Alien: Romulus is a mash-up of just about every alien movie, though borrowing more from Alien and Aliens (naturally). But they also include some ideas from Prometheus, imagery from Alien 3, and some WTF-even-is-that-it-ness from Alien: Resurrection. It’s just about all the alien properties thrown into a blender…. a very, very dark and sometimes incomprehensible blender.

The flick is about a bunch of young adults from a shitty Weyland Utani mining colony who investigate a nearby abandoned space station (that nobody else noticed). Too bad they stumble into the results of an alien attack… slime, facehuggers, acid blood, and all that jazz.

My first reaction to this movie is that it’s an unholy nightmare of dark corners and vague, hand-waving exposition. It was a MESS. It opens with some text letting us know the colony world has 0 days of sunshine… at which point I said “great. I can barely see a anything as-is just so they can hide their special effects”.

But, hey, they soon leave the planet in a space that’s just as dark and murky. And board another that’s – get this – just as dark and murky. And it doesn’t help the exposition and what they are even doing mechanically often felt murky too. And the characters are mostly interchangeable and woefully free of personality to boot.

But when they finally – FINALLY – stumble upon the plot and the aliens become a thing to worry about and they intermix some good Alien themes and lore new to the franchise. And, hey, they found a room with goddamn lights too. In fact, the second half of the film was also easier to read visually even when shot in darkness. Maybe I had shades on the first half of the movie but I could generally figure out the second half.

The second half nailed some great set pieces and felt thought-out and reasonably intelligent. And if the ending felt a little drawn out, Alien and Aliens went on past the sell-by date too and they were great. This one felt like too many moving parts but basically earned its runtime.

This movie starts messy but I’m happy that it pulled out in time. I can say it’s a completely mid-range Alien flick. Wish I knew half the characters and the plotting was more comprehensible. I liked how it added to the Alien universe while borrowing from earlier films. I’m disappointed in it but probably I’ll like it more on second viewing.

Score: 78