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Here’s something to help get you through your Monday! We have just uploaded the 68th episode of the Alien vs. Predator Galaxy Podcast (right-click and save as to download)! Our latest episode sees regular hosts Corporal Hicks, RidgeTop and Xenomorphine reconvene to discuss how we feel about Alien: Covenant after a year to learn about the film, re-watch it and re-consider it.

We talk about how what we’ve learnt about Alien: Covenant since the film’s release, we briefly discuss the prequel novel, if our opinions on the film have changed and if we’d still want to see Sir Ridley Scott with his hands on the reins of the franchise.

What did you think of our latest episode? Be sure to let us know down below! You can also listen to any of our previous episodes in the Podcast section under the News tab on the main menu. The Alien vs. Predator Galaxy Podcast is also available via iTunes, PodBean, GooglePlay Stitcher and now YouTube!

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Yay! :laugh:

Will listen now :)

Great podcast!
I still have to read the prequel novel. I totally lost interest after I found out its not about David and Shaw...    ???
By the way, I think there are a lot of fans out there who want to see the painting of giger come to life in form of an engineer home planet. I dont think money is the reason. I really dont know why they're not doing it... It would be fantastatic!  :)

Scott needs to STAY AWAY....Crapynant is just terrible and has ruined the franchise for me, I saw the film on the first day. I came out of the cinema in rage and utter disappointment along with my other friends. The Alien being a tacked on horror gimmick but all the stupid things that happen in the film was shocking. Everything wrong with... and Honest trailers put it down perfectly on why its terrible. Damn movie, damn Scott... -_-

If they make more Alien films it needs to stay away from Scotts odd prequels. Hell Alien Isolation was just perfect. They can expand on that. May be Amanda Ripley is still alive or she didn't die the way Burke said in Aliens, a cover up etc.

Foxnet need to hire Rebellion to make another AvP game to continue after the 2010 game. And another dev needs to make an open world / planets Predator game

also, love the podcast guys :-)

Right  ::)

The one thing Isolation did wrong was to include Amanda Ripley, Alien needs to move away from that family- not towards. Leave them alone.

The universe is vast, there's plenty other opportunities for stories all their own.

Unfortunately the right idea to cash in was to keep going with the Ripley family. Anything new would have opened up a can of empty unless they tied it to the films. One thing they did wrong was tie it to the Alien family (ie, the life cycle and all it's members). What keeps this franchise going is mythology and unanswered questions. The problem is IF they don't use the myth HR Giger brought us, we will find ourselves empty yet again. At least Prometheus managed to tie HR GIger work (if only a mural or two). Otherwise would have been something like Covenant.

I'd say "aside of the Juggernaut" because everything else in that movie lacks Giger's touch. The murals are vague and incoherent in the background.

Isolation would have been just as good if Amanda Ripley were somebody else. Change a few of the details, and poof. Works just fine.

That's ultimately due to the fact that Amanda Ripley has no personality, she's essentially a shell for the player and the players' nostalgic reaction to hearing a message left specifically for them is intended to be the same as Amandas' reaction.

That's why, as coincidental as the whole scenario is- that's why it works.

I see the whole thing as a spiritual closure to the Ripley story, more genuine to the tone of the first three than Resurrection.

It's also left the Torrens floating through space that could end up anywhere for a good writer to exploit.

Quote from: acrediblesource on Jul 08, 2018, 10:43:06 PMWhat keeps this franchise going is mythology and unanswered questions. The problem is IF they don't use the myth HR Giger brought us, we will find ourselves empty yet again. At least Prometheus managed to tie HR GIger work (if only a mural or two). Otherwise would have been something like Covenant.

Covenant didn't provide any mythology and unanswered questions?
The ship, eggs and the xeno in Covenant were no tie in to Giger's work?

Isolation has a pretty subpar story and writing. I would never want a movie based on it, it's essentially the first movie but slightly bigger.

It has, however, some really really good world-building with the Sevastopol's downfall and how people reacted to it. That really felt like something out of the Alien universe. The desperation of becoming jobless and hopeless on the far reaches of space affected me way more than the main storyline, through some very simple audio logs and emails. The whole litigation between Seegson and its employees was great and how Weyland-Yutani stepped in to buy the entire station, giving some momentary hope, only to be taken away by the Alien "invasion" was fantastic.

Quote from: MU-TH-UR 6000 on Jul 09, 2018, 10:31:44 AM
Isolation has a pretty subpar story and writing. I would never want a movie based on it, it's essentially the first movie but slightly bigger.

It has, however, some really really good world-building with the Sevastopol's downfall and how people reacted to it. That really felt like something out of the Alien universe. The desperation of becoming jobless and hopeless on the far reaches of space affected me way more than the main storyline, through some very simple audio logs and emails. The whole litigation between Seegson and its employees was great and how Weyland-Yutani stepped in to buy the entire station, giving some momentary hope, only to be taken away by the Alien "invasion" was fantastic.

This.

I really do want a film though to find a crashed Torrens at some point.

I agree that the trailers didn't help the movie, especially how they spoiled a lot of stuff including who dies and how.

Quote from: MU-TH-UR 6000 on Jul 09, 2018, 10:31:44 AM
Isolation has a pretty subpar story and writing. I would never want a movie based on it, it's essentially the first movie but slightly bigger.

Yes. It would need alot of work to turn it into amovie.

But I think the writers need a bit of defending because I feel like they were hamstrung by technical limitations. For e.g. there are so few times when you really get to interact with NPCs, as though the tech. director didn't feel like the user's CPU could handle many AI people at once. Maybe the xeno AI was just a huge CPU cycle hog.

Quote from: MU-TH-UR 6000 on Jul 09, 2018, 10:31:44 AMIt has, however, some really really good world-building with the Sevastopol's downfall and how people reacted to it. That really felt like something out of the Alien universe. The desperation of becoming jobless and hopeless on the far reaches of space affected me way more than the main storyline, through some very simple audio logs and emails. The whole litigation between Seegson and its employees was great and how Weyland-Yutani stepped in to buy the entire station, giving some momentary hope, only to be taken away by the Alien "invasion" was fantastic.

It was well thought through, but all told via "log entries." If you compare it to film, this is a very curious kind of scriptwriting; it's all setting, with no real ability to build character or plot. (Characterisation is all hearsay, and you have to reconstruct the plot from what you read, more like prose fiction than the realtime drama a play or film gives you). I think I learned a bit about game writing from this.

But an enjoyable game. And thats what really counts.

TC

One of those rare occurences where I can say- yep I CAN believe its been a (busy) year.

I re-watched Covenant on download a few months back (after a June 2017 Cinema ticket) and my positive opinion is unchanged. Still a 4/5 movie and third only to ALIEN 5/5 and ALIENS 5/5.

I also had a suggested YouTube video of an "against the grain" movie reviewer who also liked the film. I agree Covenant greatest strength is David as the central character and his story arc from servant to God with a multitude of subliminal imagery, sound and symbolism.



Yes Covenant is misanthropic and anti-humanist, nihilistic. But that is/was the whole point of the ALIEN series!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Quote from: AVP-CAPCOM on Jul 09, 2018, 05:15:17 PM
Yes Covenant is misanthropic and anti-humanist, nihilistic. But that is/was the whole point of the ALIEN series!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I don't quite agree, since the Alien also represents a sort of Nietzschean Übermensch. It literally has our DNA. In that sense the Alien series is life affirming.

Great poddie guys, you bring up a lot of good points positive and negative.

Thanks for the mention as well, if anyone else wants to read what I've found in Alien Covenant you can find it here https://yutani.blog/a-l-i-e-n/ (https://yutani.blog/a-l-i-e-n/)

As for my friend Clayre, her blog is https://gothic-fiction-in-space.tumblr.com/post/164533391538/1-the-romanticism-of-alien-covenant (https://gothic-fiction-in-space.tumblr.com/post/164533391538/1-the-romanticism-of-alien-covenant)

Thinking about aesthetic differences between the book and the movie I have changed my mind and I actually enjoy the fact David is the creator, thematically it makes sense because Walter can only copy and imitate but David can do more. And if David was to die at the hand of his creation(or his creation's creation/ Queen and subsequent offspring) which seems to be where this story is going, it would make sense that he is the creator of the Xenomorph.

Quote from: tleilaxu on Jul 09, 2018, 09:23:54 PM

Quote from: AVP-CAPCOM on Jul 09, 2018, 05:15:17 PM
Yes Covenant is misanthropic and anti-humanist, nihilistic. But that is/was the whole point of the ALIEN series!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I don't quite agree, since the Alien also represents a sort of Nietzschean Übermensch. It literally has our DNA. In that sense the Alien series is life affirming.

And I do love how Ridley has been able to retroactively change the story to suit that Nietzschean Übermensch storyline/chain of events leading right up to Alien Resurrection. It's just another thing I love about these prequels, it gives me a lot to think about in the sense you get the inspiration from the very first myths right up to horror of the modern day.

Love the podcast fellas, quality as always and I agree with nearly everything said,

Keep up the good work

There was an article  posted over a year ago, it involved an interview with Ridley Scott taking about Alien Covenant where tells us Alien: Covenant 2 to Start Shooting in 14 Months? That was May of 2017, now its been 14 months July 2018. The less than expected box office results and fan response have Fox reevaluating the series. Hope Ridley's given the chance to make one more entry and end his trilogy leading to the set up of his original Alien. May likely not happen though.

It's more likely the box office and subsequent Disney sale that have slowed things down.  There were reports since Covenant that they were looking at where to go next.

Great podcast!

As for the movie, even year later I think it is crap! The most thing that I hate about it (among many things) is how stupid and retarded the characters are. The only explanation I can find is that you don't send the most valuable members of society on a virgin flight to colonise an unknown planet. But why do you send complete idiots is beyond me?!?!

Cinematography is beatiful though. First 30 minutes is pretty good as well.

Still, gonna give it a one more shot todays evening. If not for anything else than for guilty pleasure. I can always wach Alien and Alien 3 to see a great ALIEN movie and forget about Prometheus/Covenant/Scotts "visions" and "fresh ideas".

I think Ridley will finish Big  (FIGERS CROSSED AND EAY PRAY LOVE) and then I hope more Ripley omg Yeah! Then a 10 part-Story Arch with a Male Hero and also Staring Me Lt Jesse Ripley.

This was a good listen after having been away from the site for a while. It seemed appropriate to touch on the anger frothing particularly intensely in certain fandoms at the moment. Although I agree this fanbase can be more 'stable' overall than some others, I think it's fair to say things got ugly after Covenant, to the point (for me) that the discussion just wasn't enjoyable anymore.

I think Ridley should be given the shot if he's willing to wrap up his prequel story within one more movie. That always seemed like a more realistic choice anyways, instead of going off for another three or four. I don't agree with everything he's done, but I liked Covenant and would at least like to see the story get a real resolution.

If nothing else, one thing I hope comes of the Prometheus-Covenant era is for Fox not to be afraid to continue in a direction that's not Ripley-centric, wherever they may go timeline-wise.

Quote from: tleilaxu on Jul 09, 2018, 09:23:54 PMthe Alien also represents a sort of Nietzschean Übermensch.

Now that is one of the darnedest things that I ever read.

QuoteIt literally has our DNA.

Oh shit.

Quote from: Bad Replicant on Jul 14, 2018, 08:33:39 AM

If nothing else, one thing I hope comes of the Prometheus-Covenant era is for Fox not to be afraid to continue in a direction that's not Ripley-centric, wherever they may go timeline-wise.

This.

I like A:C and PROM less and less every time I watch them. There is so much both lore-wise, film-wise and storytelling-wise that I strongly disagree with and find highly lackluster and disappointing.

I somewhat disagree about the pathogen being able to do anything the film makers want, it can't set you on fire, etc. It atomized into particles in the air due to being deployed at high velocity and air pressure; the ampules shook up like cans of soda, while the stationary ampules just bled when exposed to the air. It's a reactive, chaotic mutagen but there's one constant - it's consistently aggressive across the variety of applications that we've seen. It's basically the perfect weapon. David tried to improve upon perfection; he gave the neomorph armour, made the egg sacs larger, created a facehugger to deploy embryos via the throat, thus he poured all of his sexual neurosis/madness into his designs. His creature's life cycle is "perfect" to him because it's especially sadistic to humans, he chose aesthetic, cruel sexual deviance over efficiency. David was made to be as close to humans as possible but not to perish or pass on his genes. The xenomorph is the culmination of that - a literal rape and death machine. With 10 years of isolation and sexual neurosis it follows that he'd stop caring about efficiency, totally steeped as he is in his own visionary, mad genius.

(https://orig00.deviantart.net/06a3/f/2015/120/1/2/not_bad_by_brandonale-d8rn3zk.png)

Quote from: Necro II on Jul 15, 2018, 06:00:02 AM
I somewhat disagree about the pathogen being able to do anything the film makers want, it can't set you on fire, etc. It atomized into particles in the air due to being deployed at high velocity and air pressure; the ampules shook up like cans of soda, while the stationary ampules just bled when exposed to the air. It's a reactive, chaotic mutagen but there's one constant - it's consistently aggressive across the variety of applications that we've seen. It's basically the perfect weapon. David tried to improve upon perfection; he gave the neomorph armour, made the egg sacs larger, created a facehugger to deploy embryos via the throat, thus he poured all of his sexual neurosis/madness into his designs. His creature's life cycle is "perfect" to him because it's especially sadistic to humans, he chose aesthetic, cruel sexual deviance over efficiency. David was made to be as close to humans as possible but not to perish or pass on his genes. The xenomorph is the culmination of that - a literal rape and death machine. With 10 years of isolation and sexual neurosis it follows that he'd stop caring about efficiency, totally steeped as he is in his own visionary, mad genius.

<3 <3 <3

Quote from: Bad Replicant on Jul 14, 2018, 08:33:39 AM
This was a good listen after having been away from the site for a while. It seemed appropriate to touch on the anger frothing particularly intensely in certain fandoms at the moment. Although I agree this fanbase can be more 'stable' overall than some others, I think it's fair to say things got ugly after Covenant, to the point (for me) that the discussion just wasn't enjoyable anymore.

I'm sorry it got that bad for you. Welcome back though.

QuoteIf nothing else, one thing I hope comes of the Prometheus-Covenant era is for Fox not to be afraid to continue in a direction that's not Ripley-centric, wherever they may go timeline-wise.

Completely agreed. They need to push on without fear of dragging Ripley with them.

Quote from: Necro II on Jul 15, 2018, 06:00:02 AM
I somewhat disagree about the pathogen being able to do anything the film makers want, it can't set you on fire, etc. It atomized into particles in the air due to being deployed at high velocity and air pressure; the ampules shook up like cans of soda, while the stationary ampules just bled when exposed to the air. It's a reactive, chaotic mutagen but there's one constant - it's consistently aggressive across the variety of applications that we've seen. It's basically the perfect weapon. David tried to improve upon perfection; he gave the neomorph armour, made the egg sacs larger, created a facehugger to deploy embryos via the throat, thus he poured all of his sexual neurosis/madness into his designs. His creature's life cycle is "perfect" to him because it's especially sadistic to humans, he chose aesthetic, cruel sexual deviance over efficiency. David was made to be as close to humans as possible but not to perish or pass on his genes. The xenomorph is the culmination of that - a literal rape and death machine. With 10 years of isolation and sexual neurosis it follows that he'd stop caring about efficiency, totally steeped as he is in his own visionary, mad genius.

I really really like this take on it. Not so much literal perfection of the Aliens.

---

Thanks to everyone for listening!

Omg, I disagree with so many of these opinions.  :-X

Quote from: Corporal Hicks on Jul 15, 2018, 08:39:38 AM
I'm sorry it got that bad for you. Welcome back though.

Well, y'know, I've been waking up every night with my sheets soaked with sweat, so, here I am.

And thank you, sir.

The best thing to do was get back on that horse.

Yeah i was glad to see you on the forum again BR, always enjoyed your posts.

If youre into predator at all I would steer clear of the section for the new movie lol :D

Thanks! I've taken a peak; I felt like a weary Danny Glover stumbling around an orange spaceship during a heatwave, but that's kind of how I usually feel when I hop the fence into that section.

One year on I love the film more. Right up there with the original.

Quote from: SpreadEagleBeagle on Jul 15, 2018, 05:28:31 AM
I like A:C and PROM less and less every time I watch them. There is so much both lore-wise, film-wise and storytelling-wise that I strongly disagree with and find highly lackluster and disappointing.

I'm not arguing your opinion, but specifically what lore? I always see this complaint about the lore but all we had to go on were eggs left inside a ship. Anything else lore-wise was created and built up in peoples minds.

Quote from: Necro II on Jul 15, 2018, 06:00:02 AM
I somewhat disagree about the pathogen being able to do anything the film makers want, it can't set you on fire, etc. It atomized into particles in the air due to being deployed at high velocity and air pressure; the ampules shook up like cans of soda, while the stationary ampules just bled when exposed to the air. It's a reactive, chaotic mutagen but there's one constant - it's consistently aggressive across the variety of applications that we've seen. It's basically the perfect weapon. David tried to improve upon perfection; he gave the neomorph armour, made the egg sacs larger, created a facehugger to deploy embryos via the throat, thus he poured all of his sexual neurosis/madness into his designs. His creature's life cycle is "perfect" to him because it's especially sadistic to humans, he chose aesthetic, cruel sexual deviance over efficiency. David was made to be as close to humans as possible but not to perish or pass on his genes. The xenomorph is the culmination of that - a literal rape and death machine. With 10 years of isolation and sexual neurosis it follows that he'd stop caring about efficiency, totally steeped as he is in his own visionary, mad genius.

This is excellent and is a good case of why I love this movie. It's very interesting.

Quote from: PsyKore on Jul 17, 2018, 12:43:48 AM
One year on I love the film more. Right up there with the original.

Quote from: SpreadEagleBeagle on Jul 15, 2018, 05:28:31 AM
I like A:C and PROM less and less every time I watch them. There is so much both lore-wise, film-wise and storytelling-wise that I strongly disagree with and find highly lackluster and disappointing.

I'm not arguing your opinion, but specifically what lore? I always see this complaint about the lore but all we had to go on were eggs left inside a ship. Anything else lore-wise was created and built up in peoples minds.

Well, the derelict and the space jockey being fossilized for starters, which implied that the Xenomorph was ancient and not something some rampant android AI concocted and conjured up just a decennium or two earlier on some faraway bastion formerly inhabited by giant bald albino humans (whom btw. are the same people as the supposedly mysterious Space Jockey race). Every thing that was 'alien' about ALIEN showed up to be anything but alien. The Engineers are escentially us (same DNA signature as us) and the Alien is indirectly created by us (as the black goo is life-altering Engineer technology and David is "Earthling" human-mimicking technology). It's highly anticlimactic and totally kills any shred of mystery that was left. At least to me.

I understand the train of thought and the alure of the whole concept of an artificial being being the creator of a new lifeform designed to prey on said artificial being's own creators, just as I understand the alure of us being created by an ancient space faring race of people who look very much like us. It's very poetic and all but also takes away from the original concept and themes. It's a change of soul, so to speak. All of a sudden the Alien saga turned into The Frankenstein Family Chronicles.

Personally I hope that Scott aims to make Alien alien again, in one way or another. I would love the idea that the Xenomorph, which David believes that he is the sole creator of, has been created/recreated countless times before David had his way with it. The ones before David to recreate the Xenomorph was the Space Jockey, which was a primordially ancient non human race (now extinct or mysteriously vanquished), the same race from which the Engineers got most of their technology from.

I would love to see the reaction and existential crisis of David once he realizes that "his creation" (the Xenomorph) was not his creation after all and thus cements the fact that he is just another android incapable of true creation, creativity, art and invention. That it was the black goo that used David to recreate/create the Xenomorph rather than the other way around. That would be a cruel but fitting end to the David story line.

I would also prefer if the Engineers are/were nothing but primitive humans originating from Earth. Maybe they were abducted and taken away to Paradise by Space Jockeys as an experiment? And ever since the Space Jockey race vanquished, the space age stone age people of the Engineers have ritualistically taken it upon themselves to continue what they believe was their gods' (the Space Jockeys) quest and mission - to "seed" the galaxy with life (unfortunately without even partially understanding Space Jockey technology).

Quote from: SpreadEagleBeagle on Jul 17, 2018, 04:18:38 PM

Quote from: PsyKore on Jul 17, 2018, 12:43:48 AM
One year on I love the film more. Right up there with the original.

Quote from: SpreadEagleBeagle on Jul 15, 2018, 05:28:31 AM
I like A:C and PROM less and less every time I watch them. There is so much both lore-wise, film-wise and storytelling-wise that I strongly disagree with and find highly lackluster and disappointing.

I'm not arguing your opinion, but specifically what lore? I always see this complaint about the lore but all we had to go on were eggs left inside a ship. Anything else lore-wise was created and built up in peoples minds.

...

Although I really enjoy and like the expansion of the Alien mythos in Alien Covenant- (the intelligence of the characters in the script is another thing) & MUTHUR's blog shows exactly why I enjoy the new ideas and the thematics of Alien Covenant, without repeating myself it would be a big contention of mine that the solution to these prequels is to ignore them and return the universe to that of a claustrophobic spaceship.

These are films first and foremost. Ridley Scott- although he believes the Alien universe can be expansive- his primary interest is to explore ideas he thinks worth exploring through his films- not to be beholden to what came before or what comes after, and I admire that brazen disregard for what fanatics perceive Alien to be or what they want from it due to preconceptions they have.

I think your perspective would be the ideal inbetween, it would enrich Covenant and S.RC's perspective whilst simultaneously adding more to the fictional universe than we have at the moment.
It's always difficult towing the line between adding more and avoiding turning Alien from what should be a
barren, harsh and realistic universe into a bustling galaxy teeming with all forms of life.

The whole Alien universe, like our own- should be a dire necropolis.
Not that their is no life- but what their is, is Alien. The animals here on earth know what they are-
we are the strange ones with an existence that we constantly question, everything else is simply in a race for survival.
Deep space should be like the deep sea. Empty- lifeless- barren, with terrifying things we can barely fathom waiting for us. Like the Neomorphs.

It is for that reason that I like Ridley Scott's idea of going one step beyond that, by making the Alien a biological AI. Imagine something with the intelligence of Skynet or AM from "I have no mouth and I must scream."
But purely devoted to survival and evolution.

Isn't that the perfect organism? Isn't that the most terrifying thing imaginable?
That matches Giger's design language to boot, the biological machine.

THE OLD ONE:
Yeah, I get all of that and I agree with your analysis and assessment concerning the prequels - those are good points.

Still, I dont think Scott went the right way as he departed from the premise of the nihilistic, fateless, faithless, meaningless barren darkness and void of the universe and mankind and existance as a whole. Survival is banal but it's all that we got in the end even though we will be wiped out in one way or another without anyone highly sentient other than us ever noticing our existence to begin with. It's us alone with our own insanity and banality, and then you have all of that toppled over once you face what could be considered the very manifestation of the harsh and unforgiving nature of space and the universe - the Alien. Primordial perfection. Scott kind of fumbled that away on more levels than one according to me. A lot has to do with the tone and the execution of the prequels.

Anyways, that train kind of passed and I'm open to the ideas you brought to discussion as long as they "promote" the Alien and "demote" the Engineers while bringing back the Space Jockey as a separate race, mysterious and ancient. In other words:
1 - It was the black goo (Xenomorph Essence) that lead David to recreate the Alien/Xenomorph (and not the other way around). David is also not the first one to recreate it - the Space Jockeys did so before him. Did they find the Xenomorph/Alien first followed by creating Xenomorph Essence (black goo) out of the Alien specimens they found or did they first find Xenomorph Essence which lead them to unknowingly (re)create the Xenomorph? Either way it's almost like summoning an ancient demon.
2 - The Engineers are literally humans abducted from Earth by Space Jockeys tens of thousands of years ago and were brought to Paradise for experimentation etc. The ones we saw in PROM were enhanced, possibly genetically augmented clones schooled and instructed by Space Jockeys for whatever reason. The Engineers in A:C were the regular janes and joes of their kind, more or less purposely kept in this pre-industrial almost stone age like bubble where they seem to worship their enhanced bretheren as actual gods (hence the stone faces).
3 - The Space Jockeys were not the same as the Engineers. In fact, the Space Jockey race was barely even humanoid to begin with. How, when and why they disappeared we don't know, but the fossilization of the derelict suggest it to be at least a big handful of milleniums ago.

Your first point I really like, although it does remind me of how the Marker always leads to the creation of Necromorphs in Dead Space despite trying to use it for other reasons. 2, I could take or leave- and wouldn't need to be done blatantly as that can already be inferred if you firmly establish 3 in the narrative.

Quote from: The Old One on Jul 18, 2018, 03:48:31 PM
By making the Alien a biological AI. Imagine something with the intelligence of the perfect AI, so beyond us it's incomprehensible.
But purely devoted to survival and evolution.

Isn't that the perfect organism? Isn't that the most terrifying thing imaginable?
That matches Giger's design language, the biological machine.

My main concern is that the above stay congruent.
Maybe if you went with your idea of the SJ being something other, it could be one of many races that recreated the Alien in the past and it doomed them as it did many before them. You could fill the universe with new ruins, and new intrigue whilst maintaining the tone of the fiction.

Quote from: The Old One on Jul 18, 2018, 11:53:32 PM
Your first point I really like, although it does remind me of how the Marker always leads to the creation of Necromorphs in Dead Space despite trying to use it for other reasons.

I'm familiar with the Dead Space video games and I've watched replay videos etc. of people playing them on YouTube, but I have never played the games myself. With that said I'm fine with the Black Goo/Mutagen/Xenomorph Essence being very much similar to the concept of the Marker.

Also, as a side note, I've followed the conversations regarding the new Alien comic ALIEN: The Cold Forge in which the main scientist discovers that the Facehugger doesn't implant an embryo per se rather than some hyper fast gene/chromosome altering/evolving "virus" (some kind of mass or LIQUID) which is what forces the host's body to turn its own components into the actual Chestburster embryo. Maybe the Black Goo is nothing but extracted, even synthesized, Facehugger implantation mutagen?

The Space Jockeys probably saw the potential in the Facehugger implantation mutagen (Xenomorph Essence) and tried to, like I already mentioned, harness and even synthesize the Xenomorph Essence for an abundance of other uses than producing Xenomorphs/Aliens. The Space Jockeys thought that they could completely override the Xenomorph nature of the source by turning into an industrialized technology (all their tech, structures and vessels seem to be biomechanoid a la Xenomorph) just to find out that even when 'controlled' and 'synthesized', seemingly evolved and utilized 'safely' for eons, the Black Goo will eventually, at some point, end up producing Xenomorphs no matter what.

In that scope, taking A:TCF (ALIEN: The Cold Forge) in account, it all turns into a literal yet quite deadly play on the age-old Chicken-or-the-Egg conundrum.

Quote2, I could take or leave- and wouldn't need to be done blatantly as that can already be inferred if you firmly establish 3 in the narrative.

I agree that there's no need to explicitly hammer it down in order for the audience to get it, but I do think it's of importance to make it heavily implied that the Engineers are prehistoric humans abducted by the Space Jockeys at some point (visually the natives of Paradise - Engineer pleb - almost look like they could have Neanderthal origins). The reason I think it's important has to do with the need of mystery and things being alien to us rather than thoroughly explained and relatable, which is the way things are now with PROM and A:C. Making the Space Jockey alien again, separating it from the Engineers, is one way to bring back the mystery of the Space Jockey and the Derelict from ALIEN, and by spelling out that the Engineers are literally humans from Earth also dispels the idea that humans (Engineers in this case) have been around for hundreds of thousands of years, maybe million years and that humans have been the formative power, drive and presence throughout the galaxy ever since. We need to be taken back a few notches and eat some humble pie.

The downside of this take is that it's pretty similar to the original concept of Star Gate (the movie), but I'm perfectly ok with that as Star Gate (the movie, not the series) is one of my favorite modern(wish) popcorn friendly sci-fi movies. It does a lot of things well on the mystery department for one.

Quote from: The Old One on Jul 18, 2018, 03:48:31 PM
My main concern is that the above stay congruent.
Maybe if you went with your idea of the SJ being something other, it could be one of many races that recreated the Alien in the past and it doomed them as it did many before them. You could fill the universe with new ruins, and new intrigue whilst maintaining the tone of the fiction.

Exactly! It would also make the Alien universe unique in a sense. Instead of introducing sentient new non-Xenomorph aliens all the time for us humans to interact with, we instead run into the ruins and remains of other races that bumped into the Xenomorph/Black Goo millions of years before we did (they were either wiped out by Xenomorph infestations or losing control of the Black Goo at some point or another). I guess the book series of ALIENS: In the Shadows and River of Pain etc. introduced this concept with the addition of the extinct "Dog-Aliens" race.

With that said: Arcturians ARE human colonists inhabiting worlds inside the Arcturian solar/star system rather than being some kind of Star Trekkish extraterrestrial race. Yes, one could argue that they (Arcturians) could be yet another slew of humans from Earth abducted by Space Jockeys (or even Engineers), but that would take away from the uniqueness and mystery of the Engineers and kind of opens up this concept of the entire Milky Way being inhabited by abducted human offshoots, much like Star Gate the TV series, which I DON'T like.  :P ;)

Agreed, I'd be pleased if this concept made it to fruition.

Oh gosh! I just heard Hicks' pronunciation of 'Dea-cons'  for the first time ;D ;D ;D

Thank you for the Podcast.

My year since the movie has taken me to the point where Covenant is a dead end from which I wish to reverse out of. It has also taken me back to pick up the reins of where Prometheus was going and re looking from that point.  There are two absolutely key signposts which have been crippled by the re positioning.

1) Elizabeth Shaw was the audiences proxy for the search for our creators and like us she was dissatisfied at the answers and needed to go on. That has been smashed out of the narrative.

2) Many of the answers to the catalyser/mutagen and the teardrop ship/engineers are in Prometheus but would have been clarified by arriving at where they were going which Damon Lindelof has confirmed has not happened in A :C. In other words Planet 4 is not where they intended to go after Prometheus but some place else and I mean in the artistic sense.

I am unusual in that I am passionate about the authority lent by the fabric of the movies and the story of Ripley in the first three films but as regards the prequels I am not interested in the creature other than why and whom and why the D SJ and Eggs were where they were. That latter point should have been knocked off with authority in Prometheus. It confused the audience and took them away from Elizabeths journey.   

I also agree with your remarks about fandom it is more personable maybe its because all the aggression is on the screen !!

Quote from: Necro II on Jul 15, 2018, 06:00:02 AM
I somewhat disagree about the pathogen being able to do anything the film makers want, it can't set you on fire, etc. It atomized into particles in the air due to being deployed at high velocity and air pressure; the ampules shook up like cans of soda, while the stationary ampules just bled when exposed to the air. It's a reactive, chaotic mutagen but there's one constant - it's consistently aggressive across the variety of applications that we've seen. It's basically the perfect weapon. David tried to improve upon perfection; he gave the neomorph armour, made the egg sacs larger, created a facehugger to deploy embryos via the throat, thus he poured all of his sexual neurosis/madness into his designs. His creature's life cycle is "perfect" to him because it's especially sadistic to humans, he chose aesthetic, cruel sexual deviance over efficiency. David was made to be as close to humans as possible but not to perish or pass on his genes. The xenomorph is the culmination of that - a literal rape and death machine. With 10 years of isolation and sexual neurosis it follows that he'd stop caring about efficiency, totally steeped as he is in his own visionary, mad genius.

This ^^

Whatever happens in the next prequel,  I believe Ash is renegade from WY and is actually either:  reprogrammed by David, David himself uploaded(As I believe he did to Walter's body) or David creates a hive mind network amongst AI....You could then argue the hearing panel in Aliens could legitimately claim  ignorance but I dunno

Except the part where Ash is operating on Company orders.

The inquiry board can legitimately claim ignorance because the only person from the Company is Burke.

Can we just... ignore the events on the original quadrilogy, trying to wrap up David's story instead and just make a little bit more sense of the new stuff introduced with the prequels? I just don't want any connections with the first movie at all, it will only add to the clutter of storytelling that are the prequels. Just hint or downright say the engineers were tinkering with xenos way before David to solve the LV-426 derelict in an elegant way, proving David is a bit of a fraud. Making a bridge-movie between Covenant and Alien and their characters will always be pretty boring and underwhelming.

Agreed, have the last entries relate thematically not literally.

Quote from: MU-TH-UR 6000 on Aug 31, 2018, 09:50:49 AM
Can we just... ignore the events on the original quadrilogy, trying to wrap up David's story instead and just make a little bit more sense of the new stuff introduced with the prequels? I just don't want any connections with the first movie at all, it will only add to the clutter of storytelling that are the prequels. Just hint or downright say the engineers were tinkering with xenos way before David to solve the LV-426 derelict in an elegant way, proving David is a bit of a fraud. Making a bridge-movie between Covenant and Alien and their characters will always be pretty boring and underwhelming.

Unfortunately for you, isn't that the point of these prequels?
I get that a lot of people feel certain elements are sacrosanct to them in terms of the original horror & mystery to the Xenos but this elegant way to show David as a fraud & that they existed in their classic form definitively, thousands of years ago boring actually
The new irony now of the Alien title is a wonderfully perverse reflection of humanity and its creations...or perhaps on an interstellar scale of history repeating itself?..
But I think the actual Alien element in the story is the Black goo. It is from here that there is the capacity to open up the horrific possibilities beyond anything we've seen with the Xenos made by the Engineers or other species yet to be introduced as the makers of the goo.
I feel that there is something majorly missed by people in Prometheus. I could be wrong but I find a path cleared in terms of understanding of what we are being told.  When they are in the mural room- It is when David touches the black goo urns & remarks, ' Organic' that the 'Paintings in the ceiling begin to change. Shaw notices this and thinks they've 'contaminated the environment in the room'
Holloway soon after shines a light on the mural for the first time
Therefore I hypothesise that the mural is in fact a form of 'Black goo mirror' or a form of readout of the shape of reaction the organisms in the room will turn into as a result in contact with the substance.

The origin of the classic Xenos is I believe going to remain the result of David, personally in terms of the bigger picture I love this decision & along with the illustrations made by Dane Hallett & co, the spirit of Gigers original bio tech vision is in place to develop further in the future.
How I'd like to see it is David being chased by the Engineers & their form of Xenos, a WY Android army(Who David turns & or hacks to his side like Walter & that Ash is actually one of the androids), they defeat the Engineers in a super battle and hijack multiple engineer ships seeding the galaxy with Xenos except the Derelict which is a result of human meddling, probably Daniels & Tenesssee or some other character maybe an engineer or one of its 'Wolves'(Advent)
I'd like to think David gets away to come back in future films but I doubt it. I can accept he needs some bad karma.. Still with AI, he could probably save himself on a memory stick or he uploads or sends Ash to keep his work alive.
Sorry about the jumpy thoughts but at the end of the day, in a deliciously sinister way, rather than anything else by being a species that specifically existed before, the Deacon is a result of Black goo underpinning an aborted human foetus that turned into a giant sex organ like Facehugger & an Engineer(Who could actually be a form of AI robot super soldier, a step up from Planet 4 inhabitants)
The Neomorph, again is a result of black goo, Planet 4 spores & a human rather than intelligent design.
The Xenos however are David making a bespoke model as a result of his research splicing the perceived best bits for him along with Shaw on Planet 4
So, in essence the black goo allows so much more to refresh the franchise, I don't have a problem & totally see the long term common sense and vision Ridley Scott has mapped out on its behalf, despite the flaws of the prequels themselves. I hope he sticks with it rather than succumbs again to the fan base's complaints.

Quote from: MU-TH-UR 6000 on Aug 31, 2018, 09:50:49 AM
Can we just... ignore the events on the original quadrilogy, trying to wrap up David's story instead and just make a little bit more sense of the new stuff introduced with the prequels? I just don't want any connections with the first movie at all, it will only add to the clutter of storytelling that are the prequels. Just hint or downright say the engineers were tinkering with xenos way before David to solve the LV-426 derelict in an elegant way, proving David is a bit of a fraud. Making a bridge-movie between Covenant and Alien and their characters will always be pretty boring and underwhelming.

You are interested in a subtle link, which is not bad and can be very healthy for both movies series (prequels and main tetralogy). In my case, however, I would like to see David finding the original Space Jockey (already dead and mummified of course).

Quote from: David Weyland on Aug 31, 2018, 06:56:52 PM

Quote from: MU-TH-UR 6000 on Aug 31, 2018, 09:50:49 AM
Can we just... ignore the events on the original quadrilogy, trying to wrap up David's story instead and just make a little bit more sense of the new stuff introduced with the prequels? I just don't want any connections with the first movie at all, it will only add to the clutter of storytelling that are the prequels. Just hint or downright say the engineers were tinkering with xenos way before David to solve the LV-426 derelict in an elegant way, proving David is a bit of a fraud. Making a bridge-movie between Covenant and Alien and their characters will always be pretty boring and underwhelming.

Unfortunately for you, isn't that the point of these prequels?
I get that a lot of people feel certain elements are sacrosanct to them in terms of the original horror & mystery to the Xenos but this elegant way to show David as a fraud & that they existed in there classic form before definitively I find boring actually

I think the Alien in the story is the Black goo. It is from here that there is the capacity to open up the horrific possibilities beyond anything we've seen with the Xenos

I feel that there is something majorly missed by people in Prometheus. I could be wrong but I find a path cleared in terms of understanding of what we are being told.  When they are in the mural room- It is when David touches the black goo urns & remarks, ' Organic' that the 'Paintings in the ceiling begin to change. Shaw notices this and thinks they've 'contaminated the environment in the room'
Holloway soon after shines a light on the mural for the first time

Therefore I hypothesise that the mural is in fact a form of 'Black goo mirror' or a form of readout of the shape of reaction the organisms in the room will turn into as a result in contact with the substance.
The origin of the classic Xenos is I believe going to remain the result of David, personally in terms of the bigger picture I love this decision & along with the illustrations made by Dane, the spirit of Gigers original bio tech vision is in place to develop further in the future.
How I'd like to see it is David being chased by the Engineers & a WY Android army(Who he turns of hacks to his side like Walter & that Ash is actually one of the androids), they defeat the Engineers in a battle and hijack multiple engineer ships seeding the galaxy with Xenos except the Derelict which is a result of human meddling, probably Daniels & Tenesssee or some other character maybe an engineer. I'd like to think David gets away to come back in future films but I doubt it. Still with AI, he could probably save himself on a memory stick!
Sorry about the jumpy thoughts but At the end of the day, in a deliciously sinister way, rather than anything else, rather than being a species that specifically existed before, the Deacon is a result of Black goo underpinning an aborted human foetus that turned into a giant sex organ & an Engineer(Who could actually be a form of AI robot super soldier, a step up from Planet 4 inhabitants)
The Neomorph, again is a result of black goo, spores & a human rather than intelligent design.
The Xenos however are David making a bespoke model as a result of his research on Planet 4
So, in essence the black goo allows so much more to refresh the franchise, I don't have a problem & totally see the long term common sense and vision Ridley Scott has mapped out on its behalf, despite the flaws of the prequels themselves. I hope he sticks with it rather than succumbs again to the fan base's complaints

As much as I like the prequels as a canonical part of the main franchise, I'd say this prequel series should have remained as its own thing: Alien spin-off or even a soft reboot showing a parallel timeline. However, I agree on one thing in particular: if the events of such prequels have little (if any) influence on the events of the main tetralogy...what is the justification for the existence of such stories in the first place ??? is like a prequel to Star Wars revealing in the third installment that the protagonist or main villain is not Darth Vader, but rather a fraud...making totally pointless the existence of these new stories and characters :-\ or at least, it doesn't make sense as part of a prequel / origin story  :P

I don't hope to see Ridley Scott compromise to the complaints of fanatics that have never worked in a creative industry, especially if he continues the rather interesting approach of taking inspiration from mythology and classical imagery such as John Milton's Paradise Lost.

I'd hope that if he returns to complete David's story and in this instance he has a clear idea of a narrative arc,
embellished by a superb script.
I don't see anything worthwhile in the Pathogen as an expansionist tool without boundaries, it has to be clearly defined.
It's a fascinating tool- but that one element can't carry the entire franchise, nor can the Alien alone.

It was the collaborative process that, in my opinion made the original Alien films work as successfully as they did.
Despite R.S now having nearly complete creative control, appreciably so due to his pedigree the prequel films fall apart in the writing department-
He's great at creating ideas, things you wouldn't think of- but he lacks a David Giler and Walter Hill to refine them, or reject them.

I would have never have thought of the Alien as a "biological AI"  for instance but I'm glad that Ridley Scott did.
I think David being their creator works within the context of the voyage of the Covenant but in the context of "A L I E N" as an entity and a universe it does not.

I much prefer the idea that while unnatural as far as we can tell, the Alien is a construct that willed itself into existence.
It doesn't have a homeworld or detectable point of origin- it just is.

How to convey that within the context of the Pathogen in the hands of the Engineers would be difficult, though.

What is the justification of Ridley Scott's prequels if they don't connect directly? To expand the universe, the mythos- simple.

I'm not 100% opposed to have some connections between the prequels and the quadrilogy. I just don't want the third prequel to be solely about that connection, if you catch my drift. Some subtle elements here and there, sure, I'd love it but not make the whole movie about "how the big guy got onto THE planet" as Ridley put it.

Which isn't to say that they couldn't pull that off with an interesting movie, I enjoyed that three way war that Ridley described he was interested in. If that culminated on the juggernaut crashing, ok cool. I just want new things. Hints that there are much weirder things out there (hell, the xeno could be one just under different forms, something that's been around since ages. As The Old One just put it: it just is.)

I'd love for the final movie to end on a Gigeresque planet, full of weird shit going on that's too hard to put onto words, with some xeno-like creatures around. Some could be evil, others were just there, kinda basking in rivers of black goo or something. Pretty much like the Scorn videogame landscapes. It would leave the door open for future movies to go crazy and end the prequels with David or a crew stranded on that "paradise", ending everything in traditional Alien-nihilistic fashion.

Quote from: The Old One on Aug 31, 2018, 07:36:28 PM
I don't hope to see Ridley Scott compromise to the complaints of fanatics that have never worked in a creative industry, especially if he continues the rather interesting approach of taking inspiration from mythology and classical imagery such as John Milton's Paradise Lost.

1. There is nothing wrong with having a critical opinion about a piece of fiction, as long as it is well-made criticism.

2.  Sometimes, even an authority could be wrong about something.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argument_from_authority)

3. The fanatics that have never worked in a creative industry, are paying for this pieces of entertainment. However, vote with the wallet is more efficiently than just moaning al the time via the internet.

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Quote from: The Old One on Aug 31, 2018, 07:36:28 PM
What is the justification of Ridley Scott's prequels if they don't connect directly? To expand the universe, the mythos- simple.

Fair enough. But still, such films don't need to be prequels and Ridley Scott has no need to say "It will scare the living shit out of you" before the release  :P

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Quote from: MU-TH-UR 6000 on Aug 31, 2018, 07:59:35 PM
I'm not 100% opposed to have some connections between the prequels and the quadrilogy. I just don't want the third prequel to be solely about that connection, if you catch my drift. Some subtle elements here and there, sure, I'd love it but not make the whole movie about "how the big guy got onto THE planet" as Ridley put it.

Which isn't to say that they couldn't pull that off with an interesting movie, I enjoyed that three way war that Ridley described he was interested in. If that culminated on the juggernaut crashing, ok cool. I just want new things. Hints that there are much weirder things out there (hell, the xeno could be one just under different forms, something that's been around since ages. As The Old One just put it: it just is.)

I'd love for the final movie to end on a Gigeresque planet, full of weird shit going on that's too hard to put onto words, with some xeno-like creatures around. Some could be evil, others were just there, kinda basking in rivers of black goo or something. Pretty much like the Scorn videogame landscapes. It would leave the door open for future movies to go crazy and end the prequels with David or a crew stranded on that "paradise", ending everything in traditional Alien-nihilistic fashion.

I always wanted this story to be its own thing with everything and new monsters. When I'm talking about the Space Jockey, it's half serious half joke. Even a guilty pleasure. However, I understand that we don't need that particular reference to finish the story and the (if any) connections can be handled with subtlety and elegance as you have said.

Quote from: Crazy Shrimp on Aug 31, 2018, 08:17:32 PM
3. The fanatics that have never worked in a creative industry, are paying for this pieces of entertainment. However, vote with the wallet is more efficiently than just moaning al the time via the internet.

At the end of the day, they did with Covenant. Record making drop-off in in-take in its second week. While it wasn't a failure, it did poor enough to make Fox put on the breaks and reconsider what it and Scott were doing with the series.

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Quote from: The Old One on Aug 31, 2018, 07:36:28 PM
I don't hope to see Ridley Scott compromise to the complaints of fanatics that have never worked in a creative industry, especially if he continues the rather interesting approach of taking inspiration from mythology and classical imagery such as John Milton's Paradise Lost.

That's what got us Covenant, though. I still don't recall the complaint being as loud as Scott seemed to put it across. But him noting some fan issues was what got everyone Covenant.