I lovedAlien: Romulus' ending, especially thanks to the perfectly timed countdown that director Fede Álvarez included. There is always some expectation regarding anAlienmovie’s third act and what happens, with a final confrontation between the humans and xenomorphs almost always coming. This typically comes after the human cast list decreases as more characters die, signaling to audiences when the finale is approaching. The same methodology certainly applies toAlien: Romulus' endingand the signs that the final part of the story is approaching, but the movie also had a much bigger signal.
Alien: Romulustells us early on that the group’s time aboard the Renaissance space station is limited and decreasing quickly. This comes through the revelation thatthe space station is on a collision course with the rings around LV-410.Alien: Romuluspays off this tease when the space station is completely destroyed as it drags across the rings during the third act, along with killing thexenomorph offspring. While it’s a small detail, the movie does an incredible job of counting down to this moment of destruction thanks to a perfectly timed piece of movie-making.
Alien: Romulus' Countdown Clock To The Space Station Crash Is Perfectly Timed
The Warnings Are Precise
There is an incredible level of attention to detail inAlien: Romulusthrough its countdown clock to the space station crash. The Renaissance’s automated systemprovides warnings throughout the movie’s second and third acts that time is running out. There are warnings when the crash is 40 minutes away, 30 minutes away, 20 minutes away, and 10 minutes away. The precision of these messages related to the countdown clock is perfect, as they happen precisely at each 10-minute interval to provide a real-time update as to when the crash will take place.
Alien: Romulus Reveal Makes Ellen Ripley’s Survival Before Aliens Even More Miraculous
A major Alien: Romulus easter egg involves the fate of Sigourney Weaver’s Ripley, which only makes her survival between films more impressive.
It might seem silly to some degree, but I love it when movies pay attention to details like this. Nothing is quite as annoying as a movie telling us that something will happen in a certain amount of time, and it actually happens in a much shorter or longer amount. It’s typically the result of a movie not having the time to tell the story in real-time and condense events into a shorter period.I fully expectedAlien: Romulusto do this, too, untilI realized that the countdown clock was perfectly timed with the movie’s runtime and story.
Alien: Romulus' Accurate Countdown Clock Made Me Love The Ending Even More
It would have been easy forAlien: Romulusto ignore the real-time element of the countdown clock and have the space station crash occur faster than it promised. But I loved the ending even more, knowing that it was all happening in real time. It’s a great way to build tension andgive weight to every second or minute of what the characters are doing. There’s no wiggle room for them or the movie’s edit so that the space station crash occurs exactly when it was previously stated to.
The warnings are audio only, making them easier to include as the edit evolved
The accurate countdown clock is also another sign of how carefully constructedAlien: Romulusis and how detail-oriented Álvarez was in creating it. The movie did not need an exact countdown to the space station crash. It was another element added toincrease the stakes and elevate the tension as time runs out. And once I realizedAlien: Romuluswas doing that with its countdown clock, it only became more apparent to me how much I admired everything Álvarez attempted in the ending.
