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15 Aug 2024

Alien: Romulus review – Recapturing the essence of the original

Glenn Cochrane

STACK Senior Editor

Numerous attempts have been made to revive the Alien franchise, including two by the original director Ridley Scott, but none have come this close to recapturing the spirit and tone of that seminal 1979 classic.

Alien: Romulus is both a legacy sequel and a standalone chapter, in that it directly connects with the original film, but also serves as a good entry point for newcomers. The guy responsible for it is Fede Álvarez, the Uruguayan director known for bringing other dormant franchises back to life, such as Evil Dead (2014) and The Girl in the Spider's Web (2018). He also produced the 2022 Texas Chainsaw Massacre reboot sequel.

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With Ridley Scott serving as producer and set between the events of Alien and Aliens, the film begins on a regimented mining planet controlled by the notorious Weyland-Yutani Corporation. There we are introduced to Rain Carradine (Cailee Spaeny), a young employee who's been denied her end-of-contract release and given an extension of five years, and her “brother” Andy (David Jonsson), a synthetic humanoid programmed to look after her best interests.

This introduction includes some of the film's most interesting ideas. Located approximately 65 light years from Earth, it's a large, complex environment with an industrial aesthetic that immediately sets the story apart. We're given a greater emphasis on the corporation's tyrannical nature and shown what human existence looks like in this world before any sort of space travel or alien attack occurs. It's a fantastic location for future instalments.

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With the dread of another five years of hard labour, Rain and David join with a group of other disgruntled workers who steal a company spacecraft, escape the planet and quickly realise that there's less oxygen in the hypersleep chambers than anticipated.

They're forced to dock on an abandoned space station, which houses a research facility called Romulus. They quickly discover that it is infested with parasitical lifeforms (aka Face Huggers).

Spaeny and Jonsson are fantastic as the leads. She has a strong Ellen Ripley thing going for her, although she's far from being a carbon copy. Her own circumstances and plot in life are very different from those of Sigourney Weaver's iconic character, but the deadly threat she faces sees her enter the same instinctive survival mode while adapting to take up the fight.

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Jonsson presents another synthetic character to the legacy, not unlike Lance Henriksen's Bishop from Aliens, and is fundamental to the escapee's survival. His humanity – albeit programmed – makes for a sympathetic character, which goes a long way in raising the stakes when it all hits the fan. He's a great addition to the story and is the most nuanced of all the characters.

The first striking aspect of Alien: Romulus is the loyalty to the original's aesthetic. Clear attention to detail here demonstrates a concerted effort to recapture the look of the 1979 film.

A focus that will undoubtedly please loyal fans is the abundance of outdated technology. The spacecraft's monitors are monochrome, and the numerous control panels are big and chunky, just as production designers from the '70s would have imagined the future.

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The look of the creatures themselves is also accurate to those from the original film, which were designed by the iconic Swiss artist H.R. Giger, although admittedly, Fede Álvarez has given them a lot more agility with the help of GCI. And there lies the biggest bone of contention, in that there's an overuse of CG where there needn't be.

Nevertheless, for all intents and purposes, Alien: Romulus is a stunning recreation of its iconic predecessor, and if it had stuck with an entirely practical use of effects, it would have delivered the most triumphant sequel since James Cameron's Aliens (1986).

Devotees to the saga will also rejoice at the story's connection to Prometheus (2012), which has a lot of significance in the course of the final act.

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That previous Ridley Scott prequel was criticised at the time of release for being too far removed from the saga, and contradictory to the films that came before it. Romulus seeks to contextualise some of that film's themes and seems to do so successfully. Of course, further examination of the story beyond an initial viewing will truly put that to the test.

With that being said, Alien: Romulus is a beauty and will no doubt meet fan expectations. It also comes bearing a few secrets - none of which belong in a review - that will elevate the experience for viewers.

The film hits the ground running with an awe-inspiring first act, flounders a little during the formulaic middle act, but comes home strong with a fantastically ambitious final act, proving the old adage that two out of three ain't bad!

  • Alien: Romulus is in cinemas August 14.

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