Second watch questions
Why did they have James Franco in the film at all? Was it supposed to be clever and shocking to kill off a big star at the start of the film? I saw the prologue on Youtube. However Franco doesn't do or say anything in the actual film until after he's killed off (the mountain climbing bit). I just don't get what they were going for here.
What happened with the last twenty minutes? After Daniels goes to her room and wakes up it's like a completely different film. Were we supposed to think the film was over? Jesus they nearly set it up so that people could say the ending was all a dream!!! But seriously the last twenty minutes feel so tacked on and badly written it's unreal.
Leading on from that where did the alien of the last twenty minutes come from? The Demian Bechir (Lope) character I'm guessing but how did he get infected? It was either the facehugger on the planet or the second face bandage David (pretending to be Walter) handed him. But why leave it so unclear. Bizarre for such a big film to leave such a thing so unclear.
Just a final and more minor question: When Oram (Crudup) is talking to David he says "I met the Devil as a child and never forgot him" (I'm paraphrasing). What's all that about? Was he abused or something? Not quite sure why they have him say that. It's like there was a load of backstory about him that was cut out.
To conclude I would say that the movie is very uneven. I'm not surprised the numbers for this film weren't as good as they were hoping. The nostalgia effect of Alien/Aliens is starting to wear thin on moviegoers with all these mediocre prequels.