A Good Addition To The Alien Movies

Rating: 8/10 (27 May 2017)

Ten years after "Prometheus," the crew of the colony ship, Covenant, experiences a serious malfunction of their ship. Forced out of their expected 7 year cryo-sleep to make repairs, the crew's focus switches from their destined planet to one that is much closer and supposedly more suited for humans. Only Katherine Waterston, who plays the second in command, is hesitant to alter the plans; but the acting captain (played by Billy Crudup) and the rest of the crew are insistent on checking out the newly discovered planet, and off they go.
An exploratory team lands on the planet that turns out to be beautiful and teeming with plant life — but no animals or even insects can be seen or heard. Despite this oddity, some of the crew are already planning on starting their new colony hereuntil two crewmen suddenly become sick and the horrifying, true nature of the planet is revealed.
Alien spore infestations/gestation/gory emergence, frenetic bursts of intense fights against aliens, impeccable cinematography, good and evil synthetic people (both played amazingly by Michael Fassbender), the mystery of what happened to the last two crew members of Prometheus, and claustrophobic bug hunts are all here. There are moments where you — the "Alien" movies aficionado — will tell yourself "Oh, I've seen this before in previous 'Alien' movies," but it shouldn't be looked at negatively. It's simply director Ridley Scott giving fans what they want to see. What should be treated negatively are the two, huge shenanigans in "Alien: Covenant" that, had they not been there, would have earned this movie a grade A.
Shenanigan #1: **SPOILER ALERT** Fassbender, as David, easily places his stolen spaceship above the city of "Engineers" and drops a crapload of bio-weapons on the Engineers below. So these Engineers, with their highly advanced tech capability, had no way of knowing who was piloting their ship, and just let one of their own spacecraft hover above their city without any sort of vetting on who was actually inside the ship? And where were the other space vessels of the Engineers throughout the city? This highly advanced race looked like they forgot to pay the bills and all the good stuff were repossessed. Shenanigan #2: Crudup, despite seeing the evil nature of Fassbender/David, lets himself fall into a trap that even a stoner whose brain is half-baked would've seen coming.
The fact that I gave this movie a B despite those two giant shenanigans tells you that I really enjoyed watching this. Yes, I am a serious fan of "Alien" movies; but beyond that, "Alien: Covenant" is a good movie that combines old school elements with the new, and it definitely deserves to be part of the "Alien" lore.
And now, for my most memorable, movie moment of "Alien: Covenant": the scene when **SPOILER ALERT** Fassbender/David fights Fassbender/Walter. For a brief moment, this sci/fi flick becomes a kung-fu flick. It was surprising and entertaining.
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