I dont really expect much from these films anymore, so wont be disappointed either way. Something to watch while I eat, as usual.. I dont know why I only watch TV when eating these days, is it just me?
tauist wrote: Finally the bugs get to eat terra. Excited!
I dont really expect much from these films anymore, so wont be disappointed either way. Something to watch while I eat, as usual.. I dont know why I only watch TV when eating these days, is it just me?
I mean technically Aliens have already gone rampant on earth if we assume the Alien vs Predator movie duology remains canon.
That's what we (and I assume most people) were calling Alien3 before we heard it was going to be called that.
Didn't William Gibson (or some other well known Sci-fi author get his script talked about a lot) write for Aliens, set on or near an Earth? [It was on a station, and a sequel to Aliens. So, probably not relevant.]
kyrtuck wrote: What was so bad about Alien vs Predator? I thought it was an enjoyable action romp. The 2nd one was kinda meh.
For me it was mainly setting it in modern times. I think it would have been better transposing the predator into the future, rather than transposing the alien back to now. Also the idea that ther was a secret overly complex hunting ground on earth that somehow hadn't leaked an Alien to wipe us all out was a premise too far for me.
The Dark Horse (i think) comic did a much better job, and I had read that first. The original FPS game also did a much better job, and I had also played that first.
even better then! Its not going to top "Raised by Wolves" by any means, but at least there will be more of it.. because, lets face it, the Aliens franchise isnt know for its "difficulty", so I bet it wont get canceled just when it starts to really take off
kyrtuck wrote: What was so bad about Alien vs Predator? I thought it was an enjoyable action romp. The 2nd one was kinda meh.
For me it was mainly setting it in modern times. I think it would have been better transposing the predator into the future, rather than transposing the alien back to now. Also the idea that ther was a secret overly complex hunting ground on earth that somehow hadn't leaked an Alien to wipe us all out was a premise too far for me.
The Dark Horse (i think) comic did a much better job, and I had read that first. The original FPS game also did a much better job, and I had also played that first.
Not to mention staggeringly incompetent Predators.
Incompetence and teen tend to meld together very well usually. There's a reason one of them giant swung an alien through stone pillars rather than going for a practical kill.
Eh, gotta agree with MDG, considering they were equipped with proper Predator tech (and not just being left with primitive weapons/bare hands) in their hunt, they should have accomplished a lot more in their showing in AVP. There's a better way to show inexperience than being borderline useless in killing aliens, especially when hunting dangerous species is a big part of their culture and presumably they've had some form of training before completing this rite of passage.
So this looks pretty good, but so did Romulus and I didn't much care for that. I'm baffled by how much people seem to like that movie, it tries so hard to ape iconic moments from the rest of the franchise that it forgets to do anything novel of its own.
Well, you can just about flipping well get out, can’t you! (This Is A Joke. You do you and enjoy what you enjoy )
Also….I don’t think we’ve been explicit about the trailer, but it’s not just me…..that was a Predator ship, yeah? And I’m sure I heard that signature throaty gravelly crackle?
creeping-deth87 wrote: So this looks pretty good, but so did Romulus and I didn't much care for that. I'm baffled by how much people seem to like that movie, it tries so hard to ape iconic moments from the rest of the franchise that it forgets to do anything novel of its own.
Romulus was a safe movie. Didn’t do anything to out of line. Fleshed out the universe, had some cool scenes. I do think it punched the nostalgia button a little too hard and a little too often.
I don’t think it had enough high points to warrant making it anyones’s favorite entry in the franchise, but it was a solid addition.
That's what we (and I assume most people) were calling Alien3 before we heard it was going to be called that.
Didn't William Gibson (or some other well known Sci-fi author get his script talked about a lot) write for Aliens, set on or near an Earth? [It was on a station, and a sequel to Aliens. So, probably not relevant.]
Gibson did a treatment for Alien³ that was set on a quarantine/research station near earth (various earth power struggle things between some sort of "Communist China" style block and the capitalist corporation-states we already knew form the B-plot). It has been turned into a novel, and more interestingly, a comic (the next-best thing to a movie) - it's also profoundly weird, and i mean Prometheus-level weird:
That's what we (and I assume most people) were calling Alien3 before we heard it was going to be called that.
Didn't William Gibson (or some other well known Sci-fi author get his script talked about a lot) write for Aliens, set on or near an Earth? [It was on a station, and a sequel to Aliens. So, probably not relevant.]
Gibson did a treatment for Alien³ that was set on a quarantine/research station near earth (various earth power struggle things between some sort of "Communist China" style block and the capitalist corporation-states we already knew form the B-plot). It has been turned into a novel, and more interestingly, a comic (the next-best thing to a movie) - it's also profoundly weird, and i mean Prometheus-level weird:
Flinty wrote: And coming after the utter drivel that was Covenant and Prometheus, Romulus gains so much more from the comparison.
Honestly, I don't agree, but I'll concede I'm in the minority of alien fans here. For all that's wrong with Prometheus and Covenant, they at least tried to do something new with the franchise. Romulus is just creatively bankrupt nostalgia berries, exactly the sort of 'safe' filmmaking that gave us the sequel trilogy. If Hollywood insists on continuously dragging these venerable franchises back to theaters, I would rather they gave us fresh takes instead of a reskinned highlight reel of everything that made those older movies good.
I don’t think they did anything new. They followed the typical themes of landing unexpectedly on an alien planet, getting attacked, birthing monsters and then blasting the monster apart with the ship exhaust. It’s just that Prometheus and Covenant did it with the biggest sets of utter morons this side of Orion. The only thing really new they did was expand on the Engineer race a bit, but then ended up genociding them before it mattered at all. Fire Team Elite did a better job of exploring the Engineers than either film.
Romulus tied a lot of the previous concepts together.
We get a non-crap looking weirdo hybrid. We get a genuinely convincing reason why The Company is so hellbent on obtaining the Xenomorph - the black goo, so they can forcibly evolve humans to survive on worlds other than Earth with ease.
We learn that Facehuggers hunt by temperature and sound - and see an interesting solution to that.
We learn The Company has a form of indentured servitude, and can just shift the rules whenever it wants.
Our heroes actually have a pretty solid plan to get to a new world. And all was going well until the Facehuggers got released.
Nobody, and I mean nobody, does anything inexplicably dumb. OK, Mr Smoking Weed Is My Entire Personality really shouldn’t have cattleprodded the cocoon, but he’s angry and clearly a dumbass anyway. So yes it’s stupid, but not inexplicably “my what fascinating black goo, I’m gonna lick it for science!” stupid.
Flinty wrote: And coming after the utter drivel that was Covenant and Prometheus, Romulus gains so much more from the comparison.
Honestly, I don't agree, but I'll concede I'm in the minority of alien fans here. For all that's wrong with Prometheus and Covenant, they at least tried to do something new with the franchise.
I think the long standing fans of these clapped out old franchises (aliens, Star Wars, etc) don’t really want anything new. They want something very familiar with a very, very slight change to the window dressing.
Watched the trailer and it’s more aliens. There is nothing new and interesting that can be done with this stuff it’s been absolutely milked dry over the years. The monster just isn’t scary anymore due to familiarity and no amount of ‘lore’ can fix that.
Maybe the xenomorph will be taken out by something new... and different... and....
Yeah, I don't believe it will happen either.
Ooh... Aliens Vs. Predator: Requiem is available to watch for free... wonder if it's the director's cut with the kid enjoying the chestburster (Buddy's buddy )?
Flinty wrote: And coming after the utter drivel that was Covenant and Prometheus, Romulus gains so much more from the comparison.
Honestly, I don't agree, but I'll concede I'm in the minority of alien fans here. For all that's wrong with Prometheus and Covenant, they at least tried to do something new with the franchise.
I think the long standing fans of these clapped out old franchises (aliens, Star Wars, etc) don’t really want anything new. They want something very familiar with a very, very slight change to the window dressing.
Watched the trailer and it’s more aliens. There is nothing new and interesting that can be done with this stuff it’s been absolutely milked dry over the years. The monster just isn’t scary anymore due to familiarity and no amount of ‘lore’ can fix that.
The fix is to have interesting characters do interesting things in the known setting. Romulus did that to a degree Covenant and Prometheus did not, and earned itself some goodwill for it.
Also I'm pretty sure the moral of most movies is that the real monster is man, usually in the form of company men. Yeah, we are by now entirely familiar with that dreadful species and it'd be best to bin the whole concept, but I don't know. Stories about humans just keep coming back. I don't know why that is.
Also also Alien hasn't yet gone the Star Wars route of exploring the larger political situation of the setting. That's an easy way to expand it. I'm hoping for stunning sessions of megacorp trade council meetings myself.
Also I'm pretty sure the moral of most movies is that the real monster is man
Always thought this was a trite idea.
Maybe I’m wrong, but based on that trailer it’ll just be more of the same heated up slop we’ve seen for the past 30 years.
At least Ridley tried some Chariot of the Gods nonsense with Prometheus. It was also pretty ropey but at least it attempted something new.
It wouldn't have been bad if they didn't humanize the engineers.
Here is the thing. We KNOW the engineers were not human-like AT ALL in Alien. The Space Jockey that was fossilized to his chair is both larger then the engineers are presented in Promethius AND that wasn't a space suit it was it's skull. You could SEE it.
The thing about Alien is these monsters are meant to BE Alien. Not in the it's from outer space sense. In the not at all like mankind almost unknowable sense. The Xenomorphs are horrid monsters whose only knowable motivation appeared to be an absolute malice. The Space Jockey's could have engineered mankind. But the why and what for and their own nature should have remained absolutely inhuman and unknown.
Ridley's new concept was flawed from inception. And it wasn't particularly new either. Star Gate did like 15 seasons across 3 shows and 4 movies on that gak.
I'm not confident doing anything interesting with the Engineers would have saved Prometheus and Covenant. Even with that element improved both movies are still Aliens vs Idiots vs Robot with Daddy Issues, and in the case of Prometheus the Aliens part is marginal at best. As long as the exploration of the Engineers happens in that narrative context, I doubt it matters what exactly is done with the the Engineers.
Pistols at Dawn wrote: Maybe I’m wrong, but based on that trailer it’ll just be more of the same heated up slop we’ve seen for the past 30 years.
Out of curiosity, what would have been an interesting way to take the franchise to you?
Dysartes wrote: Be careful not to accidentally cut yourself there, Mr Edgy.
I’ll try, but it’s hard to keep concentration when I’m so busy watching all these really, really, really amazing sequels and prequels and spin offs.
You're not wrong, nothing after Aliens has really proven that the franchise should have continued after that. Even Romulus (which has massive props for going back to practical effects) is really nothing more than rehashed ideas and "look at all these moments were referencing". Things need to know when to bow out gracefully, rather than be dragged through the mud. Half a dozen of the comics are pretty good though.
The alien is no longer the scariest part of the franchise. After Aliens, it’s hard not to see them as merely dangerous animals, essentially wolves with acid blood. But the soulless, corporation run future, that still hits. The sequel to aliens I would want to see would barely have any xenomorph a in it, except maybe as a mcguffin for the main conflict, something that typifies the companies’ exploitation of all life as commodities.
What I like about the Black Goo angle is it does make a kind of sense.
We see it in 40K, genetic tailoring used to rapidly adapt colonists to new worlds and environments, giving them the best possible chance to thrive and survive.
Weyland Yutani’s desire there is also understandable. But what we see in Romulus are colonists as indentured servants. Sure, the company will pay for your ticket to the colonies, and the deal is you work it off. Nothing inherently wrong with that. But then….the Company can and does just unilaterally shift the goalposts.
We see our heroine complete her contracted quota. But…. Feth You. We’ve decided your quota just increaswd. From 12,032 hours to 24,000 hours.
For context, earlier in that scene we hear an announcement that Day Shift is beginning. That suggests two shifts, and I’ll assume 12 hours per shift.
12,032 hours is 501 days. So, 1002 days to complete, or around 2.75 years - not allowing for days off, sickness etc. Office Lady actually says it’d be around another 5-6 years, so perhaps it’s less than 12 hours per shift.
And what can you do about it? Nobody much cares if you arse around in space worthy ships. Because the cryosleep stuff is strictly regulated, and none of you bums are allowed any. Until you complete your quota.
That’s….far more evil than “mwahahaha we am has living weapon” stuff. That’s possibly bordering on outright slavery. If Weyland Yutani ever cracked the Black Goo as the tool it wanted? You’re even more stuffed, as there’s little to stop them ensuring you can only survive on whichever colony they put you on. Or do a Jem Hadar and get you genetically addicted to something only it can provide. Which you’ll only get if you’re a good little modified monkey.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Also, props again for their plan being a good one. They know where they need to go, and adapt on the fly when they need the cryosauce.
If it hadn’t been the same cryosauce keeping Facehuggers on ice? It would’ve worked. And Romulus station would’ve been destroyed in the rings over Jackson’s Hole.
Everything after Alien is an adventure story in an established universe. There is a valuable place for adventure stories, even if they don't bring anything particularly new. Spectacle is a thing, and seeing a competently told tale is satisfying in and of itself. Also, for some, Romulus will be the entry point to the series and a lot of it will be new.
Prometheus and Covenant make such a hash of the central characters and situation that the lovely graphics and set design couldn't do enough to make them enjoyable films.
@MDG, that company f—ery sounds like the kind of horror I was looking for. The black goo…eh. It’s too attached to Prometheus to cause me any reaction other than cringing. And they already have synthetic humans to explore similar themes.
I don’t know. Maybe I’ve just had enough Aliens for a while.
One of the things that I really liked about Romulus is that I think every single decision that the humans make is believable in their context. They are a bunch of ill-educated teenage delinquents from a mining colony. They have technical knowledge from their work and environment, but limited knowledge about anything outside their planet, certainly no knowledge about alien life of any kind, they’re trying to escape from a desperate situation using illegal methods and they’re full of the arrogance and impetuousness of youth.
So every mistake they make, every impulsive decision is completely understandable. Unlike certain other entries in the franchise…
I wouldn’t say they even do anything objectively stupid.
As noted, it all goes wrong when they grab the cryogas. Something their plan required.
If anything, their mistake was not stopping to think “wait, what is this currently being used for?”.
But then…..as far as they were concerned, the station was a derelict. So I can understand not checking every last thing. And Andy not having clearance to open lockdown doors I can file under unforeseen due to inexperience.
“a group of underdogs find themselves in a deserted planet/spaceship/facility and wander around for a bit. Eventually one of them decides to stick their face right next to the weird creepy egg and gets attacked. The monster appears and picks off most of the cast until a big finale where they kill it”
There you go there’s the story of every aliens sequel, prequel and spin off past and present. That’s all it’s ever going to be.
So even better, Romulus is the most profitable of the three. Especially when you factor in that, reputedly, the filming budget is typically matched by the marketing budget.
Pistols at Dawn wrote: “a group of underdogs find themselves in a deserted planet/spaceship/facility and wander around for a bit. Eventually one of them decides to stick their face right next to the weird creepy egg and gets attacked. The monster appears and picks off most of the cast until a big finale where they kill it”
There you go there’s the story of every aliens sequel, prequel and spin off past and present. That’s all it’s ever going to be.
That doesn’t sound like either Aliens or Alien 3, or even Alien 4.
Pistols at Dawn wrote: “a group of underdogs find themselves in a deserted planet/spaceship/facility and wander around for a bit. Eventually one of them decides to stick their face right next to the weird creepy egg and gets attacked. The monster appears and picks off most of the cast until a big finale where they kill it”
There you go there’s the story of every aliens sequel, prequel and spin off past and present. That’s all it’s ever going to be.
That doesn’t sound like either Aliens or Alien 3, or even Alien 4.
Nor, the masterpiece known as Alien vs. Predator: Requiem.
Dysartes wrote: Last I checked, doesn't "Hollywood Accounting" need to you to make 2.5x your filming budget to be a success?
Covenant ends up on some real thin ice there, depending on how far north of the minimum it ended up costing.
Something like that.
For a post from yesterday I started watching Romulus again for accurate info. And I come back to finish that watch tonight? I’m struck by another part of its appeal. It’s so well made as a prequel? It could easily be the first Alien movie you see. It doesn’t really spoil much for Alien or Aliens.
Sure, Rook means you know Ash is a synthetic, but not that he’s a dodgy git that’s gonna go loopy. But Alien and Aliens could still serve as prequel and sequel to it, which is nice.
Also, I enjoy rewatching it to spot ever more little details and call backs. Like the set dressing, especially the….lab I guess, they find Rook in? Seamless with the established look of the universe. The overall attention to detail is just superb.
Dysartes wrote: Last I checked, doesn't "Hollywood Accounting" need to you to make 2.5x your filming budget to be a success?
"Hollywood Accounting" just means that the studios have creative ways of determine if a movie was a profitable or not; there is no set number or formula. Probably the most famous example is declaring that Forest Gump made no money so they didn't owe the author of the book anything because his contract was based on net and not gross.
The 2x/2.5x usually usually comes up as a simple way to figure the final cost of the film i.e. production + marketing. If they say a movie cost 90 million then double that to 180 million for the studio to cover all the costs.
Looking great. The Disney era and Alien and Predator seems to be in great hands. Fox had no idea wtf they were doing with the properties for a long time.
Preferably a genius level physicist who gave up his day job to make the lives of those artsy types difficult. Because normal people won't make time travel work any better next time than any other time before.
Exactly who do I need to offer “executive relief” to in order to get The Terminator into similar hands?
I’d kill for a proper Future War series.
Isn’t the future war canonically a tedious grind of attrition? Terminator Salvation tried to give us more of it, and it somehow made it less. On YouTube someone edited together the future war sequences from the first 2 (or 3, unfortunately) movies, which is almost certainly the best way to get that future war fix without further degrading the franchise.
Terminator Salvation is a movie from the 00s, and like many, possibly most such movies, it suffers from the need to take a thing, skin the thing, and then make another thing wear that thing's skin with a big name tag stapled on to make sure everyone knows it is in fact the thing it tries to pass for.
I'm tempted to say we're barely ten years out of that fad. Studios these days seem to do better at making sequels that feel like they respect and build on the originals of old than what we got for the first decade and a half of this century.
Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote: Nope. I’m not fussed for Hard Sci-Fi. Otherwise, many classic series and settings would be much more boring.
Just to point out, I'm not asking for hard sci-fi. If I asked for hard sci-fi with time travel, I'd ask for hard sci-fi without time travel.
Watched the first two episodes of this last night. It's pretty good so far. Some good world-building with expansion on the corporations and a good amount of well-done horror elements. Lots of nods to the franchise without dwelling on things too much. It looks like the initial trailers with looks at all the various alien creatures might be a bit of a misdirect, but maybe not. We'll have to see where things go as far as the crashed ship is concerned. Not sure if the whole season will be set there over quite a compressed timeline, or if this is just the first few episodes.
Spoiler:
Having one group of characters being basically children in super-powered adult bodies has some interesting potential. I'm hoping they explore the consequences of exposing pre-teens to the absolute horror of the alien. Speaking of the xenomorph, it's amusing how it switches from ridiculous efficiency as it slaughters 4 fully armed men in two seconds, to the long, drawn-out attack on individual characters. Also, I'm already a little bit bored of the motionless xenomorph in the background thing they're doing.
It’s definitely different having an Alien tale not done and dusted within a couple of hours.
I’ve loved what I’ve seen so far, including some excellent world building. And I look forward to some of the mysteries being presumably revealed as we go along.
Speaking of the xenomorph, it's amusing how it switches from ridiculous efficiency as it slaughters 4 fully armed men in two seconds, to the long, drawn-out attack on individual characters.
Spoiler:
Amusing isn't the word I'd use. I find the blatant favoritism only slightly less annoying than the lingering black transitions.
Unrelentingly smashes thru welded bulkhead doors, can’t get into an elevator. Also
Spoiler:
why the heck is it killing everyone on sight when there’s a room full of eggs back on the ship? It should be taking captives back to the eggs for implantation.
The aggression is to protect the nascent nest. There’s armed prey out there, who right now are a risk to the nest. Priory is to take them out, with the last few being parents to the following generation.
Bulkhead, if I’m thinking of the right scene? It’s just Mr Gribblybug and Mr Cyborg at that time. Hence it takes the time to headbutt its way in and get the door open. Elevator? Two armed humans in very close proximity, so again different priorities.
I don't understand what year it's supposed to be as we are missing Hyperdyne (the Corporation who makes Synthetics) and America (The USCM were around in 2101.
Lathe Biosas wrote: I don't understand what year it's supposed to be as we are missing Hyperdyne (the Corporation who makes Synthetics) and America (The USCM were around in 2101.
Got to say, I’ve recently been ploughing my way through the six Dark Horse Aliens Omnibi.
Whilst Alien Earth isn’t a direct translation of any, there are common elements which are colouring my take.
For instance, Weyland Yutani being only one of a number of Massive Companies. And the Alien, when alone, prioritising targets by threat and density of prey.
So apologies if I seem to be pulling thoughts and inferences out of thin air.
It's a drone. So it's mostly running on instinct. There is a not insignificant stretch of time spent on the ship before the crash that we have not seen. We don't know what happened to it for them to catch it and/or trying to escape it on the ship. A lot of unknowns that could explain it's behavior.
Souleater wrote: I'm enjoying it so far. World building is good. I like the characters and setup. The reason for the hybrids being kids is solid.
Effects, script and acting are really good.
But some bits seem a bit too For the Purposes of the Plot, but maybe those will be explained later on.
That’s pretty much my take on it too. Although I wonder if the “alien” Earth is actually the weird deviations from humanity, rather than the big monsters?
Also I respect the fact that it’s doing some slightly arty things, and also not taking a straight line with the plot. My biggest fear was that this would be a very generic, by the numbers, box ticking series and it is definitely not that so far.
Also, I like that they didn’t keep the sister’s identity secret from her brother, so there’s no silly false tension there.
Lance845 wrote: And their handler, though not specifically stated as such, appears to by a synthetic.
He quite explicitly is, in the way he refers to humans and Kavalier referring to his 'synthetic intelligence'.
I'm liking this, so far. Tonally, it feels somewhere in between the first two movies, which works for me. More story-driven and less actiony than Aliens, while not being as much of a slow burn as Alien. And they've done a fantastic job of matching up the tech to the originals.
Just seeing (and hearing!) a Pulse Rifle without the grenade launcher is nice.
Presumably, being some years before Aliens and Romulus they’re an earlier model? Certainly the magazine appears to hold 45 rounds, going on the counter.
This show has one thing against it. The same thing that plagues all prequels.
If you introduce new technology or information into the series, you then need an explanation of why the people in the later "episodes/films" don't have the technology/information.
Alien is set two years after. And we know those deep space missions can last years, thanks to cryosleep. Indeed the crew in the show are ending a 65 year mission.
So when the crew of the Sulaco were woken up to investigate LV426? They couldn’t have known about the events of Alien Earth.
And by the events of Aliens? Cover up and plausible deniability. By the end of the second episode, the infestation is still contained to the crash site.
Working on the assumption it doesn’t go much further? There’s no reason for anyone outside The Company to know or learn exactly what happened, as any and all deaths can be put down to “spaceship crashed into mixed residential/commercial building, lots of people went rather predictably splat”
Alien is set two years after. And we know those deep space missions can last years, thanks to cryosleep. Indeed the crew in the show are ending a 65 year mission.
So when the crew of the Sulaco were woken up to investigate LV426? They couldn’t have known about the events of Alien Earth.
And by the events of Aliens? Cover up and plausible deniability. By the end of the second episode, the infestation is still contained to the crash site.
Working on the assumption it doesn’t go much further? There’s no reason for anyone outside The Company to know or learn exactly what happened, as any and all deaths can be put down to “spaceship crashed into mixed residential/commercial building, lots of people went rather predictably splat”
Spoiler:
What about the "phaser" weapon that disables the Xenomorph and the spray net, it seems like WT would send that out with Burke and the Marines, since the Company is aware of what the Xenomorph can do, and how best to disable one.
We see they’re not really up to the task. Sure, the taser eventually KO’s the Alien, and then it’s gooped for transport.
Within a few minutes at most? It’s waking up, and able to get out the goop net easily enough. Had the Cyborg lad not had a distraction on his hands, there is an argument he’d be able to rinse and repeat.
But it seems a very short term thing. Sooner or later, you’re going to run out of goop. So it doesn’t seem terribly fit for purpose.
The Marines in Aliens were sacrificial. Ostensibly there to wipe the Aliens out, we see from Burke’s actions that was a lie. They wanted specimens.
Safest way to do that is get people facehugged, then stick the in cryo. You keep them in cryo until you get them to a suitable facility and go from there.
Which is more or less what we see in Alien Ressurection. Sure, there they have the Queen from Ripley, and bring the “donors” to the resultant eggs. But the principal is the same - the safest way to get new test subjects.
On the point of the Xenomorph not taking people back to the egg room, I'd argue it's a weight of numbers thing mixed with the overriding instinct to kill.
If we think about Alien, it's a lone slasher, hiding in the dark places to grab each crewmember almost one by one. There are only five crew on the very large Nostromo, easy enough to get people alone and into the proto-hive.
The Maginot is a different beast. It's one Xenomorph against a crew of eleven, plus the other specimens on the ship. We don't know which ones have interacted with the Xenomorph, and if it has deliberately delayed forming a hive because of these other predatory specimens.
Then we've got the crash, introducing even more variables into the mix with new humans with weapons, and an expanded hunting ground.
Ultimately, the real reason is "plot" but we know Xenomorphs are highly intelligent creatures, and they do a heck of a lot of ambush hunting.
I like it. Prometheus' problem (well, one of them) was how it somehow managed to make the alien universe both smaller and dumber at the same time. And then the sequel repeated the error. Episode 1 so far actually makes the universe bigger. More varied. Expanded with new ideas that fit or add some interest. I like it so far. There's some rough spots for sure, but as with Romulus I admire that this movie is at least trying to be good and to actually be part of its own brand rather than stupidly trying to be some other brand entirely in Alien's skin.
Honestly the story is not entirely far off from what you'd get in the OG Dark Horse comics back in the 90s which gives it a nostalgic vibe for me. It's nice to see some other moral questionable and most definitely probably evil corporation getting in on the game and competing with Yutani. It's cool to see the idea of synthetics get expanded. I like that they're sticking to the retrotech design instead of gaudy holograms that don't do anything useful but spend the SFX budget. Some of the new critters look like they have some potential even.
I liked the first 2 episoders more than I would have originally thought. Then I listened to the ofc series podcast and realized, the Fargo guy is actually behind this. Explains a lot.
Looking forward to seeing what happens next.
Not going to bother thinking about the overall timelines and potential retcons. I'm pretty sure the franchise honchos dont think timeline consistency as much as average Dakkaites.
Watched the two eps tonight. I enjoyed them. A definite solid start to the series.
I appreciated that the show didn't try to hold your hand and explain way to much stuff early on. It just throws you in to the good stuff pretty quickly. Set up for events was tight and punchy with minimal messing around.
I couple of things I liked.
Spoiler:
-The fact that we didn't get burdened with the events that lead to the specimens getting loose. You KNOW they're going to get loose. It's the whole point of the show. But I'm glad they skipped it all and cut right to end where things had gone the shape of the pear and the ship was on an unstoppable collision course with Earth.
-The kids in adult/synth bodies. An interesting route to take with the characters, but more so I like that the actors portraying the kids in adult bodies still acted and spoke like kids. Especially when in the ship and they're getting spooked by little noises and electrical sparks, etc. They react like kids would. So as much a kudos to the actors themselves as the directing/script. I foresee their inevitable deaths/destruction being suitably traumatic.
-The critters were interesting. The blood bugs and the weird tentacle eye (poor Jonesy 2.0) look like they've got some potential for shenanigans. I'm keen to find out more about that hanging pod thing that was raring to suck face with Tootles (I think it was). I also get the impression there was more in containment there then we've yet seen. So hopefully there's more to come from the non-xenomorph critter angle.
-It was nice to see a Xenomorph in full combat mode for once. With less ambush/strike and fade, and more RIP and TEAR.
-The fact they didn't try to hide who Wendy was to Hermit for an annoyingly long time. Again, this ties into the kids in adult bodies. Kids don't have a filter and things WILL just slip out whether by accident or not.
On the other hand though there were a couple of things that didn't sit right with me.
Spoiler:
-Is Earth completely bereft of Near Space scanning equipment? No radar or any such thing to detect a ship coming in on a direct collision course. How did no one see it?
-The guillotine blade Wendy casually rips off the guillotine. She just... sticks it to her back? Is it magnetised? Is there an invisible hard-light sheathe she slides it into? Maybe kept in some sort of geostationary orbit with her via hyper-localised gravity well? It just seemed a bit janky.
-Something about the scene in the apartment annoyed me. The xenomorpth attacks Hermit and he's promptly saved by Morrow. Yep fine, no issue there. But then his actions afterwards don't seem right. He almost get skull-fethed and then.... goes off to watch baseball highlights and commit theft? Ok, I get that stress and near death experiences do strange things to people and everyone reacts to those situations differently. Then when Wendy and Slightly turn up and all of a sudden he's forgotten his protocols and he just starts talking to them like nothing happened. The whole scene just seems a bit of disconnect from the rest of the events.
Dropping this here as folks might be interested. Potential spoilers across all Alien franchise films and the new series, but they focus in on the weapons pretty tightly.
Alien is set two years after. And we know those deep space missions can last years, thanks to cryosleep. Indeed the crew in the show are ending a 65 year mission.
So when the crew of the Sulaco were woken up to investigate LV426? They couldn’t have known about the events of Alien Earth.
And by the events of Aliens? Cover up and plausible deniability. By the end of the second episode, the infestation is still contained to the crash site.
Working on the assumption it doesn’t go much further? There’s no reason for anyone outside The Company to know or learn exactly what happened, as any and all deaths can be put down to “spaceship crashed into mixed residential/commercial building, lots of people went rather predictably splat”
Spoiler:
What about the "phaser" weapon that disables the Xenomorph and the spray net, it seems like WT would send that out with Burke and the Marines, since the Company is aware of what the Xenomorph can do, and how best to disable one.
Spoiler:
I quite like that we actually see special equipment, and a moderately successful capture team. Most of those specimens are still contained, and clearly they were able to complete their primary mission. With the exception of Resurrection, we've always seen groups that are not prepared for or equipped to deal with the xenomorphs fight them. Convicts, miners, marines, but we haven't seen a WY hazardous biological specimen capture team in action. Given this company, I'd assume that's simply a cost efficiency decision. Why waste the expensive high tech gear on the possibility a team might encounter xenomorphs (and have to explain to all teams that xenomorphs exist and what they do) when you know capturing a dormant egg and securing it is far more safe? By resurrection they have secured samples and data, and mostly solved the containment issue. Mostly. This is a chance to see the cutting edge gear being put to use.
I'm enjoying it so far. The atmosphere is right, the alien is suitably killy, and we're setting up a nice philosophical debate about perfecting the post-human species is best- thinking machines, cybernetic bodies with human brains, or genetic evolution to aliens.
Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote: The fact it has so much potential, and 8 episodes has me oddly worried.
See….the first two episodes brought a lot. And I definitely want to know more about the other species farting around the wreck.
With six hours of episodes yet to come? I do worry it might begin to drag, and leave points of interest hanging.
It’s also not clear if this is a One And Done serial. I can’t find mention of any second season or follow up.And for now, I don’t know it’ll need one.
Guess I just feel a bit fingers burned from other shows having wasted potential, or outstaying their welcome.
If the Fargo series set any sort of precedent, you can expect this to be a pretty tight set of 8 episodes which wrap up the entire story. No follow up seasons. Could be wrong though.
Listening to the podcast for the 2nd episode. The Alien costume in the show is made by Weta Workshop (surprise surprise). The actor inside the suit moves the body, Weta technicians handle the animatronics, moving the tail, head and mouth. No CGI involved in the xenomorph shots. The epic leap in the 2nd episode was shot in 2 takes, utilizing only practical effects in real time.
There was also a "spoiler" for ep 3 at the end of the podcast, just a single sentence.. I'll leave it up to you to hear it for yourself.
That would explain a lot of why it looks so damn good.
I would love for a return of practical effects. CGI has somehow only managed to look faker and faker as time has gone on and doesn't age well while practical effects age with the grace of a fine wine and just look great for the work that goes into doing them right.
My only major gripe is the whole 'it can smell your fear' thing is fething stupid. I get that it's there to 'explain' obvious plot holes at 'certain moments' but it's still stupid.
It's just not stupid enough to ruin that it's still a very good show so far. Good enough I'm willing not to care about the occasional stupid bit. I'm really liking out newest corporate douche by the way. He's like the perfect stand in for the techbro age of corporate douchery. If I were told the character was overtly inspired by Zuckerberg, I wouldn't need much convincing.
In a way, he’s kinda sympathetic. And whilst hardly Mr Altruism? What he did for those kids was remarkable. He gave them their lives back.
The bunging them in adult bodies kinda makes sense, or at least is a reasonable explanation for potentially nefarious reasons. Though he did say he wanted the kids to grow and learn, and hopefully give him an intellectual equivalent to talk to,
I don’t think we can say he’s a wrong ‘un for sending them in to the wreck. At this point, I don’t think we’ve reason to believe he knew what the ship’s cargo and mission actually was. But I wouldn’t be surprised if we find out he did actually know.
My only major gripe is the whole 'it can smell your fear' thing is fething stupid. I get that it's there to 'explain' obvious plot holes at 'certain moments' but it's still stupid.
The fact that a character said it doesn't mean it's actually true.
Spoiler:
Or that his attempt to stay calm would have saved him if the alien hadn't been interrupted.
In a way, he’s kinda sympathetic. And whilst hardly Mr Altruism? What he did for those kids was remarkable. He gave them their lives back.
The bunging them in adult bodies kinda makes sense, or at least is a reasonable explanation for potentially nefarious reasons. Though he did say he wanted the kids to grow and learn, and hopefully give him an intellectual equivalent to talk to,
I don’t think we can say he’s a wrong ‘un for sending them in to the wreck. At this point, I don’t think we’ve reason to believe he knew what the ship’s cargo and mission actually was. But I wouldn’t be surprised if we find out he did actually know.
Nah. It's really fethed up, and rather foolish.
Spoiler:
The story more than a little implies they're all trapped at the emotional maturity they had when they got bodied. He even calls them 'the lost boys' referring to how they will never grow up.
And experimenting in secret on terminally ill children who are then locked away on his 'Neverland' island is insanely exploitive on several levels.
He outright tells us his goal isn't altruistic. He's literally so high on himself he thinks the only way to have an interesting conversation is to make someone smarter than him and apparently his way of doing this is putting terminally ill and vulnerable kids in synthetic bodies and locking them away from their families.
He's not like, the outright evil but he's not noble and literally said 'this isn't about ego, I'm just smarter than everyone else and bored' which sure sounds like it's all about his ego.
EDIT: Granted I agree he's interesting but given this is Alien I'm doubtful he comes out a hero by the end of this.
The story more than a little implies they're all trapped at the emotional maturity they had when they got bodied. He even calls them 'the lost boys' referring to how they will never grow up..
Spoiler:
That may be how it turned out (although the Lost Boys reference is the only hint of that that I caught) but it certainly wasn't the goal, as they explain to Wendy that they expect her to mature mentally into her adult body.
But, yeah, either way Boy Kavalier is very much coming out of this a villain.
LordofHats wrote: Wending? The Lost Boys? Neverland? Eccentric and self-absorbed? He's kind of a walking allusion to Peter Pan.
Yes, he sees himself as Peter and has set up his domain to reflect that. but they specifically explain to Wendy that they expect her mind to mature into her adult body. Which fits, as the Lost Boys all eventually leave Neverland. It's only Peter who never grows up.
LordofHats wrote: Wending? The Lost Boys? Neverland? Eccentric and self-absorbed? He's kind of a walking allusion to Peter Pan.
Yes, he sees himself as Peter and has set up his domain to reflect that. but they specifically explain to Wendy that they expect her mind to mature into her adult body. Which fits, as the Lost Boys all eventually leave Neverland. It's only Peter who never grows up.
Wasn't there a scene specifically about how they were trying to handle simulating growth, physically and mentally, in a body that doesn't grow?
Spoiler:
At the end of episode two when the xeno was barreling down on them and she was hearing that noise in her head and it transitioned to a slightly different sound that I thought it sounded an awful lot like part of the intro to Tool's Stinkfist. Turns out that is exactly what it was. Was not expecting Tool to make an appearance.
One minor issue that's been bugging me is the intro that states the corporations are vying against one another to control the next big technology/evolution of mankind. They list the three technologies as:
AI (synths, which we've seen before)
Cyborgs
Hybrids
I get that hybrids are the new thing that Prodigy has just invented, but the cyborg thing bothers me a bit. I've not read any of the extra material in comics or novelisations so maybe this pops up there, but it seems weird that cyborgs are a thing yet we've never encountered them in the franchise before, especially in Aliens where it seems like having a cyborg in the team would have been a really good idea.
It's not enough of a thing to reduce my enjoyment of the series. It just seems a little odd to introduce it now. Maybe they just wanted the cool cyborg character.
Was it nano-machines? All we’ve seen is a blowtorch thing (and presumably fuel for it) and a knife.
Both of those could happily be stowed in the arm itself.
Indeed, if it was nano-machines? I’d expect something a bit fancier than just a knife.
My take is Horses for Courses. A Synthetic cannot move beyond its programming. A human can make leaps of logic and find novel solutions a Synthetic may simply discount due to low chance of success. So slap some upgrades on, and hope for the best of both worlds.
And you don’t need to worry about programming errors with a smelly hooman. Gross stupidity of their own invention? Sure. But not “do not enact any plan with less than X percent chance of success” type goofs.
At the end of episode two when the xeno was barreling down on them and she was hearing that noise in her head and it transitioned to a slightly different sound that I thought it sounded an awful lot like part of the intro to Tool's Stinkfist. Turns out that is exactly what it was. Was not expecting Tool to make an appearance.
Spoiler:
on similar note, i think its interesting that both episodes have started with a muffled/mangled version of a line from Cream's Strange Brew - "strange brew, kill whats inside of you"
might just be a ref to Alien in general, but i think the fact its in both episodes feels very deliberate... when she started 'hearing' the alien, it made me think maybe its referring to her...?
Is Boy Genius supposed to be Peter? I was getting more vibes that Wendy is filling both roles. Her body language, massive apparent self confidence and grabbing that blade before the mission follows Peter to me, whole she is also acting as the Wendy role as more caring role for the others.
I do quite like the use of the Peter Pan tropes in this new setting. It may be a bit contrived, but it gives a familiar structure for viewers. When do you think they will be massively subverted, and it turns out that Wendy is in fact a Predator-human hybrid now transplanted into a synthetic shell
Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote: I’m genuinely half expecting a Predator to turn up in the later episodes.
Based entirely on hope.
Oh. I was talking about Bladerunner and its same-universe sister film Soldier.
Don’t have time to look it up right now, but I think there’s a background cross reference in either Aliens or one of the Blade Runner cuts that puts them in the same universe (like one of the corporations name checked on a computer screen somewhere).
This discussion makes me hope the people in charge haven't overdone it with the Peter Pan stuff. I've had very little exposure to Peter Pan. I'd rather not have to catch up on unrelated stuff to get whatever super clever subtext they put in Alien Earth.
I’m still not entirely convinced Boy Kavalier is malevolent.
Rash, self obsessed and reckless? Sure thing. No argument there. But I’m not sure it’s a conscious thing.
From his video call with Weyland Yutani, he seems genuinely unaware or at least uncertain what the Maginot had been doing before it parked itself on his land. So I don’t think he’s sent in Wendy and Chums out of anything but genuine curiosity and avarice (on his land, claim salvage rights, nick everything not nailed down, then come back with a crowbar, prise up everything that was nailed down, and swipe the nails whilst you’re at it).
What will be interesting is how he reacts once the brown stuff has hit the rapidly spinning cooling device.
He may order them home. He may wish to see how tough they are in a bad situation. He may wish to claim the gribblies at all costs, considering them a much better project. Remains to be seen.
But for now? He’s mostly just supremely arrogant. Which isn’t in itself a crime.
Geifer wrote: This discussion makes me hope the people in charge haven't overdone it with the Peter Pan stuff. I've had very little exposure to Peter Pan. I'd rather not have to catch up on unrelated stuff to get whatever super clever subtext they put in Alien Earth.
I've never seen peter pan before and have little knowledge of it outside of knowing the names of Peter, Tinkerbell and Captain Hook. I didn't even catch the Wendy/Lost Boys significance until I saw it mentioned here.
That said, in hindsight, I don't feel like I was missing out on anything crucial, not being familiar with it. It's not a huge plot device or anything. So far they're just names. They could have been called Bob, Rob, Job, Lob and Dob and been apart of the "Sketchy Billionaires Robo Goon Squad" for all the difference it would have made.
Gert wrote: Being an arrogant billionaire who faked the death of children to satisfy his urge for a mental peer is pretty malevolent.
While I don't disagree, they could be playing him as one of those "I'm actually so incredibly superduper-slighly-autistic smart that I completely missunderstood that what I was doing is actually really evil" type smart people. Doesn't ignore the morality of it, just actually misses it entirely.
Given the history of the setting, I really doubt that the individual in charge of any of the major corporations is intended to be viewed as anything other than massively flawed, narcissistic and largely without morals.
From a man with self stated ulterior motives based on purely personal reasons.
The boy-genius isn't doing this to help those suffering from life threatening illness, he's doing it to make someone who he can have an "intellectual" conversation with.
Then he tells the family "sorry I couldn't help your child, they died here's a funeral".
When she’s talking to her brother she implies that her father knew she was “alive”, but the deal was that he had to keep it secret, so the funeral was for show. Well, maybe, they may well have had the body to bury after she’d uploaded.
I'm not sure what's at stake precisely in debating whether Boy Kavalier is a bad person or exactly how bad a person he is, but I think there's a lot of potential badness for the series to explore in the very nature of the "transfer" of human consciousness and the ultimate fate of the children.
I'm not generally a believer in "transferring" or "downloading" human consciousness, because it seems to me that such "soul transference" is basically mystical bs. What people are really describing when they talk about such things isn't transferring the original consciousness, but mapping it and replicating it in a computer, leaving the original consciousness exactly where it was in the first place - in a dying human body. The original person still expires, and only their tech duplicate remains. In that framework, Marcy would still be dead. And if the process of copying her consciousness into a robot body destroys her original consciousness, that's not "transference" either in my book, it's murder. True transference would be not just philosophical but literal - moving the original consciousness out of one body and into another one just like you or me getting out of an old car and into a new one, with no original you or me left behind to die in the old car, or destroyed and replicated by the act of getting into a new one.
Put another way, if Mad Doc Grotsnik's consciousness was "downloaded" onto a computer to continue after Grotsnik dies, you wouldn't have "the (original) Grotsnik" surviving, but either a false duplicate or "a Grotsnik." You can argue that if the technology truly replicates perfectly that the downloaded Grotsnik still philosophically and even legally should count as "a" real Grotsnik, but unless actual transference somehow occurs, "the" original human Grotsnik still ultimately dies.
I can go with "suspend my disbelief" for the series and imagine that somehow Boy Kavalier's magical Peter Pan technology actually does transfer, rather than just (destroy and?) replicate human consciousness. But what we don't know at this point is whether that particular rug will get pulled out from under us later, and that the series itself will throw emotional identity sturm und drang at us by revealing that the original Marcy's consciousness actually did die, further complicating Wendy hybrid's claim to being the original, to being human, and her relationship with her brother.
The series might content itself with just showing the psychological difficulties / problems of putting child minds in adult, super-powerful bodies, and that's pretty interesting and entertaining. But it could also ultimately reveal that the "transfer" was never as real, effective, or permanent as it seemed, and that the hybrids will have technically-originating dysfunctional flaws that become highly problematic, or even monstrous. Or maybe they are physically built to last forever, but it turns out that their seemingly intact original identities aren't stable and won't last a year.
I'm willing to suspend my disbelief to go along with magical Peter Pan transference as it is presented so far, but I don't know if I should yet, because it could be another problematic dystopian plate spinning in the air, waiting to fall.
Put another way, if Mad Doc Grotsnik's consciousness was "downloaded" onto a computer to continue after Grotsnik dies, you wouldn't have "the (original) Grotsnik" surviving, but either a false duplicate or "a Grotsnik." You can argue that if the technology truly replicates perfectly that the downloaded Grotsnik still philosophically and even legally should count as "a" real Grotsnik, but unless actual transference somehow occurs, "the" original human Grotsnik still ultimately dies.
You’d have a very silly computer on your hands. Every key stroke, a fart noise. And when you try to play it like a synth, all the noises being randomly reassigned.
Random childish insults added to every outgoing email.
That sort of thing.
But here? It does seem to be a full consciousness transfer.
Of course. They’ve not actually shown the full process yet. Instead we get a rather cleverly shot/edited montage of the other kids being in position and then being in their new bodies. I don’t think we explicitly see the original body actually pass away. Unconscious for Wendy, certainly. But not necessarily dead. And if they are dead? We don’t for certain know it was the transfer wot done it, leaving an empty shell. It could be a duplication, followed by a lethal injection type thing.
Talking Banana wrote: I'm not sure what's at stake precisely in debating whether Boy Kavalier is a bad person or exactly how bad a person he is, but I think there's a lot of potential badness for the series to explore in the very nature of the "transfer" of human consciousness and the ultimate fate of the children.
I'm not generally a believer in "transferring" or "downloading" human consciousness, because it seems to me that such "soul transference" is basically mystical bs. What people are really describing when they talk about such things isn't transferring the original consciousness, but mapping it and replicating it in a computer, leaving the original consciousness exactly where it was in the first place - in a dying human body. The original person still expires, and only their tech duplicate remains. In that framework, Marcy would still be dead. And if the process of copying her consciousness into a robot body destroys her original consciousness, that's not "transference" either in my book, it's murder. True transference would be not just philosophical but literal - moving the original consciousness out of one body and into another one just like you or me getting out of an old car and into a new one, with no original you or me left behind to die in the old car, or destroyed and replicated by the act of getting into a new one.
Put another way, if Mad Doc Grotsnik's consciousness was "downloaded" onto a computer to continue after Grotsnik dies, you wouldn't have "the (original) Grotsnik" surviving, but either a false duplicate or "a Grotsnik." You can argue that if the technology truly replicates perfectly that the downloaded Grotsnik still philosophically and even legally should count as "a" real Grotsnik, but unless actual transference somehow occurs, "the" original human Grotsnik still ultimately dies.
I can go with "suspend my disbelief" for the series and imagine that somehow Boy Kavalier's magical Peter Pan technology actually does transfer, rather than just (destroy and?) replicate human consciousness. But what we don't know at this point is whether that particular rug will get pulled out from under us later, and that the series itself will throw emotional identity sturm und drang at us by revealing that the original Marcy's consciousness actually did die, further complicating Wendy hybrid's claim to being the original, to being human, and her relationship with her brother.
The series might content itself with just showing the psychological difficulties / problems of putting child minds in adult, super-powerful bodies, and that's pretty interesting and entertaining. But it could also ultimately reveal that the "transfer" was never as real, effective, or permanent as it seemed, and that the hybrids will have technically-originating dysfunctional flaws that become highly problematic, or even monstrous. Or maybe they are physically built to last forever, but it turns out that their seemingly intact original identities aren't stable and won't last a year.
I'm willing to suspend my disbelief to go along with magical Peter Pan transference as it is presented so far, but I don't know if I should yet, because it could be another problematic dystopian plate spinning in the air, waiting to fall.
The computer game SOMA touches on this topic exquisitely. I strongly recommend playing it to the end, just to see what happens.. Lost sleep that night, myself.
Indeed, a potentially failing "transference" is creepy AF. All that is left is a dumb simulation of a person who used to exist, and some of them cant cope with the fact they've died.. All you can do is reset the simulation over and over again, and hope that the psyche of the simulation somehow doesnt implode this time around...
Speaking of whether the transference of Wendy was a successful one or not, we will never know.. at least she didnt go insane. That's already a big win.
If we get serious with the theoreticals for a second, I am quite certain that consciousness, if one exists in the first place, is quantum by its nature. Therefore, in order to obtain a succeful transference would require some sort of quantum entanglement to occur between the old and new "consciousness".. and before we have actual quantum computing in the real world, it aint going to happen any time soon..
Of course. They’ve not actually shown the full process yet. Instead we get a rather cleverly shot/edited montage of the other kids being in position and then being in their new bodies. I don’t think we explicitly see the original body actually pass away. Unconscious for Wendy, certainly. But not necessarily dead. And if they are dead? We don’t for certain know it was the transfer wot done it, leaving an empty shell. It could be a duplication, followed by a lethal injection type thing.
They did show original Marcy being zipped up in a corpse bag.
As for whether the transfer "did it," I think what would matter is how it did it. If it really transferred her consciousness, it's not murder. If it destroyed her original consciousness in the process of copying it, I'd call that murder.
But ultimately I agree with your point that we don't know for certain. I just don't know yet if I should trust that the process is as effective as it's being presented to be so far, or if horrific unintended consequences from an imperfect experimental technology will become plot points over the next 6 or so episodes. I'm willing to suspend my disbelief either way - I'm really enjoying the show so far, even if I think "transferring" / downloading consciousness is a mirage in real life (I also enjoy supernatural films whose premises I don't remotely believe in) - but this is the Alien franchise, so any number of awful things could still happent. From the very first movie, this series could have had the tagline "You can't spell Alien without A.I.," because synth-related problems have always been at the heart of the series (even if, in some movies, some synths are positively portrayed.) As for the hybrids, transference is utopian, experimental tech being used on children, and the series is already teasing us with senior characters debating whether the hybrids are truly human or synth or what have you. What could possibly go wrong?
Tauist, thanks for the thoughts and for recommending SOMA. It's been on my radar for awhile; I'll give it a whirl.
I disagree with your certainty that we'll "never know" if the transference was fully effective, though. I just don't think we know that yet. Marcy / Wendy hasn't gone insane, but we're only two episodes in. None of the hybrids have gone insane . . . yet. I don't know if that will happen to any of them, but I think it very well could in an Alien franchise series. It certainly wouldn't be out of place; future tech artificial people behaving badly has a lot of precedent in this franchise, so perhaps we will know by the end.
One way or another, though, this series is a prequel, and the Alien movies that follow don't feature cyborgs or hybrids. It looks like A.I. synths are the future, and that Wendy and the Lost Boys, and probably Boy Kavalier and Prodigy, won't survive past episode 8. (Or if any hybrids do survive, the technology to make them won't, and they'll persist in some isolated secretive fashion passing as humans or synths when the series ends.) Personally I'm betting that Boy genius gets his superbrain cored by a hungry Alien before this show is through.
Talking Banana wrote: I'm not generally a believer in "transferring" or "downloading" human consciousness, because it seems to me that such "soul transference" is basically mystical bs.
...
True transference would be not just philosophical but literal - moving the original consciousness out of one body and into another one just like you or me getting out of an old car and into a new one, with no original you or me left behind to die in the old car, or destroyed and replicated by the act of getting into a new one.
I cut down the quote to keep the post from exploding in size, but those are the points I want to address.
I'd argue that true transference is mystical bs as well. Conscience doesn't exist separate from the rest of the human body. Any attempt to transfer only the conscience would necessarily result in an alteration from the original. The original isn't going anywhere, ever.
At that point it's about managing perspective. What we're looking at is how to preserve the idea of transference as a move instead of a replacement, so the new individual considers itself a continuation of the old one. I doubt you get around euthanizing the original at the end of transference or before booting up the copy so the copy doesn't get the idea that it's a copy by having another one of itself around, if only for a while.
Only thing that's a given is that this struggle between "human" and "machine" WRT hybrids will continue throughout the series. It was talked about at lenght in the podcast.
I remember cons of yesteryear that revilved around Trek's transporter... and if it kills you everytime you use it.
I don't know about "hung up," but I don't find it very surprising that people talk about it; it's a fascinating subject.
Here's something else I'm finding it fun to wonder about: T. Ocellus.
Spoiler:
So far, it seems like at least one of the alien creatures is closely based on a real-world one, namely the ticks. (Although I really hope that what happens after they feed turns out to be a big horrific surprise, rather than just following standard tick biology and spawning lots of little baby ticks.) I think T. Ocellus is based on octopusses, and I think that inspiration goes well beyond the tentacles, to include it's high intelligence, something that's been more and more in public consciousness over the past couple decades ("My Octopus Teacher" etc.) If you freeze the screen while the Prodigy synth (Resh?) is looking at the data on T. Ocellus, you can read what WY knows about it, including that its problem-solving skills approach human intelligence levels. Having a "smarter" xeno-threat could go in so many interesting directions that I'm really looking forward to seeing what they do with it. So far, it definitely recognized that human (looking) hosts would be a step up from occupying a cat.
Given it's attempt to take over Nibbs, I'm also interested to see if hybrids and synths are immune to it's mind-controlling abilities. I'm guessing they would be, but it's never been clear to me what all that white pseudo-organic goo inside synths really is, so maybe I'm wrong? More likely I think we'll see T. Ocellus take over a fully human host before this is over, and I'm guessing it will be able to do things like push button sequences it observes to open sealed doors and that sort of thing, but will be more like a shambling zombie in terms of motor control, and incapable of accessing human memories, talking, or "passing" as human (if people don't notice the obviously overlarge eyeball, that is.) There's also the possibility that it could be a hell of a lot more intelligent than WY knows, even smarter than an average human, although I don't expect they'll go that way.
I'm also happy that the true nature of the "plant" creature is still up for grabs, and that the last of the four new xeno-species hasn't even been shown yet. I'm guessing that one of the two is responsible for poisoning the blue-lipped corpse that Wendy's brother noticed, as venom hasn't been explicitly linked with either the ticks or the eyeball creature so far.
Whilst we might get an answer later in the show? For now it’s an interesting concept with moral quandaries.
Now, saving your kid’s life as it’s billed? I see nothing inherently wrong with that.
Putting a child’s mind in an adult body? Could be fine - but also genuine concerns and reservations. If, as we’ve not seen, they’re given a chance for their minds to mature in the same sort of environment we’d like all kids to grow up in? All good. But also open to Horrible Things. There it becomes a matter of motivations and protections.
And as with any medical treatment? All about Informed Consent. Ensure accurate information about the potential risks is given to the patient, or their responsible adult, and respect the resulting choice.
Cause for concern here is seemingly little attempt to put the kid’s mind in a kid’s body. Now I don’t want to rule out child sized synthetics being outlawed (there are real world equivalents we won’t go into on Dakka). But also, why are their new bodies not attempts to look like the kids grown up? They’re Synthetics. You can given them pretty much any height, build, skin tone etc. I have to assume they’re custom jobs like for the new technology. Whatever passes for their central nervous system must surely directly mimic that of a human, otherwise the occupant consciousness would have to learn how to walk, not to panic when it can’t breathe and all those other autonomic functions.
One reason? To deliberately obfuscate the “donor”.
He's definitely not a good person. Good people don't say gak like 'I just want to have an interesting conversation because you're all too stupid, so I'll experiment on some kids!'
Whether or not he's full blown evil or merely banally evil remains to be seen.
LordofHats wrote: He's definitely not a good person. Good people don't say gak like 'I just want to have an interesting conversation because you're all too stupid, so I'll experiment on some kids!'
Whether or not he's full blown evil or merely banally evil remains to be seen.
I don't like when they put a face on the evil corporation.
That's one of the reasons I didn't like the AvP films as they gave us Mr. Weyland in the first one and Ms. Yutani in the sequel.
I like my evil corporations to be faceless entities, like in Alien: Romulus.
Always a bit strange to see Ade Edmondson in a straight role.
I still have some hope we’ll get to see him swing a frying pan at a Xenomorph.
Acting by the Child Piloted Synthetics is fantastic. It could easily have been the wrong kind of creepy, but it’s done incredibly well. They genuinely feel like kids that just happen to have adult bodies, and not adults pretending to be kids.
But yes, there is an element of “you fell out of the tall tower, you creep”.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Pleasingly novel sights and moments too.
Absolutely phenomenal stuff! Just sucks that I now have to wait a week for more.
On the mind transference thing, I generally agree with the idea that it’s a copy (and I think the issues with that are something this series might explore), but I have mused on how that would/could work in reality. I do wonder if you linked a living person to a synthetic neural net over a very extended period of time, so that they are effectively incorporating the technology into their mind, whether that could ultimately allow genuine transfer / continuation of consciousness, as when the biological bit finally switches off, it’s only a small part of the whole.
Jadenim wrote: On the mind transference thing, I generally agree with the idea that it’s a copy (and I think the issues with that are something this series might explore), but I have mused on how that would/could work in reality. I do wonder if you linked a living person to a synthetic neural net over a very extended period of time, so that they are effectively incorporating the technology into their mind, whether that could ultimately allow genuine transfer / continuation of consciousness, as when the biological bit finally switches off, it’s only a small part of the whole.
Spoiler:
I thought we had a major clue for the upload process from how difficult it was for our cyborg Morrow to upload Mother's database from the ship. I got the impression that the process could have easily gone wrong and caused him irreperable damage, or possibly even death. Contrast that with Kirsh effortlessly processing all that data in the lab, just taking a little longer to do so. My theory is they leaned further into Peter Pan conspiracy theories, that he's the grim reaper, and the lost boys are killed before reaching Neverland, which is why they don't grow up. So the transference process does copy a human mind, but kills the human in doing so (that much we know). Yet another reason for Kid Cavalier to be experimenting with terminally ill kids. If the technology really does produce robust intelligence transfer, and leaves the children able to grow and adapt long term, then it becomes a viable route to immortality. If it turns out to freeze them at their maturity levelit's just a novelty.
The lost boys acting is remarkable. I'm deeply curious about Wendy and the Aliens connection. Was she a different model of synth body? Why alter to a less capable model for the other prototypes? Is it a case of spending too long as a ghost in the machine expands the consciousness? Why must we wait a week for answers?
Its definitely a point of interest. Does she just have wonky ears? Like, overly sensitive, erm, sensors? Is it a specific design choice to make her More Than Human.
Yes I know we’ve seen Wendy has superior speed and strength. But is that unique to her? I don’t recall we got any similar scene for the others.
I do wonder if they’re experiments within experiments. With the process proven to work, do they all have different Synthetic bodies with different perks? Is this to see whether the human mind can adapt to a very different body?
That could fit with using kids. Due to rapid growth spurts, let alone puberty, young brains adapt rapidly. So it’s possible an adult consciousness may not be suited to the transference?
Automatically Appended Next Post: Also…has the show joined the hallowed Andor as a show universally enjoyed by Dakkanauts?
Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote: Also…has the show joined the hallowed Andor as a show universally enjoyed by Dakkanauts?
Only 3 episodes in. There is still time.
I have some issues so far, but going to wait for the full body of work because I love the showrunners work with Fargo and I've heard good things about Legion, though I never watched that one.
Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote: Also…has the show joined the hallowed Andor as a show universally enjoyed by Dakkanauts?
Only 3 episodes in. There is still time.
I have some issues so far, but going to wait for the full body of work because I love the showrunners work with Fargo and I've heard good things about Legion, though I never watched that one.
I'm much the same. I don't think the writers respect the laws of physics*, which effortlessly puts them on my naughty list. The question is whether the good parts outweigh that in the end.
* --->
Spoiler:
The xenomorph can effortlessly knock over a heavy ass steel cargo container but lets itself get dragged around by a 50kg synth girl. Right.
I am still holding out for a cross alien hybrid where T.O. infects the plant thing and makes Audrey III. Cue Musical Episode.
Spoiler:
Wendy’s connection to Xenomorphs. I was wondering if it could be related to her illness?
My only gripe is the sixty-five year old transceiver that manages to connect to a distant ‘secure facility’ island.
It’s weird that they haven’t given the kids any kind of psychological counselling/ debrief. Not simply from a caring perspective but more a scientific perspective.
I’m hoping BK just wants her to read some books on philosophy…but it have a suspicion it might be rather more sordid than that.
Legion is available on Disney+ . Highly recommended.
I haven't been this happy - delighted, really - with a series in a long, long time. It keeps flashing through my mind as I watch: they know what they're doing! At least for the first three episodes, anyway. Loved all three.
I really needed this. Sometimes the fates really are kind.
Wendy’s connection to Xenomorphs. I was wondering if it could be related to her illness?
Spoiler:
I don't think it's a connection at all, just a side effect of her super-acute hearing (revealed in episode 1 or 2 when they showed her doing a hearing test and said she was way above the human range). So she's hearing the aliens communicate at a level that everyone else can't register.
Her collapse at the end of ep 3 is presumably just because it was loud and painful enough to be debilitating.
I could be wrong, but that's how it looks so far to me.
I still think Romulus provided the most interesting answer there.
It’s not the Xenomorph, so much as the Prometheus Black Goo, Xenomorphs being the current sole source thereof, that’s of interest.
If you can harness that, you can make colonists better suited to their colony world’s environment. That increases profits and saves lives. Probably with interest in that exact order.
But even so? The critters seen in Alien Earth are of course like no native flora or fauna. What breakthroughs might their unique biologies throw up?
Consider the Horseshoe Crab. Their blood is used in modern medicine, and no other critter’s blood offers the same properties.
So like anything new? What is it? What does it do? How does it do it? Are there any beneficial traits there, expected or unexpected? Can we isolate them to understand the chemical/biological process underlying it? Can that be synthesised, or do we need more, erm, raw materials?
Really good third episode for the most part. The hybrid acting is really well done. Anyone else wondering what the deal is with the guy constantly washing the wall?
Spoiler:
Still not liking the weirdly schizophrenic xenomorph with a level of aggression tuned to the plot requirements of the scene. There are a few issues with the cyborg too. He's clearly intelligent and resourceful but seems confused by the fact the Yutani he knows is dead since it's been 65 years since he left Earth. On that note, I do wonder how he knows about modern technology and how it works, especially the scene where he securely dials into WY using a stolen phone. Imagine someone from 1960 trying to do that with a modern mobile. Also, the comm device he attached to Slightly annoyed me. Apart from the ease with which a 65-year old piece of tech apparently avoids detection in a secure facility, there's the fact he randomly starts communicating with Slightly without knowing where he is. As far as the cyborg knows he's sitting in a room with all the other hybrids and a bunch of scientists when he decides to announce himself.
I am liking the approach to the xenomorphs though. It's the first time we've actually seen vaguely competent science being done on them. That said, it did seem a touch irresponsible to let BK get so close to an egg before telling him how dangerous it was.
Definitely intrigued what the wall washer is doing.
Kinda reminds of Lu-Tze from Discworld. Nobody notices the sweeper, after all….
On the others?
Spoiler:
The Cyborg had just uploaded a load of files into his bonce. So I’m happy to chalk that one up to “brain is full, simple things shoved out for important files”.
Others are valid. If we’re looking at a single Xenomorph - and I’m not sure we are! We see someone in a cryo-tube that became the not at all proud parent to a bouncing baby killing machine. And we see what I think was the result of at least an attempt to remove the Chestburster before it let itself out like a big boy.
So perhaps (and I’ll admit credulity is at least slightly stretched here), the one surgically removed is a bit stunted in brain growth, allowing for odd behaviour, compared to its full term sibling? Haven’t at all persuaded myself here, but it’s possible, I guess.
Cyborg’s sneaky implant thing mildly irks me as well. Though on the “how did he know the hybrid was alone”? He can clearly use it to hear the person it’s on. So I’m ok assuming he was listening out for periods of silence.
Mr. Hawley likes to put background characters into the foreground later in the series... but, I have a buddy who worked in Thailand for about 6 years and he said they had guys spraying for mold before the rainy season kicked in and right after.
This guy could be a metaphor for humanity's struggle against biological lifeforms that are hostile to human life (like black mold)...
I’m intrigued that they left the crash site this quickly, I figured that would be the main location for the series.
Despite occasional cliched moments, this feels like it’s turning into a very good show. It weirdly feels like a bit of a slow burn, despite the fact that plot elements are moving at a reasonable pace.
Souleater wrote: As someone who’s only watched the films: why are the corporations so obsessed with the Xenomorphs as a weapon?
Acid-proof combat droids with guns and melee are well within their technical capabilities.
It's in a lot of ways a creeping specter in the franchise that I'd argue has sort of become a mythos plot tumor;
-Alien never explains why 'the company' wanted the Alien except vaguely as a specimen, and really how much they knew about it was obscure. Great movie.
-Aliens, the company seems to have forgotten about it entirely (no one went looking until Burke tried following up on Ripley's testimony, apparently). It's only vaguely suggested here the Alien could be worth something as a bioweapon, which has about as much sense as weaponized velociraptors but w/e. Great movie.
-Alien Cubed, we're not really told why 'the company' wants it yet again, simply that they do and how much they know about it is obscure. It's not a great movie.
-Buffy the Alien Slayer is just a gakky movie that doesn't even fething try and is honestly kind of better off for plain not trying.
-Alien Romulus rounds back to Prometheus, providing a solid impetus for why the company wants the Alien and what they want to do with it.
In essence, each film in the series has either not given a gak why the alien is important. Sometimes 'the company' is just a nefarious boogeyman vaguely in the film's background whose reasons, motives, and methods are essentially Lovecraftian. Other times it's bioweapon or research reasons. Other times it's 'just cause idk look they're fighting aliens underwater now!'
To a certain extent, the obsession with the Xenomorph starts bordering on the utterly asinine (it keeps killing everything and everyone who feths with it and you're getting nowhere, stop fething with it). So I feel you, but at least this series seems to be setting up how the Xenomorph came to Weyland-Yutani's awareness in the first place. The first film implied someone had already been to LV426, which may well be the ship in the series, and it's trying to procure another sample that motivated the events of Alien and that this series will round back to explaining 'the company's initial interest.
Jadenim wrote: I’m intrigued that they left the crash site this quickly, I figured that would be the main location for the series.
Despite occasional cliched moments, this feels like it’s turning into a very good show. It weirdly feels like a bit of a slow burn, despite the fact that plot elements are moving at a reasonable pace.
That the series draws so many illusions to Peter Pan I took as an indicator that 'Neverland' would be the primary setting. And yeah. Ep3 slowed down compared to ep 1 and 2 but that's only a problem if the whole series then slows to a crawl.
The schizophrenic Alien, the horrible action scene, the sometimes acid blood. Why did they go thru the whole process of removing the embryo from the egg to implant into a single lung rather than just tossing one egg into a room with a sheep and seeing what happens? Like, how did they even know specifically to look for the embryo, that it could survive submerged in liquid, etc. I liked the android’s “Don’t stick your face next to the egg” speech and their “no humans allowed in this room” protocol they then enacted, but everything after that felt like Too much knowledge on the subject. Also Wendy’s unique super hearing the others don’t have, and no one apparently noticing she came into the room during surgery and passed out twitching on the floor behind them.
The schizophrenic Alien, the horrible action scene, the sometimes acid blood. Why did they go thru the whole process of removing the embryo from the egg to implant into a single lung rather than just tossing one egg into a room with a sheep and seeing what happens? Like, how did they even know specifically to look for the embryo, that it could survive submerged in liquid, etc. I liked the android’s “Don’t stick your face next to the egg” speech and their “no humans allowed in this room” protocol they then enacted, but everything after that felt like Too much knowledge on the subject. Also Wendy’s unique super hearing the others don’t have, and no one apparently noticing she came into the room during surgery and passed out twitching on the floor behind them.
Spoiler:
Anyone else notice that the embryo burrowing into the lung would've killed the host?
Jadenim wrote: I’m intrigued that they left the crash site this quickly, I figured that would be the main location for the series.
Despite occasional cliched moments, this feels like it’s turning into a very good show. It weirdly feels like a bit of a slow burn, despite the fact that plot elements are moving at a reasonable pace.
That the series draws so many illusions to Peter Pan I took as an indicator that 'Neverland' would be the primary setting. And yeah. Ep3 slowed down compared to ep 1 and 2 but that's only a problem if the whole series then slows to a crawl.
If it's set before Alien they kind of have to keep Alien Earth's story contained and largely out of the public eye. A spaceship crash in the setting is probably no different than a plane crash nowadays. Happens rarely, but does happen. Besides, they named the thing after a Frenchman. It was bound to end in catastrophe. Move along. Nothing to see here.
It seems Prodigy also flew in the surviving first responders that came into contact with the ship's cargo. And with our android buddy determined to make his way to Neverland everything is nicely contained on a remote island and whatever mayhem ensues can be neatly swept under a rug. Possibly nuked from orbit, just to be sure.
The schizophrenic Alien, the horrible action scene, the sometimes acid blood. Why did they go thru the whole process of removing the embryo from the egg to implant into a single lung rather than just tossing one egg into a room with a sheep and seeing what happens? Like, how did they even know specifically to look for the embryo, that it could survive submerged in liquid, etc. I liked the android’s “Don’t stick your face next to the egg” speech and their “no humans allowed in this room” protocol they then enacted, but everything after that felt like Too much knowledge on the subject. Also Wendy’s unique super hearing the others don’t have, and no one apparently noticing she came into the room during surgery and passed out twitching on the floor behind them.
Well…
Spoiler:
On too much knowledge? He had reviewed and recorded the ship’s data logs. We see from the initial exploration of the ship that research had been done.
Presumably, he’s picking up wherever that left off. No need to conduct the same experiment twice, provided the records of that experiment seem thorough in methodology and that. Not when you’ve currently limited stock to work with.
Anyone else notice that the embryo burrowing into the lung would've killed the host?
Spoiler:
To be fair, it was free swimming in a tank. It would normally have been placed directly inside some appropriate tissue by the facehugger, so no burrowing required. Although I had always assumed it was somewhere in the oesophagus, rather than the lung? Having said that, the lungs have an incredible blood supply, so using them as a pseudo-placenta would have a logic.
If it's set before Alien they kind of have to keep Alien Earth's story contained and largely out of the public eye. A spaceship crash in the setting is probably no different than a plane crash nowadays. Happens rarely, but does happen. Besides, they named the thing after a Frenchman. It was bound to end in catastrophe. Move along. Nothing to see here.
It seems Prodigy also flew in the surviving first responders that came into contact with the ship's cargo. And with our android buddy determined to make his way to Neverland everything is nicely contained on a remote island and whatever mayhem ensues can be neatly swept under a rug. Possibly nuked from orbit, just to be sure.
Yeah, I'm expecting that whenever this all winds up, it finishes with Wayland Yutani wiping the island off the map to keep it all under wraps.
Another outcome is that Weyland-Yutani interrupts the Nostromo, because it loses everything to Boy Kavalier. They’re yet to recover the data held in Morrow. If he comes a cropper, or it turns out his implants and upgrades are faulty, and/or they never recover the live specimens? You’ve reason enough there to direct whichever ship you own that’s nearest to where the samples were originally found. Heck, that order could already have been given. Even before the Maginot had its little accident (insurance, we’d like a second shipment pls universe), or as soon as Weyland-Yutani knew something had gone wrong. Given hypersleep, the sheer scale of space and subliminal speeds? It’s entirely possible the Nostromo was still the closest ship possible.
By the time of Aliens, where we’ve ostensibly learned more of Earth in that time (but we never actually see it), more could’ve happened. Including Prodigy figuring the creatures are just far too dangerous, terminating the specimens and experiments. Which could come at any point in that currently 59 year span.
I think we're ignoring the really big technology question here.
It's not synthetic people vs cyborgs, implantation of alien zygotes, or why Mu/th/er can't autopilot.
No, the real question is
Spoiler:
What the hell was Wendy's guillotine (paper cutter blade) made from? How did it survive being plunged into a xenomorph, and still be able to behead one! If TO doesn't get to kill a Xenomorph by throwing a board rubber at it...I'm going to be a little disapponted...
I'm really enjoying the series despite one or two gripes.
My favourite character is definitely Timothy Oliphant's SP. The dry sense of humour. The 'I'm better than you but I'm not going to be so crude as to say...but I am actually telling you that...' of the character is a nice change from the 'I've gone made and started slaughering meatsacks schtick'
I've noticed that the black goo hasn't made an appearance in dialogue, are they skipping over the odd prequel stuff that contradicted the original film, or are they sticking closer to the original Alien/Aliens?
Lathe Biosas wrote: I've noticed that the black goo hasn't made an appearance in dialogue, are they skipping over the odd prequel stuff that contradicted the original film, or are they sticking closer to the original Alien/Aliens?
I don't think we can really know yet if they will/won't bring up the goo. This is before the events of Romulus so maybe these events play into the company's search for the stuff/how they even became aware of it to begin with.
On the whole, while Romulus actually made something plot coherent come of the black gunk, I would not shed a tear over all future alien properties acting as if Prometheus and Covenant never happened.
Another outcome is that Weyland-Yutani interrupts the Nostromo, because it loses everything to Boy Kavalier. They’re yet to recover the data held in Morrow. If he comes a cropper, or it turns out his implants and upgrades are faulty, and/or they never recover the live specimens? You’ve reason enough there to direct whichever ship you own that’s nearest to where the samples were originally found. Heck, that order could already have been given. Even before the Maginot had its little accident (insurance, we’d like a second shipment pls universe), or as soon as Weyland-Yutani knew something had gone wrong. Given hypersleep, the sheer scale of space and subliminal speeds? It’s entirely possible the Nostromo was still the closest ship possible.
By the time of Aliens, where we’ve ostensibly learned more of Earth in that time (but we never actually see it), more could’ve happened. Including Prodigy figuring the creatures are just far too dangerous, terminating the specimens and experiments. Which could come at any point in that currently 59 year span.
Thing is, the more people know a secret, the harder it is to keep it secret. Particularly when some of them are not on your side.
Regardless of whether or not Wayland Yutani manage to recover their specimens (and it would certainly make sense that they don't, leading to the Nostramo's diversion) Prodigy needs to be eliminated to keep things quiet.
Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote: He’s definitely closer to Bishop in portrayal. Personable enough, but kind of without ego.
No, he definitely has ego, he's just polite enough to not generally rub the humans' faces in his clear superiority. But they've been fairly clear in showing that he considers humans as lesser beings. He's Bishop without the extra subservience programming.
Watched the 3rd ep last night. Was not impressed by the
Spoiler:
Wendy/Xenomorph fight. The whole scene was flawed.
-First it flips a shipping container around with no effort. Then can't even pull a single biped opponent off her feet. Even if we give Wendy the benefit of the doubt and assume that her new Synth body is significantly heavier (and stronger) then a human equivalent, it still should have been a pretty one sided fight.
-Also, why was it trying to pull away from her? It could have just as easily jumped onto her, pinned her down and then went stabby stabby with its tail.
-On that note, what happened to its tail? It suddenly too short to reach past its head? Pah.
Other then that, a strong 3rd episode.
I did like the
Spoiler:
eggs/facehuggers not reacting to synths. That's not something I've given much thought to before as I don't think we've ever seen androids/synth interact with the eggs. Combined with the scene from Romulus where they evade the facehuggers in the corridor, it adds an interesting limitation to that stage of the Xenomorph lifecycle.
Lathe Biosas wrote: I've noticed that the black goo hasn't made an appearance in dialogue, are they skipping over the odd prequel stuff that contradicted the original film, or are they sticking closer to the original Alien/Aliens?
The schizophrenic Alien, the horrible action scene, the sometimes acid blood.
-If you're referring to after the fight scene where they've got the dead alien on the trolley, wheeling it into the facility, I'm prepared to assume that the aliens blood goes inert(?) after a certain amount of time exposed to air/non-internal body conditions. Maybe the coagulation process for xenomorph blood alkalises it? Returns it to a base level Ph?
I'm not sure on the correct terminology, for as much as I enjoyed it, chemistry was not a strong subject for me.
Spoiler:
Why did they go thru the whole process of removing the embryo from the egg to implant into a single lung rather than just tossing one egg into a room with a sheep and seeing what happens? Like, how did they even know specifically to look for the embryo, that it could survive submerged in liquid, etc. I liked the android’s “Don’t stick your face next to the egg” speech and their “no humans allowed in this room” protocol they then enacted, but everything after that felt like Too much knowledge on the subject.
-I agree with MDG, Kirsh had read all the files the previous crew had collated on the various alien species. He was working from an informed position and either knew exactly what he was looking for, or otherwise correctly extrapolated what he had to do.
I did like the way he took charge with BK and pushed him out of the lab. Shows he's not prepared to fool around with things he doesn't yet fully understand. And I think actually shows that BK has at least a modicum of trust in those he delegates too. Or at least a level of trust in Kirsh. He allows himself to be ejected from the lab without throwing a tantrum and doing the the usual billionaire thing of "you can't tell me what to do!" when they're separated from their new toys. While he might not like it, he accepts Kirsh's judgement on the matter and is instantly prepared to roll with it.
Spoiler:
and no one apparently noticing she came into the room during surgery and passed out twitching on the floor behind them.
-That scene might not be as linear as we're lead to believe. I don't think Kirsh just stepped over her without on his way out. There's something else going on in that scene and I'll not be at all surprised if the 4th episode starts with Wendy being rushed back to lab for further diagnostics/debugging/etc.
You know given the general weirdness of the whole scene, what with the audio interference Wendy's getting, along with Kirsh and the others not registering she'd entered the lab and subsequently ignoring her collapse. I'd not be shocked if the entire thing turns out to be some sort of synth fever dream bought on by... whatever.
Lathe Biosas wrote: I've noticed that the black goo hasn't made an appearance in dialogue, are they skipping over the odd prequel stuff that contradicted the original film, or are they sticking closer to the original Alien/Aliens?
I don't think we can really know yet if they will/won't bring up the goo. This is before the events of Romulus so maybe these events play into the company's search for the stuff/how they even became aware of it to begin with.
On the whole, while Romulus actually made something plot coherent come of the black gunk, I would not shed a tear over all future alien properties acting as if Prometheus and Covenant never happened.
It’s also not clear in Romulus how the black goo is harvested.
We know it’s obtained from the Xenomorph. Seemingly the Face Huggers specifically if memory of that scene serves. And there’s the “no other explanation has been offered” assumption that between the end of Covenant, and the events leading up to Romulus, the company learns of the Black Goo. Yet we still don’t know how, exactly.
Though perhaps the crew of the Prometheus had been uploading clips of their antics to Future Space YouTube, that footage found it’s way to Fail Army, which was being watched by a Weyland-Yutani Intern on their lunch, when in comedy film stylings a Big Wig walked past, saw the “hey, let’s sniff the mystery substance” and started getting ideas.
Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote: Also…has the show joined the hallowed Andor as a show universally enjoyed by Dakkanauts?
Only 3 episodes in. There is still time.
I have some issues so far, but going to wait for the full body of work because I love the showrunners work with Fargo and I've heard good things about Legion, though I never watched that one.
I'm much the same. I don't think the writers respect the laws of physics*, which effortlessly puts them on my naughty list. The question is whether the good parts outweigh that in the end.
* --->
Spoiler:
The xenomorph can effortlessly knock over a heavy ass steel cargo container but lets itself get dragged around by a 50kg synth girl. Right.
On the spoilered bit?
Spoiler:
As ever, if I’m thinking of the same bit of the scene? When they’re wrestling, she’s got it by the pharyngeal jaw. We know she has super strength. Add to that a useful pressure point and I’m much more forgiving of that scene.
Doesn’t make it suddenly entirely realistic of course. But it’s sufficient for my suspension of disbelief to not require toxic amounts of salt.
And to add Srunb’s observation on other steps it could’ve taken? I’m happy enough that whilst a bit silly, it’s within “it’s a creature of instinct when solitary” tolerances for me. Again if we apply my pressure point argument, and perhaps add in she’s the one that stabbed it so perhaps it’s mildly cautious of her as a result?
Only argument and opinion. Not intended to be taken as cast iron fact and that.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Also it did put me in mind of this classic fight.
By the sometimes acid blood I mean why doesn’t it melt thru a paper cutter or a meat hook? Forget weight and strength and pressure points, that hook shouldn’t have lasted even a couple seconds impaled thru the alien before melting.
There I’m assuming it missed any major blood vessels and that.
Presumably, that jaw is predominantly muscle and cartilage. Perhaps it only has tiny capillaries, as it’s not intended for much more than whipping out to brain someone, and not any kind of sustained physical activity which might require a greater blood supply?
Not saying the scene isn’t silly for it. But again, I think there are fairly reasonable explanations.
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