This Character from 'Prometheus' Changes the 'Alien' in 'Covenant'

Humanity’s run-ins with Xenomorphs have never ended well, but it turns out there’s more in common between our two species than anyone ever thought possible, according to some newly previewed scenes from the upcoming Alien: Covenant.

This post might contain spoilers for the upcoming Alien: Covenant.

Ridley Scott hosted a screening of the original 1979 Alien on the opening night of South by Southwest in Austin, Texas. The showing was abruptly followed by 3 clips — totalling about 20 minutes of footage — from Covenant, the sixth film in the Alien franchise and the sequel to 2012’s Prometheus. The clips revealed that Covenant may tie up the frayed strings between its predecessor and the original Alien film, answering the question about how the titular Alien came to be once and for all.

The third and final preview clip shown at SXSW shows Michael Fassbender’s David leading Christopher Oram (Billy Crudup) through his personal workshop. It turns out David, who was originally introduced in Prometheus as the sole survivor of the film’s expedition, has been genetically engineering different versions of the Aliens he discovered during that film. He’s just been waiting for “one final puzzle piece,” according to The Verge, to complete his studies.

So, David created the blood-curdling Alien from the original film.

This small but vital bit of information reveals that humanity created its own destruction. Alien and Aliens — the first two films in the franchise — center heavily around humanity trying to harness the unknown for personal gain. The Alien, naturally, does what it does best by killing people in the bloodiest, most carnal ways possible, and humanity’s attempts at controlling the Alien are thwarted.

But it turns out that all that death and destruction came from the creations of humanity’s own creation: a highly intelligent android named David. An artificial intelligence of humanity’s own making decided to play around with the genetics of aliens, and if that’s not a “heads up” about a potentially dark future, then nothing is.

Alien: Covenant premieres on May 19.