Ridley Scott next George Lucas? Terms of recent franchise vs old.

So George went from A list maker of franchises, to shit show thanks to his Prequels (I did not mind them) and his work on Indiana Jones Crystal Skull (Which was a shit show). Now, decade later, another great director has so far seem to ruin his franchise Alien with shitty movies like Prometheus, and now the terrible retcons and plot holes that make up David Covenant, I mean Alien Covenant. We all know he is making Blade Runner 2 as well which is coming out soon. Oh lord....

Closest to my thoughts.

What do you guys think? Is there some terrible trend with Directors who are consider awesome going to shit and is Ridley next? Will James Cameron be next with his super smurf films?

I thought Prometheus and Covenant were both good and unlike George Lucas, Ridley 's best work were actually due to him :p

Honestly, I don't think of Lucas as a "Great" director. As a storyteller and visualist, he's one of the greatest of all-times, as a director? ...eh ?

I can't speak for the movie itself since I'm still catching up with the Alien franchise, but I for one am tired of long convulted backstories for things that did not need explaining.

Star Wars: Darth Vader was a good guy that turned into a bad guy. Also he's Anakin Skywalker. Boom. Done. We didn't need three long movies of backstory, two of which were terrible, that made him more important than the overall story as a whole. We got the message in the original trilogy, and he was just a cool bad guy there. None of this "prophecy" nonsense needed to happen.

Alien: Super-creatures kill everyone. Bang. Explanation over. Why do we need two movies to cover where the xenomorphs come from? Part of what makes them scary is the mystique around them, and the fact that they are not understood. They are an alien (heh) prescene both to us and the characters, and that's what makes them unsettling. Telling us all about them and where they come from only makes them more familiar and by definition less scary. And when I watched Alien, I never needed or asked for a long, drawn out origin story for the xenomorph. Once again, we got the message decades ago.

People need to understand that less is more.

I don't think Lucas had ever established himself as a great director. He had a reputation as an up and coming director when the original SW came out but after that sort of stopped directing and once the ot was over seemed to focus more on Industrial light and magic and sw related properties. I think Lucas has always been more associated as the creator of the sw mythos and a movie tech guy more so than as a director. Scott just got old. I mean he's almost 80(79) now and no one performs most anything at the same level when they are 70's/80's as they did when they were 30's-50's. Also, Scott is just making due with the scripts he is being given. Had Prometheus and the latest had better scripts/stories I think they would in turn be better movies. Granted he may have some say in them but better scripts would help.

@sirfizzwhizz: I assume you saw AngryJoe's review? I haven't seen the film yet but from my understanding, doesn't covenant retcon the easter egg in predator 2, which was the alien skull confirming a shared universe?

You must be forgetting that Ridley Scott somewhat recently directed the cinematic masterpiece that is halo nightfall.

I liked the prequels.

Watch The Martian and tell me his career is on the decline.

People butthurt because they don't want decent films and would rather watch Alien and Aliens with rosy tinted glasses, while shitting on other fans who actually want to see an expanded storyline of the creatures. If you don't like them then don't bother seeing the movie and watch the original films and bask in how incestuous your logic is that "OMG they'll never be better than this". There is always going to be a group of people who want to know more about the creature's origins and the expanded world they live in.

@georgewbush: I myself have no problem with him doing these prequel Alien movies but I'd still say they could be better done and have better plot/writing behind them. I don't think his direction has even really been the problem. I think its more just been the writing that is causing most of the problems/criticisms.

George Lucas was never an A-list director though. Two hits and a 20 year break before souring people on those two hits don't make you an A-list director.

Not hard to direct a movie right from a best selling novel. Ridley Scott still does GREAT visuals in his films, its his own material and stories that seem to decline.

I seen like 10-12 reviews and most feel the way I do. Atmosphere is nice. Visuals are gorgeous. Sound is epic. Story.... shit. My issue for both films as followed.

Prometheus:

• What is the ooze?
• Why Engineers made mankind? Never answered and just dropped.
• Why Engineers want to kill mankind? never answered and forgotten.
• Two of the biggest threats in the film were laughable. Trouser Snake and two Space Zombies.... ugh.
• Scientist act like freaking silly retards in a Friday the 13th film.
• The whole scene of the rolling space ship, and crushing that chick looney toons style.
• The whole I just had major surgery and can run a marathon chick.
• Cock tease of the Deacon creature we NEVER see again. ugh....
• Davids weird I hate humanity, I love my human father, I want to help th humans, nope I will test on them.... sweet jesus. Pick a angle.

Alien Covenant:

• Still no explanation on the ooze.
• Still no explanation on why Engineers made us and want to kill us.
• Engineers get killed off in one half ass flash back scene. They seem so weak and pathetic too to die in such a way. Laughable silly and small race in size. It was so LAZY and un epic.
• Shaw killed off screen. What a tragedy of a good character.
• Shaw and David relationship makes no sense. Shaw cared for David, and David clearly liked Shaw. Up, she is dead and used for experiments. Ugh.....
• Movie does not know what it wants to be. Starts of Prometheus style, then turns slasher film last half.
• Scientist again make stupid and cliche mistakes.
• Tons of cliche horror tropes used than any 80s slasher film.
• To little screen time for "Protomorph" and "Neomorph".
• Protomorph feels like a little bitch. Dies easy.
• Second protomorph disappears and forgotten about.
• Walter character > Davids, but Walter dies.
• The whole retcon that David made the Xenomorph. Worst retcon ever. There is just TONS and TONS and TONs of lore from comics and novels of Aliens being thousands of years old. Nope. They are made 100 years before Alien. Wow. Also retcons first move, as in first movie the Xenomorph and Derlict ship are stated 1000 year old crash. 1000s. Oh no wait, its only 100 by "Davids" time line. Also sucks the most fearsome creature in the galaxy was made by a simple ass cyborg made by mankind. God dang biological version of Skynet now. ugh......

Yeah, these movies are garbage.

As others have already pointed out, George was never an A-list director. Producer, visionary storyteller and film technology advocate, yes. Director, no.

Cute. Let me edit the title then.