Alien: Covenant Reveals How The Xenomorphs Were Created
04/18/2017 01:01 pm EDT
Ridley Scott returned to his beloved Alien franchise with Prometheus, promising he'd explore the origins of the Xenomorph in a brand new slate of films set before Ripley goes toe-to-toe with the first monster from LV-426.
After Prometheus set the stage for a slow-burn reveal of these origins, only hinting at humankind's origin and the Engineers purpose, it seemed like we wouldn't get those answers until the end of Scott's planned trilogy. Why would he give the answer away so quickly after taking a whole film to set up the species' creators?
Well, it turns out, that's exactly what he's doing in Alien: Covenant—the 10th Most Anticipated Film as voted by ComicBook.com readers.
The director recently premiered a clip from the film at the South by Southwest festival in Austin, a scene previously hinted at in the trailer, in which the origins are explained. At least, that's what one viewer believes.
Obviously, we are entering into spoiler territory here, so only read on if you want to know the truth about the creation of the deadliest creature in the universe.
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Over at the Verge, writer Bryan Bishop attended a screening of the new footage with Ridley Scott, Katherine Waterston, and Michael Fassbender. He details the scenes, but the last one shown seems to be the clear-cut indication that a character from Prometheus was directly responsible for the Xenomorphs we've seen in the original Alien and its sequels.
Bishop writes:
Michael Fassbender's android David (he's definitely the same character from Prometheus in this scene, as he's called David by name) walks Billy Crudup's character through his personal workshop of biological terrors. He shows off different mutations of the creatures, explaining that he has been trying to understand the aliens that were discovered in Prometheus, going so far as to genetically engineer new versions — a process that's been waiting for one final puzzle piece to complete.
That's when David takes him into a small chamber filled with four eggs that look identical to the ones seen in the original Alien. The final puzzle piece, David says, is "mother" — a waiting host — and Crudup's character is lined up for the honor. The dots are easy to connect: the alien as audiences saw it in 1979 wasn't the result of evolution or natural selection. Instead, it was the result of an android intentionally breeding the most dangerous, lethal creature possible.
It's great to see the curious android from Prometheus, who's own nature damned his human hosts just as much as their own desire to know their origins, is still causing havoc for hapless explorers well into the future.
We're likely to learn more about the Xenomorphs, the Engineers, and how the ever-present Weyland-Yutani corporation factors into all of this when Alien: Covenant releases in theaters on May 19.
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In Alien: Covenant, bound for a remote planet on the far side of the galaxy, the crew of the colony ship Covenant discovers what they think is an uncharted paradise, but is actually a dark, dangerous world — whose sole inhabitant is the "synthetic" David, survivor of the doomed Prometheus expedition.
Alien: Covenant stars Michael Fassbender, Katherine Waterston, Billy Crudup, Danny McBride, Demián Bichir, Carmen Ejogo, Amy Seimetz, Jussie Smollett, Callie Hernandez, Nathaniel Dean, Alexander England and Benjamin Rigby.
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