‘Alien: Romulus’ review: Franchise’s best sequel in years

Nothing can kill the aliens.

Not even six decent-to-awful movies. 

And for the first time in years, I applaud the xenomorph’s deadly resilience in the face of Hollywood hackery.

The acid-blooded menaces are back for the ninth time in the rip-roaring “Alien: Romulus,” directed by Fede Álvarez of the most recent “Evil Dead.”

And while watching them scurry about tormenting a group of unsuspecting space travelers brings on a feeling of déjà vu, it’s the happy kind. Well, happy and horrifying.

Moviegoers would much rather be reminded of Ridley Scott and James Cameron’s respective “Alien” and “Aliens” — one of the greatest sequels ever made — than “Resurrection” or, perish the thought, “Aliens vs. Predator: Requiem.”

Álvarez’s gripping film, which is set in between the first two movies, goes back to the franchise’s basics — isolation, paranoia, survival, tactile creatures — instead of expounding upon extraterrestrial mythology that became increasingly unwieldy, confusing and, frankly, beside the point. 

And unlike the duo of “AVP” flicks, “Romulus” is not the dumbest thing you have ever seen. In fact, it’s one of the long-running franchise’s better entries.

The supervillain is, as ever, corporate greed. 

At the start, we watch as scientists from the Weyland-Yutani Corporation, a k a “The Company,” retrieve the body of the alien that Ripley blasted out into space at the end of the original in order to study it. 

We all know what a bum decision that’ll turn out to be. 

The story then commences on a smoky mining colony run by Weyland, which only allows residents to leave after completing an impossibly grueling number of work hours. 

Rain (Cailee Spaeny) has had enough. She wants to escape to the beautiful planet Yvaga III with her young friends and see the sun for the first time.

Instead, she will see onyx killing machines that look like angry miniature whales with teeth.

Nevertheless, the group sneaks a vessel into orbit en route to their new home.

First, though, they must steal some cryosleep chambers from an abandoned space station nearby. They require the devices because the journey to Yvaga takes nine years, and the pods make a claustrophobic decade with limited food feel like a groggy nap. 

But, tale as old as time, the station has not so much been deserted as devoured. The Company was studying the species there, with the help of the first film’s shifty android Rook (Ian Holm), and was overtaken. 

Now Rain and Co. have to fight to get out alive.

Álvarez and co-writer Rodo Sayagues shrewdly introduce us to each character with just enough detail to flesh them out without dragging the accelerating pace.

Tyler (Archie Renaux) is the golden boy, Bjorn (Spike Fearn) is a jackass, Kay (Isabela Merced) is secretly pregnant, Navarro (Aileen Wu) is no-nonsense and Andy (David Jonsson, the film’s best performance) is Rain’s android friend who has a complex sense of self.

“Romulus” follows the small-medium-large path of most “Alien” movies — starting with face-huggers and ending with a big baddie. It borrows the shabby-computer aesthetic of the ’79 flick while upping the ante with haunting grandeur.

There are jump scares throughout, but not the cheap sort. 

The bonkers ending will be a talker. At first, I was skeptical, segued to disturbed, and then thoroughly creeped out. It’s a wild choice, however, one with a hint of precedent elsewhere in the series. And it serves to differentiate what is, admirably, a highly deferential film.

In that spirit, the writer-director doesn’t try to craft a new Ripley in Rain. Unlike Sigourney Weaver, Spaeny (the star of “Priscilla”) is not a shouter; the veins don’t pop out of her neck. Plus, the character is not set up as the aliens’ ultimate foe. Rather, she’s a girl doing whatever it takes to ensure a better life.

Because of that, it’s hard to imagine “Romulus” as the kickoff to a new subseries of films starring Rain.

That said, those who bet against the aliens usually wind up dead.