Entertainment
Smash Hit That Brought Sci-Fi’s Most Extremely Graphic Franchise Back To Life, Now Streaming
By Chris Snellgrove
| Published
Ridley Scott transformed the horror landscape forever with Alien, kickstarting a franchise that has careened from pure action (like in Aliens) to pure schlock (like in Alien: Resurrection). Even after Scott came back to direct both Prometheus and Alien: Covenant, the damage was done: the Alien movies no longer had cultural cachet, and they just didn’t seem that creepy compared to modern scary movies.
Fortunately, Alien: Romulus brought sci-fi’s creepiest franchise back to life, and you can stream this terrifying blockbuster thriller for yourself on Hulu.
Sleeping Your Way To Paradise
The premise of Alien: Romulus is that disgruntled colonists board a derelict space station, hoping to steal the cryo pods they’ll need to sleep while traveling towards a kind of paradise planet. Unfortunately, the space station has some unexpected occupants in the form of the deadliest creatures the galaxy has ever known. Soon, our heroes’ attempts to reach paradise transform into a frantic fight for their lives against facehuggers, xenomorphs, and a rogue android who seemingly can’t be stopped.
Unlike previous franchise entries (especially Alien: Resurrection), Alien: Romulus had a relatively unknown cast, but everyone made a real meal of their roles. Cailee Spaeny is all relatable angst as our designated final girl, while Spike Fearn plays a kind of bullying character that you just love to hate. Nobody puts in the work quite like David Jonsson, who goes from being a simple servant to (after an ersatz upgrade) an inhuman force of nature who may be even more of a threat than all the xenomorphs combined.
The Secret Master of Horror Revivals
When I first watched Alien: Romulus, I walked into the theater cautiously optimistic because of who was behind the camera rather than in front of it. Fede Álvarez had previously made his directorial debut with the 2013 film Evil Dead, which has stood the test of time as one of the absolute best remakes in horror history. As far as I was concerned, he had a proven track record of reviving dormant franchises, and I was excited to see what he was going to do with a franchise that had gone so far off the rails that even original Alien director Ridley Scott couldn’t get things back on track.
Sure enough, Alvarez made Alien: Romulus a success by doing the same thing he did with Evil Dead: namely, focusing on the fundamentals that fans had come to expect without deviating much from a proven franchise formula. Romulus, for example, is filled with touchstones from previous films, including banal corporate evil, secretive androids, and aliens run amok. The director manages to add some innovative new ideas into the mix, but the fact that he didn’t try to rock the boat too much (or, worse yet, try to subvert our expectations) is a big part of why this movie was such a smashing success.
Alien: Romulus Walked So Alien: Earth Could Run
Ironically, Alvarez’s staying faithful to the franchise may have paved the way for other creators to take more adventurous approaches. After Alien: Romulus proved that there was still an audience for the kind of scares delivered by previous directors Ridley Scott and James Cameron, showrunner Noah Hawley took Alien: Earth in an entirely new direction with a TV series in which characters could communicate with the xenomorph, and the galaxy includes other intelligent alien life. The TV show proved to be a smash hit, and at this point, I think it’s fair to say that Alien: Romulus walked so that Alien: Earth could run.
The first two Alien films clearly inspired Alvarez, and Romulus ultimately became a perfect tonal blend of those earlier movies. The first half of this newer film is very clearly inspired by Ridley Scott, with relatively helpless characters just trying to stay alive as they explore a derelict space station. The second half of the movie takes its cues from James Cameron, throwing so many facehuggers, xenomorphs, and androids at the screen that you might have to hit pause to catch your breath.
Rejecting The Creator
Speaking of that first Alien director, it’s impossible not to see Alien: Romulus as a gentle rebuke of what Ridley Scott did with the franchise in Prometheus and Alien: Covenant. At some point, Scott developed an almost fannish devotion to exploring the exact origin of sci-fi’s scariest monster, and he created two bizarrely baroque horror films devoted to that exploration. Those films are as beautiful as they are weirdly impenetrable, and it was arguably best for the franchise as a whole that Fede Álvarez returned everything to formula with a simple tale of humanity fighting against an unknown and unknowable threat.
Will you agree that Alien: Romulus deserves full credit for bringing this freaky franchise back to life, or will this move leave you wanting to snooze in the nearest cryopod? The only way to find out is to stream this gory sci-fi thrillride on Hulu and decide for yourself. If this puts you in the mood to binge-watch the rest of the series, you’re in luck: the entire franchise is currently streaming on Hulu, making it easy for you to decide exactly where Romulus lands on your personal list of Alien films.
