Alien: Covenant

Set 10 years after the events of Prometheus, Alien: Covenant follows the crew of a colony spacecraft as they divert from their course to explore a seemingly perfect new world – with chaos and mayhem ensuing as it becomes clear that said planet is far from uninhabited. It’s apparent fairly early on that filmmaker Ridley Scott, along with scripters Michael Green, Dante Harper, and John Logan, isn’t looking to deviate from the introspective tone of 2012’s Prometheus, as Alien: Covenant boasts (or suffers from) a similarly deliberate pace that’s compounded by a lack of memorable characters and a tedious emphasis on philosophical musings. (The movie fares especially poorly in terms of the former, as there isn’t, aside from Michael Fassbender’s returning David, a single figure here that’s developed beyond their most basic attributes.) And although the film seems to take a turn for the exceedingly positive about a third in – Scott delivers an absolutely enthralling sequence that’s as visceral and exciting as anything within the entire series – Alien: Covenant progresses into a somewhat watchable yet entirely underwhelming midsection that does, more often than not, seem to be spinning its wheels. (It doesn’t help, either, that Scott bathes the picture in often impenetrable darkness.) The third-act pivot into full-on horror territory, though appreciated, feels like it’s been grafted on from an entirely different movie, with this climactic stretch ultimately indicative of the movie’s inability to decide if it wants to be a Prometheus sequel or a full-bore Alien prequel (ie this indecision ensures that it’s fairly unsuccessful in both realms).

**1/2 out of ****