Fede Alvarez’s Alien: Romulus hits cinemas at a precarious time. On the one hand, the 20th Century Studios’ film is at a feverish high from fans whose expectations from the film series’ seventh entry in the 45-year-old franchise is equally as high, especially with the tepid reactions to producer Ridley Scott’s previous two films, Prometheus and Alien: Covenant. On the other hand, the enormous change that happened behind the scenes since Alien: Covenant was released; Disney purchased the franchise (along with all of 20th Century Fox’s assets). COVID changed the film distribution landscape, and Hollywood strikes have reduced theatrical output in 2024, softening the box office, the studio is driving audiences toward IMAX and other premium large theatrical formats.

For his part, Alvarez (Don’t Breathe, the Evil Dead remake) is a fan of the series and you can feel that respect and impact throughout Alien: Romulus, especially in the look and feel of the film, set twenty years after the events of Scott’s original 1979 Alien.

The lived-in physicality of the sets and the creature design are impressive, right down to the state-of-the-art laboratories on the Romulus station, a hallmark of where the vaunted Company, Weyland-Yutani, invests its resources compared to the drudgery of the colony where our characters fight for their survival. Alvarez and his team got down to the smallest of details in revealing in-universe advancements in computing technology with MU-TH-UR.

Alvarez and co-screenwriter Rodo Sayagues make the smart decision with a narrower cast of characters, six in all. Alien: Romulus is led by Cailee Spaeny’s (Priscilla) Rain who makes the character her own in the Alien universe. She doesn’t work for the Company and is not an ideologue, she isn’t a scientist; she’s your average, run-of-the-mill colonist, trying to make a better life for herself. While Spaeny’s performance is fine, it isn’t over-the-top; the character has the same ambitions as say Ripley did 45 years ago, though the difference here is that the character’s attributes are unremarkable when set against the computer-generated elements in the film. Alvarez and Sayagues set many sequences between Spaeny and David Jonsson’s Andy that are touching and low-key humorous – Andy serves as the film’s lynchpin in a pleasing way and is easily the best original character to come from the series in many years.

Archie Renaux’s Tyler, Isabela Merced’s Kay, Spike Fearn’s Bjorn, and Aileen Wu’s Navarro round out the cast, with each character echoing other fan favorites from throughout the film series. As an ensemble, the young cast wears the effects of Weyland-Yutani’s tamping down of lower-class citizens effectively as scavengers seek resources on a derelict space station with a familiar beat and beast awaiting them. Beyond Andy, none of the characters truly stands out. Whether that’s a factor of being treated like scum as a part of society from the get, or that they’re all trying to seek a better life on an equal footing and get lost in the shuffle, will depend on the set of values brought by the audience to the movie.

Therein lies the rub with Alien: Romulus. Alvarez was so focused on driving fan service through callbacks to prior entries in the film, which even as a passing fan brought a smile to this critic’s lips, Alien: Romulus tries so hard to bridge too much from prior entries that it loses its pedigree; its character development does not drive the story. We can relate to the cast’s struggles, an allegory for today’s financial environment. The escapism comes from the group’s sacrifices to find a better life, the desire to face our fears in the face of terror is just as loud. There’s not a single voice saying, “this isn’t right, we can do better.” Admittedly, they were probably so scared out of their wits they didn’t have time to thinking about anything other than survival.

Looking back on prior entries in the franchise, the characters drove the various stories, even in the films we didn’t like. One gets the feeling that Alvarez wanted to say more, at the expense of popcorn, and that the studio gave missives to make something more commercial. The film though, as solid an entry as it is, doesn’t fire on every cylinder as it should, instead landing with a loud thud.

Alien: Romulus is a roller coaster of emotion and action – the xenomorph is in exceptional form – until we reach the third act. Where the final minutes of the film should be visceral, pulse-pounding excitement, and they are in a first-person video-game way, Alien: Romulus can’t break new ground story-wise.

Alien: Romulus is modestly budgeted, so even if audiences choose a premium screen to experience the film, it should break even. Much like Weyland-Yutani’s tamping down on colonists to depress spirits, Hollywood is driving more and more audiences toward premium on-demand options at home, the suspicion that this film will play out there is justified, unfortunately. The jump scares are effective, yet the haunted house, tension-filled feeling that drove Alien wasn’t there. Like the xenomorph, the mystique has comparatively worn off of the film’s environs and intentions.

Will you jump? You bet. Will you be talking about the film’s merits years after its release? Most probably not. Is this review being overly harsh? It has to be. Yes, even for a few hours, Alien: Romulus does reach into the darkest parts of your soul, the overall tensions are worn on its sleeves. It is overly ambitious and it knows it is; its principal job is to entertain first. If you walk away from it entertained, then you are saluted. If there is even doubt of what the film says through its bag of well-worn tricks, you’ve won – it enhances and extends the franchise’s lore at its own expense.

Fede Alvarez’s style will appeal to modern audiences and superfans seeking more juice based on the broader franchise that started with Dan O’Bannon, Ronald Shusett, Scott, Walter Hill, David Giler, and Gordon Carroll 45 years ago. Alvarez’s attention to detail, coupled with Galo Olivieres’ strong cinematography will appeal to fans of the classic entries in the series.

In those regards, Alien: Romulus mostly works as a solid, continued entry in a long-running franchise. Mostly.