A touch of Star Trek. Exercises in Futility

Rating: 1/10 (3 June 2017)

I did not think it was possible, but Covenant is even weaker than its predecessor and has little to do with the original Alien concept. The original story focused on the xenomorph as a symbol for deadly and almost invincible human greed. It was based on solid storytelling, good dialogue and character development, innovative set design etc. Remember: the first and still best movie in the series was made on a budget. It was craftsmanship and art that made it what it is.
Everything went over board with Prometheus, where the xenomorph became a meaningless extra while the film really was about man trying to find his creator. Storytelling and dialogues went further downhill (I did not think it was possible after Alien IV) and all attempts by Scott to plagiarize positive elements of his own movies failed miserably: instead of craftsmanship there were loads of expensive VFX. Money, however, cannot make a good film, let alone write a good plot.
Covenant is a disaster. Here you go: more expensive VFX which, alas, still look what they are and hence *pale* in comparison to 1979 hand modeling. A plot that - again - is about man looking for his creator. Is this a plot to be presented in a sci-fi format by a director who scored big time some 40 years ago but has produced nothing but sub- par flicks ever since? Yes, there is a great danger: the whole thing can easily get very pathetic. Quoting Wagner and Byron does not help, on the contrary. Throwing in the xenomorph, slightly remodeled, does not help either.
Why has Scott abandoned the original Alien concept? Maybe he felt that it had become outdated and decided to replace it with this pseudo-philosophical creation mumbo-jumbo instead. A touch of Star Trek. Ridley, it is sci-fi horror, and you have to do a hell of a better job to present such a subject in such a format without looking like a total half-wit. Tarkovsky could pull that off, or Kubrick... and without all the shitty VFX.
I refuse to believe that the original Alien concept is an anachronism. We just need someone who can tell the story the right way. No need for a huge budget, no need for hollow effects. Oh, btw: since the xenomorph is nothing but an extra and since the story is very predictable and the storytelling poor, it's not scary at all. I remember having read about jump scares. Really? Yawn. Alien I-IV are way more scary than this... dunno what to call it. Desperate attempt of an aging director to treat subjects that he deems important maybe. Creation. Ugh.