The Big Picture - ‘Alien: Romulus’ and the 'Alien' Movie Rankings

Episode Date: August 16, 2024

Sean is joined by Chris Ryan to react to a handful of casting tidbits (1:00), before digging into the newest installment in the ‘Alien’ franchise, ‘Alien: Romulus’ (11:00). They discuss the new movie’s fealty to the original, the chances it takes, how it works as a pure horror movie, and more. Then, they rank all nine movies in the franchise (53:00), before Sean is joined by ‘Romulus’ director Fede Álvarez to talk about making a movie in the franchise that he is a superfan of, some of the particular choices made around fan service, how he approached practical effects during the production, and more (1:11:00). Host: Sean Fennessey Guests: Chris Ryan and Fede Álvarez Senior Producer: Bobby Wagner Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In the fall of 2014, a group of hackers pulled off the biggest Hollywood heist of all time. They broke into computer servers belonging to Sony Pictures and released hundreds of thousands of top-secret documents. The attack would cause an international incident, upend thousands of lives, and change the movie industry forever. From Spotify and the Ringer Podcast Network, I'm Brian Raftery, and this is The Hollywood Hack.

Listen on the Big Picture feed starting August 19th. up to $75 in PC Optimum Points. Visit Superstore.ca to get started. I'm Sean Fennessey, and this is The Big Picture, a conversation show about aliens. Later in the show, I'll have a conversation with Fede Alvarez, the co-writer and director of the new film Alien Romulus. Fede is a lifelong alien fanatic and the director of 2013's Evil Dead remake, 2016's Don't Breathe 2 movies I like quite a bit. Fede has a fascinating perspective

on working inside the franchise machine in Hollywood. Great mind for talking movies. I hope you'll stick around for our conversation. But first, if we're talking about an Alien movie, there's only one man to join us, the xenomorph to my face hugger, Chris Ryan. What's up, buddy? Should I do the John Hurt thing?

That's just a, that's a zinc cough, really more than anything. What if that was an unexpected side effect of six milligrams citrus zinz? When an alien burst through your chest live on a Rewatchables recording. A xenomorph. Oh, man.

Dude, why are we giving this away? I don't know. I don't know. The cross marketingmarketing. It could be happening for all your interests. Alejo, we have to do like a sketch where like a Zin alien jumps out of my chest. I think that would really help Sean's pod. It's struggling a little bit.

Programming note before we get into all things movie news and aliens. The Hollywood hack begins on Monday. Three-part series hosted by our buddy Brian Raftery, covering the 2014 data hack that happened in the aftermath of the announcement of the Sony film, The Interview. Talked with Brian about this on the show earlier this week. Brian also was a guest on The Town this week. Great conversation with him and Matt Bellany. If you liked those conversations, if you're interested in the ramifications of that hack, and there were a lot, please check out that show Monday, Wednesday, Friday of next week on the Big Picture feed.

Please listen. Okay, quick news. One, I just wanted to say rest in peace Jenna Rollins. Yeah. Died at 94. One of the great actresses of her generation.

I know you're a big fan of the films of John Cassavetes as am I. Her work in all of his films and she acted in nearly all of his films is astounding. She's set the benchmark, I think,

for what we could deem independent actress. You know, she's really an icon of independent cinema. Shadows, Faces, especially a woman under the influence in Opening Night, Minnie and Moskowitz. She's probably best known for her work in her son's film, The Notebook, which I know is a big movie for you.

Any notes on Jenna Rollins? One of the bravest performers I've ever seen. One of the most vulnerable and in some ways, like basically humble because of what she was willing to put of herself on screen. And I think anecdotally, based on like Criterion closets and letterboxed fours that are now proliferating everywhere you look on social media. One of the most influential performers of like even this current generation of actors and actresses that you're sort of seeing

emerge in movies now or every single person it seems like is like a woman under the influence is one of my four like most treasured experiences watching movies. It's interesting how Cassavetes persists. You know, like he obviously had a huge boost in the nineties where a lot of people were discovering his films and then Criterion, I think, you know, reissuing all those movies in the

two thousands, everybody had that set on their shelf. If they were cinephiles, I think you're right from an acting style perspective, all of those movies that she appeared in where she seemed to be breaking the rules without ruining the movie. I would say something that she does really well. A lot of people cited that moment where she's waiting for her kids to get off the bus on A Woman Under the Influence as such like an electrifyingly strange moment in movies, where you don't know where something is happening and you're nervous and excited at the same time of watching her.

Just an amazing performer. Go check out those movies if you haven't seen them. Okay, I'm actually really glad you're here for this bit of casting news. This is a double shot of CR and Sean interests. Yeah. The first one is that there was an announcement earlier this week that Dominic Sessa will be appearing, starring, in an Anthony Bourdain biopic produced by A24,

directed by Matt Johnson, who most recently made the Blackberry movie. Anthony Bourdain is one of the signature cultural figures of your life. Is that fair to say? Yeah, he was responsible for like a lot of an awakening I feel like I had in my adult life, whether it was like through his traveling and introducing me to food, which I've since abandoned if anybody listened to Grand Budapest Hotel rewatchables but just a way of looking at the world very influential and obviously like really meant a lot to me

and it was very tough when he passed so what do you make of this? everyone gets a turn in the cuck chair that's my it's like if you love something

don't hold on to it too much because it's gonna happen I'll be honest with you love something, don't hold onto it too much because it's going to happen. I'll be honest with you though. I love Blackberry. I think Dominic Sessa is really interesting as a performer. And I think

this will probably concentrate, if I had to guess, on his young, wild upcoming days, maybe like in Provincetown or wherever he worked out on the Cape or in Nantucket or something.

And maybe some New York stuff. So I wonder if this is going to be a little bit more of a angry young man story than it is going to be like the last days of Anthony Bourdain, which I think would be a little bit unclassy. Yeah. I don't think that's what we're going to get either. And I think if you've seen Blackberry, you know that Matt Johnson is not one for classic hagiographic biopics. That's not really the kind of thing he's interested in. He'll probably look for a way to upend the structure and style. I wonder if he's going to draw a lot on Kitchen Confidential and some of the anecdotes and kind of like,

this is how restaurants really work stuff. Doesn't that feel a little beat to death though? That's the one thing I thought when I heard about this, but the bear, but you know, that book was adapted for a TV show and it had been, you know, like it has been kind of worked over a lot. I was wondering if it was more like what you were describing. Well, I wonder if we'll get into,

I mean, one of the things that's been sort of fascinating to see wrestled over with his posthumous, the culture that's come out of like his death, whether it's memoirs or, you know, recollections by his friends and also documentaries and stuff is what a complicated figure he was

and kind of like trying to reclaim the person from the myth and I wonder whether this film will engage with that at all. I hope so. Yeah.

But this is just like if you're a Bob Dylan fan the Bob Dylan movie is coming for you. If you're an Anthony Bourdain fan the Anthony Bourdain movie is coming for you. If you're a Mufasa fan

the Mufasa movie is coming for you. Let me tell you. Let me tell you about the Mufasa movie. Watched it on a me tell you. Let me tell you about the Mufasa movie. Watched it on a large screen with my daughter recently, the trailer. And she was like, I want to see that. So now she's three.

She's more of a guardian of the lore of Lion King, although also something of a free jazz improviser. Yeah. Sometimes she'll be like Scar is the hero. And this film suggests perhaps what if he could have been. What if Alice was right? So, you know, I'm interested. It's sort of a once upon a time in Hollywood, but for the Pride lands.

I'm interested in that. Just flipping the script. Okay, the other piece of casting news that I want to talk about is yesterday it was announced that Nicolas Cage has been cast as John Madden in a forthcoming biopic, which is going to be directed by David O. Russell just days after George Clooney melted

David O. Russell's soul in the pages of GQ as communicated by our pal Zach Barron who profiled Clooney and Brad Pitt. So John Madden? Nicolas Cage? John Madden, Nicolas Cage, David O. Russell I think that

that's the the last part is important interesting that being said I'll make the case for it okay David O. Russell

is a pretty good sports director sports movie director yeah well that's Philly bias but okay keep going or he has made two films at least

that have sports at the core of them that I thought were two of his more successful movies okay Nicolas Cage is obviously coming off of kind of a cage-a-sance that have sports at the core of them that I thought were two of his more successful movies. Nicolas Cage is obviously coming off of kind of a Cage-a-sance, although still... I mean, Long Legs, huge hit.

Right. Huge hit. Again, I'm curious what part of Madden's career they'll be focusing on. If this is going to be sprawling across all of it, is this just going to be him with the badass Oakland Raiders teams and Kenny Stabler

and kind of have a 70s American Hustle feel? Or will it be like the lovable guy on the bus with Pat Summerall? I don't know. Which one do you want? I mean, I think we know what we want. We want the gunslinger out in Oakland, right? Well, unlike the Bourdain idea,

which if that spans his whole life, I'll be disappointed and kind of frustrated. I'm not opposed to and kind of frustrated. I don't, I'm not opposed to a kind of snapshot series of portraits of Madden's extraordinary life. Do you think we'll get to the bottom

of his bus trauma? Like why he always needed to be on a bus? I'm sure it will be explored. I mean, the fact that he, I was like, was he almost in a plane crash?

I think he was afraid of air travel. I don't know what, what he was afraid of specifically. Probably should I be asking Brian Curtis these things. He's sort of like the guru of the John Madden myth.

Brian Curtis should probably be consulted on this movie. You know, Cage, Cage is a coin flip. Cage is fearless and likes to go big and Madden was a big personality. I'm not sure if I would call

Cage a mimic. Aside from Charlie Kaufman, I can't recall him mimicking too many people. No, I think he very much will make this his own. Yeah, so that's a gamble. I like what Cage has been up to, though.

I think he's actually exhibited... He's been able to still do the straight-to-VOD stuff on the side while exploring pig and long legs in more auteurist fare. So, I don't know. Dream scenario, I think, also was kind of underrated. I'm on board for anything he's doing. David O. Russell,

did you see Amsterdam? No. You know, I think it's just gone. Like I think he's just lost it. Like I was a fan. I really liked Three Kings. I'm a big fan of I Heart Huckabees. I was very dubious about the

Silver Linings, American Hustle, Joy trajectory. And now I feel like it's kind of like, in addition to the fact that- Well, then he was also making an Amazon series. Was he? Yes. and then it went away I believe so I that seems to have been memory hold or I thought it was in production yeah I mean he's also somebody who obviously there's been an

enormous amount of personal revelation about him and he just seems like just not a very nice person so anytime something like this comes along you're like right this is the guy who's gonna make the John Madden movie it's a little bit frustrating but but I'll watch it. I'm always going to watch it. Stay tuned for that. We'll see if it actually happens. Shall we pivot to Alien Romulus? Let's do it. This has been certainly among the most anticipated movies of

this year for you and I. We are probably upsettingly loyal to this franchise, even though I consistently have notes about all but two of the movies in the franchise. You know what I mean?

It's one of those things where I love it so dearly and I feel like I can criticize it. And that's really how I come to Alien Romulus too. So I mentioned Fede Alvarez is the director.

It's written by Roto Sayagoya is the same writer that he writes all of his movies with. Stars Kaylee Spaney, David Johnson from Industry,

Archie Renaud, Isabella Merced, Spike Fern and Eileen Wu. Just a very young, mostly unknown cast. Interesting choice. Kind of a contrast to the last two films, the Ridley Scott origin story films, Prometheus and Covenant, which had just absolutely gangbusters ensembles all over the map.

Charlize Theron, Idris Elba, Michael Fassbender. Guy Pierce. Yeah, Catherine Waterston, very well-known people. So this movie is set notably between alien and aliens. And it's about a group of space colonists, really space pirates, who launch off a mining colony in an effort to hijack some floating materials on a space station in an attempt to escape their sort of like their orphanage yeah so like their parents a lot of their parents are dead they've been trapped on this mining colony

called jackson star that basically has like a little bit of the andor prison thing going where like you think you're almost done with your contract and they're like we've added 12 more years to your contract so it's a it's it's a very like Dickensian kind of urchins trying to escape thing. And they do in fact attempt to, they do in fact go up to this space station

and of course, what do they encounter there? But facehuggers, xenomorphs, lots, lots, lots of aliens, lots of remnants of alien exploration.

So I'll start with what, did you like the movie? Yeah, I liked it a lot as a horror movie and I thought it was a pretty good alien movie. Yeah, I generally agree with that.

That's pretty much where I'm at. My favorite thing about the Alien franchise, which I think, and this is, I think, fainter praise than it sounds like, is my favorite franchise. Of all the kind of current blue chip, reliably, financially rewarding.

Divergent 2, Fifty Shades of Grey 3. Well, actually, can we put Maze Runner aside? Because I think that's just simply the greatest story ever told. That's right. It's the Dollars Trilogy and then it's Maze Runner.

It's Scorch Trials and then it's Once Upon a Time in the West. Okay, good. No, so, I love these movies because they can be anything that they want them to be.

They can be straight-up slasher. They can be straight-up slasher. They can be crypto-religious origin stories. And they can be prison break movies. They can be, and in this case, it's a haunted house movie. It's like they create the world of this space station that's sort of dead floating above a mining colony for some reason.

And it's called Romulus and Remus, which is the two brothers, one of whom founded Rome in myth. I have to admit, I did a little bit of reading about that last night, but I don't quite understand the connection between... There's usually a lot of Joseph Conrad. Prometheus has tons of

biblical allegories. And it's not quite as clear a connectivity between Prometheus and fire and what the power of the alien and that very symbology there. I'm with you. I think this has been

an interesting experience watching people respond to this movie. And there are a couple of choices that are made in the movie that have gotten people's hackles up. We'll talk about them. We won't spoil them until a little bit later in our

conversation. But I found this to be a very effective mid-tier genre movie. And those are not as easy to make as you think. Fede Alvarez is a very skilled craftsman, and this is a movie that relies a lot on his craft. He's also the writer of the film, and he expresses an incredible amount of affection, maybe too much affection, for the franchise writ large. Even still, there were moments where I was genuinely scared, where I was genuinely excited. Or in awe. The third act in particular, I think, is incredibly creative and fun. And that being said, how you feel about the idea of the legacy sequel and what is fan service versus what is, I think as Adam Neiman put it in his review for The Ringer, the fine line between fan service and clever continuity. And because this is a movie wedged between the two most beloved installments

of this movie, I think it's going to come under some significant fire. There's a couple of things I didn't like about it. I did ask Fede Alvarez about one of the big choices and I liked what he had to say about it and it made me a little bit more at peace with the decision that he made okay what's you how do you think about fan service now especially with a franchise that you really like well this kind of goes back to the Bourdain thing which is that uh if you want to I think if we basically started every podcast we did raging against the the snake eating its own tailness of a lot of the movies that we see these days, then we would just kind of run out of steam. There's a certain amount that I guess I have to accept.

I was sort of surprised to see it in this film because, and I guess I understand why when you look at the, I think broadly speaking, Prometheus and Covenant are looked at at least as commercial failures, if not critical, like, critical failures. Now, they are very dear to my heart. Yeah. But I think I understand why

this movie made an effort to kind of get back to some of the source material, if even in how the characters dressed. It's more right in that sweet spot between Alien and Aliens. People are wearing the high tops people are wearing overalls they're wearing coveralls they look kind of like they're at least dressed like that now i think crucially unfortunately they don't have the verisimilitude

that the casts of alien and aliens did even though i liked a lot of the performances and in romulus but it's strange to see something that's actually so terrifying and in some ways about the evils that men wreak on each other because of their creations or whatever. To see it try to be like, remember this cool moment from aliens when they hold a pulse rifle? They're doing it again here. I'm like, that was never like a sentimental moment for me. And it's sort of strange to see that echoed. In fact, it reminds me a little bit

of like some of the Deadpool and Wolverine stuff where I'm like, who is feeling nostalgic about the human torch? Elektra. Yeah, right. Exactly.

Yeah, no, I think there are a couple of moments of fan service. For example, the utterance of a very famous line from Aliens that will have some people clapping and some people groaning. moments of fan service for example the utterance of a very famous line from the from aliens that

will have some people clapping and some people groaning those are over those are iconic that exact reaction happened in my theater there was a couple like huh and then there were a couple people like yeah yeah so and i think that this movie is going to do that i think it's going to be divisive in that way fan service in general i think if it's clever i tend to enjoy like i was i would think i was an even bigger fan than you were of the two most recent Scream movies. I thought those were... No, I liked them a lot. You liked them a lot?

Yeah. Okay, so I think we both really enjoyed those. And self-awareness is kind of a signature aspect of the Scream movies. This movie is doing things very knowingly, but it is kind of po-faced in the way that it tells the story. You know, there's nothing snarky or smarmy about Alvarez's storytelling style. He's just like a straight ahead thriller guy. And there's one in particular that we'll spend some time discussing and how we feel that fits. Because the comparison that this movie has gotten the most I've seen is The Force Awakens.

Which is that it repeats some of the general structures of the original stories. It attempts to recreate or reshow signature moments or even characters from those original films despite being 30, 40 years in the past. And it's fun and feels safe, but also kind of empty. And I think one of the great things about the Alien franchise, in addition to it being this kind of portal for a tourist creativity, is it's very thematically deep. And this movie is not very thematically deep.

And I don't really think that's a bad thing. I don't think every movie needs to be a lodestar for questions about isolation and science and the way that corporatism infects our lifestyles. That's obviously something that literally happens in the movie where we watch somebody. It's communicated to her that she's going to continue to be a corporate slave. But there's nothing subtle about it. There's nothing thematic surrounding just the plot action.

I think it's probably a course correction from Prometheus and Covenant and probably what was supposed to be the third david movie and the ideas of you know real like myth making in front of us and and using john spates and damon lindelof's like ideas and john logan's ideas to like kind of really push the boundaries of like what you i mean i don't think you really really wanted aliens in those movies so much as the goo like so much like the primordial what is this thing that reacts to the people that are in the room with it and takes their intentions and like reflects it back to them you know yeah he's he's such a defensive genius like he and i don't mean that in the john madden sense of the word he um he's very like he's like vic fangio he's very he's very ornery about his creations and i think he's very he's like Vic Fangio he's very he's very ornery about his creations

and I think he's simultaneously a little bit like wounded about the quote unquote failures of Prometheus and Covenant but also he's the executive producer of this movie

he's been promoting it very aggressively he clearly worked closely with Alvarez gave him a lot of notes on the movie and so and obviously he's

financially incentivized to you know support it but there is definitely some elements of Ridley Scott vision in the movie.

It just feels it feels like processed in the same way to me that Prey felt processed for the Predator universe. For this one, I would just say that if there was any theme

and they may have stumbled upon it. I know that this film has been in development for a while. There was an initial idea that this was going to be, I think it was basically completely unconnected

to the sort of storylines of any of the other films. Then there was also a rumor for a while, or maybe it was because it was going to be based on a video game to some extent, that Ripley's daughter would be the main character, and this would be while Ripley's in cryosleep in between the first two films. In any case, I do think that this film happens into a ai critique uh and i and i sort of our reliance on technology and what that actually

gets us in the end but maybe that's almost more because of like how prevalent that is in the papers today than it is rather than the film itself yeah i wonder how self-reflexive this movie actually is in its creation because the same could be said for the way that corporate continuity is what is most important, what the quote-unquote company wants, in this case, 20th century studios needing to be able to proliferate

the Alien franchise forevermore and artists and young people coming in and having to make something that they they're excited about but also feels a little bit crass you know like it could be a movie that is kind of in conversation with itself that's a generous reading i think like the the ungenerous reading is just like they're just trying to make a buck you know 20th century suit is super interesting now because they keep going through all of these properties that they you know that disney inherited yeah during the fox acquisition like predator right because they keep going through all of these properties that they you know that disney inherited yeah during the fox acquisition predator right because they did prey right prey they did the

first omen they did the most recent planet of the apes film these are movies that are trying to rebirth you know to create it quite literally in some cases rebirth yeah these these valuable franchises and do them in ways that are both familiar but different and progressive i admire them for taking some chances on some like really uh interesting takes on the material like this is cool filmmakers i think yeah and that's the thing is like it's like prey was awesome you know first omen was really good like these movies are obviously like there's like a kind of melancholy that i have that like even even at the movie last night man like you just if you time those AMC movies wrong

and you just sit through 25 minutes of trailers and you just get so bummed out by the end of it where you're just like The Crow and Mufasa

and like all these movies that are just like we had this thing it was gonna expire we had to make it or somebody was like one thing we haven't tried yet

is Mufasa's story you know like and you're just like, oh my God. And then you get to the movie that you're watching and then that movie is also doing all this,

like, remember these sneakers? They're cool. This is my life, man. I live inside. I see all of these movies. So yeah, I totally relate. I didn't quite feel that way. I had a lot of fun here.

All that being said, like Fede Alvarez and all these guys who were... Yeah, West Ball, Arkasha Stevenson, Dan Trachtenberg. These are interesting directors. West Ball.

That's your boy. I know. Your scorch boy. Are you a scorch boy? I'm more of a death trial lawyer. So, I think we should probably start spoiling it

to talk about some of the details of the film. So, if you haven't yet had a chance to see Alien Romulus, let's see, skip ahead about 20 minutes. We'll be ranking the Alien films. Spoiler warning.

I'll start with some of the fan service stuff. The most significant thing is that a kind of digital resurrection of Ian Holm takes place here. Ian Holm, of course, the Great British actor who portrayed Ash in the original Alien film, the synthetic who turns on the group of...

The Nostromo crew. The Nostromo crew. And he's recreated here not as Ash, but as a character called Rook. And Rook is a science officer who they discover on this abandoned space station that they've gone up to get this kind of payload from. And there we see that he is, you know,

again, a representative of the company and he still is operating and because of that um he has a mission which is to capture the alien and the aliens goo and do whatever it can to for whaling utani to kind of proliferate the aliens basically trying to reverse engineer the goo that you see in Prometheus that they find on that planet to essentially create a species that can do all the things that humans can't on these colonies that get whale and yutani is terraforming. Which we'll see more of in aliens, obviously. But yeah, it's essentially to make it like people who don't get respiratory diseases in mines and people who can terraform

without you know needing any cryo sleep and things like that so yeah he is dressed exactly as ash he is found in the same state as ash is found almost position yeah uh where he's basically been torn in half and uh yeah what did you think of this i didn't like it when I first saw it. I had no idea it was coming. I wouldn't say I was like emotionally distraught when I saw it, but I thought it was... This is a movie that has exceptional set design and some really good digital and practical effects. It's a movie that looks and feels good.

And this was the first introduction of very obvious CGI. And so set aside the kind of like ethical quandary of recreating an actor. Ian Holm is no longer with us. He passed in 2020. This is, yeah. So that's a bold choice to make. I just didn't think it looked that great.

No. Especially for how practical the film feels, how tactile the film feels. You start the movie with this incredible sense of what this colony is like and what this world is like beneath the space station, that all these people are basically trapped in this permanent night where they work tirelessly until death for Weyland-Yutani. And then you get up into the space station and it's essentially the set of Alien, the set of Aliens, and an android from

Alien. Well, so the thing that I found particularly frustrating about it is the film is very delivered in the first 20 minutes. It really takes its time, if not necessarily deepening the character arcs of the Kaylee Spaney character, who's our star. Yeah. The David Johnson character, who is the android, who is sort of her brother slash companion. Named Andy. Yes, Andy. And we'll talk about them. And they're both terrific in this movie.

But, you know also this cast of pirates who are trying to compel her to go up with them so that they can use Andy I was on board with all of that when they get up

to the space station and they start showing us facehuggers I was like let's go yeah like Fede Alvarez is really good at

nailing the tension of a sequence like that and then shortly after that it introduces the Rook character, and it took me out of it for about a few minutes. It took me out of the tension that was being built, and it took me out of the character's concern, because I was

trying to wrap my head around, one, just the way that it looked, and two, the fact that it's not Ash, but it seems exactly like Ash. The case for it is that in most of the movies, there's a David and a Walter. There's Bishop shows up in 3N in Aliens,

but is actually in William Gibson's version of 3 was supposed to be one of a main character. He shows up at the end of Alien 3 in Fincher's version as Bishop's creator. So there's priors for they made a version of an android and it looked the same everywhere.

This just could have been literally name any cool British actor. This could have been Liam Cunningham. This could have been Michael Fassbender. This could have been so many different versions of this and you would not have had the like why are we corpse fucking here?

Like with all due respect to the great Ian Holm that's what it felt like for a while. So I'll encourage people to listen to what Alvarez had to say about this. I'm excited to hear it.

I think the way that he explained it I thought was incredibly respectful and thoughtful and he has considered all of the criticisms. He basically ultimately was like some people are going to like it some people aren't yeah we thought it was a good

choice and we think we did it respectfully you can listen to it when we when it gets there so that that's really the one piece of hardcore fan service yeah i didn't then there's lots of easter eggs there's small stuff there's like little references like you know very early on in the film you see that kind of like the water bird that like bounces back and forth a paperweight yeah it is very memorable from the first film that is on that big circular table where the john her chestburster scene comes from and throughout the film there's like 10 20 of those alvarez and his co-writer are kind of obsessed with these movies just kind of dropping them in some of them were satisfying some of them you'll miss are there any that you

really liked or didn't like i didn't love get away from her you bitch yeah but not i i wasn't like raging in my seat about it it was just sort of like that's ellen ripley's line like that's very much rooted in is is rooted in her trying to protect newt you know what i mean like now i get andy's also trying to protect uh rain so i there is like a relationship there but i don't know that's like that would be like i i don't know you can't really you shouldn't that shouldn't transfer you know right right yeah i i think there's like when when andy or i think uh when the sorry i forget his the character's name. The last remaining human male lead? Yeah, the Archie Renaud character.

Archie Renaud character. He's showing her how to use the pulse rifle. It's essentially Michael Biehn showing Ripley how to use the pulse rifle. Yeah, that's Tyler. Tyler, right. That was okay. I agree with you that I don't have a big relationship

to the pulse rifle mythology in these films, so it's not something I care about that much. But even just the very practical stuff of, you know, Rook dealing with Mother and the computer and the, like you said, the tactile,

like the buttons and the interface and the screens and all of that stuff feels very familiar but good. It doesn't look cheap. It doesn't look, you know,

I just rewatched Aliens in the 4K reissue, which has been making some noise. Has been. He took all the grain out, right? He took all the grain out. Yeah, James Cameron, who also said look you know i just re-watched um aliens in the 4k reissue which has been making some noise recently because he took all the grain out he took all the grain out yeah james cameron who also said you know you need to get out of your mother's basement if you are worried about the grain you don't have that problem you're in your own adu i i was i was in a basement of my own design and you know my my very quick thought about that point is that i don't really care about the grain the issue that i have with what he did to Aliens is it makes the setting of Aliens look like movie sets now

because everything is so clearly defined and lit. And so without any darkness, you can see things that feel constructed rather than lived in. It's a small note. It's not a big deal, but it does make a difference. Anyhow, this movie feels dirty, grimy, gritty.

Not as dirty, grimy, and gritty as Alien 3, but it feels like it's a leftover space station. And it has the mechanics, just to go back to the thing I was mentioning in the beginning of A Haunted House. There are dark, creaky stairs that they have to go down, pathways that are obstructed, stuff growing on the walls. There's even a weird gondola system that they have to go down at one point.

There's a big elevator shaft sequence. There's so many things that feel like they could be like a tower of terror type thing. And it's very effective. I don't think, you know, the last two movies were largely set on like these, these alien planets and were much more outdoorsy for lack of a

better term um so to get back into the claustrophobia of a space station and turn this space station much more into like this ghoulish thing that's been basically floating like a dead rock and so like what would have happened if aliens were able to proliferate inside of it is really really cool there's this added layer of tension where the space station and the adjoining ship are in the proximity of an asteroid belt, essentially. And so there's a really good, it's a really effective storytelling mechanism

to be like there's this countdown constantly happening. Yes. I think that for the most part, the visceral set pieces work really well. Like you have listed a bunch here, but the one that you didn't list is the first one, which is when the two men, the sort of like snarling, rude guy, Bjorn and Tyler. The two dudes from Skins. Yes.

But even though they're not. I was going to ask you, like Britain and America, is that like a, does that, why do people have accents in the alien universe I don't know I also don't know why it was like these

these are like two cockney guys but Rain is just has an American accent Rain's from Kansas yeah I don't know and Andy has a kind of non accent

a non-descript accent entirely anyhow those two guys are going exploring in this ship they're trying to get cryo fuel

fuel cells for their cryo sleep pods because they want to basically fly to some nice planet. They find that the cryo fuel chamber has been flooded and there are a series of face huggers that are gestating. And they've been unfrozen and they start splashing into this water that is in this flooded zone.

Yeah, that was great. Cool scene. That was awesome. It was exciting. It was scary. It was really well executed. And the whole time while this is happening. So these two guys have been locked inside of this lab.

You can see the face huggers defrosting. And then to get out of the lab, they need to essentially put Rook's computer, his hard drive, into Andy. So up until this point, Andy has been kind of force-gumping it and telling dad jokes, but having epileptic seizures and is shaking and kind of useless as an android.

He's a malfunctioning old model. Little mice and men action going. And then they put Rook's AI into him and this David Johnson does an incredible job with this. He's so good at this.

First they have like this terrifying like almost him being possessed scene where his eyes have rolled back and he's like standing stock still

as he almost summons these aliens out of hibernation but then when he snaps out of it he's athletic decisive knows everything about the situation.

And it's a great turn by Johnson because I was watching it. I was like, man, this guy's really good. I hope that he doesn't just kind of humble bumble through the entire movie. And it's a really, really, really cool twist. Oh, great casting choice bringing him in, too, because he is on industry, at least. And even in Rye Lane, to some extent, the rom-com that he was in a couple of years ago, very kind of sly actor. You know, someone whose face you're always trying to read.

You have a little bit quiet. And in this movie, he gets to do a lot. For an android, he's very expressive. That sequence in particular I thought was great, and it kind of kicks off the chaos of the movie because then at this point, facehuggers have been unleashed throughout these two ships, Romulus and Remus,

and xenomorphs are being born and xenomorphs are being summoned. And the film takes on, like you said, that kind of haunted house chaos that is generally really exciting. Did you have a favorite of all of the set pieces in the movie? I thought that the chest burst,

Aileen Wu's chest burst, into the spaceship crashing their shuttle crashing into the Romulus' like hangar bay which is shot essentially like a really really awful car crash and does really effective things with like when it cuts to outside it'll be

quiet and then it cuts to inside the spaceship and it's like chaotically loud Isabella Merced's character Kay is stuck with Eileenced's character Kay is stuck with Eileen Wu's character Navarro as she's foreshadowing a birth that we will later

get. But this chestburster comes out I thought higher than it did on John Hurt. Most certainly. It was more like in the breastplate here.

Which is probably fatal. Yeah not ideal. She kicks it right away. Yeah. Which is a shame because she was ideal. She kicks it right away. Yeah. Which is a shame because she was awesome. She's a cool character. Yeah.

She is awesome. I have a big kind of thing to say about the ensemble, but she ruled. And basically, it's this chaotic thing where Isabella Merced's character is getting thrown all over the spaceship as it crashes. And a facehugger has just been born, basically. Yeah. I like that scene a lot, too. character is getting like thrown all over the spaceship as it crashes yeah and then and a a facehugger has just been born basically yeah um i like that scene a lot too and then i also loved um i love the acid blood death have we seen that before i mean when bjorn gets dripped on to death

yes yes that was really gross and very effective this This, of course, comes... This is the thing. I will say this. I can imagine a lot of people being like, well, this and well and that. This movie's for shooters. Like, this movie's for my killers. It's for guys who are like, oh, yeah, slow drip acid blood death. Haven't seen that before.

When I talked to Fede Alvarez, he was like, do not forget, I am the man who had blood rain at the end of my Evil Dead remake.varez, he was like, do not forget, I am the man who had blood rain at the end of my Evil Dead remake. You know, he's like, I really live this life. And he does. He's really into extremely gnarly stuff.

I've seen some people say like, oh, this isn't even that gnarly. It's pretty fucking gnarly. The chestburster scene coming out of Eileen Wu where it goes out, it cracks her... I'm sorry for describing this so intimately, but come with us.

Walk with us. It jumps out it sprays so much blood on Isabella Merced's face and then she lets out a truly awesome horror movie scream I wish that scream had not been

it's spoiled in the trailer which is unfortunate I didn't watch the trailer I watched like just the teaser and then I was like I'm done it is a great scream

those sequences are both great the final 20 minutes of the movie Just the teaser and then I was like, I'm done. It is a great scream. Those sequences are both great. The final 20 minutes of the movie. This is like the, I almost feel like they were like, if you do X, Y, and Z, they being Bob Iger, who I'm sure was deeply involved in this film. A lot of script notes. I feel like there was like, hey.

He was originally cast as Rain in this film. Bob Iger, yeah. If you can, if we can make, it was almost like this trade-off where it's like, if you pay homage and put this little Easter egg in

and do this and it's Ash and it's the Nostromo is flying around in pieces and there are these references, then you can do the most fucked up birth scene ever. Yeah.

And it was really funny because I was sitting next to my wife watching this last night and she was just like, oh my God, are they going to do this? Like she was like, because there was this whole thing where you find out that Kay,

Isabella Merced's character, is pregnant about midway through. And I actually got annoyed because I was like, now she has protective armor on. She has character armor. We can't kill her. Yeah. I was like, now she has protective armor on. Mm-hmm. She has character armor. We can't kill her. Yeah.

I was wrong. To an extent, you know. You were wrong. They couldn't use her, you know. Well, she died and then she effectively

saved herself by implanting herself. into her body. Exactly. That cocktail that the Ian Holm character is sort of cooking up. Yeah.

Which, earlier in the film, we get this sort of like Chekhov's goo moment where like we're about to hit Tyler with it. And then they pause and they don't give it to him. And that turned out to be a good choice. But later when Kay takes it, clearly it transforms her seed. Yeah. Into something unique. I will say like even before that scene and what transpires after that,

you have these two huge action set pieces. The elevator shaft. There's the anti-gravity sequence in which aliens are encroaching and they're trapped and there's no way out of the airlock.

And the only move, and I hadn't seen this before, although you pointed out to me that there was a version of this in another film. In the William Gibson script, there's a zero gravity thing. So she hits the zero gravity button

and all of the xenomorphs start floating and Rain and Andy are holding on and she starts shooting all of the aliens with a pulse rifle and of course the xenomorphs have acid blood and so the blood floats.

And then she does a little bit of a night fox move. Yeah, she does the bedtime ballet through have acid blood. And so the blood floats. Yeah, and then she does a little bit of a night fox move. Yeah, she does the bedtime ballet through the acid blood, which I thought was really fun. I mean, it was very CGI, but I thought it was a very clever idea. That's immediately followed by this incredibly thrilling, you know, elevator shaft sequence in which they're all being chased by xenomorphs. They're floating and then this gravity goes off.

And yeah, it's cool. And then that is followed by the birth from hell. Something from the director of Don't Breathe. Yes. Truly. The first thing I did when I got out of this movie was texted Amanda and said, you cannot see this movie under any circumstances. Like, I don't even want to describe it to her.

It's really fucking gnarly. And of course, Kay does give birth. She gives birth to a xenomorph human hybrid. A little bit of Alien 3's man-baby alien, and then... Alien 4. Oh, Alien Resurrection.

Yes. Right, yeah, yeah, sorry. There's a bit of Alien Resurrection kind of monster human xenomorph, and a little bit of... I thought it was more engineer.

The engineer. Yeah. So it's a sort of like... Because it's the goo. Giant humanoid alien. Yeah. And it's a sort of like, cause it's the goo giant humanoid alien. Yeah. And it just turns into a crazy monster movie for about 15, 20 minutes.

And I thought it worked. I, I was like hooting and hollering. I was like, this is so, so fun. Sixers to bring that guy in on a 10 day. He seems like he can really protect the,

do you think they considered casting Boban in that role? He's kind of got some Boban energy yeah he's that was fucking terrifying it was great yeah and the movie is

like you said it's really having fun Fede is having a lot of fun doing all of this stuff and you know it's ultimately a

it's a fun rollercoaster blockbuster at the end of a long summer full of IP is it my favorite alien movie it's not fun rollercoaster blockbuster at the end of a long summer full of IP is it my favorite alien movie

it's not my favorite alien movie it's gonna be tough to rank these because the bottom is really boring and the top is really boring so really all of the

discussion I think is very concentrated within four movies may I just ask you before we move into the rankings just about the

film itself how did you feel about move into the rankings just about the film itself, how did you feel about the ensemble, the casting? This is one of the hallmarks of Alien movies, I think, is just really,

really, really top-notch casting. To me, this was most similar to Alien 3 where, you know, Alien and Aliens,

at least, this is hard because it's retroactive where you're like, it's Bill Paxton and Michael Biehn, but maybe Bill Paxton and Michael Biehn weren't household names in the moment Aliens came out. Obviously, Michael Biehn had been Terminator and everything, but you know what I mean, right?

I don't want to oversell my enthusiasm for Kaylee Spaney. I think she's very good. She's awesome. She's going to be very famous. And we're going to look back and be like, that was crazy when Kaylee Spaney was in an an alien movie and in civil war in the same year yes civil war and coming off of priscilla yeah so she's on an interesting run now of kind of doing something we praise a lot of other people for like you know timothy chalamet florence pew like

high and low you know prestige small indie and also franchise stuff that is pretty cool so i think it will look back. I don't know how famous David Johnson will get, but he's a very, very good actor. The other people I thought were like, they were fine, but I was not very familiar with that. I thought it was just missing. This is like saying it was missing like a 320 hitter with 40 homers, but it was missing like Harry Dean Stanton, Rafe Spall, Danny McBride,

like that, like the thing that you're like, oh, this guy's in it or this woman's in it. Like, this is awesome. Like Amy Simons in Covenant is so good in what she has to do. Yeah.

And I just felt like they, I don't know if it was like a budgetary thing to use really unknown actors. I mean, these guys, a couple of these people have been in like

Netflix shows. Very, very short careers. Yeah, but couple of these people have been in like Netflix shows. Very, very short careers. Yeah, but they are very much in the beginning of their career. They're very much unknowns. There was some charm to that, but there was also like,

these films do not spend a ton of time on character. So you get in the beginning of Alien famously, this Robert Altman sequence of them talking over one another during breakfast

after they've come out of cryosleep. But you know and care about them so much after that scene. And you kind of understand sequence of them talking over one another during breakfast after they've come out cry or sleep but you know and care about them so much after that scene and you kind of understand their dynamics with each other throughout this film i feel like they constantly had to be like i don't like you because you were present at a mining disaster that my mother and father perished at you know it's like a lot of exposition rather than feeling like the characters are very lived in. But that being said, I really liked Eileen Wu and I really liked Isabella Merced, whose character seems like kind of like a nothing part in the beginning

and then kind of explodes over the course of the character. Well, literally over the course of the movie. Yeah, I mean, I think that was a very intentional choice that they made because the last two Alien movies in particular were movies about incredibly stupid adult scientists. Like everything that all of the actors do and the characters do in those movies is just like, why would you do that?

Like, why would you touch that? Why would you go near that? It's kind of a signature aspect of these movies. This is the first one where it was like Gen Z are full of morons too. Like that's kind of the point. You're not really giving Neil Armstrong right now, but okay.

Um, I thought that was a funny idea. Nope. Not doing that. Yeah. I mean, I don't know. So if you stumbled upon a,

a pulsating egg. Yeah. If I was asleep for nine years to get to that egg. Yeah. I would say, I say, who are your guys? Egg, are you into like a Dio Sabbath or Ozzy Sabbath? Like what's your preference?

I think the things that these people witness and see is like, you're supposed to imagine that they've traveled in cryosleep to see pyramids and giant faces on an alien planet. Wouldn't you be like, we got to hang out and touch this? If you come across the engineer's little landing pad, you know, his little rocking chair. Yeah. Are you like, I'm getting on that bitch?

Space jockey, yeah. You're getting in there. You're riding into the future. All right, that's good to know. I'm not going to space with you. Okay. I just want you to know that. Because you want to have a movie theater in space.

You want to not be disturbed. You don't want to know that. Because you want to have a movie theater in space. You want to not be disturbed. You don't want to explore. What do you want to do? Just relax. Yeah. Vibe out. You know, smoke a pie stick.

Just eat some Cheetos. You made a good point here when I have this question, what is the future of this franchise in the document? And you reminded me that Noah Hawley

is currently at work, I think, on an Alien series. It's coming soon. I think it has been, the shooting has ceased. Yeah. And it's called Alien colon Earth. Yeah. Or it might just be called Earth. I don't know. But it's set before Alien. It's set before Prometheus, I believe. I think it's going to maybe, the rumor is like, I thinkah has been in contact with ridley scott they've been talking a lot about it but i don't know how much it will honor prometheus in terms of like some of the mythological leanings of that and origins of that stuff and i think one frustration point that i think hardcore fans of the franchise have is that scott had intended to do three films

yes as prequels to kind of conclude this story. It was going to be the David trilogy, which is what's so interesting about this franchise is that we think about it almost like it's like Friday the 13th where there's so many of these movies. But it's like really actually there are four Ripley movies and two David movies,

now Romulus, and then the Alien vs. Predator movies, which depends on your point of view whether those are real or not. They're effectively not canon when you go back and then the Alien vs. Predator movies, which depends on your point of view whether those are real or not. They're effectively not canon when you go back and look at those movies. I mean, they tried to make it canon. There's like Weyland's and Yutani's.

Yes. In fact, Lance Henriksen plays Weyland in those movies. It's interesting that it's Alien Earth. I assume there are going to be xenomorphs on Earth. It's about the... It's like corporate machinations of the Whalen Corporation

and I think the rise of the Android technology. But no aliens in the thing. I don't, I mean, obviously there will be aliens, but this is, it's reminding me a lot of Legion in terms of like,

it'll be tangentially like X-Men. That is really risky. But it's Noah Hawley's show. I meanMen. That is really risky. It's a Noah Hawley show. I mean like, I'm interested. Obviously, he's really talented, especially in making TV.

But, if the word alien isn't, like, the word alien is not in the title of Prometheus. I know. But it is in the title of this show, but it's set at a time before the, anyway,

who knows? I will happily watch it. It's notable. I will be shocked if there's not a xenomorph in the first five episodes of this. There's not going to, they can't do it. Yeah.

I think that this is a really good question about this franchise though, which is, do you look at it as a reliable thrill ride? Do you look at it as a sci-fi epic that has canon and it has things you're supposed to adhere to? And it's like, well, David did this. So this is why this is like this. Or do you just want like a bunch of different kinds

of filmmakers and storytellers to take their shot at it. And eventually at some point in that story, something's going to burst out of somebody's chest. Right. Is it James Bond or is it Star Wars? And, you know, I think Ridley Scott really upset that by returning with Prometheus. I think he really like, I don't want to say he ruined it.

He didn't ruin anything because I think both of his latter two Alien movies are really good. But he made it difficult for it to only be that. And the fact that this most recent movie is quarantined between two pre-existing movies. Yeah, and that the Noah Hawley thing is like this pre-pre-prequel.

I'm kind of shocked that this is happening because one of the things about this movie, this franchise is like, I don't think people are overly precious about it. And I do think that you could keep moving the ball forward a little bit with some interesting ideas. Or it could just be like,

who's the most badass horror director on the block right now? He gets to take a shot at this every three years. It's so funny though, because the franchise itself is such a bear trap. Like, some of the best directors of the last 30 years

have tried to make movies in this franchise and have been completely, you know, bewildered. Yeah. You know, I don't want to say

have bungled it, but have gotten stuck. I mean, Randy Harlan. But Jean-Pierre Jeunet, you know, like at the time, he's coming off of

City of Lost Children and Delicatessen and, you know, genuinely considered a truly visionary filmmaker. And there's some really cool stuff in Resurrection, but it's a very weird and ultimately, I think, unsuccessful movie. So the idea of it being this fungible is fascinating. The other thing about it being called Alien Earth is there had long been rumored a fifth alien movie in the chronology of the alien story in which I think Ripley would appear and aliens would go to her. This is the Blomkamp movie, right? I guess that's what Neil Blomkamp was going to make.

Ripley was going to be in the Neil Blomkamp movie, which he essentially put all the art for up, right? And has shared quite a bit about it. And then Ridley came in and was like, I'm actually making Prometheus. So one thing I like about Kaylee Spanier's performance in Romulus is she's not trying to do Ripley at all. There's nothing that is like... There was a moment where I was like, oh, is she going to be your daughter? Oh. I guess that's...

I wonder if they even shot something like that and took it out. Because I was like... For some reason, the sound mix in the... It was very loud but like i couldn't really also always understand the dialogue and uh when she's first like at the sort of office of the mind trying to get off and she's like my name's ray i was like did she just say her name was something ripley like i and then i i couldn't get it out of my head i was like this would work technically because she would be in her 20s.

Her mom did die a few cycles ago on working for Weyland-Yutani. And so it would have been kind of right around there. Hmm. Now you've got my wheels turning on that. I wonder if they wanted it to be that and decided against it at a certain point. Nevertheless, do you want Ripley to come back in any form? Is that something you want to see?

No, I don't. But I don't, I'm not, I just think that they have, they've kind of taken that as far as it can go. And Sigourney Weaver herself was like, there's only so much to that character. We've kind of pushed it.

Like how often can she keep accidentally landing exactly where the aliens are landing? She's been cloned. She's been impregnated. She's gone through the cycles of this. I was happy that she didn't show up on the you know the computer of the nostromo to help them or something and yeah i i actually

feel like this is the healthiest relationship i have to a lot of like these projects out there it's just like i think alien is just reliably like they are fucking scary i like it when they run i like it when they appear out of the ground i like it when they drip I like it when they run. I like it when they appear out of the ground. I like it when they drip. I like it when they bleed. I kind of dig the vibes of all of these things. Like I know it's kind of stupid that they would keep these dumb scientists keeping like, we better go to that home in Deacon.

But it's cool. Like why are all the kids like, you know, stop going to Elm Street. That's what I was just going to say. If you like slasher movies, it's easier to just get on board with this. If you only think of the Alien franchise as this sacred place where Ridley Scott and James Cameron completely redefined science fiction and action forevermore, you're going to have more hang-ups. You know, I don't have a lot of hang-ups about it.

I had a good time. I also think, you know, the arc of time always favors every single one of these movies every single one of these movies with the exception of the Alien vs. Predator movies have been reclaimed

as a kind of misunderstood masterpiece will Romulus ever get there? honestly probably will oh yeah in 10 years when we're in a cycle

of even worse IP it's gonna be like two months later on Letterboxd people are gonna be like you guys didn't understand what Fede was cooking you're probably right

okay let's rank them. Let's just say for the sake of conversation that Alien vs. Predator's Requiem is the worst movie ever made featuring an alien and that Alien vs. Predator is probably the second worst movie ever made. Yeah, so I think that what's really helpful with this

would be to do tiers. I think you can do, I think there's a very obvious tier one which is the first two films and I would be curious, tiers you know I think you can do I think there's a very obvious tier one which is the first two films and I would be curious are you aliens or alien I am alien alien ultimately I am alien

as well okay you are that's your favorite yes it's very close it's it's there and they're very different mm-hmm but it's it's and I just think that the original is one of

my favorite films ever made and I think even doing that rewatchables really like I was like I can hear Jimmy with this right now

like this is just an incredible act when is the aliens rewatchables um we have to do DeJearling Limited first Phil wanted us to wait

for him for that that sounds fun uh I the one thing I found amusing re-watching Aliens again was how interested James Cameron is in weak men. How funny he finds weak men and how many of them are in these movies.

So like Paul Reiser. Paul Reiser and I forget the command leader's name who's on the intercom. Oh, Gorman. Gorman and of, Bill Paxton. You know, the like baby man. Game over, man.

Everything Paxton does is elite. Is this a bug hunt? I think it's pretty close, but I think it's Alien and Aliens. And then you've got this quartet.

This is the most interesting part, which is like, what's three for you? For me, it's Prometheus. For me, it's Alien and Aliens and then you've got this quartet. This is the most interesting part which is like what's three for you? For me it's Prometheus. For me it's Prometheus as well. Now I have

been desperate to return to both Alien 3 and Alien Resurrection and have that moment of like I see now. I see its greatness.

I see its grandeur. And they both just feel like deeply compromised movies to me. They don't they're not very fun to watch most of the time even though they have great moments and some great characterization and they feel kind of fucked with.

So while I like them fine, Prometheus is a huge vision in which somebody got to follow through completely. And that's the way it feels. I think it's one of the more, I'm very heavily influenced by a lot of the writing that happened around Prometheus and a lot of the like sort of speculative criticism that happened around Prometheus

that takes things that Ridley Scott throws out in interviews that didn't make it into the movie at all. Like, so basically there's this one snippet of an interview where Ridley Scott is like, Jesus Christ was an engineer and crucifying him angered the engineers and that's why they have unleashed... I know.

That's so sick. It's the fucking best. This is why we can't quit Ridley. I mean, he's literally communicating, though, as though engineers existed in our chronological timeline. No, they made Earth, and then Earth started going the wrong way. And they send an emissary, which is Jesus. And then we crucified Jesus.

And they were like, you guys are fucked. Man, that is so good. It's so good. I love Ridley Scott so much. And all the stuff with tearing the alien coming out of the abdomen of Prometheus, all the mythological stuff of that is sick. And then I think... Also, just the abortion bay sequence is an unbelievable body horror film.

Yeah. Unbelievable. I was so far on the edge of my seat, I almost like bumped into the seat in front of me when that was happening. Famously, seen with Andy Greenwald after a massive Grantland party in which all three of us were deeply hungover.

Which was one of the coolest things I've ever done. Just gin floating off of me. It was amazing. Yeah. Okay, so Covenant or Three. Fourth is hard. Covenant or Three. I don't think for me,

that's what it's between. I think it's Covenant for me. I think it's Covenant 2, which I think some people would think is blasphemous, especially from us, the Fincher boys. I mean, it's not like Fincher's like,

I love Alien 3. It's my least favorite David Fincher movie. I looked at my rankings again yesterday just to confirm. I have it last. So I think it is Covenant. There's really cool stuff in it

and I think Charles Dance gives one of my favorite Alien franchise performances in that film. But it is a difficult movie to love. And it feels, like you said, like incredibly fucked with. Yeah. I would, Covenant is not perfect.

Nope. It just has. First 45 minutes is perfect. It has incredibly high highs. Yeah. And it does have a fascinating Fassbender performance in which he's really going for the weirdness of the David character.

Yeah. And it really makes you want to see even more so where the story goes. I think that the two films together, I think Prometheus and Covenant, it's a fool's errand to dream of Ridley Scott director's cuts.

Did we ever get the Napoleon one? No. Okay. But it was rated. Yeah. So apparently it is going to come out at some point. I. But it was rated. Yeah. So apparently it is going to come out at some point. I think it's 220

minutes. In totality, the David story of him escaping the first planet, flying to the engineer home planet, dropping the goo, then taking over and then building the xenomorphs to kill his own god or whatever. I'll do the diddling. It's so awesome.

And so interesting. And kind of now, in retrospect, very unique in blockbuster filmmaking and how brave and weird and fucked up it was. And in both of those films, it includes truly horrifying

horror movie stuff that he just like is able to throw out. The backburster. And some of the great production design and like. Yeah, yeah. Yeah.

The backburster sequence in Covenant, in the first 35 some of the great production design and like yeah yeah yeah the back burster sequence in Covenant in the first 35 minutes of Covenant is insane the whole Simon sequence where she like shoots the shotgun yes fucking awesome so I I think

Covenant's four for me and I think then I go three resurrection although I think I go three Romulus resurrection oh yeah I think I do too now I hadn't even thought

about where to put Romulus inurrection. Oh yeah, I think I do too now. I hadn't even thought about where to put Romulus in, honestly. Resurrection has a ton of fun, gory stuff. It also has the underwater sequence, which is super cool. And at the time, it was mind-blowing. Brad Dourif is really crazy and cool in that movie, but like... Every performance is at a pitch that I don't like.

The Jeanne acting style, where you're sort of like wide-eyed and yelling all the time. I'm not really, like Dan Hedaya is terrible in that movie. It just doesn't match Joss Whedon. You know what I mean? Or whoever was writing those. Whoever did rewrites on it, it's just like.

I think it's his script. But it's like this almost weird Guillermo del Toro, like Carnival Barker performances. Featuring Ron Perlman. And then it's Joss Whedon sort of like rat-a-tat dialogue in places.

So yeah, I think Romulus is ahead of Resurrection for me actually. Even I've just only seen it once. Is there a world in which Romulus

could get into the zone of Covenant and Prometheus? I don't think it has the same level of ideas although I think that I leave it with this and I'm curious whether or not

you I mean I'm curious whether or not you... I'm curious to hear the Fede conversation because it very knowingly deals with the idea that you can't escape certain pieces of iconography or storylines from this

franchise. And there is something kind of like... there's a lot of reanimation there's a lot of like we found a dead frozen thing in space and brought it back to life kind of stuff um that seems to be a very knowing wink at the state of filmmaking which is essentially all franchise filmmaking now like i mean like it's like all all of this stuff unless you're like making things on the margins or making an a24 movie you're basically like i mean like it's like all all of this stuff unless you're like making things on the margins or making an a24 movie you're basically like i'm making a reinterpretation of this so i

wonder how much of it's true i wonder how much of that stuff especially in in years past maybe the film will be improved when i'm not thinking about this shit so much because hopefully we end a cycle where we can't possibly keep squeezing out reboots of things. Or I'll be like, that's really sad that that's where this all ended up was bringing Ian Holm back to life. I think both things can be true. If they make another one of these movies

with a director that I'm at least interested in, I'm going to see any movie that they make, honestly. But even the shitty ones are Paul W.S. Anderson, who's at least interested in things and has a visual style. But even the shitty ones are Paul W.S. Anderson, who's at least interested in things and has a visual style. I just didn't need The Predator. I don't, like, that was just like,

I was never like, oh, I really want to see these two fight. Yeah. Is there a director out there that you think would be... No, that's a good question. ...would be... Well, okay, so here's the thing.

Here's what's really weird about these movies. And I have a very obvious, straightforward answer because she's already in the system, even though they're not going to let her do this. There's never been a woman to make a movie. So Arkasha should do it.

It's Arkasha Stevenson, who just made The First Omen, which did not do well at the box office. And so I'm not sure the 20th century studios- But didn't she make it for like 8 million bucks? No, no. It was like a $30 million movie. So I don't know if they're going to hand her the keys to an alien movie. But alien movies are all about motherhood femininity the fucked up nature of birth you

know the way that our bodies transform and become disgusting and become beautiful like the design of life is the very essence of the movies men are fine but they don't understand anything about that and so the fact that we now have like nine alien movies all made by guys is really fascinating because most of the big franchises have become increasingly democratized. More people are getting opportunities

to tell these stories. Now, Fede is a Uruguayan filmmaker. He's not just like another British guy who's come along. But it would be cool to see someone like Arkasha take on a movie like this, I think.

What about you? Anybody you want to see? Bring Fincher back? No, that's fucking interesting. I wonder whether or not, like, him doing World War Z Part 2, which never happened, was supposed to be him being like,

there's, like, an alien... Like, I have, like, I want to see flesh being torn from people. It feels like he's too in the bag of his own cool lifestyle now to ever do it, but I would like to see him do one crazy franchise movie i know that's like a stupid 13 year old's opinion yeah but it would be fun to watch him try to do something like that i think there is a tactile

intensity to the way jeremy saulnier makes movies that i don't know what his sci-fi movie would look like but like when you see even the True Detective episodes he directed, when you see Blue Ruin and Green Room, and I can't wait to see Rebel Ridge, which is coming out next month, there is a real dirty lived-in-ness to his movies that I think would suit this franchise. I don't know if he would get a $100 million sci-fi movie to make, though.

I'm not sure either. The next time you'll be on this show will be to talk about the film Rebel Ridge. I did think of one person because of Isabella Merced being in this film, which was Stefano Salima. Well, no, that's just a CR pipe dream. Well, she's...

Isabella Merced is in Day of the Soldado. Yeah, Day of the Soldado, the director of Without Remorse. Yeah. What if it was a Rainbow Six alien crossover oh my god dude

yeah wouldn't you watch that yeah I would watch that you know Michael B. Jordan hand to hand combat with a xenomorph

I really don't care for Alien vs. Predator but Alien vs. Predator vs. Jack Ryan and Mr. Clark Tom Clancy's Men of Honor that would be a music

what else are you excited about with movies? Anything coming up that you're pumped for? I do have your Rebel Ridge is in September 6th. I've written down the phrase trash justice

aka garbage revenge. What do you think about that? That is a really good idea. I was just watching Extreme Prejudice the other day. Great movie. Yeah.

Speaking of Walter Hill, one of the originators of the Alien franchise. Yeah. Film wise what am I looking forward to? I haven't seen Sing Sing I'm really looking forward to that

Oh yeah Tell me about this movie that you can't really tell me anything about because you want me to go in cold Thanks for saying that I was going to mention it at the end of this episode

because when we come back on August 27th Strange Darling will have already been released This is one of my favorite movies of the year It's directed by a guy named J.T. Malner It's directed by a guy named JT Molnar.

It is photographed by Giovanni Ribisi. Yeah. One of your favorite actors last seen in the end credits of horizon chapter one, an American saga. Uh, he printing press magnate. That's what I'm looking forward to.

I know. I know. I wish I was going to Venice. Anyhow, Ribisi has never been the DP on a film. It is a, I'll just say it's a serial killer story. Unlike one you've probably seen before.

Okay. And I really, really liked it. And it stars Willa Fitzgerald and Kyle Gallner. And Kyle Gallner, right? Yeah. Okay. So that's one to check out.

Comes out August 23rd. But you know, it's sicko time. Like when we come back. I know. It's Sean and Chris's scary hours, Halloween countdown. We're going to have

a great Halloween. We're going to have a great October. There's a lot of fucked up stuff coming. And I had a chance to see Anora and I look forward

to more people seeing Anora because that was really cool. Is Mufasa going to be good? I didn't realize Anora was a Mufasa prequel. So, interesting twist there. Mufasa, I mean, it interesting twist there. Mufasa,

I mean, it's Barry Jenkins. But also, digitally rendered lion talking. How are you feeling about our levels of hype? Did you feel like

going into Romulus, you were like, I've been looking forward to this so hard and then like 10 minutes in you were like, eh. No.

Okay. I didn't have that approach. The Gladiator 2 trailer played again last night before romulus and i was like our consumer confidence remains high in this film i actually had the opposite experience when i saw trap i saw gladiator 2 on a big screen the trailer for the first time and i was like oh no you thought i looked kind of cheesy a lot of digital yeah a lot of digital so you know what i ride with ridley how's your lady raven fanfic going uh i've been bumping it in the house non-stop you know what I ride with Ridley how's your Lady Raven fanfic going I've been bumping it

in the house non-stop you know it's Lion King soundtrack Lady Raven bangers back and forth back and forth it's been good I hope they make a trap too

where it's just her as like a pop star detective that was my favorite part like a Harriet the Spy style situation it's a good idea you were not a big fan of trap I love the first half of trap

hated the conclusion I just it's just it's just very difficult to build that many tunnels in suburban Philadelphia. It's a good note. I have found, this is maybe a different episode. Did you guys talk about the fact that Hartnett's name is Cooper and his daughter's name is Riley, so they are Riley Cooper? No. That's something that could only come from a native Philadelphian. I thought that was weird. That was a weird,

like if it was like, her name is Iverson and his name is Allen, that would have made more sense. But I was like, Isn't Riley Cooper famously a racist? Yeah.

Well, he was, yes. He used a certain word. Yeah. Okay. That's not ideal. Interesting choice. M. Night Shyamalan,

a true blue Philly sports fan. That's why I was like, this is not an accident, is it? You never know. Unless it's like Cooper Dijon, their second round draft pick from Iowa. That feels like a stretch. And Riley, I don't know.

I have found... Lincoln Riley, USC coach. I have found the fan reactions or sort of moviegoer reactions to Trap and to to long legs to be fascinating because there's clearly a level of frustration with those movies that i didn't experience when i watched them yeah and i'm kind of like trying to reckon why i like that people are getting so passionate about the movies and they're getting mad in some cases i mean people

seem really mad about trap I've not seen the reaction where people are like, this is one of the worst movies I've ever seen. I can't trust you anymore because you liked it. I'm actually, for the first time

in a long time, kind of confused because there seems to be this versamilitude issue that people seem to be hung up on that I'm honestly

trying to work through because I don't go to the movies for that. I don't go to the movies for like... I certainly don go to the movies i certainly don't go to m night movies and beyond like their setups like pretty much since the happening is movies have been like seemingly communicated from outer space and then translated into something that resembles humanity but is not like that like that was but that was what i was i mean the the visit and old and knock at the cabin and the two, you know, split and glass

are all tonally and script wise in this oddity mode that is very purposeful, you know, that he's decided to lean into that I enjoy. It's so funny

because in Trap when he shows up as like the usher or like Lady Raven's like assistant. Oh, the uncle, yeah. And he's like, hey, what's going on?

I'm like, why are you the most normal person in this movie? Maybe that's his do know that you know that's a really good point well i i interviewed him for knock at the cabin and i was like what a lovely guy yeah like he's just super normal and just sits courtside at sixers games and then he's just like josh hart and it needs to act like he's never been outside before yeah that's tough trap didn't do very well unfortunately yeah but it doesn't like aren't the economics of his movies

kind of like such? He pays for them. Yeah. Yeah, so it's really on him. Lady Raven, I think her royalties will make up the back end. It'll be fine.

Really a hot riser on my Spotify for you. So for you, it's Sabrina Carpenter, Rowan Chapel. Chapel Roan. Chapel Roan. Jesus Christ.

I heard her for the first time That was the most old man moment ever. Chapel Roan, my bad. F I heard her for the first time that was the most old man moment ever Chapel Roan my bad Feminomenon pretty good okay uh

Aaliyah Brat Aaliyah just laughing at the 40 year old man um what else is on your hit list uh there's a new band called Fentanyl

that I really like Fentanyl are you being serious okay it's time to go to my conversation with Fede Alvarez thanks Chris Are you serious? Okay. It's time to go to my conversation with Fede Alvarez. Thanks, Chris. In 100 meters, turn right.

Actually, no. Turn left. There's some awesome new breakfast wraps at McDonald's. Really? Yeah. There's the sausage, bacon, and egg. A crispy seasoned chicken one. Mmm. A spicy end egg. Worth the detour. They sound amazing. Bet they taste amazing, too. Wish I had a mouth. Take your morning into a delicious new direction with McDonald's new breakfast wraps. Add a small premium roast coffee for a dollar plus tax. At participating McDonald's restaurants.

Ba-da-ba-ba-ba. Very excited to have Fede Alvarez here to talk about Alien Romulus. Fede, this is a risky property to get involved with. People have a big emotional relationship to this movie. Was it... I know that this is something you really wanted to do, but did you ever have any concern about getting involved because of the big feelings that we all have about these movies well not really i mean usually if you truly love something

like i do with alien and um and there's and there's gonna be more movies and you know it someone's gonna do it and um i just and i felt like i i i want to make sure i i steer in the right direction that i that i make a movie that i want to see is the best way for you as a fan to go okay not only i'm going to watch the movie i want i'm going to i'm going to experience i'm going to travel to that world myself there's nothing better you know for me as a film lover it that one thing is to watch the movie the other thing is to experience it firsthand which is what i've done everything people will see in the movie i was there i was first row right watching it happening and the way i make the movies which everything you see most of the time it's there

is real the creatures are there the sets are there it's it's like putting on the show for me to be there and it's what i've done when i was seven years old you know put in a tent in between beds and figured out a way to take a photo and pretend it was a spaceship and and then with cameras that's still what i do i try to go to the world that i want to experience myself myself firsthand and it's almost like being a war photographer when i go there and i have to shoot it and capture it and come back from that crazy adventure and show it to you like this is what happened this is i survived this is what happened back there and show you the footage of what the adventure was so when you think about that that way there's there's irresistible the idea of going to an alien advent to go through the adventure of an alien movie, the experience of an alien movie firsthand yourself, when you can actually, as a writer as well, control the narrative and make sure it is the story you want to hear, right?

So that's why it comes, when you love it so much, it's just impossible to, you know, I don't know. Imagine in high school, there's a girl that you're in love with. He dated all these very handsome men and now suddenly she wants to date you. What are you going to say? No, I'm not at the level of those handsome men. And she's like, come on, let's do it. And you're like, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Who would you be if you do that?

Come on. I'm going like, yes, lady. Let's go. That's a great comparison. How old were you when you saw the alien films? Well, it's probably, I was actually researching on that because I've been asked this question again,

and I'm a bit like the Joker on, on, on dark night. I tell a different story every time you have, you guys pick, which was the real one. But the, but the truth is, is because it's hard sometimes to remember exactly

that experience i i do know i've i watched aliens before alien because i turned 12 when in 1990 so you know i i couldn't you know obviously i didn't see the original in theaters or anything like that and uh and at that time actually a couple years before that or that same year there was a new addition in vhs of aliens because fox was pumping aliens into the vhs stores to promote alien 3 that was very close to come out so so that's that's when my generation really got hit by it most of us got hit by the promotional machine of Fox trying to make sure you knew what Alien was before releasing Alien 3. So in 1990, I got that edition of VHS,

like rented that, watched that, blew my mind. Right away went to see Alien, watch Alien on television actually, because I don't think it was, I have to fact check me on that if it was actually available on VHS at the time for rent I have not been and uh but I watch it on television and uh terrify me because I thought it was this action you know Thriller like Cameron style and then I go to a very dark world and then Alien 3 comes right at the head

of the 90s with the grunge is hitting when We all decide that glam and colorful stuff is horrendous. And we need to go into a bleak, nihilistic 90s. And here comes Fincher, kills all the characters, does that movie. So those three hit me back to back, kind of the same couple of years when I was 12 years old, 12, 13. So, you know, I definitely left it randomly. I'm fascinated by the decision to set this movie between the first and the second films. It does present some challenges and maybe a little bit of fantasy realization. So, you know, I love that you did so much practical, that you built sets, that you put us back into a familiar place.

But it seems like that would be hard to do to actually create a world with materials that maybe don't exist anymore to try to render those spaces that Ridley shot so beautifully but also make it your own thing like can you talk about trying to have it both ways in that respect yeah I think that the decision was you know when you're going to make an alien movie because they all kind of do quite look quite different as they progressed in time and through decades of filmmaking um so i thought like which one we're gonna go to i think everybody would agree that that vibe and that style the retrofuturism of the of the first two it's it's fascinating and it's not something that's done every day these days right so it's not something

you see every day on screen that's sort of like all TVs and buttons and again for us might be feel like retro, you know, it wasn't supposed to be retro at the time, retro futurist. Now we call it like that cassette futurism actually as it's called. But I knew that that was the world that I want to travel to. And that's what I was like, you know, I couldn't wait to travel to a spaceship that is made with all that technology and for that era. So obviously, you want to make sure it makes sense in the canon of the film. So that's when the decision of setting between one and two was made. Also for the story we're telling, it needs to happen a few years, not too many years, but a few years after the first film i think and then you know

that was the big bet in a way that say what happened if you overlap you know if you put take alien and aliens you put them on top of each other you look through it and see what you see and you knew the result of it was going to be something that is not either or alien or aliens it's going to be it's this new thing and different thing um at the same time I don't think too much about maybe I should but I don't think too much about the comparations for one and two and things like that because it's been 45 years right when you know when I watched I don't know I remember watching the fly or the blob or the thing all these movies in the 80s and my dad telling me blah but you know the the one from the 60s the one from the 50s so much better

and and and that was just 20 years 25 years of difference between the sci-fi the fly probably and and the chronic versus like it didn't matter to me as a young audience you go like sure i bet that one was great but i it is irrelevant it's completely relevant for my experience of watching those movies if there was something before and it was even better sure i don't i don't i don't doubt there were at the time whatever it was but um but the same with a new audience today you make movies you put in a big theater i think you you want to make sure you're not unfair to the young audience that shows up that hasn't seen any of them. You got to think that the last time there was an alien movie, I mean, you know, Covenant wasn't a big hit.

So there wasn't it didn't make an imprint on a generation. So that new generation, even someone that is 20 something today, probably if you didn't see that one, hasn't really been in a movie watching an alien movie. And it was called Alien because Prometheus was called Prometheus and with something else and the last one it's a resurrection so it's like talking about the far past people like me it's like two minutes ago because i'm old i'm 46 years old feels like yesterday for a young audience it's a decades in the past it's you know they were not even born so do you make it too much about like, well, but the other ones, that's when we sound like my dad used to sound

when he said those things. He was my age when he was saying those things, probably. So that's why I try not to think too much about that. I really try to make it for the fans like me. It has to work, but also aware that there's a new generation that have not seen any of them. It's a great point especially because the fly and the blob and the thing from the 80s are now considered classics and considered

classics in part because of the way that they were made and the practical effects and a lot of the things that you're doing in your film too so it's an interesting comparison i hadn't thought about it that way they were all remakes they were all remakes they were filmmakers that just loved those films just like i loved alien and they want to make their own and they made the reinterpretation of what those movies were and and and they brought to a new generation and they kept them alive because of doing so so a lot of times the question of why to do this now is like well it comes usually from older people that have really enjoyed they had their fun and they don't want the new generation to add it apparently it's like don't give them they don't give one to them this is like i have my fun what

would you give them an alien movie i'm like okay let's let them let's the young people discover what this is right yeah there's an inevitable gatekeeping anything that people have a big relationship to um was there like a a creature or a tool or a thing that you just wanted to see or hold in your hand or bring into the world that was very important to you or exciting to make again? I mean, we didn't really repeat anything directly, right? I don't think there's anything that is exactly from the original films right there's no prop that is directly that it's just everything kind of um is kind of a new version or different or like maybe inspired by by an original prop and i'm trying to think if there's anything in the movie that is exactly

out of the other ones that i wanted to go back and experience myself firsthand. One of my favorite props, I can tell you, is the pulse rifle in our movie. And for those that would look closely at that, it's the best example of that juxtaposition of alien and aliens. Because you got to take, look at, not in the movie, because it's hard to see the colors of things in movies because it gets so affected by the light.

But if you look at a photo, maybe in an auction website or the flamethrower from Alien, and look at the pulse rifle from Aliens, you'll see that all pulse rifle is exact combination of those two things. It's like the child of just two things combined. It has all the materials and colors of the flamethrower from Ripley, but all the design and shapes and silhouette of the pulse rifle from James Cameron. So I think that prop itself kind of sums up the whole approach to how we made this film. I love that. I noticed that there's a kind of an orange hue throughout this movie. And I feel like in the first film and even the second film, blue is like the defining color that you see when you're

watching this movie. I don't know, was that a very purposeful choice to kind of change the palette a little bit? Yeah, and I'm glad you say that because a lot of people think like, oh, it looks just like the other ones. And I'm like, no, it doesn't. It actually, there's some moments that maybe do, the cooler moments where there's cooler light, but we really try to figure out a palette that would be distinctive.

That would be, okay, that one is Rommel's. I think they all do. Like I said, Cameron obviously is very blue in the Cameron fashion. Jean-Pierre Jeannette, Resurrection has this amber all over. And that's very of to times as well. You know, and Fincher is kind of green in many, many levels, which is very Fincher as well. So a lot of the colors were taken,

so we had to get the one that wasn't taken yet to give it an identity. But there was really, really a lot of work on controlling our color palette, you know, for the custom designer the production designer dp everybody has this little palette of colors that we picked early on with a very narrow amount of colors that make them go okay if i have to pick one orange it has to be that orange if there's one green it has to be that green from the button if you look at a green light on the on the spaceship or in the station or it's a light that is green is always going to be exactly the same tone. And that,

that that's how you control the look of a movie to make sure it feels, um, coherent and, and, and, um, and, and eventually it could be an identity that you watch one frame of the movie

and go, I know that's, that's that movie, man. Do you like having to operate within a world with rules and structure and have some expectations? Is it, is it hard? Does he, do you feel hemmed in when you're operating in a space?

Cause this is not your first franchise either. You've worked in other franchise stories. Um, I do love the fact that I can sit down. I don't see it. I honestly, I don't see it like rules or anything like that because I don't think there's any I mean the studio doesn't hire you and goes like okay I'm gonna you know start working the script we're gonna send you the manual there's no such thing I think people think that's the way it is and hope sometimes that's the way it is with even I mean

maybe other franchises do have that. I doubt they do. I don't think Star Wars has that either. You're in the hands of a writer and a filmmaker that hopefully would have done his homework and understand what the rules are. That's my job. It's no one else's. So you can decide how to break them.

What I do usually is to make sure I'm the one that knows the canon and the rules better than anybody on the whole production and i would argue that probably i am up there with steve aswell which is the head of 20th which also is a total expert on alien so uh we'll have debates about who is right and who is wrong about some canon idea but the that's the main thing i think if i know it very well this is unlikely someone's going to come and contest me on that and go like wait a second that's wrong that's not the way it is um so that's a part of it i and and then the privilege of doing these things i tell you is that you in a way it takes it took 45 years to make this film right all these other

movies need to happen and all those other directors that are, you know, masters of the craft had to sit down, look at the script, look at the challenge of an alien movie, make a lot of decisions, create a lot of ideas. And I have the privilege to sit back, look at all of them with a cup of coffee, analyze them, think like that that work that didn't work so well that got obsolete with time this is still relevant and and and kind of really cherry pick about the best ideas of all those films and put them back on this one put them in spin usually because in the context of a different story the same idea always feels new in a way and always will play differently and then create new things and do my own experiments

with it right which is the part that i think it's uh hopefully you know when it comes to the rules and all that you know hopefully people understand that the best ones they actually went to places that didn't feel like they belong to the franchise i can guarantee you if you were if you go back to mid 80s and and andens is about to come out, there was a lot of people that thought like, this is not Alien. What is this? Marines? What's the point?

This is just scary when there's one and you don't have weapons. And now they have weapons? Oh, great. They ruined Alien. And that was Aliens. And that was true. I remember some friends of mine that believed, that really loved the first one to say those sort of things at the time.

Every time a new chapter is going to introduce new things, the sentiment is like, this is not that anymore. And then once it comes out and it works, now we all assume Marines and guns is part of Alien, when the first one made a whole point of they didn't have any weapons, and that was a whole big idea. So I think that is the spirit here as well you need to understand the rules and but then you need to progress to other places and it needs to hopefully do things that the other movies didn't do that eventually you know like having young people this time and people are like that's not alien yeah sure it wasn't either or wasn't a prison or any of those things or space pirates you know whatever it is you need to keep introducing things to and hopefully you will become alien one of the the ways in which i think the film accomplishes what you're describing is just the

entire third act which is incredibly fun and really creative and definitely never not anything that we've seen in any of these movies i think you have a real knack for third acts i think you know especially in your first two features i mean they're just really really exciting and and ramping the tension and doing things that are like right on the edge of i don't know if i can handle this um i was wondering if you could talk a little bit about constructing you know the anti-gravity moment the elevator shaft that sort of final creature battle, and kind of creating like a propulsive moment,

which I think in franchise storytelling is often very challenging because you have to like tie things neatly or set up the next chapter or do a lot of things. And you have a lot to do here, but don't feel hemmed in by some of that stuff. Thank you so much. I mean, I think in a way that um technically i would say this is the snob screenwriting me it will be a fourth act that i do and and and it's always been the

strength and weakness of my moves because i think there hasn't been a screen of my first cut that when someone says it has too many endings and i'm like yeah that's my that's the fourth act there's a there's there there is really a fourth act because the story really ends at some point at the end of third act you've seen the movie it's like when you think everything is done and that's it i mean it really calls the fourth act as well that whole narcissus part on on alien right the inside the shuttle fourth act movie he's too bad and then thing has wrapped fourth act. The movie hits the bed, and then the thing has wrapped up. The movie could end there, and then you add another act at the end.

And it really feels like almost part of a different movie, particularly in our movie. It's a very pure fourth act, because it is like an extra chapter that you felt like, what? Is it going? Oh, we go, we go, we go, here we go. And it almost feels like a different movie, tonally, which I think is what

makes things really scary sometimes where all the things you thought you knew and the rules you got used to by that point suddenly changed you know i changed the music there's no music anymore like that's done you know we're going to sound design only and we go to a level of intensity that the movie never went before so um that was my uh blood rain on on on on evil dad on my first movie i've never seen it but at the end it started raining blood on the the fourth act and and that was not part of anything that people could expect at that movie at that point and really puts you on a completely uncharted waters right and that's what i want that's what i really hope to put you in a place that that you

never see coming and it's hard because you've been watching the movie for an hour 45 minutes by that point and you kind of get the idea what are the boundaries what's the scope of the movie what's the style you know how violent it is you know how what things it does i think it doesn't so that's when you usually i kind of i felt like last night like when it got to that point one hour before my mid and i and people think okay this is good okay i had a great time this boom okay god and that's when they see me removing my jacket and sleeving up but when stuff is about to happen and and is it is that fourth act in a way but um i at the end of the day like i tell you it comes i was watching the movie last night

i think like well man it comes out of all my insecurities is my insecurities that i'm never doing enough that's that's one of my toxic traits i just i think i'm not doing enough that i i'm not doing enough of the juggling thing to entertain you so so i might have passed that line a long time you know you know a few minutes ago and i'm still going at it, trying to do more and more and more. And it's kind of insanity, really. I think that third act is kind of schizophrenic. When I was watching it last night, thinking, oh, man, like it doesn't stop. Keeps going.

Let's keep coming up with ideas. ideas but I think it's my job to really impress and and and and punish the audience and give them more and and feel like you've been run over by the film right like I think I think aliens did that to me at the time it was just I couldn't believe everything that was happening at the level it was happening and that movie when you're exhausted you know Cameron brings the queen you know and go god damn it and then after all that escape when you cannot believe that he she made it out of there he goes no he's in the ship with you it's gonna and the best set piece is still yet to come so I think that's something that I aspire to at least I really aspire to in every movie to try to give you that sense of the movie ran you over you really did it you know the the film starts fairly deliberately too

do you think of it as like a momentum machine in that way because some movies will say like let's just have a big action set piece in the first five minutes of your movie and your movie doesn't quite work that way no because i i think it's a scale in size and and how uh big something might feel it's all relative to where you've been the last five minutes, right? It's just relative. So yeah, you're totally right.

A lot of movies make the big mistake to burn all their fuel in the first few minutes. And they show you so much so quickly that then, you know, all your weight is for, hopefully that will happen again later on, but you just don't do yourself a service if you do that. So I,

I'm always want to make sure that I start in a place where I have always somewhere to go so you start there you keep going up and the and my movies tend to be a crescendo constantly so I want you to believe by the middle of the movie that that's as big as it's gonna get and i know i have so much room yet the way where to go right and so i save pace myself to really get there at the end and i try to do a lot with just suspense and and storytelling for for the most part and make sure that it always feels like compared to what we're used to where you are setting right now is insane and bigger and more dramatic and uh it's um i try to make them very operatic that way and uh sometimes more the line silly but but i think

that's what it should be it has to keep growing and keep growing and then we think it cannot get bigger and sometimes it's not just visual style it's just the drama of the story of how intense it gets you know we we go to crazy places at the end with the intensity and that was the idea to make you feel at some point that we're going to play it safe that this is this is that sort of movie and then really go to to to insane places but um yeah it's something i really pay close attention to the the scope and make sure is a constant crescendo i never stop and at the end it really steeps and it takes you up up and up and up and up until you know you you know that it sort of give you the sort of finale that one always expect from this film can you tell me about the decision to include rook in the story and how you thought about that sure this will come out after the

movie is out yes one of my obsessions is to and and i have even wagers with the studio and they're involved in the movie if we're really going to be able to reach friday without being all over the internet the the rook the room i think it's going to be tough yeah a lot of people saw yesterday yeah my bet is that it that it will that that it will but maybe i haven't really looked at my phone or any news since last night, so I have no idea. But I really hope so because for me, it's all about that experience of Friday night

and going in without knowing what's going to happen and being surprised. And that's what movies used to be before the internet. And I still remember going to watch Terminator 2 and find out while I'm watching that Arnold is not the bad guy this time. That was the secret at the time. I knew that and it was like oh my god it's amazing like it's just

what a mind blow and and there was because Cameron controlled that the whole the whole material and no one knew that until the day the movie came out. So there's many things like it's so hard these days but I really hope so. I mean we we told everybody, please do not spill the beans. Let's not talk about it until so. So we can give some the people that care about that sort of thing a great experience on Friday night. The decision was because we knew it was going to be a torso. It was always a torso on the script.

It was just half of a synthetic on the table that was going to play the antagonistic role of Will and Yutani. Talking with Ridley, we realized because we're going to build an animatronic that talk, that move, that interact with the actors, that legacy effects build for us. When we're going to start building the animatronic, we realized it could be any face, really. You have to come up with a face.

It's not going to be an actor. There was going to be an actor, which was an actor that does the performance and the lines and translate into the dummy. But you needed, but when it comes to the likeness, it could be anything. And talking with Ridley, we both came up with this idea of what is,

but it was how crazy it was that, you know, Lance Harrington got to show up many times, you know, Michael Fassbender got it more than once, and the only one that was never show up again was Ian Holmes' likeness. And so we both got really excited about that. The first thing I did was to call his widow and talk with her and make sure to check with the family

and the kids and make sure everybody was cool with the idea. I would have never done it without their consent. Yeah. I lost my dad a few years ago. So, you know, kind of the same time that Ian Holm passed away. And so I know how recent it might be for them and,

and what, how important that is that they need to be on board, but she, they all, they all agree that, you know, Ian was given the cold shoulder by Hollywood in the last 10 years of his career. And he would have loved to get the call, you know ian was given the cold shoulder by hollywood in the last 10 years of his career and he would have loved to get the call you know to be part of of this movie of the part of an

alien movie again so they they that's that's was their guess in that he would have loved to be part of the project in any any possible way and then you know really for me as well as like i know you can technology can recreate a lot of things. And we did a combination of puppets. Sometimes all the shots is puppets. Sometimes have some CG in there. It's a whole combination of techniques. But at the end of the day, it's not really,

what you can never recreate is the talent of that actor. You know, the nuance of their performance, the talent that you get out. So all you can do is go for the likeness. And we're like, that's what we do. And we just, this is a different character with different personalities it's not it's not even pretending to do what you know would have done it's just it's just something different it's a different character different name um so so we felt like uh it was exciting to do for me as a fan to to give the character of ash that likeness another one and not be the only one that was never seen again in the Alien franchise.

Interesting. Thanks for making that so clear. I think people will be fascinated by that decision. And there'll probably be a lot of debate about it, honestly. I'm sure it will be. But I think for me, it's like on the whole debate part, which I'm sure some people go, oh, they shouldn't do it.

Maybe I'm wrong, but I think you'll have to understand what's the difference between that or when gary oldman puts a whole makeup and pretend it's churchill and you know i'm sure churchill didn't say yes and he can walk around and and even play him and be he's him that i think is way more extreme right but but the makeup artists get an Oscar and in these situations you get like, oh no, it's kind of, hmm,

is this correct or not? I think it's no different between, it's just a different kind of makeup, that's all it is. And in this case, we're not even pretending

we're the person or the character. So I think it's, for me at least, I think it's fun and people should be okay with it, but everybody will have an opinion about it.

I know you have a lot of admiration and have a lot of fun making these franchise movies, but Don't Breathe is a big favorite of mine, and I'm wondering if you will make a, go back to an original horror, an original genre, what's your mentality about that? Because once you get inside of these big play sets,

they're tempting to stick around inside of. No, I definitely want to do that. That's what me and my co-writer, we set up for this one. It was like, let's go do something original. In a way, we've done Don't Breathe, and then I think between the pandemic, and we didn't make movies for a while,

we made Don't Breathe 2, which was also a very original story we love writing and and and but came out in the pandemic as well so it kind of but but now i saw i was happy to see it was there on the top one of the most watched movies on netflix in the world and i was like okay great people can find that one again um but that's that's definitely the goal it's it's just it's just healthy for us to go and and do something that is completely original then i mean the reason also is why that is this is different a lot of times is because we when you create completely new characters in a completely new story you you don't feel like you're restricted by the franchise

of it all right we we don't get involved in those you know the the ones that really have these rules and the things we tend to avoid you know i i tend to say no to those and never want to be involved the ones that has so much requirements of what it needs to be i want to be free when i write you know and and you know we come up with our stories and so the franchise here gives you a sandbox that is so big and and the studio is also very um you know just really lets us do what we want in the story. And they have their point of views, of course, as they should. And that's great.

But but we really feel it's almost it feels like for us again, like we're doing an original thing, you know, that is based on all this idea stuff. But it feels like that. It feels, I don't know, almost like adapting a book, you know, like you can then just take it and it doesn't feel restrictive. At no point it felt restrictive, like, oh, we cannot do this because of the franchise of it all. But all that being said, we really want to, I think we're in a moment where people really want to see original things. And that can't wait to give it to them, right? So that's hopefully, you know, I'm so happy to see stuff like Long Legs doing so well,

you know, that something that has, you know, in a way has no right to do as well as it did. Like you can't imagine how a few years ago, even I've never bet that does that. I'm so happy it did. So I feel like people are, because the new generations, they just want their own things for their generation. That doesn't feel like it belonged to someone else. Yeah, that's exactly why I ask. So I look forward to that.

Fede, we end every episode of this show by asking filmmakers, what's the last great thing they have seen? Have you seen anything good lately? I've been working so hard on this film that I don't think I haven't been to the movies yet a lot. What have I seen? My concept of great though is like a bit snobbish as a snob cinephile. But I would say

I did enjoy Long Legs. I thought I went to early screening and I didn't know what to expect and I was blown away by Nick Cage characterization of that specific character. That I thought was truly, truly incredible. What else have I seen that blew me away? Could be new or old. It doesn't have to be something. No, no, yeah, absolutely. Oh, you know what I've seen that blew my mind?

Old, actually. I saw it a couple of weeks ago that I have never seen before. Sexy Beast. Oh, yeah. Great movie. What'd you like about it? I recommend it. blew my mind old actually episode a couple weeks ago that i have never seen before sexy beast oh yeah great movie what'd you like about it recommend it i just didn't know it's just ben kingsley it's just everything when when people go for characters like dad and it's just so magical i have not seen the movie and and it's just such a simplicity. He's an amazing director, obviously, but the simplicity of the film and how with a very simple setup you can create so much suspense.

They call you to do a job that you don't want to do and they're going to send this guy that will convince you. And everybody's freaking out because this guy, oh, he will convince you. For me, I'm someone that can argue in favor or against something for hours you know i just love it i just like i love the idea that this guy that will will get in your head that that you gotta do it and there's no way you can say no to him that that's sort of uh i don't know like uh enforcer through arguments and through rhetoric in a way and some violence sometimes. I thought it was such

an incredible concept. And you never know what you're going to get from his movies. So, you know, just like under the skin or zone of interest. It's such a unique filmmaker so I could believe that I took so much time in my life to watch Sexy Beast.

It's a great recommendation hey congrats on alien romulus and thanks for the time today i appreciate it thank you so much i'll talk to you thanks to fede alvarez thanks to cr of course thanks to alea zanaris and our producer bobby wagner for his work on this episode. Next week, don't forget to check out The Hollywood Hack. And like I said, Amanda and I will be back on August 27th to talk about some sicko movies. Go see Strange Darling if you have the chance,

but don't learn anything else about the movie beforehand. We'll see you soon.