie that felt a little bit watered down.

Andy Nelson:
And I will say, in both cases, it feels like the directors are feeling the need to make it very Ripley-esque from Alien. In both cases, they have so many beats that repeat — nods and winks to remind us about Ripley. And I don’t think we needed that, because I think Cailee does a great job on her own. She doesn’t need that.

She does a great job playing this struggling person whose parents have died in this crappy world they’re terraforming in the mines, who has Andy — the only thing in her life — kind of her brother, but secretly not telling him that she’s planning to go to this other place and can’t take him because he’s not allowed. So this is our change character: someone who is hiding things from her own — we’ll just say brother — only to, at the end, say, “You know what, you’re coming with me. We’ll figure things out.” To have that emotional development over the course of this plays really well. I haven’t seen Cailee in anything that I haven’t really enjoyed. I think she’s always been good in what I’ve seen so far.

Pete Wright:
Yeah. I mean, obviously Pacific Rim: Uprising — where she started — I saw her in that.

Andy Nelson:
I don’t even remember her in that.

Pete Wright:
That’s a big crazy action movie.

Andy Nelson:
That’s funny.

Pete Wright:
She started in a short in terms of films — Counting to a Thousand, haven’t seen that. But Bad Times at the El Royale, On the Basis of Sex, Vice. I didn’t see The Craft: Legacy. I don’t think I saw How It Ends either. Oh, Priscilla — she played Priscilla Presley. Civil War, which we covered on The Film Board, not this show. And then Alien: Romulus, Wake Up Dead Man. And she’s going to be with Garland for Elden Ring, filming now. That oughta be something.

Andy Nelson:
Yeah. Civil War was covered on The Film Board, not on this show.

Pete Wright:
Right. Right.

Andy Nelson:
Yeah. I’ve never played Elden Ring.

Pete Wright:
Ah, well, boy, are you in for a treat?

Andy Nelson:
Oh, okay.

Pete Wright:
I’ve never played it either. I’ve watched the playthroughs on YouTube and read stuff about it getting ready to talk about Garland stuff. But —

Andy Nelson:
Well, she is listed as being — she and David Jonsson are the two people attached to Alien: Romulus 2, which is still very much in development.

Pete Wright:
That’s great. I’ll see David Jonsson again in a heartbeat.

Andy Nelson:
The continuing journey of them as they go to their new planet, I guess.

Pete Wright:
Do you think Jillian and Tommy will be there?

Andy Nelson:
I hope so. Oh man.

Pete Wright:
Okay.

Andy Nelson:
Well, I mean — I really enjoy this film. I have a lot of fun with it. I just — the problems really weigh it down for me. But I do have a good time with it. Should we move into the back half?

Pete Wright:
Me too. Let’s do the back half.

Andy Nelson:
All right, let’s do it. First let’s take a quick break.

Pete Wright:
The Next Reel is a production of TruStory FM. Engineering by Andy Nelson. Music by Tzabutan, Jimmy Svensson, Oriol Novella, and Eli Catlin. Andy usually finds all the stats for the awards and numbers at The-Numbers.com, BoxOfficeMojo.com, IMDb.com, and Wikipedia.org. Find the show and the full archive at TruStory.fm. You can follow us from there too, plus you can find out how to become a member and go further with every episode. Check out our merch store at thenextreel.com/merch. And if your app allows ratings and reviews, please consider doing that for our show.

All right, Andy, sequels and remakes. Give it to me.

Andy Nelson:
Well, there was a tie-in prequel comic book that bridged the events from Alien to this. Just a one-issue thing that really focused on this space station Renaissance and gave us more context for what happened after they brought this alien from the Nostromo there. That’s kind of the comic book.

As for a sequel — after this film came out, Alvarez said this: “We really try to think about it more in terms of story and if it needs another chapter and whether people want to know what happens next. So we’ll wait to see what people think and if people ask for it. My philosophy is that you should never make a sequel in two years. You’ve got to get away. You’ve got to get the audience to really want it. If you think about Alien and Aliens, there’s seven years between them. But we definitely have ideas about where it should go.”

He also had this to say, which I kind of love. He said — regarding a third Alien vs. Predator film — “Maybe it’s something I have to co-direct with my buddy Dan Trachtenberg. Maybe we should do like Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez did with From Dusk Till Dawn. I’ll direct a half and he’ll direct a half.”

Pete Wright:
Oh my god.

Andy Nelson:
I would love that so much.

Pete Wright:
I would show up for that, yeah.

Andy Nelson:
Yeah. Then October 2024 — a little later after the film came out — the 20th Century Studios president said, “We’re working on a sequel idea now. We haven’t quite closed our deal with Fede, but we are going to, and he has an idea that we’re working on.” By February 2025, he said he was currently writing the script — it was the next project he was going to do. So going back to his comments about waiting seven years — he’s like, very next year, already doing it. By June, it was in pre-production. And by September 2025, he said the script was done, but he would not return to direct it — he’s only going to remain on as a producer.

Which makes me wonder if it really was a thing where he’s like, “You know what, the world doesn’t need this just yet. If the studio wants to push it, let them do it.” It definitely feels very much like we are in a world controlled by corporate studios that just want to turn stuff out constantly. There was seven years from Alien: Covenant to Alien: Romulus — another big seven-year gap. And now that Disney owns it, I think we’re just going to see stuff getting cranked out constantly. I mean, Alien: Earth is already on TV.

Pete Wright:
Well, it’s fine. And I know I’m on the record having liked Alien: Earth more than you — by, I think, a wide margin, because you liked it so little.

Andy Nelson:
It’s not that I wasn’t enjoying the show as a concept. It’s just that I could not watch these adults acting as children. It was the hardest thing for me to get past. They just couldn’t pull it off, and I thought it was so stupid. I had to stop.

Pete Wright:
I understand.

Andy Nelson:
I made it like two episodes.

Pete Wright:
Yeah. No, I totally get that. And the thing I regret the most is that I kind of liked it. And because of that, they’re just going to keep shoveling it down my throat. I do want more of it, and I hate myself for wanting more of it.

Andy Nelson:
Yeah, yeah.

Pete Wright:
All right. How did it do in award season?

Andy Nelson:
It did okay for itself. 16 wins with 55 other nominations, lots of them in technical categories. At the Oscars, nominated for Best Visual Effects, but lost to Dune: Part Two. At the Saturn Awards, it won for Best Horror Film. It was nominated for Best Film Direction, Production Design, and Visual Effects, but lost to Dune: Part Two. Nominated for Best Makeup, but lost to The Substance. David Jonsson was nominated for Best Supporting Actor, but lost to Hugh Jackman in Deadpool & Wolverine.

This one really left me scratching my head, though, because Cailee Spaeny was nominated for supporting actress.

Pete Wright:
Nope.

Andy Nelson:
What? Like, how is that ever possible?

Pete Wright:
That doesn’t make any sense to me at all. Then who is the actress?

Andy Nelson:
Yeah, right. It makes no sense. “Supporting.”

Pete Wright:
Dora? It’s Alien: Romulus: Dora Gets Pregnant. That makes her the — yeah, it’s really dumb.

Andy Nelson:
It’s so dumb. Yeah. But anyway, she lost to Rebecca Ferguson in Dune: Part Two. Last but not least, the Visual Effects Society Awards — it won for Outstanding Model in a Photoreal or Animated Project for the actual model built of the Renaissance space station.

Pete Wright:
Mm-hmm.

Andy Nelson:
So there you go.

Pete Wright:
All right. How’d it do at the box office?

Andy Nelson:
Well, for Alvarez’s entry into the franchise, he had a budget of eighty million dollars, which is the same in today’s dollars as it was just released two years ago. The movie premiered August 12th, 2024, then opened wide August 16th, opposite My Penguin Friend and Ryan’s World the Movie: Titan Universe Adventure. And this easily took the number one spot. It stayed in the top ten for six weeks and went on to earn $105.3 million domestically and $245.5 million internationally, for a total gross of $350.8 million. In today’s dollars, all told, that lands the film with an adjusted profit per finished minute of almost $2.3 million. A great way to rejuvenate the franchise.

Pete Wright:
I think that is a great way to rejuvenate the franchise. I don’t think there was ever any hope of making a billion-dollar movie out of this entry into this franchise. $350 million on $80 million seems like a noble win for Alvarez.

Andy Nelson:
Well, if anything, it’s a message to Disney that people want more. Make ’em, Disney. Get them on the machine. Start cranking them out.

Pete Wright:
There you are. You make my strong opinion seem so stupid.

Andy Nelson:
No.

Pete Wright:
Like, why am I sending this signal?

Andy Nelson:
No. Hey, I enjoyed it too.

Pete Wright:
Yeah.

Andy Nelson:
If they make stuff we enjoy, where’s the — it’s a hard dance. It’s a hard dance.

Pete Wright:
Yeah, it really is. Well, and that’s why — the Alien franchise for the last two movies spent the entire time trying to be about something that Ridley Scott wanted to say, and then Alien: Romulus decides to be scary instead and succeeds most of the time. I think Fede Alvarez delivers exactly what he needed to deliver for this franchise. And in spite of all of the challenges and the fan service and the problems we have with it, I think for the most part, this was a really satisfying watch.

Andy Nelson:
Yeah. My big gripe is just that I wish that Alvarez trusted the audience and made a film that stood on its own merits, as opposed to feeling like he had to make all these callbacks. That is endlessly frustrating for me.

Pete Wright:
Yeah, I get it.

Andy Nelson:
So yeah.

Pete Wright:
All right. Good film.

Andy Nelson:
Well, that is it for our conversation about Alien: Romulus, and a current wrap on our Alien series until someone decides to return to it. Next week, we’re adding a one-off to our Ellen Burstyn series with Resurrection — the 1980 Daniel Petrie film in which Burstyn plays a woman who, after surviving a near-fatal car accident, discovers she has the ability to heal others. It’s a quiet, deeply felt film that earned Burstyn an Academy Award nomination for Best Actress, and one that sits well outside the mainstream — more spiritual drama than genre film. We’ll dig into why it matters and why Burstyn is so extraordinary in it next week. Let’s do our ratings.

Pete Wright:
Letterboxd.com/thenextreel — that’s where you can find our HQ page where we review all of the films that we talk about on the show. Andy, what are you going to do for Romulus?

Andy Nelson:
I enjoy it. I have a lot of fun with it, but the fan service, man — I just roll my eyes as much as I enjoy this film. So three stars and a heart is where I sit with this one.

Pete Wright:
Yeah, you know — I don’t feel as strongly as you do about the fan service. But I still remain unconvinced about the model numbers of the super-secret spy androids. And I think that was just a really poor decision, and it took me right out of the movie in a way that has never succeeded at bringing me back at the same level. It is a massive interruption and a hard left turn for me when I watch this movie. And I hate the final alien character design — I think it looks really dumb. And so as a result, I’m at three stars and a heart too.

Andy Nelson:
All right. Well, that’s an easy average. We end up at three stars and a heart. That’s over at our account on Letterboxd, which you can find at @thenextreel. You can find me there at @sodacreekfilm and Pete at @petewright. So what did you think about Alien: Romulus? We would love to hear your thoughts. Hop into the Show Talk channel over in our Discord community where we will be talking about the movie this week.

Pete Wright:
When the movie ends.

Andy Nelson:
Our conversation begins.

Pete Wright:
Letterboxd together, Andrew.

Andy Nelson:
As Letterboxd always doeth.

Pete Wright:
All right. There are a lot of likes on the popular reviews.

Andy Nelson:
Yes, there are.

Pete Wright:
And so we’re not going to bend to the tides. We’re just going to read some popular ones. What’s yours?

Andy Nelson:
Mine is Srirachachau — two stars, no heart. “I don’t even hate The Force Awakens, but I’m not sure if Alien needed its own Force Awakens.”

Pete Wright:
Okay, that’s actually pretty good. There’s a lot going on in that one. I have a four-star from Louis Peitzman who says, “I’m starting to feel like the Weyland-Yutani Corporation does not have our best interests at heart.”

What if you had never seen an Alien movie and you started with Prometheus?

Andy Nelson:
Oh.

Pete Wright:
Think about that.

Andy Nelson:
And then go where?

Pete Wright:
Straight through.

Andy Nelson:
Just all chronological?

Pete Wright:
In chronological order. What does that do for your viewing experience?

Andy Nelson:
Well, no — you’d have to start with Alien vs. Predator.

Pete Wright:
Okay, that presumes they’re all canon, and I don’t know that I stand by that.

Andy Nelson:
Okay. Well —

Pete Wright:
Let’s just take the films. What does that do to your viewing experience? You see the Engineers first and the discovery — they make this weird thing — and then suddenly it’s Ripley? That’s such a weird leap. I don’t think I’ve ever thought about this. That may be a really weird leap. Or not a weird leap at all. Maybe it makes total sense. Oh god — were they secretly geniuses? Just not for us?

Andy Nelson:
I think there would be a drastic shift going from Alien: Covenant — if you throw Alien: Earth in there — and then landing on Alien. And going, “Whoa, why is everything suddenly so dirty now and old looking?”

Pete Wright:
Yeah.

Andy Nelson:
Like, I think that is a hard thing. But story-wise, it’s an interesting idea to see that evolution. I don’t know. Maybe one day I will actually watch it that way just to get a read on how things play in chronological order.

Pete Wright:
Because you’re meeting Rook after meeting Ash — directly. Yeah, I don’t know, man. I don’t know how to clear my head enough to take those in authentically in order. All right. Bad idea. Don’t do it. I don’t recommend it. This show does not stand behind that. Thanks, Letterboxd.