It doesn’t matter whether you prefer Ridley Scott’s original or James Cameron’s sequel, both of which are classics in their own right, but nobody could rightfully claim that the Alien franchise has improved since 1986. That’s not to say the continued adventures of the Xenomorphs have been a catastrophe (Alien vs. Predator: Requiem) excluded, although the bar may have been set too high by the first two installments.
Regardless, there was a genuine sense of excitement and intrigue when it was first announced that Ridley Scott would be returning to the series to helm Prometheus, which was intended to be the first chapter in a brand new prequel trilogy. In the end, it wasn’t a bad film by any stretch, but it proved to be hugely polarizing among casual audiences, critics, and longtime Alien fans.
It certainly can’t be faulted in terms of ambition or visual style, but the unwieldy screenplay was packed to bursting point with half-baked ideas that were never explored in enough detail, or explained to everyone’s satisfaction. That doesn’t mean it’s not got a passionate number of supporters, though, many of whom appear to be revisiting the intergalactic epic on streaming, after FlixPatrol named Prometheus as one of the most-watched titles on the iTunes global chart.
It does at least rank as the top-grossing entry in the saga after posting a solid $403 million take at the box office, but Prometheus also holds middle-of-the road scores on Rotten Tomatoes, Metacritic, and CinemaScore in the grand scheme of the six-film sci-fi horror property, so there’s no such thing as a unanimous agreement on its merits.
