Alien: Covenant: the latest news, trailers, and images from Ridley Scott’s latest film – The Verge

Alien: Covenant leaves much better lingering questions than Prometheus

2017-05-24T10:46:28-04:00

In 2012, the science-fiction / horror film Prometheus brought Ridley Scott back to the film franchise he launched in 1979 with Alien. There have been many Alien sequels, spinoffs, and multimedia franchise additions over nearly 40 years, but Scott's return to the series was big news. It raised fans' hopes that the series could return to its earliest, most chilling roots. But Prometheus left a lot of questions behind. Many of the biggest ones were just exasperating plot holes: how does a geologist get lost in a cavern system he just electronically auto-mapped? Why is the best xenobiologist money can buy stupid enough to try to pet a snarling a …

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Alien: Covenant returns to the theme that made the original so scary: men giving birth

2017-05-24T09:03:52-04:00

There is a simple truth at the heart of the Alien movie franchise: being chased by a monster is terrifying. Nobody likes being eaten alive. But the real terror of the series isn't the prospect of being murdered by a runaway xenomorph. It's the idea of being violated, and forced to give unnatural, fatal birth. Dan O'Bannon, screenwriter of the original Alien film, was specific about mining horror from the idea of men suffering rape and pregnancy. "I'm not going to go after the women in the audience," he said in the making-of documentary The Alien Saga. "I'm going to attack the men. I am going to put in every image I can think of to make the m …

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8 stories you should check out after watching Alien: Covenant

2017-05-20T11:30:01-04:00

Alien: Covenant is now in theaters, and it helps steer the franchise right back into the space-horror territory that captivated audiences when the first Alien film hit back in 1979. While 2001: A Space Odyssey and Star Wars showed filmgoers that science fiction could go beyond cheap B-movies, Ridley Scott's film was a separate revelation, proof that screen science fiction could also produce quality horror-dramas. His creepy, Freudian Alien captivated audiences, and became an instant horror classic.

But Alien didn't come out of nowhere. Its filmmaking team was inspired by a whole range of works, both intentionally and otherwise, in construct …

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How Alien: Covenant fits in the larger Alien timeline, and what comes next

2017-05-19T10:46:53-04:00

The latest installment of Ridley Scott's space-horror franchise, Alien: Covenant, hits theaters today. The series is coming up on its 40th anniversary, and over the course of its lifetime, it's taken some interesting turns - and some downright unfortunate ones.

The franchise is already in a strange place, with the latest films sitting somewhere between prequels and sequels. And as with any long-running franchise, numerous entries can led to a complicated timeline. With the latest film coming out, it's a good time to look back at the scope of the series, where it started, and where it's currently landed.

What are the franchise's core install …

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Alien: Covenant review: a terrifying return to horror that doesn’t quite click

2017-05-19T10:35:43-04:00

When Ridley Scott returned to the Alien franchise with 2012's Prometheus, one of the primary criticisms was that the film wasn't really, well, Alien-esque. Rather than build upon the sci-fi / horror formula he had created in 1979, Scott went in a different direction with a film that was much more concerned with questions about the origins of humanity and our place in the universe. It was an intentional shift, with Scott even saying at the time that the film shouldn't be taken as a direct prequel to his previous work, but that didn't do much to curb audience expectations.

For his new sequel to Prometheus, Scott has made the decision to go ba …

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Alien: Covenant’s VR experience is violent, creepy, and short

2017-04-27T12:30:05-04:00

So much of the Alien mythos boils down to a single scene. Even if you haven't seen the original, you know the beats: a casual meal interrupted by the victim's sudden collapse. There's confusion, then dread, some crunching sounds, then a tiny alien popping out of the victim's chest, accompanied by an insane amount of gore.

It's rightfully iconic, and judging by the reaction to this week's VR version, much of the Verge staff is still traumatized by it. When the question came up - who wants to try out a VR thing where you're an alien bursting out of someone's chest? - there were surprisingly few takers.

But, well, here I am.

This time, you're …

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A new Alien: Covenant prologue connects the film to Prometheus

2017-04-26T15:27:25-04:00

20th Century Fox has released a new clip from Alien: Covenant and it shows off how the film connects to the last entry in the franchise, Prometheus. While the movie's trailers have gone to great lengths to make viewers forget about Scott's disappointing side film, this clip shows that Prometheus will have a role to play in this year's film.

This is the second prologue that we've seen for Alien: Covenant. In February, the studio released a clip that introduced us to the colonists bound for this film's planet, which happens to also be home to the android known as David, who we last saw as a disembodied head in the last film. It serves as a fo …

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Alien: Covenant changes everything we know about cinema’s most terrifying monster

2017-03-11T16:33:04-05:00

On the opening night of the SXSW film festival, Ridley Scott hosted a screening of his 1979 classic Alien along with a special bonus: a preview of footage from the upcoming Alien: Covenant. Normally, I don't think there's a ton of value in writing up preview footage, particularly in a review-style format. It's always the best of the best, handpicked to get people as hyped as possible, and let's face it: even the worst movie can have great moments.

The 20 terrifying minutes of Alien: Covenant that screened warrants a bit more discussion, however. Made up of three discrete sequences, the footage covered what appears to be at least two pivotal …

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The new Alien: Covenant trailer gives us a good look at the updated xenomorph

2017-02-28T23:08:06-05:00

The last Alien: Covenant teaser was a subtle hint at the dangers the movie's colonists would face on their new world, taking the time to make a reference to the iconic dinner scene in the original Alien. The new trailer, released today, has none of that subtlety - it seems like it's basically the whole movie condensed into a two-minute clip.

The trailer gives the plot away

That means that if you want to go into theaters on May 19th this year and be surprised by Ridley Scott's next take on the Alien series, you might want to steer clear of this trailer. But for the too-curious among you, the clip will show you a world that seems strangely lik …

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The trouble with the Alien: Covenant prologue

2017-02-23T13:23:52-05:00

A four-minute prologue for Ridley Scott's next film, Alien: Covenant, hit the web last night, showing off how the film will borrow aesthetically from the original Alien, and ignore its more immediate predecessor, the critically maligned Prometheus. The prologue introduces us to the crew of its titular spaceship, and culminates with a nod to the chestburster scene in Alien.

For memory's sake, here's the original sequence:

As my colleague Rich McCormick mentioned last night, there's other, atmospheric elements that steer this film more to Alien than Prometheus. The ship feels like it's more in line with the industrial stylings of the Nostrom …

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