Average..plagued by the prequel symptoms

Rating: 5/10 (13 May 2017)

Covenant unfolds as struggling to balance two dissonant approaches, one of a prequel and a adhering to the classic alien film conventions but presented as a missed opportunity to engage in some religion vs. science debate as if its the millennium year 2000 now. Such a film will have been appropriate for those times when conspiracy nuts going nuts on the streets will feel perfectly at home embracing the notions presented in this film and its earlier prequel: Prometheus.
Alien: Covenant is for the most part a average ride. But it never chills the marrow quite in the way the the earlier 90s films did. It is plagued by the classic prequel symptoms (when prequel was a recent thing made popular by the Star Wars trilogy). The franchise has adopted the prequel setup in its reinvention but with mixed results.
Don't get me wrong with the current CGI technology, things should look better but it ain't the case here. The stop motion Puppet renditions in Aliens or even the bits and glimpses of the the blue screen dog running animal in the third film seems to scare us more than these CGI ones (HR Giger?, are u still around?) Nevertheless the film still packs there is a certain anarchic thrill, but not in the same amounts we are used to. There's still life in the old bugger hatching from an egg if the series went thru a fresh reboot with the same conventions that made the past Alien movies successful.
I am hard pressed to give it a high rating . Average, watchable.