If the reviews are to be believed, and they should be because we wrote it, Alien: Covenant is not a good movie, and is definitely not the space horror film you thought you were getting. However, that probably won’t stop the box office from being good, and it definitely won’t stop the studio from abusing the brand some more. In fact they’re going to do it quite quickly. Ridley Scott has said that the sequel will start filming within the next 14 months and they’re working on the script now.
This, of course, was always the plan. The Alien franchise was turning into a universe after Prometheus, got all weird with it. Eventually the new films will connect with the old ones, bringing us full circle in some way. Of course if the movies keep on being so controversial I’m not sure any of us are going to stick around for that.