Katherine Waterston’s Role In ‘Alien: Covenant’ Revealed?

[XenoHunter99]

OTOH, isn't there a Dark Horse comic where Ripley is fated through her great-grandfather on earth or something and the aliens have some sort of genetic memory of the Ripley clan? It's a stupid difficult idea to swallow (because how would the alien species magically know the Nostromo would somehow encounter the derelict or have any contact at all), but it does set a precedent of sorts.

It was some kind of in-joke-style cameo of the surname, right at the end. Could have kind of worked, but the story it was a part of was a bit awful/underwhelming.

Thanks for that! 

I'm fairly sure 'Isolation' was what compelled Fox to demand 'Out Of the Shadows' include Ripley (could be wrong on that, but it seems likely, given the retconned nature of her constantly having nightmares about Amanda, compared to us seeing she was mostly having nightmares about herself in 'Aliens'). Then the sequel to that had the Aliens decide to hold some kind of psychotic burning hatred for her very genes and decide some distant descendent MUST BE DESTROYED... Even though, y'know, Burke pointed out Amanda never had any children.

And so, precedent was set.

That makes sense. Burke could have lied. A guy like that, he probably lies every time his mouth moves. 

Either that or Ridley Scott's somehow repeated his weird 'concidence magic', again... He's never watched the first of the AVP films, yet we know there were a lot of coincidences between that and 'Prometheus'. Maybe he's spontaneously come up with the Ripley connection, not realise it's effectively repeating what has recently now become a tired formula.

I find it hard to believe that he really never watched AVP or that no one mentioned the similarities.It's possible, but it seems a stretch. More likely, he liked the ideas and used them. And tired as it is, I think we're going to get more Ripley-weaving. Soap opera is eternal, and movie studios love their franchises.

[predxeno]

I wonder if the Ridley Scott fans still think he has the right to do whatever he wants with the franchise simply because he was the director of Alien.  To me (and perhaps everyone who disliked Prometheus), RS makes movies solely for money now rather than to tell a good story.  We need to throw him out of the franchise (and as long as we're at it, we should throw Disney out of Star Wars as well).


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[XenoHunter99]

We didn't need 3 sequels and 3 spinoffs to Alien either but we got them.  You know if they mess this whole thing up, it will just get rebooted in 20 years anyway.

I'm sure a Ripley origin story would bring in the crowds.

I'm among those who wanted Alien sequels. I love the way the original set up the Alien universe. It could have been glorious. Instead, it's been more 'meh.' I wanted sequels that told compelling stories about humanity's unpleasant interactions with the Terror of the Space Lanes. I wanted the space jockeys to be enigmatic, cool, and utterly alien themselves. I even really liked the way Dark Horse set up AVP from the first time they talked about it in Dark Horse Presents. But that's not really the way it went. And despite the hundreds of millions of dollars that Fox will throw at it, I don't see the situation becoming much better. Each new chapter in the Alien universe exhibits at least the potential for greatness. And somehow, the effort falls short. Only the original movie remains truly great.

[THE CITY HUNTER]

I wonder if the Ridley Scott fans still think he has the right to do whatever he wants with the franchise simply because he was the director of Alien.  To me (and perhaps everyone who disliked Prometheus), RS makes movies solely for money now rather than to tell a good story.  We need to throw him out of the franchise (and as long as we're at it, we should throw Disney out of Star Wars as well).


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So true.

[XenoHunter99]

I wonder if the Ridley Scott fans still think he has the right to do whatever he wants with the franchise simply because he was the director of Alien.  To me (and perhaps everyone who disliked Prometheus), RS makes movies solely for money now rather than to tell a good story.

I'm sure he does and you're probably right.

  We need to throw him out of the franchise (and as long as we're at it, we should throw Disney out of Star Wars as well).

Yes, I agree!

[xenoboner4everyone]

Hmmmm, if the spoiler was removed at the request of the studio then that certainly lends credence to the spoiler, or maybe FOX didn't want a false rumor about the connections with Ripley? Waterston's surname is Daniels in the film, and lil' Ripley will be 11, so Daniels obviously remarried if this is to be true. If Daniels "disappeared" in space, maybe that is what prompts Ripley to become a flight officer in the first place? Maybe she tried looking for her...man I'll laugh if Daniels' first name is Jonesy haha! This would all obviously parallel Isolation's plot but Isolation's success could very well have inspired this, heck it could act as a thematic through-line with the maternal themes of Aliens; daughter lost mother/mother lost daughter, mother gains new daughter (new daughter dies in A3, mother makes ultimate sacrifice/in Blomkamp's film mother and new daughter live on fighting...) Who knows, if true and they make it work, fine, I honestly don't care what they do so much character-wise so long as they're spacetrucker-like, I care mostly about whether Giger's aesthetic will return and whether Scott brings the terror, if I get both of those things Scott can shoehorn whatever he wants quite frankly! But that's just me, this is all yet to be confirmed after all.

[CainsSon]

As much as I liked some of the elements in Spaihts drafts of Prometheus... I believe him and Ridley Scott are wrong about one thing that they both keep mentioning -

That the story has to be intrinsically tied to OUR story. The human story. Ripley's story.

Yes. It will be good to have a better ending to Ripley's story, but it's not good to tie the Aliens to the human race in any big way. Prometheus moved in that direction. The Aliens themselves are better left a mystery and tie-ing them into the human race was ONE GIANT CHIP in the veneer, and now tie-ing them to Ripley in a bigger way, is the next big chip in the veneer. Eventually it cracks.

[RakaiThwei]

So they're really doing the whole... Ripley family legacy thing? Mmmm.. Know what? I... just don't care. Yeah it's annoying but at this point I... just don't really care anymore.

And what was the spoiler the studio requested be taken down? The Ripley's Mom rumor or.. what?

[xenoboners4everyone]

Assuming it's the case that Daniels is on the Covenant for a job as security and left lil' Ripley behind, perhaps Daniels orders her a certain kitten for her birthday, and Ripley never hears from her mother ever again, hence why Ripley is so attached to Jonesy; the last thing she remembers of her mother, and because Ripley has mother issues maybe that's why she projects at M.O.T.H.E.R.; calling her a bitch, yes, it's all coming together. 

[Burn the Floor]

How about no? Alien Isolation already has Amanda encountering the Alien, having Ripley's mother encounter it too is bordering on some mystical familial destiny shit

[nonentity]

This sounds like a studio bullet point.  I like the character of Ripley, but it is beyond silly that some think that character is the "secret sauce" of Alien.  The artwork/design of Giger being realized on film by Scott is why Alien is still relevant 30+ years later.  Nothing has equaled or surpassed that view of a completely believable yet foreign alien culture.  There had never been a monster so elegant and beautiful, yet terrifying.  Birth-sex-death personified as the ultimate penis-headed killing/raping machine.

I think the art/design of the alien + jockey was the true stand-out, but it also helped that the script, actors, and human tech were outstanding as well.  Things like actors being believable for the type of work they performed (rugged/middle-aged, etc), rather than 20-35 year old Gap models that we see in most films elevated the art as a whole.  I acknowledge the other exceptional factors of the film, but it is Giger's art that places it in a league above almost all others.

What makes Alien relevant and different to all the other sci-fi films is Giger...not whether Ripley or her fathers, brothers, nephews, cousin's former room mate is on board the Covenant.  I do not buy the Art of Ripley books.  I would not automatically play a game or read a comic about the adventures of Ripley fighting space pirates or any other generic villains.  My biggest wish since seeing Alien was to see more of this tech in motion and for what purposes did it exist.  I hope Scott explores some of this with the new film while keeping Giger's biomechanics front and center. 
 

[Glaive]

Well, hope Covenant turns out as good as this...

[Seegson]

David 8 in prometheus its just one of the numerous "clone" robots weyland have (you can see that on the BR extras).

So perhaps Fassbender its playing another David8 different from the Prometheus one. That will make sense with Shaw dont playing any role in Covenant. Fassbender its just the android of the Covenant.

If Scott explain it well i have no problem with Daniels being Ripleys mother...a 11yo child its waiting for her mother (a who works on space) to come back...but she died. It make sense for her getting involved with the same company working in space like her mother.

Why she was in the nostromo, ...well, give the film a chance, perhaps its a good link after all.

[thecaffeinatedone]

I see Ridley Scott still hasn't re-learned how to make good movies, huh?  Alien: Isolation was a fluke, using Amanda Ripley as the protagonist worked because people could believe that she would introduce herself to the Alien in order to find out what happened to her mother.  Ridley Scott should just stop making Alien movies altogether, I think the only people here who would like this twist are the fans of Prometheus.


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I thought it was because Isolation was...well, a video game and largely nobody places much stake in whether or not it's strictly canon. You could've put any generic protagonist in Alien: Isolation and it would've worked just as well. There's the bit about her finding the log from the Nostromo, but how does she develop as a character from listening to her mother? Not much at all, except for advancing the plot and providing fan-service.

EDIT: Not sure it advances the plot much either...or the story really. Maybe the background, but it's not like you don't know the plot of Alien already. I mean, come on. :b

[predxeno]

I recall that many Prometheus fans argued that since Ridley Scott was the director of the first film, all his ideas were automatically great ones no matter what.  I'm actually rather curious to know whether they still think that in light of this new plot development or whether they changed their minds.


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