'Alien: Romulus' movie review: Familiar sci-fi squirms get a sheen of freshness

If you were unnerved by Ridley Scott’s claustrophobic terror in 1979's “Alien,” gird your sci-fi loins for the new “Alien: Romulus.” There’s a smattering of old favorite foes, some needed newness and a giddy commitment to the scary stuff.

Co-writer/director Fede Alvarez (“Don’t Breathe”) clearly loves the original and James Cameron’s action-packed 1986 sequel “Aliens.” The latest franchise installment (★★★ out of four; rated R; in theaters Friday) is set between those two earlier standouts and crafts a narrative pitting a crew of youngsters vs. assorted deadly creatures running amok. (Not a spoiler: There is a healthy body count.) The filmmaker embraces unpredictability and plenty of gore for his graphic spectacle, yet Alvarez first makes us care for his main characters before unleashing sheer terror.

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Rain Carradine (Cailee Spaeny) and her android “brother” Andy (David Jonsson) work on a mining colony in space run by the extremely shady Weyland-Yutani Corporation. Rain’s parents, and many others, have died as part of this hellish existence, and Rain dreams of living one day on a pastoral planet far away. When her travel request to go off world is rejected and hard labor is the only thing she has to look forward to, she joins her ex Tyler (Archie Renaux), his sister Kay (Isabela Merced) and friends Bjorn (Spike Fearn) and Navarro (Aileen Wu) in an ambitious getaway plan.

A recently discovered decommissioned space station has the cryo pods they need to survive a years-long trek to their ideal home. With their spaceship (because kids have personal spaceships apparently), the explorers go plundering the abandoned vessel and find the pods don't have enough fuel for the journey. In the process of seeking extra fuel, they also find an army of Facehuggers, which have a tendency to implant monstrosities in people that birth in the most heinous ways possible. (They’re not called “Chestbursters” for nothing, folks.)

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And of course, bigger problems arise as well – you can’t have an “Alien” movie without a Xenomorph, the best of the worst – leading to the dwindling survivors doing what they can to avoid getting ripped open via sinister beastie.

“Romulus” begins with an interesting “Blade Runner” vibe before borrowing from the franchise’s greatest hits, from notable quotes to archetypal personalities. It’s also a pretty straightforward plot – it’s an “Alien” movie, so you do want to stick to what works. Alvarez amps up the horror quotient a lot, with the freakiest atmosphere since the ’79 classic, and it smartly engages with the rules of the previous “Alien” films (for example, Xenomorph blood being crazy acidic) while adding a few fresh aspects to the formula.

Some of the characters are human fodder who die in the gnarliest ways possible but Merced has an intriguing role (it's best if you don't know too much beforehand) and Spaeny gamely fills Sigourney Weaver’s signature slot of Woman Most Likely to Throw Down with a Xenomorph. She’s no Ripley but Rain has her own swagger.

And Jonsson, who was fantastic in the underrated rom-com “Rye Lane,” gives a riveting humanness to a “synthetic” bullied by those prejudiced against his artificial kind, navigating a character arc that bounces between complicating and helping the heroes’ predicament.

As he did with 2013's "Evil Dead," Alvarez is keeping an old-school chiller alive for a new generation. He's added an intriguing chapter to the “Alien” mythos, one that’s better than many of the later films, especially the prequels like 2012's “Prometheus” that waded too far into big-picture concepts and away from “Hey, watch out for the Xenomorph.”

It’s a requel of sorts like “Halloween,” bridging the first two franchise outings while carving its own path, yet knowing exactly what makes an “Alien” movie tick: In space, nobody can hear you scream, but Alvarez understands all too well how to make you squirm.