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Damn, it's been a long time since I've wanted to see so many movies in the theaters ... Valerian, Rise of the Planet of the Apes, Dunkirk, Rladerunner 2049, the next Star Wars ... and I saw Alien Covenant ... is this shaping up to be one of the greatest movie years?

I've been obsessed with Alien since I was about 8 and will aggressively argue that Covenant is the worst of the worst. Worst than resurrection, worse than Alien vs Predator, worse than Prometheus. I've never been so annoyed with how completely garbage, inconsistent and sigh inducing a film has been and it has me paranoid as fuck about 2049.

Excited for Valerian. Saw the first scene as a teaser in another movie--pretty wonderful.

Fuck yeah Valerian. Luc Besson is the shit.

Olin, I feel the same way about Covenant. The thing is, I actually enjoyed Prometheus. But Covenant was a huge letdown. Ridley Scott can make a hell of a trailer though.

Olin wrote:I've been obsessed with Alien since I was about 8 and will aggressively argue that Covenant is the worst of the worst. Worst than resurrection, worse than Alien vs Predator, worse than Prometheus. I've never been so annoyed with how completely garbage, inconsistent and sigh inducing a film has been and it has me paranoid as fuck about 2049.

How can anything be worse than Prometheus?

Olin wrote:I've been obsessed with Alien since I was about 8 and will aggressively argue that Covenant is the worst of the worst. Worst than resurrection, worse than Alien vs Predator, worse than Prometheus. I've never been so annoyed with how completely garbage, inconsistent and sigh inducing a film has been and it has me paranoid as fuck about 2049.

I enjoyed it but it was essentially a Frankenstein retelling (creator/monster). Here's how I rank the Alien movies:

1. Alien 2
2. Alien
3. Prometheus
4. Covenant
5. Alien 3
6. Alien 4

I must admit, I don't remember 3 & 4 very well ...

Interestingly, a few months before Alien came out I saw Life which was basically an alien movie but without the Giger Alien ....

Valerian looks like it will be filed next to John Carter of Mars - fun sci fi spectacle.

I am really looking forward to Covenant, haven't seen it yet and I'm ignoring your nay-saying. Also, I liked Prometheus and Resurrection makes more sense if you watch the films of Jeunet and Caro. AvP are both awful though.

I'm double-super looking forward to Planet of the Apes. Apparently the plan after this is to make more films set in the period of time between this and the original POTA.

Dapper Bandit wrote:Valerian looks like it will be filed next to John Carter of Mars - fun sci fi spectacle.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/life/ent ... 499095001/

I liked Prometheus too, and my constant defence of it has led me to romanticise it a bit. Covenant had the worst pacing I have ever seen and served absolutely no purpose. I wanted a film about Engineers, I got a shitty high budget action film. I won't mention anything specific, but everything about David's character was so sigh inducing and disappointing.

I would go

1. Alien
1.5 (its canon authenticity is disputed and it isn't a film) Alien Isolation
2. Aliens
3. Prometheus
4. Alien 3
5. Alien Resurrection
600000. Alien Covenant.

I didn't like Prometheus. Great let down. Predictable. Sad.

I think the problem is that there is no good way to explain the Engineers, they're only interesting as an open mystery and that they will lose everything that makes them interesting once they're concluded.

Dapper Bandit wrote:Valerian looks like it will be filed next to John Carter of Mars - fun sci fi spectacle.

I am really looking forward to Covenant, haven't seen it yet and I'm ignoring your nay-saying. Also, I liked Prometheus and Resurrection makes more sense if you watch the films of Jeunet and Caro. AvP are both awful though.

I'm double-super looking forward to Planet of the Apes. Apparently the plan after this is to make more films set in the period of time between this and the original POTA.

The original Planet of the Apes is better because it had this weird loop. Basically, Heston leaves Earth on a Space expiation and lands on a familiar planet that ends up being Earth. Of course, this Earth is ruled by apes. Eventually, humans are able to escape this ape-ruled planet and return back to Earth with an Ape. This ape goes back in time with humans on the trip back to Earth and gives birth to Cesar who eventually destroys the earth and creates the planet of the apes. The story is very different from the remakes. So the new movies are sort of like:

Rise of the Planet of the Apes (2011) + Dawn of the Planet of the Apes (2014) = Conquest of the Planet of the Apes (1972)
War of the Planet of the Apes (2017) = Battle for the Planet of the Apes (1973)

My personal favorite is Conquest of the Planet of the Apes. The storyline is great, Cesar becomes a leader of the apes, organizes them, and launches a full scale war against the humans.

Without the ideas in Planet of the Apes (1968), Beneath the Planet of the Apes (1970), and Escape from Planet of the Apes (1971), the new story line is much different and simpler than the original. Also, the new ones are much darker (in terms of light FX) than the originals which have a lot of light and color to them. The apes also have cool uniforms/guns in the original.

From what's been told to me, when the original movies came out in the 60s/70s they were huge hits. Real mind-benders for the time (and even still mind-benders today).

Regards,

JK

Dapper Bandit wrote:Valerian looks like it will be filed next to John Carter of Mars - fun sci fi spectacle.

I am really looking forward to Covenant, haven't seen it yet and I'm ignoring your nay-saying. Also, I liked Prometheus and Resurrection makes more sense if you watch the films of Jeunet and Caro. AvP are both awful though.

I'm double-super looking forward to Planet of the Apes. Apparently the plan after this is to make more films set in the period of time between this and the original POTA.

Go watch it ... great visuals and tacticool weaponry ... at some point humans need to consider uppings its bullet caliber when dealing with aliens ... .308 perhaps? I wonder if the movie is at the discount cinemas these days ...

Olin wrote:I think the problem is that there is no good way to explain the Engineers, they're only interesting as an open mystery and that they will lose everything that makes them interesting once they're concluded.

I think another big problem (much bigger) is that it was never really supposed to an Alien movie, from what I've heard/read. In fact, I think it was totally not an alien movie until the last few minutes. I think it should have stood alone as its own franchise without a connection to aliens. Making it an alien movie pigeonholed it ...

Chankgeez wrote:

Dapper Bandit wrote:Valerian looks like it will be filed next to John Carter of Mars - fun sci fi spectacle.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/life/ent ... 499095001/

I saw it last night and really enjoyed it (there was some political fluff towards the end that was kinda blah) and knew that it was a Luc Busson movie (The Fifth Element is ONE OF THE GREATEST MOVIES OF ALL TIME). Expect weirdness/cirque du sole type stuff from his sci-fi ventures. Part Star Wars/Moulan Rougue (though I've never seen it )/Avatar which allows you to enjoy a movie the way you did when you were a kid ... btw, Busson also directed the AMAZING The Professional. This dude is a living legend.