TheAlien: “The way to paradise begins in hell.” The crew of the colony ship Covenant prepares to be massacred, the Covenant trailer ominously declares. With a dark, unsettling poster that is reminiscent of Renaissance paintings of angels and demons, the new poster for Ridley Scott’s second Alien prequel certainly nails that theme on the head. Let’s examine that advertisement. Let’s also look at its obvious influences while we’re at it.
Today, 20th Century Fox released the Alien: Covenant poster, and it is immediately arresting. The ominous poster depicts a horde of Xenomorphs crawling over and suffocating men’s bodies as they reach for a meager ray of sunlight illuminating a dark and constricting hellhole.
The poster serves as a stark reminder that the series is returning to its horror origins. The first Alien, starring Sigourney Weaver, was clearly referenced in the trailer, as producer Mark Huffam stressed during our visit to the set.
The corridors get smaller and darker, and you start to wonder what’s down there as they continue to enter without turning on the lights, according to Huffam. It has the scale of Prometheus.
The sixth installment in the Alien series, Alien: Covenant, is the second in the Prometheus timeline, which began with the 2012 film. In the prequel series, which takes place roughly 30 years before the events of 1979’s Alien, humans explore the deep reaches of space and come across the ruins of advanced civilizations…as well as other, more immediate threats.
Although it was designed for a 2017 release with a far-off setting, this poster evokes artwork from a much earlier era.
The Influences on the Poster Go Farther Back Than You Think
The poster is ominous and unsettling, but it’s also masterfully designed.
It strongly resembles the depictions of angelic and demonic combat in Renaissance paintings of hell. The Fall of The Rebellious Angels by Frans Floris immediately came to mind since it shows armored angels fending off fallen angels whose human forms have been changed into hideous creatures.
The Gian Lorenzo Bernini sculpture can also be seen on The Alien: Covenant poster.
In the story The Rape of Persephone, a terrified Persephone struggles to escape Hades, the god of the underworld. This statue was renowned for accurately depicting how Hades’ hands sank into Persephone’s skin, as seen in the poster, which shows these unnamed men being obviously fabricated to resemble Classical Roman and Renaissance statues as they are devoured and strangled by the Aliens.
Both works of art have intriguing Alien: Covenant connections. With The Fall, there is a connection between Aliens as demonic beings who our human characters initially see in ominous underground tunnels (or at least mysterious, wrecked spaceships) before being killed in the constricting, ominous passageways of the appropriately titled Covenant. It seems as though Scott made it his goal to include all the Biblical allusions.
Regarding The Rape of Persephone, a lot has been written about the ongoing use of sexual assault imagery in the Aliens franchise, including the Alien baby (or “facehugger”) that resembles female genitalia, the chest-bursting childbirth scene, and the numerous instances of the Aliens “violating” their victims in gruesome ways. Just take a look at the Alien: Covenant trailer’s (likely gratuitous) killing in the shower scene.
I commend the marketing department for making such wise decisions on the poster, its images, and its influences. It is encouraging for the movie itself if they put this much attention into a one-sheet poster because it should help to reconcile the divisivePrometheus.
The cast, which also includes newcomers Katherine Waterston, Billy Crudup, Danny McBride, Demi n Bichir, Carmen Ejogo, Amy Seimetz, Jussie Smollett, Callie Hernandez, Nathaniel Dean, Alexander England, and Benjamin Rigby, is not shown on the poster. Michael Fassbender is returning as another android version of his Prometheus character.
