Sophie Daniel
Contributing Writer
Trigger Warning: This article includes discussion of sexual violence and assault. Discretion is advised.
Includes spoilers for Alien (1979) and Alien: Romulus (2024)
Have we, as the dominant species of this planet, ever defined what we objectively consider to be the ‘perfect organism’ out of all known life forms? There must be some measurement or scale of how valuable certain characteristics are to each species, but it requires a little digging to decide which organism is, by our definition, the best. Intelligence, speed, defensiveness, and predation techniques: all of these traits are considered when scaling this idea. However, to humans, the one priority when it comes to deducing this question is the consideration of potency, i.e., of power. Who does our traditional society generally look to when defining the word power? To give a hint, the answer is not women. It never has been. When you look up synonyms for the word femininity, words like ‘nurturing’ and ‘gentle’ come up, creating a stark contrast to the synonyms that pop up for masculinity. ‘Powerful’ has long been used to describe the aura of men and men exclusively. These forced notions have been historically challenged time and time again through several different social movements. In 1979, an artistic and cinematic sensation dubbed Alien was released, challenging the idea that a female protagonist in an action/sci-fi film could never prevail against a force of evil by her own nature. Alien: Romulus, released just this summer, takes place between the first Alien and the second movie, Aliens (which is arguably the only one of the franchise just as good as the first). By bringing older factors used in the first and second movies, such as themes of battling forced motherhood, practical effects, and body horror with intention, Alien: Romulus reintroduces what was so intensely appreciated about the first: a prerequisite for feminist symbolism within the film industry.
This idea is not new or original to those who gush over protagonist Ellen Ripley’s dominant energy leading all the way up to Alien: Resurrection. What makes Alien so different from other box-breaking sci-fi films at that time (which happened to be the peak of its popularity during its release) is that it challenges themes of intense and invasive sexual violence at a level that the general audience had never seen before. Perhaps Dracula (1931) can be seen taking on this feeling of sexual predation, but not necessarily in a way that communicates to its male viewers. No one even expected by chance that Ellen Ripley, despite being the clear protagonist, would be the only one to survive on that ship as a woman in a film released in 1979. Every single one of her male counterparts, holding higher positions than her concerning their mission, is brutally killed by face-huggers and a fully-grown xenomorph.
The phallocentric characteristics of the alien age stages inherently feminize each man aboard the ship, as each living human (regardless of gender) is forced into a maternal figure through oral contact (mainly with face-huggers). Facehuggers penetrate the mouth, wrap their tails around the subject’s neck, and use their reproductive organ to plant an egg in the abdominal area while simultaneously keeping the person alive by regulating their breathing. It is a new level of extraterrestrial invasion, one that we do not see in Independence Day or Men In Black. Instead, it is a horrific bodily invasion. What makes these characteristics so recognizable and potent in the first movie are the practical effects used. As the film industry has progressed into the Marvel Universe’s CGI standard, the most recent Alien films have used CGI to depict these monstrous creatures. Would I say it has the same chilling effect? Personally, no. The same goes for the practical effects used in The Thing (1982) versus the 2011 remake. The body horror just isn’t as impactful. However, Alien: Romulus chooses the more original path of using practical effects, paying homage to the first few movies in the franchise. Creative directors on the set even brought back the original designers for the Xenomorph to translate that same uncanny, realistic feeling to the modern big-screen experience. Having male audience members witness other men equal to themselves be so violated in the way that women have historically suffered (at the hands of their hierarchical betters) emits a sense of empathy. You feel the dirt and grime that comes with not just being brutally tortured and killed but being raped, assaulted, and only being seen as a method to reproduce.
During Alien’s release, the movement known as Second Wave feminism was about. In other words, the march towards reproductive rights and freedoms for women was brutally being fought for, making Alien a critique of the objectification of our uteruses as women and the expectation to carry a baby against one’s will. That parasitic, dirty feeling that comes with being violated on that level was and still is being communicated to our oppressors through this movie. To tie into Alien: Romulus, director Ridley Scott rang the desk bell to start a new horror project within the franchise in 2021. Roe v. Wade was also overturned in 2021 by the Supreme Court, leaving room for states to set their own regulations regarding abortion rights. This completely ripped the cloth from the dining table, undoing everything the Second Wave feminist movement marched towards.
Traditional ideals, especially within the 1970s following the idea of the perfect nuclear family a few decades prior, usually deem having no maternal instinct as a sickness to be rid of entirely. As directly quoted by Republican vice presidential nominee J.D Vance, here is a plague of “childless cat ladies,” swarming our polls and modern society. While that trope is tired from being used for centuries, this double standard for women is still prevalent. The Alien franchise, especially this new release of Alien: Romulus, challenges the notion of forced motherhood. For those who have not watched the movie, please be advised that there is a spoiler ahead for the sake of this point. One of the most notable (and arguably disturbing) parts of Alien: Romulus is the last 20 minutes, where the audience bears witness to what is deemed “The Offspring.” Kay, one of the younger crew members on the ship, is expecting a child soon. She manages to survive the majority of the attack until she is stabbed in the end and begins to bleed out. In an attempt to save herself and her child, she injects a substance a large conglomerate is farming from this alien species. However, once she is on the rescue ship, she begins to give birth in a gory, beyond uncomfortable fashion to a large egg. Rain, the protagonist, tries to discard the egg, but it simply grows too fast into a disgusting, minacious hybrid of human and alien with a face that even a mother could have trouble loving. The offspring ends up eating its mother, which is emblematic of how motherhood literally consumes you from the bottom up.
Alien: Romulus, in a surprising turn compared to its recent counterparts, truly left the same sharp imprint the first movies created by illustrating the sheer peril that forced objectification and motherhood have left on women across the world.