Hello and welcome back to another week of mindless movie reviews. It’s September now, which means those of you tired of the heat will be getting better weather soon. For me, Summer is still prime movie release season, so I have no shortage of content to consume. I really wanted to go back, re-watch all of the Alien films, then do a top six before Romulus came out, but with my busy schedule, I couldn’t fit it in. So I will jump into this knowing my Alien history is about a year or so away from being current. You may say I’m crazy, but I will remind you that I am merely just mindless. Mindless or not, we need to get this started, so let me drop in a quick spoiler warning. If you haven’t seen this yet, then check out some of my other reviews here
Ok, if you’ve chosen to move forward, then let’s get right into it. Alien: Romulus is the latest (and seventh overall) installment of the Alien franchise. This one is directed by Fede Alvarez, who’s directed some really good horror flicks in the past decade, and features a pretty new cast of young actors and actresses. Thanks to CinemaBlend (Alien Movie Timeline Explained: All Alien Movies In Order, Chronologically And By Release Date | Cinemablend), I know the exact timeline order for these movies, which helps coming into this one. So, Alien: Romulus takes place between the first two films (Alien and Aliens).
The main cast of characters here are Rain (Cailee Spaeny) and her “brother” Andy (David Jonsson) who is actually an android that was built by Rain’s parents to watch over her. They meet up with a small group who are going to try to escape not just their planet, but their lives as well. They don’t want to end up dying early like their parents who were stuck working in mines all their lives. The group is made up of Tyler (Archie Renaux), Kay (Isabela Merced), Bjorn (Spike Fearn), and Navarro (Aileen Wu). Together, they decide to steal a ship with cryo pods so they can make it to a better place that is 9 years away.
Like any good Alien movie, the build-up is slow to start as we get a brief backstory and a few tense moments. But the action dials up as soon as the aliens hatch and start causing chaos across the ship. Navarro is the first one to attacked and despite their best efforts, the rest of them aren’t able to save her as one of the Xenomorphs hatch from inside her (a nice callback from the original movie). This is also where we get to see Rook. Holm played an android named Ash in the 1979 movie, so it was neat to see his likeness used for the Alien franchise again four years after his death.
After Rook’s warnings go unheeded, Bjorn takes Kay and Navarro with him trying to leave the other three behind. When the newly hatched Xenomorph attacks, the ship crashes leaving them stuck. By the time Rain, Andy, and Tyler make it to them, it’s nearly too late as Bjorn is dead and Kay is taken. I mentioned this last week, but it still holds true this week as well, but too much coincidental stuff happens in movies anymore. Maybe it’s always been that way and I’m just being to critical nowadays, but I really feel like it’s a consistent issue anymore. Write a movie and create your world, but stay in your world once you are there. But, I digress.
I loved the scene where they raise the room temperature to match their body temperature so the hatchlings won’t sense them, that was a nice intense sequence. Of course, by the time they get through to save Kay, Tyler is now dead and Kay injects herself with the serum that was found in a lab. The same serum that caused a rat to come back to life, but also grow really quickly. As we move towards the climax, I have to say that I enjoyed this quite a bit. Not only were the graphics on point, but it also held true to the Alien lore (to the best of my knowledge at least).
After another fun scene in the elevator shaft, it seems like we might have 3 survivors for this one… Nope. While Rain is getting ready to put herself in a cryo pod, Kay’s pod starts to flash and Rain opens it up to find out that her baby (she was pregnant at that start of the movie) is coming and what happens next is borderline horrifying and neat all at the same time. The baby that comes out is a mixture of a human and a xenomorph and it is quite the site to see. One final battle as Rain fights for her life. In the end both her and her “brother” survive and live to see another sequel… I mean day.
Like I said, I’m a bit rusty on my Alien films but this one was solid. A lot of fun, a good story that fits into the timeline without breaking anything, and lots of action and horror mixed in. Graphics wise, it’s obviously leaps and bounds over the first set of films, but the story isn’t quite as good. However, I would place this over the top of the newer films in turns of story. It’s not hard to follow along and they keep it pretty simple (with lots of complex stuff going on in the background).
In the end, I give this a 7 out of 10. I’m not sure anything could ever live up to the original one. But I do like how this one was filmed.
What are your thoughts? Have you made it out to see this yet? How would you rank this compared to the other Alien films? Let me know in the comments. Thanks and I will be back next week with another mindless movie review.
