Aliens Vs. Predator: Requiem

First off, I understand the idea here. Do small-town settings with colorful locals a la Stephen King, but instead of Killer Clowns have the killers being the Aliens and Predator. I get the appeal of the notion instantly. I also could have told them (had they bothered to ask) it would never work for either Alien or Predator.

So many failures of the premise to get through. The first reason it wouldn't work is that as a rule, in both franchises, the people who fight either the Xenomorphs or the Predators know the score. I'm not saying they all understand the stakes, but most of the protagonists in all the previous entries were people in a dangerous line of work. Xenomorphs and Predators may not have been in the job description, but they can fight back, and even help other people survive. A Facehugger gets a little boy in the opening scene and the Alien / Predator hybrid slaughters both a maternity ward and a hospital nursery. This is not what this franchise is supposed to be. Most of the victims in this movies are taken by surprise, powerless and innocent civilians, who just get taken out for no reason. There are no stakes involved in that happening, much less horror movie tension.

I think another reason the film went with this premise is because they believed having a town of people you grow to care about gives the franchise legit stakes. I have a hard time picturing how an AVP movie could pull that off in an hour and half, but Stephen King DOES make it look easy. The thing is, the small-town victims in King books are still put in believable horror scenarios with legit tension before their horrible deaths. And if we are going there, emulating King in creating a town full of characters you care about is a smart play. But none of the characters here are unique, or interesting, or anyone I am invested in emotionally. It's weird there were a couple of characters in the previous damn movie that fit that bill, but the horror of the quirky small towns of Stephen King's characters dying one by one is that you are rooting for everyone to survive. And I don't really care here.

That's another thing. I hate to say this, but a lot of times in both Alien and Predator movies, it's sort of fun to watch the bad guys take out humans acting in a stupid and selfish way. On some level both the Alien and Predator franchises let us enjoy the gore and gruesomeness, even if it's not for every victim. In this movie with a cast of innocent civilians? Not a single death I thought was "Awesome!" or "OOOO!" It's not an action movie. It's just horrible. It's not horror either. Just horrible.

I could go with the nonsensical cliffhanger to gripe about next but I think the other major thing I need to tackle is it is an amazingly shitty directing job. The scenes in the dark of the fights between the Alien and the Predator are so dark, you cannot tell what is going on, or keep score. Worse, the Predator and the Alien / Predator hybrid look SO much alike it's even more confusing. Normally you don't NEED to criticize directing in modern films. In most cases, every bad movie's biggest faults lie elsewhere. Even the shittiest Michael Bay movie is competently put together and boarded. Not this one. This amateur hour for "The Brothers Strauss". Do I have that bit right? Jesus. Fucking Hollywood.

I could have told the producers at every step of the way why this wouldn't work. But nobody ever listens to me. 0.