Despite being one of the scariest components of the original movies, the facehuggers inAlien: Romulusproved to be one of its more disappointing elements. The 2024 movie serves as a midquel between Ridley Scott and James Cameron’s first two installments, following a group of space colonists looking to escape aWeyland-Yutani work planetand head to the titular space station to salvage cryopods and travel to a new planet, only to inadvertently unleash a whole host of xenomorphs and facehuggers.
Co-written and directed by Fede Álvarez, the same mind behind 2013’sEvil Deadreboot-quel,Alien: Romulusquickly became a critical and commercial hit, with many hailing it to be the best since the first two. Even so,whileAlien: Romulusfound creative ways to better connect the timeline between Scott’s prequels and the originals, one element that ultimately should’ve been the easiest to recreate in terrifying fashion became one of its least.
The Facehuggers Have Often Been The Scariest Part Of The Alien Franchise
With Facehuggers, Once They’ve Got Their Victim, It’s Over
Across the seven mainline movies, thexenomorphs and facehuggershave served as the two main antagonists of theAlienfranchise, save for the hybrids seen inResurrection,PrometheusandRomulus' ending. Before the 2024 movie,the facehuggers had actually been somewhat absent, withResurrectionandCovenantonly giving them quick scenes, while the 2012 prequel left them out entirely due to its timeline placement.
Alien: Romulus Timeline - When It Takes Place Compared To The Other Movies
The ninth installment in the Alien film series, Alien: Romulus, has been released 38 years after the first movie, but it makes the timeline confusing.
Part ofwhat makes the facehuggers so terrifying in the prior movies is that there only needs to be one for everything to fall into chaos.Even more so is the fact that once the facehuggers get a hold of their victim, there’s essentially no escape from them. Aside from Ripley inAliensand Demián Bichir’s Lope inCovenant, no other character has survived being gripped by the creature, with the latter’s escape coming with acid burning his face and still leaving him impregnated with a praetomorph.
Why The Facehuggers In Alien: Romulus Didn’t Live Up To Past Movies
There’s Far Too Many Facehuggers In Romulus
Aileen Wu’s Navarro’s death was arguably the most gruesometo come from a facehugger since John Hurt in Scott’s original, but it’s both the scenes that precede and follow it that exemplify the movie’s issue in depicting them by having so many. The fact that their escape results in at least a dozen of them chasing down the main characters undermines how powerful they are in prior movies. Where just one could lead to the death of every main character, the introduction of a whole host of facehuggers falls flat.
That’s not to say thatAlien: Romulusis completely brought down by the facehuggers' depiction.
Showing a bunch of them jumping around and failing to grab any of the characters other than Navarro makes it unbelievable that the creatures have any intelligence or tact. That’s not to say thatAlien: Romulusis completely brought down by the facehuggers' depiction. Navarro’s death is horrific, the practical effects used to create them are fantastic, and the sequence of other characters attempting to sneak past them offers some good tension. But going intofutureAlienmovies, it would be nice to see a return to what made the facehuggers originally work to illustrate how their strength doesn’t come in numbers.
Alien: Romulus
Cast
Alien: Romulus is the seventh film in the Alien franchise. The movie is directed by Fede Álvarez and will focus on a new young group of characters who come face to face with the terrifying Xenomorphs. Alien: Romulus is a stand-alone film and takes place in a time not yet explored in the Alien franchise.
