Welcome to 5 Minutes Or Less, a script breakdown for only the biggest blockbusters, giving you hundreds of millions of dollars worth of explosive big screen action in less than 300 seconds worth of reading or your money back. (You didn’t pay for this, so there’s nothing to refund here.)
In this edition, buckle up as we get into top gear to take a gander at Alien: Covenant.
If you haven’t read them yet, here are our 5 Minute Or Less breakdowns of Wonder Woman, Logan, Beauty & The Beast, Fast & Furious 8 and the first four seasons of House Of Cards.
Oh, and obviously, SPOILERS!
FADE UP. EARTH. THE FUTURE.
GUY PEARCE: I created you, Michael Fassbender. Let’s talk about art and music and furniture and completely alienate the audience almost immediately with existentialism.
MICHAEL FASSBENDER #1: Should we have told the audience that they really needed to do their homework before seeing this? That unless they’ve seen Prometheus and Alien and all of the web-exclusive content, a lot of this won’t make a huge amount of sense?
AUDIENCE: What’s that?
CUT TO: THE COVENANT. TEN YEARS LATER.
MICHAEL FASSBENDER #2: Remember that movie Passengers? Where Chris Pratt had to exist on his own in a spaceship for years? You probably don’t, because nobody went to see it. But there’s a reason why you don’t make an entire movie about a handsome actor stuck on a spaceship by himself, because it’s not that interesting. Which is why it only takes up ten minutes of this movie…
SOMETHING IN SPACE: *explodes*
ALL OF THE IMPORTANT ACTORS: *wake up to save the day, except-*
JAMES FRANCO: *dies without having a single line of dialogue*
CUT TO: MEETING ROOM.
DANNY MCBRIDE: It’s me! The guy who tried to eat everyone in This Is The End!
PROTO-RIPLEY: I’m super sad that my husband James Franco died.
AUDIENCE: They were husband and wife?
PROTO-RIPLEY: Yeah, it was all explained in the web content! One of us here is a gay couple, and you get some really interesting information on-
DOCTOR MANHATTAN: No time! We found a new planet, and it is almost-
AUDIENCE: Don’t say it.
DOCTOR MANHATTAN: – too good –
AUDIENCE: Don’t!
DOCTOR MANHATTAN: – to be true!
AUDIENCE: God damn it…
CUT TO: TOO GOOD TO BE TRUE PLANET.
PROTO-RIPLEY: I’ve got a bad feeling about this.
DOCTOR MANHATTAN: What could possibly go wrong?
EVERYTHING THAT COULD POSSIBLY GO WRONG: *goes wrong*
ONE THIRD OF THE CAST: *dies*
MICHAEL FASSBENDER #1: I am here to save you with my long hair and weird poncho! Follow me!
CUT TO: CITY OF DEAD ALIENS.
PROTO-RIPLEY: What happened here?
MICHAEL FASSBENDER #1: Don’t worry about that. Hey, would you like to learn how to play the flute?
MICHAEL FASSBENDER #2: Huh?
MICHAEL FASSBENDER #1: Let me do the fingering.
ENTIRE AUDIENCE: *sniggers*
CUT TO: BASEMENT OF PLOT-HOLES.
MICHAEL FASSBENDER #1: I made all of these alien eggs.
AUDIENCE: Don’t you need an Alien Queen for that hap-
DOCTOR MANHATTAN: Eggs?! I LOVE EGGS! I’m gonna stick my face right in there and hope something doesn’t hug me- *gets facehugged*
PROTO-RIPLEY: You killed the original The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo off-camera? How could you?! She deserved better!
MICHAEL FASSBENDER #2: You got a classic literary quote wrong! You’ve clearly gone insane!
MICHAEL FASSBENDER #1: Possibly. But first let’s make out and then have a superhero fight.
CUT TO: BACK ON BOARD THE COVENANT.
MICHAEL FASSBENDER #2: I am totally Michael Fassbender #2, you guys, all good here.
PROTO-RIPLEY: Finally! We can relax.
DANNY MCBRIDE: Yep. Nothing to worry about now. Phew.
PROTO-RIPLEY: Where are the other cast members that haven’t died yet?
DANNY MCBRIDE: Oh, they’re having sex in the shower with the music turned way up so they definitely won’t hear anything approching.
CUT TO: EQUIPMENT ROOM.
PROTO-RIPLEY: I know you’re in here, Alien! I’ve seen the first movie so I know that once the android goes crazy, and 95% of the cast have been killed off, then it is time to blow you out of the air-lock.
ALIEN: Quick question…. what happened to the alien at the end of Prometheus? Is that still there? If I kill you and Danny McBride, can I even further my race with no-one else on here to mate with? Why exactly did Michael Fassbender #1 kill all of the Blue Man Group aliens on the planet? Didn’t Prometheus end with The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo heading to this planet to find out why the Blue Man Group aliens wanted to kill humanity? Are we just not going to deal with that ever again? I suppose we can’t, cos they’re all dead now, right? I mean… there’s a lot of plot-holes here, you guys.
PROTO-RIPLEY: I send you and your plot questions into the depths of space!
MICHAEL FASSBENDER #2 #1: Hey, you know the way I said I was Michael Fassbender #2? Guess what?
AUDIENCE: So….. Okay….. this one fixed all the plot-holes from Prometheus, so should we expect the next one to fix the plot-holes of this one? Cos I have soooooo many questions right now…..
FADE OUT.
LISTEN: You Must Be Jokin’ with Aideen McQueen – Faith healers, Coolock craic and Gigging as Gaeilge
