Alien: Romulus’ New Facehuggers Are Pure Nightmare Fuel, Much Scarier Than 45 Years Ago

Summary:

• Alien: Romulus is the upcoming film of the Alien franchise, set between the first two movies and ready to surprise fans with the updates of its alien villains.
• The movie’s first trailer presents classic xenomorphs as much more horrifying in both their appearance and behavior, which have never been seen before.

Back in 1979, Ridley Scott ’s Alien made a revolution in sci-fi, combining it with high-quality body horror that still looks terrifying even with such an advancement of visual effects.

Planned to enter the theaters in August, the new installment of the Alien franchise, titled Alien: Romulus, presents a brand-new vision of the fictional villains.

It was already revealed by the movie’s leading actress, Cailee Spaeny (Priscilla, Pacific Rim Uprising), that the new space horror will take place between the first franchise’s film and the second one, James Cameron ’s 1986 Aliens. However, other details of the plot remained under the veil of secrecy, until the first Romulus’ trailer just dropped.

The new Alien movie, following a space crew, who gets into a confrontation with the xenomorphs interfering not only with their mission, but with their lives, features an update on the alien antagonists’ look and behavior in this one-minute footage.

Despite from their much more sinister appearance, enhanced by the greater CGI, Alien: Romulus shows how facehuggers, which present the first form of the xenomorphs’ development, hunt their prey not just individually, but in a group, which makes them much more formidable force and presents a bigger challenge for the onscreen crew.

"There’s a scene that I’m in, and they all had to turn away. Not one person stayed looking at that because it was so disgusting,” Spaeny previously teased when recalling the filming of her confrontation with the alien villains.

Indeed, given the trailer allowing us only to peep into the new version of spider-like facehuggers, even the brief show of them is horrific.

The Internet’s response to the movie’s update on the xenomorphs’ behavior was quick enough, with the anticipated trailer receiving mostly positive assessments.

“The multiple face huggers going full speed towards some of the crew is my literal nightmare fuel,” expressed the common impression of the footage Redditor @TylerOrtega1500.

Directed by Fede Alvarez (Evil Dead, Don't Breathe), Alien: Romulus also stars David Jonsson (Industry, Rye Lane), Isabela Merced (Madame Web, Superman ) and Spike Fearn (The Batman, Aftersun), so the film’s crew promises a great level of action.

While the new take on the Alien franchise is scheduled to be theatrically released on August 16, you can rewatch the original Ridley Scott’s gem on Hulu and Disney+ .

Sources: 20th Century Studios, Variety, The Hollywood Reporter