I don't get why it's still not common knowledge that all the theatrical cuts are superior (especially Aliens' in my opinion, I think the extended cut turns it into a straight up boring movie).
Because everyone goes around saying the director's cuts are, except the Alien one which is beyond unnecessary (wasn't there already a special edition in the 90's that was basically the theatrical cut plus the cacoon scene?). But I agree completely on Aliens, not only does it destroy the pace for virtually no return on investment but actually takes away from the relative suspense and mystery of the colonists and their fate. Alien and Aliens were already perfect films in their respective genres and didn't need special or director's editions; ironically, that sort of fixing should only be reserved for movies that were broken in the first place.
Anyway, this atmospheric scene should have made it into the Assembly Cut: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UXBfQvzRKSE
Heh, and while he's obviously shown the opposite of interest, let's say Alien 3 was his white whale and the reason he's not interested in a Director's Cut is because he'd like to do wholesale reshoots or restart from scratch, possibly with one of the infamous alternate scripts! Do you think once Ridley Scott's done raping the corpse of his legacy they'd let Fincher take another turn?
Saw
Alien: Covenant today, which was shockingly pedestrian, and therefore bad, as previously reported. Seemed a lot more like an AvP or Predators-style imitation directed by the likes of Nimród Antal than an authentic Ridley Scott effort. The action and deaths outside the first hour have no weight or meaning, it just happens so fast it doesn't matter like a common B movie; contrast that with the care taken in previous films where the deaths at least constituted a moment for the characters and audience. Here it's just fast food junk. The Aliens tribute scene with the blipblorbs or snarfglabs or whatever in The Force Awakens is better than the final confrontation in this. The cast and characters are fittingly B grade as well. David, the most interesting creation in all of Prometheus or this film has unfortunately been reduced to a stock character. He's still far and away the best thing in the movie.
It's all unremarkable, but the worst is reserved for the Alien itself, which is probably humiliated the most throughout. It's basically more Frankenstein's monster without the pathos than "alien" now, and acts like a mindless, clumsy(!) animal to provide mere muscle, like a mutant dog, for the real antagonists. It's the least scary thing in the movie, and reduced to an ancillary role in its own ruined mythology. The movie manages to both do nothing with and yet spoil the mystery and potential of both the original Alien and, I never thought I'd say this, Prometheus (which I watched again before Covenant and found it to be less offensive and just more boring than I remembered, but leagues above this). The story goes nowhere and does nothing but cut off better potential alternatives in order to retread tired old ground less convincingly.
Finally, just for an example of what a superficial, intellectually bankrupt endeavor this is, the premise of the movie is this colony ship is carrying around 2,000 people and 10,000 human embryos to colonize a planet. Hmmmm, a ship carrying thousands of embryos? Sound familiar!? It's like Alien, but with humans! Surely there's a greater thematic point to this obvious parallel. Perhaps the humans are the invasive, aggressive alien species after all!? Ooooh, this could potentially be interes... No, it's just a coincidence. It doesn't come up despite numerous opportunities to make or acknowledge the connection (a single change of dialogue would have done to earn the credit). Maybe in the next movie like they keep promising, or more likely not; it'll just be whatever meandering bullshit Ridley's current writers pull out of their butts as an excuse to make yet another "Alien" movie, because that seems to be the only overarching point here. They might as well have let Neill Blomkamp ruin Aliens instead.
Red Letter Media Talks About Alien: Covenant - SPOILERS Updated, spur of the moment Alien film rankings reflecting my mood as of this second:1. Aliens - Because it's been proven that
James Cameron was the only writer/director with a good grasp on this creature, and it's still somewhat quarantined off from the current shit.
2. Alien - How'd the all-time great sci-fi masterwork possibly go down
since two weeks ago? Covenant actually made it, and Ridley Scott, retroactively worse! =)
*. Alien: Isolation - If games counted this rates higher than the films below. It respects the original premise and the Alien is terrifyingly unstoppable again. Also, there's only two good Alien movies.
3. Prometheus - Doesn't even have an Alien in it, which is probably best for all. Great cast and visuals, bad writing, some good scenes, but all the movies below make it look grand by comparison.
4. Alien 3 - Great cast, provides continuity and closure, and has its own unique, infamous yet enduring identity and legacy. Remember when a bad Alien movie was a big deal? Now this one's relatively good.
5. Alien: Covenant - 5th as projected, there's half a good movie here about something else, but the Alien part ruins it and vice versa. Time to retire or infuse the series with some new acid blood.
6. Alien: Resurrection - When Alien first went from tragedy to comedy; I can't forgive it. It's weird how similar some of Covenant's ideas are to this one, maybe I should rate it higher... Nah.
7. AvP - Dumb vs.
8. AvP2 - Dumber