Summary

• Alien franchise has strayed from its roots, lacking clear direction, unlike the Predator and Godzilla franchises.
• Fede Álvarez brought new life to the Evil Dead franchise with a scarier, intense approach in 2013.
• Alien: Romulus aims to bring Alien back to its horror roots with a young cast facing terrifying Xenomorphs.

The Alien franchise has taken a long and winding road to its current status. The enormous influence of the first two movies in the series has overshadowed subsequent efforts, which range from the fascinatingly flawed to the just plain bad. Few Alien movies are entirely without merit, but the franchise feels a long way from its roots in 1979. Similar series such as the Predator and Godzilla movies have resolutely (if imperfectly) moved into the future. Alien, however, seems perennially looking back to its glory days, and not even Ridley Scott has been able to shake it out of its doldrums.

Alien: Romulus looks to change that, starting with its director Fede Álvarez. The native Uruguayan made a huge splash on the horror scene with his 2013 reboot of Evil Dead, making him the first director besides Sam Raimi to helm an entry in the vaunted franchise. It sparked a renaissance in the series, including the well-regarded Ash vs. Evil Dead TV show and 2023's Evil Dead Rise. The Alien saga could use a strong dose of that right now, and fans curious to know what Romulus will be like can probably get a good idea by giving Evil Dead another look.

2013's Evil Dead Was the Scariest in the Franchise

Sam Raimi's original Evil Dead trilogy always carried a hefty dose of comedy with its terrors. Bruce Campbell's protagonist Ash Williams is at least partially a parody of classic leading man, and the actor's gift for slapstick made 1981's The Evil Dead stand out from the slasher films and derivative zombie films of the era. The 1987 sequel Evil Dead 2: Dead by Dawn came as close to parody as it could get without going over (increasing the gore and brutal scares in the process), while 1992's Army of Darkness was more of a loving homage to Ray Harryhausen fantasy movies than a straight horror film. Its PG-13 rating speaks volumes about its jovial tone.

None of this is a criticism, as Raimi's gift for dancing between horror and comedy is unparalleled. It did leave the franchise without a viable path forward, however. Ash's story felt more or less told, and both Campbell and Raimi went on to other projects. The massive success of Raimi's Spider-Man movies opened up all manner of A-list projects for him, and while further Evil Dead movies were discussed, no one seemed all that keen on reviving the franchise. It stayed that way for over twenty years, and for a time, the Evil Dead looked to be a part of the horror genre's past rather than its future.

Fede Álvarez changed that in a big way with his Evil Dead reboot in 2013. It eschewed the previous films' penchant for absurdity, though a certain gallows humor poked through here and there. Instead, it fully embraced the horrific side of the scenario: losing the chainsaw hands and Three Stooges references in favor of pure nightmare fuel. The violence reached unseen levels of intensity that cuts had to be made to avoid an NC-17 rating in the US. Álvarez also found chilling new wrinkles in the previous formula. The protagonist, for instance, is a drug addict who arrives at the cabin with her friends in an attempt to go cold turkey. So when the Necronomicon is read and the Deadites manifest on Earth, there's the distinct possibility that she's just hallucinating it all.

The shift in tone worked brilliantly, and sparked a renaissance in the Evil Dead franchise. That included Ash vs. Evil Dead -- which retained the original trilogy's sense of humor, as well as letting Ash Williams formally bow out. There was also the 2022 sequel, Evil Dead Rise, which stuck closer to the 2013 version's scarier tone. Both became a hit with fans, and more movies are on the way. All of this stems from Álvarez's efforts, and a willingness to take a chance by moving the franchise in a much different direction.

Alien Needs Álvarez's Commitment to Horror

Like Evil Dead in 2013, the Alien franchise finds itself without a clear way forward. Unlike Evil Dead, it brings much heavier baggage along for the ride. When Álvarez delivered his reboot, the franchise had been dormant for a long time, with only fond-but-comparatively distant memories of the original trilogy to contend with. Alien, on the other hand, made repeated efforts to find new creative ground, only to dilute the brand considerably in the process. Indeed, only the first two movies are undisputed classics. The two films after that -- David Fincher's Alien 3 and Jeanne-Pierre Jeunet's Alien: Resurrection -- both have interesting elements from two legitimate auteurs, but failed on too many other levels to stand with the best.

Alien 3's decision to kill off two of the survivors from the previous movie was met with howls of protest from fans, and in many ways, the franchise has yet to recover. For a time, 20th Century Fox thought that combining Alien with the Predator franchise would rejuvenate both properties. The idea began with the innovative Dark Horse Comics line beginning in 1989, and received a nod in 1990's Predator 2 when a Xenomorph skull appeared mounted on the wall of a Predator's ship as a trophy. That eventually resulted in 2004's Alien vs. Predator movie, which abandoned the Dark Horse storyline with a new narrative. It failed to rise above the basic gimmick, however.

While it turned a profit, the follow-up movie -- 2007's Alien vs. Predator: Requiem -- was disastrously bad. The franchise sat fallow for another 5 years. Hope for a leap forward arrived in the form of director Ridley Scott, who returned to the franchise with 2012's Prometheus. The story focused on other unanswered questions about the Alien universe, notably the purpose of the mysterious ship full of Xenomorphs in the first film. While it had powerful elements, it failed to connect on the same primal level as the original.

Scott followed it up with 2017's Alien: Covenant, which focused more on the Xenomorph itself, and again delivered intriguing pieces without coalescing into a satisfied whole. Disney announced the purchase of Fox's movie division a few months later, with the transition completed in 2019. That, coupled with Alien: Covenant's mediocre box office once again put a halt to more Alien movies, as the family-friendly Disney worked out a strategy for the decidedly R-rated sci-fi franchise.

Alien: Romulus Should Embrace Pure Horror

A pure horror strategy apparently relies on Álvarez, which presumably means a similar reliance on intense horror with a strong helping of gore and violence. As strange as it may sound, Alien hasn't had those sensibilities in its make-up in a long time. Scott is a legendary director, but besides his Alien movies, he hasn't directed many horror movies in his long career. Neither has famed director James Cameron, who directed 1986's Aliens as more of a sci-fi action story than a proper horror film. Fincher and Jeunet similarly have a number of suspenseful and even frightening films on their resume, but neither can be said to be a straight-up horror director.

While the Alien vs. Predator movies do embrace horror, the results are too meager to merit serious consideration, while Scott's last two movies focus more on world-building and chilly moral ambiguity than scares. That leaves a franchise with a reputation for superior horror fare with a surprising lack of pure horror in its history. Álvarez presumably intends to give all of that a serious shake-up, and not a moment too soon. The Alien franchise has tested fans' indulgence for a long time, and audience fatigue is far more of a threat now that it was for the Evil Dead remake.

At the same time, however, it has never embraced horror as a genre to the extent that many people think, leaving a huge amount of untapped potential for Álvarez to exploit. The new ownership at Disney has clearly taken its time in charting a future for the Alien movies. After all this time -- and with the franchise's best years behind it -- it needs a jolt to the system. Álvarez provided just the thing for Evil Dead in 2013. Repeating the feat here would suddenly give Alien a very bright future.

Alien: Romulus opens in theaters on Aug. 16, 2024