Alien: Romulus feels like a movie that is a bit too beholden to its idea as a legacy sequel to the Alien movies; ignoring aside from a small mention the daring ideas of Ridley Scott’s Prometheus and Covenant that opted to bring something new to the table whilst providing the traditional alien scares in space, in favour of a throwback to the gritty style of the first two films that became so beloved. However, Romulus sticks too closely to the formula that made them work in the first place: the grittiness of the survival horror elements are entertaining but mostly cheap thrills, borrowed from Alien with diminishing effects because you’ve seen them all before and you’ve seen them all done better. It’s a movie that feels like Rogue One, the world’s most expensive fan film – but even Romulus is so stilted it makes its Vader sequences look like Shakespeare in comparison – you’ll recognise the “get away from her, you bitch” line long before it’s coming but it lacks the impact of Ripley saying it and feels like the film can’t be asked to come up with its own ideas, so instead pays homage a little too faithfully.
The opening chapters of Romulus are where the film is at its best, showing the gritty mining colonies of a far future where humans are living in a corporate-controlled wasteland, the ultimate end point of capitalism. Cailee Spaeny’s Rain finds herself on board a scavenging operation when her ticket home is rejected – but with a young, naïve crew they find themselves encountering horrors on a scale never seen before – the xenomorphs, scary and terrifying as ever – are evolving. This is where the film is at its best, creating the tension and dread that made Fede Alvarez’s Evil Dead reboot so good, but the man has a mixed track record with sequels and unfortunately, Romulus is more in line with his quite frankly dull The Girl in the Spider’s Web, which had the audacious task of following a David Fincher film. This is not the first time Alvarez has had to operate within the same wheelhouse as a Fincher film – but if only Romulus was half as interesting as Alien 3; the weakest in the franchise not called Resurrection.
The gonzo gore-fest of Romulus has some good scares. It’s made the most out of by a fantastic performance by fresh-faced Cailee Spaeny, who’s had a fantastic career since emerging from Vox Lux, going into Priscilla and Civil War. She’s paired against the equally talented David Johnson, constantly uneasy as Rain’s “brother”, Andy, an android who makes constant dad jokes. The stilted, awkward humour and pairing of Andy and Rain is Romulus’ beating heart and its biggest emotional strength – if the film had developed the supporting cast a bit more around them other than making them largely one note; save perhaps for Isabel Merced’s poor, poor Kay, there might have been something more to write home about in this department but the film doesn’t have enough interest in making you care about them. By casting such a young group Romulus could become YA fodder easily but it avoids falling into that category – the bleak backstories give them sympathetic edge and it’s the despair that separates it from others of its would-be ilk. It adds a sense of desperation and desire for the kids and their no-hope strategy – just like Prometheus, the question is asked why these people would dare to venture onto an abandoned space station and a certain death trap, but Romulus handles it with tact, displaying cool and consistently awesome visuals throughout. It’s a world where workers are considered dispensable by the Weyland-Yutani corporation – and the corporations have complete control. As an end-point for capitalism, it’s a terrifying prospect as the aliens themselves – and the xenomporh is terrifying here, faithfully recreated with minimal usage of CGI and a reliance on practical effects, and expertly crafted set-design that really make the spaceships feel properly real. I’m pretty sure there was even a London underground station being used as a stairwell, much like Rogue One.
Which in turn, makes it so baffling that the film committed digital necromancy to bring back Ian Holm’s robot. Even with the approval of the family and Holms’ widow, it feels tacky, disrespectful and lazy when a like-for-like casting could have been used, or indeed, another Andy would’ve probably been more thematically relevant and interesting for the themes of Romulus. The significant chunk that Holms’ AI has for Alien: Romulus feels as single-moment ruining the entire film as Late Night with the Devil, and instantly sours any goodwill. It’s a shame as the ingredients are there elsewhere – but for a film bogged down in paying respect to the Alien franchise it falls so far wide of the mark it’s hard to view it as a fanservice project at all – instead, as soulless and as hollow as Wyland-Yutani themselves. The best thing to come out of this has been the collective rediscussion of the franchise - but as a day one Prometheus truther you were all over a decade too late.
