Warning! Spoilers ahead for Alien: Romulus, including the ending.
Summary
Alien: Romulusdirector Fede Alvarez confirms who the father of Kay’s baby is and the subtle hint regarding his identity in the film. Serving as the seventh installment in the long-runningAlienfranchise, Alvarez’s new sci-fi horror film follows a young crew of spacefarers as they encounter a Xenomorph aboard a rundown space station. Cailee Spaeny leads theAlien: Romuluscastas Rain, with other actors including David Jonsson, Archie Renaux, and Spike Fearn. Isabela Merced also stars as the pregnant Kay, with the film never explicitely revealing who the baby’s father is.
Responding to a recent theory from u/Noraodel onReddit,Alvarez confirms that Fearn’s Bjorn was indeed the father of Kay’s baby. “Right before Bjorn’s death, he and Kay share a moment where they touch each other in a very intimate way. Am I the only one who thought this was a sign that Bjorn is the “jerk” who got her pregnant?”, the user asks.
“Yes he is. Good catch!” comments Alvarez, affirming not only the father’s identity but the film’s subtle way of communicating this to audiences through a brief moment of physical contact.
Motherhood Has Been Key To The Alien Franchise
From Ridley Scott’s seminal 1979 film,pregnancy and motherhood have been two major recurring themes of theAlienfranchise. Xenomorph’s are born, after all, by facehuggers latching onto victims and “impregnating” them. The incubation period is remarkably short and far more violent than with human births, however, as a chestburster promptly crunches its way out of its victim before maturing quickly into a fully grown Xenomorph.
Alien: Romulus’ New Xenomorph Explained: Origin, Differences, & Future
Alien: Romulus introduces a new Xenomorph to the long-running franchise, and it’s one of the most frightening additions to the series in ages.
These themes are a part of essentiallyeveryAlienmovieto some degree, and they are explored both in the relationships between human characters (Ripley and Newt inAliens) and in the relationship between humans and aliens (Shaw’s alien pregnancy inPrometheus.) The franchise’s interest in pregnancy and its dark history of who becomes impregnated and with what essentially meant thatKay’s pregnancy, from its first introduction inAlien: Romulus, was a Chekov’s gun of sorts that would come back to haunt her.
Chekov’s Gun is a storytelling device in which an element is introduced as something seemingly innocuous at first that becomes crucial to the story later on. A common example is that of a shotgun mounted on the wall. If this shotgun is introduced in the first act, the Chekov’s Gun principle dictates that this gun will be fired in the third act.
While Kay’s pregnancy also raises the stakes and immediately creates empathy for that character, it’s a given that some kind of birth will eventually take place. As is in keeping with the franchise’s themes and history with pregnancy, theAlien: Romulus' endingsees Kay, after injecting herself with black goo, give birth to a terrifying Xenomorph hybrid known as the Offspring. Kay’sAlien: Romuluspregnancy storyline serves as further proof that any pregnancy in anAlienmovie is probably going to be bad news.
Alien: Romulus
Cast
Alien: Romulus is the seventh film in the Alien franchise. The movie is directed by Fede Álvarez and will focus on a new young group of characters who come face to face with the terrifying Xenomorphs. Alien: Romulus is a stand-alone film and takes place in a time not yet explored in the Alien franchise.
