Covenant is an 80% sequel of Prometheus. Katherine Waterston, Danny McBride, Billy Crudup, and Demian Bichir are a slight step down from Charlize Theron, Idris Elba, and Noomi Rapace. Fassbender is about as good in both. The visual effects and production design are good. Not on a different level than Prometheus. The story is that of an Alien movie. I'm sure that die hards of the franchise will argue that it adds nuance to the larger mythology. As a casual viewer, I found that it was a slightly different delivery system for a lot of iconic Alien deaths. I did thoroughly enjoy how often they called the aliens "those fuckers".
I'll admit, this suffers from the fact that I've seen two movies pretty recently - Passengers and Life - that use a lot of the same story beats. So, a lot of Covenant came off as stale or generic to me. Had I not seen a story like this since Prometheus or if alien/space horror was one of those genres I had a more insatiable appetite for, I'd be much more excited by this.
Covenant is a good Alien movie. That's what it wants to be. I wasn't blown away by it, but I don't believe that was the aim. It's not as good as the classic installments in the franchise or as bad as the maligned sequels in the 90s or Predator crossovers. I liked it in the sense that I was perfectly entertained for two hours that felt like two hours and wasn't distracted by anything that bothered me, however I don't imagine I'll recall much about it a few months from now.
Verdict (?): Weakly Recommend
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