Utterly and insufferably bad. Phantom Menace level bad. Worse than Prometheus (at least Prometheus didn’t bore me). It’s as if Ridley Scott learned nothing from the criticisms he received there.
At this point, Scott is retconning his series to explain everything away, midi-chlorians style. But he’s exploring the same basic themes he already (much more effectively) plundered in Blade Runner.
By the time the aliens come around, not only do we not care, we’re actively hoping they’ll kill the whole cast.
Michael Fassbender is great, but who cares when the movie is this bad? And the model work, particularly on the space ships, is phenomenal, but who cares? The CGI is the worst in the series’ history, but — well, you get the point.
The story is unbelievably heavy-handed and poorly written (“trust me, I know wheat” is my favourite line). Scott is parodying Alien now.
In fact, it’s not hard to write a better version of this movie with your friends after the fact. The movie is worse because it wouldn’t have been hard to improve the story.
It’s safe to say that Ridley Scott doesn’t understand what worked about Alien. The series has become a footstool for his old-man navel glazing as he contemplates meeting his creator in death.
I’m so done.