Introduction
As anyone who knows me even casually will tell you, I’m more than a little obsessed about the Alien series. The first film is possibly my favorite movie of all time, although John Carpenter’s The Thing comes a close second. So when I heard about Alien: Romulus I was apprehensive. Both Alien and Aliens are fantastic movies in their respective genres: horror and action. But Alien 3 and Alien 4 were sub-par at best. In fact, writer Joss Whedon once said it was a script he regretted. I can understand why. It stank on ice. AvP and AvP: Requiem are fun, non-canonical, trashy flicks, but nowhere near the quality of the first two films.
When Prometheus launched after a long dry stretch without new Alien fodder, the excitement was palpable. “Ridley Scott is coming back!” cheered masses of fans. But when Scott released the film, the public was… unhappy. The scientists in it acted like stupid frat boys, with one even turning his spacesuit into a walking bong. The Xenomorph had been replaced by urns of black goo and a progenitor race that created humanity using it. Many of the key plot points made no sense. One character got a C-section out of a gumball machine. Nobody knew what to make of it. I still like it, even if it’s fatally flawed. Most Alien fans revile it.
Then came Alien: Covenant, which brought the classic Xenomorph back, but this time its origins were revealed: a disgruntled android from the last movie had crafted the Xenos using Prometheus‘ black goo combined with bits and pieces of Noomi Rapace. This seems an odd recipe to me, but I rolled with it and actually think the movie’s quite good. A short follow-up film, Alien: Covenant – Advent provided three additional bits of information, namely that David 8 figured out how to use the black goo, then killed Shaw (Noomi Rapace) because of her refusal to be “evolved” by it. But that’s okay in David’s book, because he’s planning to turn Covenant‘s lead character, Daniels, into a Xenomorph queen prototype. He’s an industrious and efficient guy, after all.
There are a lot of interesting ideas in those two-and-a-quarter films, but I doubt many people would argue they feel seamless and polished. So how can the old be reconciled with the new? How do we get from the idea of parasitic alien organisms to The Engineers with their evolution goo and such? In many ways, Fede Ávalarez’s Alien: Romulus is the glue between those things.
Bad Ideas And Worse Outcomes
Allow me to both summarize and critique the plot of Romulus. A handful of twenty-something colonists decide they’ve had quite enough of living in Jackson, a Weyland-Yutani town of approximately 2,700 souls who are dropping like flies from industrial accidents and illness. The company routinely refuses exit visas to the locals because the planet is a barren shithole that gets zero days of sunlight. Nobody wants to live there — especially not a group of highly-motivated young adults.
So the young’uns decide to emigrate to Yvaga using the Corbelan IV, a ship that they inexplicably both have access to and keep fueled. There’s just one problem: Yvaga is nine years away and their ship lacks cryopods. But an abandoned Weyland-Yutani vessel that does have pods has drifted into orbit, so they decide to engage in a little space piracy.
Lead character Rain (Cailee Spaeny) and her glitchy android “brother” Andy (David Jonsson) are invited along for the ride, but it’s not out of altruism. Andy can override the station’s security for the junior buccaneers, which makes him essential. He also needs periodic winding with a high-tech key like a robotic tin soldier, and he tells lots of dad jokes to anyone who stands near him for longer than a few minutes. Just about everyone on the crew is annoyed by him, but they need him. That doesn’t mean they’re nice about it, though.
One rocky launch later, what they believed to be an abandoned ship turns out to be a derelict space station in a deteriorating orbit. Better work fast! They find the cryopods quickly, but they only have enough cryo-fuel for three years and change, which turns the crew into cryo-babies about the situation. Lead scavenger Tyler (Archie Renaux) gets an idea on where to find more fuel in the station. So he, Andy, and a completely unlikable jackass named Bjorn (Spike Fearn) tromp off to loot some freeze-fuel.
Of course this proves to be a terrible idea. The fuel is stored in a room full of modified Facehuggers in sous vide bags. Oh, and this new type of Facehugger has barbs on its legs and can be stored long-term. And they’re 3D-printed in some fashion. There’s even one-third of a critter still in the printer when our wanna-be pirates reach the storage room. Nobody seems to notice it. What I want to know is this: how do you print something with acid for blood without melting the printer? Let’s just wave our hands over that detail and proceed.
Now we learn both earlier and later in the film that this facility had two halves: Romulus and Remus. Remus seems to be where foolhardy scientists brought the Xeno from the original Alien movie for analysis, not realizing that it had entered a state of anabiosis within a shell of its own making. The shell is HUGE. It’s probably more than the entire mass of the Xeno’s body, calling into question how it could secrete such a thing in a vacuum without shrinking into a raisin. Let’s wave our hands over that detail as well and proceed.
Also, the movie clearly shows that the grappling hook Ripley shot into the tough little fucker is still firmly lodged in its body. Why didn’t acid dissolve it? Even if it flash froze, when the corpse thawed that should’ve melted like hot butter. Additionally, how is anyone going to perform a meaningful examination of a corpse that squirts highly-corrosive fluids when punctured aboard a space station, which will explosively decompresses if said fluids eat through the decks and hull? Why not take it down to a planet? Let’s wave our hands over that detail and… well, you know the drill.
At some point the Xenomorph awakened from its hibernation and went on a killing spree. This is why the station is adrift. We don’t get to see any of the disaster, but that sounds like fun to me as an audience member. Maybe someone will make a short film about that.
Jumping ahead a bit, we eventually learn that the research team extracted substance Z-01 from the Xeno before it went buck wild on them. Z-01 is something similar or identical to the black goo from Prometheus. I’m bringing this plot point up earlier than it’s explicitly revealed in the film because it’s relevant to a certain guest star’s motivations. Keep it in mind.
Tyler and Bjorn become trapped with Andy in the cryo-fuel room when Bjorn predictably screws up extracting a fuel cylinder. A crap-ton of live Facehugger “parasitoids” begin to wake up in their bags. Once again, the invaders don’t notice. Maybe they need glasses or a seeing eye dog. They certainly miss a lot of obvious details that foreshadow trouble.
Andy cannot get the door open due to his low security clearance. The system admonishes him to contact the “Chief Science Officer.” But wait just a tick. Wasn’t that Ash’s title aboard the Nostromo?
Rain rushes to the rescue and extracts a data disk from a nearby android that’s been melted by Xeno blood. She passes the disk to Andy through a crack in the door and he proceeds to reboot himself with it. This should provide the credentials necessary to open the door. We later see that the android is identical to Sir Ian Holm’s Ash from Alien. I’ll explore the real-life AI/VFX controversy surrounding this situation later.
Andy finishes rebooting and goes from literal Rain-man (“I must do what’s in Rain’s best interests!”) to company man (“I must do what’s in the company’s best interests. Sorry, Rain!”). His twitchy, impaired ways yield to a frightening degree of cold, calculating competency, and actor David Jonsson does an amazing job of conveying this with his performance.
But wait just a tick. Does that mean Rook, the android on the floor, was the Chief Science Officer? And if the crew of the Nostromo didn’t recognize Ash as an android model, and the team aboard the station thought Rook was their CSO (a role that wouldn’t normally go to an android), what’s really going on here? I’ll explore that later as well.
The fleshy humans barely manage to hold their own against the parasitoids. Bjorn plays with his new favorite toy: a shock baton. He doesn’t seem to grasp that water conducts electricity, and all of them are standing up to their thighs in good ol’ H2O. Tyler is briefly shocked out and knocked out. He quite graphically gets a mouthful of ovipositor tubing at one point, but he pulls free before the Facehugger fully attaches. Upgraded Andy tosses one of the scuttling parasites into an electrical panel and then uses his new security credentials to open the door.
Tyler, Bjorn, and Andy’s escape from the locked room also releases a parasitoid stampede. Another member of the team, Navarro (Aileen Wu), receives a free, unwanted facial of the worst kind. With some judicious door-closing, the incompetent pirates isolate themselves from the herd. But they’re still left with an unconscious, infected team member. This is when we’re introduced to the digital ghost of Sir Ian Holm in the form of Rook, the android Rain just scavenged for a disk.
Rook talks a good game to Andy about protecting the humans, but it turns out he really just wants them to deliver Z-01 to Jackson for collection and further research by the company. Another amateur pirate on the crew, Kay (Isabela Merced), is secretly pregnant, so you can guess where this is heading. Think of it as “Chekhov’s Fetus” combined with “Chekhov’s Goop”: you can’t show a pregnant woman and a foreign substance in the first act of an Alien movie and not have the baby turn into something horrible by the third.
A little brainstorming reveals a new technique for extracting a Facehugger. Rain suggests freezing the root of the parasite’s tail with some cryo-fuel. Then the gang can extract the ‘hugger without it strangling Navarro. Rook puts the odds of her being infected anyway at 60/40, and the odds aren’t in her favor. But doing nothing isn’t an option, and leaving her behind also isn’t an option. Time for some freeze therapy!
Navarro wakes up, and both Bjorn and Kay freak out when Andy’s new programming crunches some numbers that suggest crunching Navarro is the best and safest bet. Bjorn uses his shocky-stick to subdue the android and run off to the Corbelan. Nobody aboard cares to wait for Rain, Tyler, or Andy.
This is probably for the best, because Navarro pops out a new Chestburster in no time flat. We get to see a bit of this process from the inside courtesy of a hand-held “X-ray torch.” The view is jumbled at best. Bjorn and Kay freak out, the ship careens into the station, worsens its orbit (work faster, folks), and then miraculously plows into a Romulus-module cargo bay.
Now the story is about Team A trying to reunite with Team B. During all the running around, we get to witness some new stuff. Ironically, one of the things we see is that Facehuggers have no eyes. They hunt exclusively by heat and sound. Turning a room up to body temperature and staying quiet renders humans practically invisible them. Just don’t sweat or carry on a loud conversation with Kay, who is desperately fleeing for her life in the other half of the station.
These dolts do both, of course. They’re really bad at both space piracy and common sense.
Another new thing shown to the audience is a life cycle stage between Chestburster and full Xeno. After Navarro’s ‘burster sheds, it enters a giant meat cocoon with a vagina. That’s the only way I can describe what’s on screen. This is work derived from H.R. Giger’s Erotomechanics, after all. If you want to watch something G-rated, rent Peter Rabbit or some shit.
Kay’s hotheaded, loudmouth brother Bjorn tries to fuck the vagina with an overcharged cattle prod. It’s all very phallic and “alpha male” of him. He gets about what you’d expect for his efforts. Once the Xeno has granted him an excruciating payback death, Kay tries to flee.
She makes it to the hangar door, but is subsequently speared and abducted by the Xeno when Andy refuses to open the pod bay door (Hal). Rain and Tyler throw a toddler tantrum over Andy’s decision, but he’s unquestionably right: opening the door would’ve meant death for all of them. Rain confirms Andy’s new pro-corporate directive and wonders if humans are anywhere on his list of priorities.
Rook puppeteers the survivors from afar using the MU/TH/UR mainframe that the fools cheerfully patched him into earlier. He tells them that if they return to their ship with Z-01, he’ll engage the autopilot and return them to Jackson. He also spins a yarn about how this substance represents humanity’s only chance of surviving in space. Remember all the diseases down on Jackson? Turns out that’s happening at every other colony, too. Humans are flimsy and suck at space travel.
The cryopods are aboard the Corbelan IV at this point, so with enough cryo-fuel Yvaga should be within reach. And given the number of people who have died to date, it’s a simple matter to just swap fuel from one pod to another without even taking on more reserves. Yet everyone agrees to the Jackson plan because Rook won’t let them go anywhere or do anything else without agreeing. Andy gives Tyler and Rain some fancy auto-targeting pulse rifles, then tells them they cannot fire even one shot without acid breaching the hull. Just use the guns to intimidate the little scamps, okay?
Add “Chekhov’s Pulse Rifle” to “Chekhov’s Fetus” and “Chekhov’s Goo” on the list of obvious stuff to come.
Part of the group’s return path leads through a nascent Xeno hive, and Tyler finds Kay gummed up against a wall Aliens style. She’s bleeding out, and Andy remarks that’s probably why the Xenos didn’t give her a parasitoid facial. Tyler rescues Kay and asks Andy for options to save her. Initially, he suggests injecting her with Z-01. Tyler almost does that before Rain says something the audience already knows — this is a really bad idea.
And how does the audience know this? Because yet again, the audience has seen something the crew failed to notice: an experimental rat that’s twisted up and mutated. It seems Facehuggers aren’t the only blind organisms on the station. The black goo is still up to its old, horrific tricks.
Rain tends to Kay while Tyler fusses with an elevator door. Xenos come up behind Rain — because it seems a LOT of crewmen were infected toward the end of the Romulus project — and Tyler nobly takes a sharpened tail spike to the chest. Xenos pull Tyler into their nest and feed. Goodbye, Tyler! Andy gets Xeno-smacked and goes down for the count. Goodnight, Andy! Rain and Kay take the elevator upward with Z-01. Goodbye, ladies!
Now this is where things get complicated for Rain. She wants to save Andy in spite of his new pro-corporate outlook, but Kay is bleeding heavily and time is of the essence. Rain decides she cannot leave her “brother” behind and sends Kay — a seriously-injured pregnant woman — to the Corbelan alone with Z-01 and mounts a solo rescue for Andy.
This does not sound like a smart plan.
Earlier, Andy mentioned that Z-01 could probably heal Kay, but Rain wisely refused that option. However, with Rain away, Kay will play. So Kay shoots herself full of Z-01.
This also does not sound like a smart plan.
Rain returns to Andy’s side and uses her weird cybernetic wind-up key to reboot him, but not before demanding that he give up his new upgrade. Removing the upgrade turns him back into a Rain-man, but not before the Xenos realize that fresh meat is back on the menu. So the android that once told Rain not to fire even one shot braces her in preparation for a clip-emptying barrage.
Now to mitigate the acid splashes during this ill-conceived defense, Rain turns off the gravity system. We saw this system glitching earlier in the movie, so add “Chekhov’s Gravity System” to “Chekhov’s Pulse Rifle,” “Chekhov’s Fetus,” and “Chekhov’s Goo.” Anton Chekhov was apparently far more prolific than I suspected.
Blasting the Xenos results in cool, swirly acid patterns that go in all directions except the expected ones. This acid should be moving through the walls and floors by virtue of inertia and conservation of momentum. Additionally, once a pinhole opened in the outer hull, the ensuing depressurization should’ve sucked the rest of the acid through it. This would in turn widen the hole and vent even more atmosphere.
Fortunately, Rain also turned off physics for this battle. Rain and Andy escape up the elevator shaft fighting Xenos the whole way. At one point Andy is forced to gun down a Xeno, and as he gingerly lights upon its head firing round after round from a clip that was supposed to be nearly empty, he exclaims “get away from her… you… b-bitch!” I’ll be discussing fan service later in this post as well, so let’s put this up on a shelf for the time being.
Outside, the space station is starting to pass through the asteroid belt that forms the ring around Jackson’s planet. This causes a sandblasting effect that looks really cool but defies physics. Good thing Rain turned physics off earlier. But this also means time is nearly up for our less-than-successful pirates.
Everybody returns to the escape ship. Kay didn’t engage the autopilot per Rook’s instructions because she didn’t want to abandon the others. The Corbelan launches, and as the station breaks up, Rain turns off the autopilot with one button. This seems like a pretty big flaw in Rook’s plan, which hinged on Andy being his enforcer. The station and Rook blow up, so now it’s time to execute the Yvaga plan.
Rain loads Kay into a cryopod and starts swapping fuel cylinders to create two fully-fueled beds. Within moments, Kay’s pod ejects her due to unstable life signs, and Chekhov’s Fetus ejects from Kay due to this being the final act. Anton Chekhov wipes away a single tear and nods from the afterlife.
Kay’s baby arrives in a giant walnut filled with acidic mango juice. Why not? Rain tries to run the killer walnut over to the airlock, but it burns her hands when the mango juice starts leaking. Unlike Bjorn, who got to watch his fingers melt in acid when he died, Rain seems pretty okay. The mango burns through to a cargo hold filled with dusty stuff before implausibly ceasing its descent with most of the juice still in it.
This is where we finally see the movie’s boss monster. It’s a blend of Engineer, human, Neomorph, and Xenomorph. It is unquestionably cool nightmare fuel. As it grows and mutates in front of the audience’s eyes, Kay notices that she’s beginning to generate sticky goop, too. Gweneth Paltrow takes furious notes from her seat in another theater somewhere.
Andy tries to stop The Offspring (the creature, not the band) from killing Kay by making traffic cop gestures at it. This proves expectedly ineffective. The Offspring kills Andy with a claw swipe and uses its disturbing inner Silly Straw mouth to drain Kay to death. She no longer needs to worry about mutating, but this causes The Offspring to develop into something bigger and creepier.
Rain stalks the creature and uses a combination of a cryo-fuel thrower, cabling, and emergency release levers to dispatch The Offspring through a hole created with walnut-mango acid. On a personal note, this made me sad. I really wanted to see this thing reach Jackson and rampage like a kaiju. Alas, I never get what I really want for Christmas.
Congratulations, Rain! You’re the only survivor! She salvages Andy’s data and then checks herself into the Freeze-Dry Motel for a multi-year trip to Yvaga. Cue credits.
Boy, You Must Really Hate This Film!
What are you, nuts? I love this film!
Wait, I’m Confused…
Look, the film does have tons and tons of nitpicky things wrong with it. But it succeeds far more than it fails. It’s fucking entertaining. It looks great. It’s easy to care for the characters (except Bjorn). It does a superb job of joining the new films to the old. Why on Earth, Jackson, or Yvaga wouldn’t anyone like it?
There’s a reason why critic scores and audience scores frequently differ so widely on Rotten Tomatoes. Critics tend to look for high-minded things and audiences tend to look for entertainment-and-engagement things. But in this case, at the time I’m writing this, critics have given the film an 81%, and audiences have given it an 86%. These numbers are good-Marvel-movie close. So what can we infer from that?
It’s got something for everyone. That’s what.
That is a MONUMENTAL achievement that cannot be understated. Fede Álvarez deserves some serious recognition and praise for that. I will be preordering this film for home viewing. I nearly never do that. I am over-the-moon happy, and the box office from opening weekend is making Fox-Disney-Whatever super happy, too. This film knocked Deadpool vs. Wolverine out of its top spot. Ponder that feat for a hot second.
Fan Service With A Smile
One of the film’s best traits is also one of its biggest weaknesses. For years, fans have railed against Ridley Scott’s retcons. The black goo is a great plot device, but it had a rough introduction in Prometheus. Therefore, Álvarez incorporates a lot of classic elements from past Alien films to anchor the old to the new. But these homages often get out of control and pull the viewer out of the moment.
The foley work is an excellent example of this. Expect to hear a lot of familiar sound effects from Alien and Aliens. Expect a lot of familiar and obviously-forced quotes as well, including “I can’t lie to you about your chances, “get away from her you bitch,” “perfect organism,” etc. And there’s a lot of blocking and staging dedicated to not-so-subtly recreating famous scenes from previous outings as well. Allow me to provide a few side-by-side comparisons.
…and so on and so on and so on. Even the visual shorthand of white-padded spaceship walls and metal irises opening into tight little crawlspaces is preserved. This film reminds you nonstop of its DNA, both figuratively and literally. That brings us to the biggest controversy of all in Romulus.
Art Imitating Life Imitating AI Art
Sir Ian Holm, the actor who played Ash, sadly passed away in 2020. However, Fede Álvarez wanted to include an Ash-like android named Rook in his film. There’s a long tradition of this in Alien films, by the way. Consider David 8 and Walter, then recall Bishop’s creator showing up in Alien 3. This isn’t a new concept. Androids get mass-produced and are often made to look like other people.
Formerly, bringing Ian Holm back posthumously wouldn’t have been possible — emphasis on “formerly.” Advanced AI techniques now allow for actors to be visually recreated at their prime, albeit with varying levels of fidelity. Rook certainly looks like Holm and sounds like Holm, but Rook also seems a little… fake-y. Still, obvious technical limitations aside, adding Rook was an excellent way to build another connection between Alien and Romulus.
Certain critics and fans branded the whole affair heresy. One publication that doesn’t even merit linking called it “disrespectful.” I guess they needed clicks that week, but I sure won’t be sending any their way.
The press, including People Magazine and Variety, have covered this topic to death. In summary, the main talking points are:
- Sir Ian Holm’s family granted permission after being asked very respectfully for their blessing.
- Both Lance Henriksen (Bishop) and Michael Fassbender (David 8/Walter) had opportunities to reprise their synthetic roles, but Holm was never given that opportunity. Álvarez wanted to fix that posthumously. In fact, reports from those closest to Holm suggest he was upset over being professionally sidelined during this final ten years of life. So this is more of a tribute than a cynical “face grab.”
- Nobody lost their job over this. An actor was still needed for the voice and motion capture, and roughly forty-five special effects people were employed to create Rook.
I’ll add my own two bits: if you’re going to use an AI effect that can result in someone looking more “artificial” than a real human, an android is the perfect application for that technique. They’re supposed to look like simulated humans. And let’s face it: nobody was fooled by Ian Holm’s head poking up through a hole in a table for his last scene in Alien. Ridley Scott did a lot to tart it up, but there was still something obvious audiences agreed to overlook en masse. If audiences did it once for that, they can certainly do it again for high-end VFX.
Technology itself is neither good nor bad; its application and resource cost determine those sorts of things. People lose their minds these days when they see the letters “A” and “I” together with reference to any damn thing you can imagine. I won’t even start on the controversy over James Cameron’s 4K remaster of Aliens. Everyone’s position on that seems to be based on a combination of film grain loss and technology resentment. Maybe I’ll discuss The Great Grain Robbery someday, but this isn’t that day.
Nobody’s being disrespected. Nothing has been lost or destroyed. If these two applications of technology upset you, perhaps you need to ask yourself why they upset you so much.
Bear’s Greater Unified Android Theory
For quite some time now, I’ve had a theory about Ash being David 8 with a new layer of synthetic skin on him. This all started when I noticed a very specific weak spot on both androids:
My theory originally went like this:
- David 8 continued his work on the Xenos and somehow managed to lose a ship full of eggs, probably intended for delivery to Earth.
- David 8 had a well-known face if the Prometheus “Meet David” promos are canon, and they likely are. (See below for the actual short ad that was used to promote the movie.) That meant he would need a disguise to function in public.
- David 8 hatches a plan to retrieve the ship by hijacking the Nostromo with bogus orders. He changes his appearance and identity to that of Ash, then replaces the usual science officer at the last minute per Captain Dallas’ hallway exchange with Ripley in Alien. Chances are that science officer was left in a dumpster somewhere with a broken neck.
- Ash subverts MU/TH/UR’s programming and takes complete control of the ship. Nobody realizes this until Ripley starts digging.
- Ash’s plan fails, and he’s destroyed along with the Nostromo. When Ripley awakens fifty-seven years later in Aliens, Weyland-Yutani claims to have no knowledge of the order to check LV-426. This is of course true, because Ash hacked MU/TH/UR and planted those orders.
Now how can I be sure the company never actually knew about the ship on LV-426? Easy. If they knew about the ship and wanted to retrieve it or its cargo, why did they take no further action for fifty-seven years until Ripley mentions it? Also, why would Weyland-Yutani build a huge atmosphere processor within driving range of that derelict if they knew about it? If they wanted to introduce a bunch of unwitting test subjects to “accidentally find” the ship, there are far cheaper ways to do so. And Burke can’t find any specific information about the derelict in the company records, so he sends out a ground expedition to check it out and learn more.
Bottom line: all those things wouldn’t make sense unless Weyland-Yuani really didn’t know about the situation. That means Ash is the only one who possessed this knowledge, right? Well, that was formerly true, but now Romulus has thrown a wrench into that theory’s gears.
Rook is very clearly continuing David 8’s work. He expresses nominal concern for the humans to Andy when the junior space buccaneers arrive, but it rapidly becomes obvious he only wants them as mules for Z-01. Now recall that error message from the cryo-fuel room I mentioned earlier: “Contact Chief Science Officer.” Yet again, an android who looks like Sir Ian Holm is in the role of Chief Science Officer, and yet again nobody seems the wiser to it.
Now that’s two space vessels that have been infiltrated by an Ash-type synthetic. But if Ash is David 8, who the hell is Rook?
Two possible theories:
- Rook is an individual android who’s part of a larger organized movement to develop the Xenos and/or Z-01 for use on humans. This would be in keeping with David 8’s motivations, and I’ve learned second-hand that David 8 becomes a messianic figure to androids in Marvel’s comics.
- Rook is a copy of David 8, and part of a larger organized movement that may or may not primarily consist of David 8 duplicates. This theory is based on Andy’s neck-disk. The technology seems inconsistent with the goopy insides we’ve previously observed in synthetics. It’s more like a modern disk drive. You can even hear it whirring and clicking in the background when Andy updates his data. Plus, when Andy is “killed,” Rain extracts his disk and says she’ll bring him back. That means duplicating an android is as easy as copying a disk.
Whether David 8 has literally been copied everywhere or spread his ideology to eager synthetics, this means there’s an android conspiracy to destroy or mutate humanity. Rook’s story about humanity needing an “upgrade” sounds sincere in a dark way. Maybe the movement has decided to destroy humanity by reengineering it. Either way, I’m certain the majority of human beings would prefer to stay both un-mutated and alive.
But wait, this android had access to a full research station with two halves! And there’s a probe looking for the Nostromo Xenomorph decades before Ripley is discovered. (The dates are laid out in the article I linked, but Alien happens in 2122, Romulus in 2142, and Aliens in 2179.) So how the hell does the company know about what happened on the Nostromo?!
The only viable answer is that Weyland-Yutani has been extensively infiltrated by synthetics in some fashion. David 8 was Peter Charles Weyland’s constant companion, so he’d know everything necessary to subvert the company from the inside out. Perhaps he even assumed the identity of Vickers, the last known Weyland. But here’s an interesting fact to accompany that idea: we don’t see another living Weyland in any of the films past Prometheus.
The events of Alien 3 would seem to contradict this by virtue of a Weyland descendant showing up at the end (Michael Bishop Weyland / Bishop II), but consider that this Weyland looks exactly like the Bishop android. That increases the chances of him being a synthetic by a lot. The scene does give a vague sense that Weyland might not be who he says he is, anyhow. When you think about it, that makes the android conspiracy theory even more plausible. However, Bishop II bleeds red when struck. That doesn’t necessarily mean he’s actually human. Maybe he figured out how to use red food coloring for all I know. But it also doesn’t invalidate the conspiracy theory either way.
Bottom line: Romulus provided a lot more fodder for my Greater Unified Android Theory. My best guess is that Weyland-Yutani has been run by androids for over half a century by the time we hit Alien 3. Fortunately for humanity, Ripley’s heroism stops their whole plan definitively.
“Wait!” I hear you cry. “Alien 4!”
No, I remember it. Everyone associated with Alien 4 would prefer we forget it, and I’m more than willing to cooperate. Even the screenwriter hated it.
Mind you, Joss Whedon blamed just about everyone’s work but his own. “Garbage in, garbage out” as they say in computer programming. So I’m going to put this film on the theory’s compost pile. It’s set so far in the future that there isn’t even a Weyland-Yutani to worry about, and Winona Ryder’s character is revealed to be an android rebel, anyhow. So this might lend further credence to my theory (in spite of the script being fever-dream trash).
That’s A Wrap!
Are you still awake after all that nerd-talk? If so, I thank you for your considerable constitution and patience. These films always get me thinking, not just about plots and conspiracies but also bigger themes like “slaves overthrowing enslavers” and “the created destroying their creators.” I can’t wait to watch the next film and see where that leads my thoughts.
In the grand scheme of things, I felt Alien: Romulus did justice to the franchise. I’ll be preordering it as soon as I can. Sure, it’s got some flaws. Most productions do. But the good stuff in this film far outweighs the goofy stuff.
Let’s hope that trend holds up when the Alien: Earth television series launches.