Alien: Romulus (2024)

Starring: Cailee Spaeny, David Jonsson, Isabel Merced, the ghost of Ian Holm

Directed by: Fede Alvarez

Where It’s Available: Hulu in the US, Disney Plus in Canada and international territories.

When I heard that Fede Alvarez (director of the recent-ish Evil Dead remake and, more recently, the intense “blind man kills a bunch of young no-goodniks” thriller ‘Don’t Breathe’) was helming a new addition to the Alien franchise, my interest was piqued, but tempered. This is, after all, a franchise that hasn’t had an arguably ‘good’ film since David Fincher’s ‘Alien 3’ 30 years ago for Pete’s sake (I see you, ‘Prometheus’ Stans. … you’re very, very wrong. But I see you). Colour me happily surprised when this film jumps out of the gates with a neat concept (anti-capitalist heist film gone *horribly* awry) and great action set pieces. I can say with all honesty, final act missteps aside (we’ll touch on those) this is the third best film in the Alien franchise (behind the iconic, genre-defining first two).

The story opens with our protagonist, Rain (played with affable vulnerability by a personal favourite of mine, Cailee Spaeny) a literal wage-slave on a Weyland-Yutani colony looking to book a trip off-world so she can strike out on her own as a colonist in a new system with her ‘brother’, Andy - an old, obsolete synthetic (played by David Jonsson in an absolute starmaking performance). After her request to transfer is denied (quite literally ‘because capitalism’) she meets up with an old flame and a group of friends who devise a new plan… rob an old, derelict WY ship that is floating, abandoned, in degrading orbit above their home planet.  Now I’m sure you can imagine *why* that ship (which actually turns out to be a space station) is abandoned and the heist predictably goes sideways, with the group slowing being knocked off while a creepy CGI Ian Holm (‘reprising’ his role from the initial film) narrates / antagonizes.

The fun part of this movie is that it takes the haunted house vibes of the first film (the space station is VERY creepy) and smashes it together with the action-oriented vibes of the James Cameron-helmed sequel, going for a ‘greatest hits’ package - and, for the most part, nailing it (one particularly fan-friendly beat is near the end of the film where one of the characters repeats a famous Ripley line from the second film that had me popping and jumping out of my chair).

As if this franchise’s wont, Cailee Spaeny does a great job as the Ripley stand-in, the right blend of vulnerability and badassery. Her crewmates run the gamut from ‘the love interest’ to ‘the annoying one’ and they’re killed off in inventive fashions once thr xenomorphs start doing xenomorph things. Set pieces aplenty kick off, some of which play with zero-gravity in a way that you really feel Ridley Scott would’ve loved to do in the first film. 

The Good: David Jonsson is an absolute revelation as ‘Andy’, the group’s synthetic. For reasons I wont divulge, he effectively plays two separate characters over the course of the narrative and nails them both. A standout performance.

The Bad: In some parallel universe there is a 9/10 version of this film that ends about twelve minutes earlier. Simply put, the finale was… too much. It’s a case of the director going back to the well one too many times to the film’s detriment. There is an absolute ‘perfect’ end point (you’ll know it when you see it) and then, inexplicably… it just keeps going. It sucks the air out and makes a fantastic film into simply a ‘very good’ one.

The Ugly: Fede Alvarez really leans hard into the body-horror aspects of the franchise. This is a good thing! It’s where the stronger films in the franchise really bake their bread and this film is no exception. In addition, one character’s death in particular that relies on the xenomorph’s acidic blood had me crawling in my skin. Don’t me wrong - it was cool as shit, but it was quite revolting.

Is It Kid-Friendly?: It’s a hard-R sci-fi horror gorefest. So…. No. 

The Verdict: Though it ultimately drags on a little too long, Fede Alvarez has done what I did not think was possible - he got me excited in the Alien franchise again. The mixture of 80s-era future aesthetics with 21st century CGI is a spectacle to see. This is a rip-roaring crowd pleaser that may come across a bit as a band playing their ‘greatest hits’, but hey… there’s a reason why those songs were hits in the first place, right? 7.5/10