Movie Review: Alien Resurrection

Alien: Resurrection [1997] 

I review an Alien movie every Halloween, although I missed last year since it was Resident Evil month for 2022. Despite everyone telling me that the third and fourth movies in the franchise are terrible, I actually found Alien 3 to be... well, it's not as good as the others, but I would say that it's an 'all right' movie, so long as you're watching the director's cut. 

Then there's this movie. 

I'm honestly not sure where to begin with this one, so I'll just quickly detail the plot of the movie. After the events of Alien 3, two hundred years later a bunch of military scientists clone Ripley a bunch of times (somehow they got her DNA despite her jumping into molten metal) in order to extract the Xenomorph queen within her body. They study and breed the new queen in the USM Auriga, and a bunch of mercenaries arrive to deliver a bunch of kidnapped humans, which the Auriga crew use to breed the Xenomorphs. 

Among the mercenary crew, one of their members, Call (Winona Ryder), start to investigate Ripley and seems to know more than she lets on, eventually getting close enough to kill her. Ripley (or, rather, 'Number Eight') reveals that she has xenomorph DNA and blood, having fused with xenomorph DNA during the cloning process. Of course, this being an Alien movie, the aliens break free, kill a lot of the crew on board the Auriga, and the survivors of both the military crew and the mercenaries have to kill all the Aliens before the ship goes on its automated course back to Earth. 

Call reveals herself to be an "auton", a type of synthetic android with human feelings, who's trying her best to kill all the xenomorphs to protect humankind. Ripley 8 gets caught by xenomorphs just long enough to witness the Queen giving birth into a human-xenomorph hybrid, who ends up being the final villain that stalks our heroes into their escape ship. The Newborn actually thinks Ripley is its mommy, but is utterly murderous to everything else. Most of the characters die, Ripley and Call kill the hybrid, and very brutally kill it by shoving it into space.

There are some pretty decent showings in this movie, I will admit. Ryder's character Call is surprisingly compelling and easily the best part of the movie. And Sigourney Weaver playing Ripley Eight as someone who gives absolutely no fucks is admittedly pretty entertaining as well. There's a vague theme of... being human? Or something? Ripley Eight and Call have a well-acted conversation about it, in any case. Members of the mercenary crew like Vriess and Christie are significantly more memorable than the lackluster side-characters of Alien 3, too. And between the swimming aliens, the back-to-back climbing scene and the little eggs-as-traps scene, they do get a bunch of neat action scenes. I also do like the rather ridiculous 'button' scene with the two Xenomorphs in a room. 

But then the one feeling I had when coming out of this movie is... "ew, it's gross". Not scary, not disturbing, just... gross. And I'm not sure what really turned me off of this movie, because the first half of the movie is all right. A bit odd due to the amount of comedy (the military staff really are chewing the scenery) but it's mostly all right. And there's the room full of utterly wrong Ripley-Alien hybrid mash-ups, including a still-living clone that begs for Eight to kill her. That one was actually disturbing and if it had been toned down a bit, I would actually say that it's effective.

But then we've got the scene of Ripley being embraced by a lot of aliens as she falls down the grates. Or the extended scene of the Alien Queen giving birth from an oversized womb -- which apparently was 'Ripley's gift to her'. It's pretty gross and I honestly don't quite understand the specifics of how the Queen managed to make a bunch of regular Xenomorphs but then decided to... give birth to the Newborn just this one time? Or the general pathetic look of the Newborn human-alien hybrid in general... There are some shots where the Newborn's bizarre skull-face does look pretty sad and pathetic, but for the most part it just looks kind of gross. And let's not get to the overly long scene where it dies, which feels unnecessarily long and goes from 'oh man, it's disturbing, the creature is in terrible pain' to just 'okay, I get it?' I don't know. There's a lot of attempts to show imagery that symbolize birth or whatever, but unlike the original Xenomorph design or even things like the Facehuggers and Chestbursters and that weird octo-thing from Prometheus, the imagery in this movie just feel like they're here to gross you out. And, well, they sure succeeded in that regard. 

There's also the scene where the 'obviously he's going to die at some point' infected man Purvis ends up somehow able to flail around and wrestle the evil Dr. Wren and weaponize the Chestburster coming out of his chest to lance through Wren's skull. It's actually so over-the-top that it ends up being hilarious. 

Anyway, this movie. It's not actually entirely terrible, and there were some decent parts of it -- I did like the mercenary crew and their dynamic, for what it's worth. It's just that the general idea of a human-alien hybrid or a Ripley clone are all just kind of tossed into a blender and the movie just sort of shrugs about it, resulting in a movie that, again, ends up just feeling kind of messy. If I wasn't so grossed out by the Newborn, I might actually have better things to say about this movie. The action scenes are neat, and the actors had a pretty fun time. But the vibe of the main plot with the hybrid aliens and telepathic Ripley really didn't do it for me. 

As it is... eh? I'm not surprised that the movie series basically went into hiatus after this and went on and on to do spinoffs and prequels that, while ending up being more action-oriented, at least isn't full of over-the-top attempts at imagery like this one. I know this movie probably has fans out there, but as it stands, it's not my favourite Alien movie by far. 

Reviewing Monsters: Resident Evil 4 [Remake, 2023]

Resident Evil 4 Remake [2023]

So it's going to be quite some time before I actually play through the remake of Resident Evil 4. I am pleased to say that apparently the dseign team took the criticisms of Resident Evil 3 severely gimping the original game and cutting things out and promised that "nothing will be removed" from the far more iconic and well-known Resident Evil 4. And... to be frank, I'm excited about this game but I'm also a little bit terrified that it won't live up to my expectations. Resident Evil 4 is my favourite Resident Evil game of all time, and ranks up very, very high as one of my favourite games period, which is why I'm taking time to... well, basically 'prepare' myself for this game. I am happy to hear that the game is as universally beloved as the original that it's remaking, which gives me hope. 

That, and I've like a half-dozen other games to get through, and Steam refuses to put this game on sale. 

But I'm very much willing to see the designs of these monsters, and it's fun to see that all of the old favourites are back, including some new wacky additions to the Plaga family! I've already covered the original Resident Evil 4 way back when, so for the sake of not repeating myself too much I'll try to blaze through some of the enemies that didn't change too much in the HD-fication. 

Plaga

One of the biggest upgrades, I felt, are the actual Plaga parasites. The 2005 game clearly has some models for them, but they were rather simple and a bit lacking of detailing, relying more on supplementary artwork as well as the horror of these things bursting out of people's heads to be scary. But compared to the four-legged designs of the original RE4, the remake version goes all-in on the Alien Facehugger homage, giving the new Plaga parasites eight legs with some webbing on the most proximal end. In addition, the 'tail'-like body of the Plagas' body doesn't just trail behind it, but now curve upwards and point forwards like a scorpion. Several generations of video game graphics improvement have also made the little trailing tentacles and vines look a bit more nasty, especially if you imagine them using those tendrils to infiltrate someone's internal organs. 

I don't know if the remake still uses the original RE4 canon's division of 'eusocial' and 'dominant' Plagas, which I think is one of the biggest appeals of the remake for me -- that we'll get the RE2/RE3-remake or RE7/RE8 level of notes and information scattered in the overworld about the Plagas and the Los Illuminados cult. 

Again, it's always such a fun twist in RE4 for our hero Leon S. Kennedy as he tries to figure out the horror of these brand-new zombie-like creatures. How they are seemingly happy to be subservient to the Los Illuminados cult, and how the local villagers are still going on their day-to-day lives until the parasites decide to take over. It's something rather similar with certain types of parasitoids in real life where the host animal looks and acts fine -- or just a bit off -- like a snail infected with Leucochloridium or ants infected with Ophiocordyceps having some behaviour alteration of them moving into places where it'll benefit the parasite. 

Again, I'll update this review whenever I get to playing the RE4 remake, which could be anywhere between next month or next year. But rest assured, I'm definitely happy to see this massive visual upgrade that makes the lowly Plagas parasite look so much more sinister even though they didn't really change too much from the original. 

Ganado
The Ganado ('cattle') are still the primary enemy of the game, and they're still just Spanish villagers or psychotic castle-dwelling cultists with medieval weapons. Again, I don't have a whole ton to say about these the first time around, and I don't have much to say here other than the fact that they're the common enemies that chant more or less the same couple of phrases. Can't really say much about humanoid enemies, though the cultists look rather sinister. 

Apparently one of the improved parts of the remake is how sinsiter the 'cult' part of the game's setting is expanded, which I'm looking fowrard to talking about more whenever I play the game. 

Desnucado

One thing that I enjoy the most about the update in the RE4 remake is the expansion of the 'mutated' Ganados, where they are just called "Plaga A, Plaga B and Plaga C" in the original game's ancillary material. Here, we've got a bunch more stages and some fun names for them, like Desnucado ("broken neck" in Spanish), an intermediary stage between the regular 'human with parasite' Ganado to the more extreme mutations before. 

The Desnucado are mutations that happen on a Ganado after suffering fatal injuries. But the fact that the pain tolerance of these infected humans have increased, and they're being pupeteered by a powerful parasite, means that they can still shamble with a fatal wound -- and as the name and picture shows, this fatal wound is almost always a neck wound as the Desnucado walks towarsd leon with the head hanging broken and lolling on the side. Little tentacles of the internal Las Plagas parasite can be seen inside, and the end result is a nice, ghoulish addition that help sell another 'zombie' trope. 

Guadaña

Essentially the 'Plaga A' of the original game with some traits of 'Plaga C' is the Guadaña, meaning 'scythe' in Spanish. As per the original, the head burst open and has turned into a giant meat-tentacle of flesh tipped with a scythe... which here is much more obviously made out of bone. As in, the host's bones mutated and transformed into a bludgeon to defend the parasite within. The original game's artwork is a bit more ambiguous on whether that spiky tip are chitin from the Plagas' anatomy, but here there's an extra bit of squickiness when you realize that to make the scythe appendage, the Plagas probably is ripping apart the poor sod and rearranging the bones to make that blade. 

Originally I was about to bemoan that we lost the two almost comical snail eyeballs on the original game's "Plaga A"... until I realized that the eyeballs are still there. They're just nasty and creepily embedded into the mass of flesh sprouting out of the Guadaña's neck, looking somewhat like William Birkin's monstrous "G" forms. 

Mandíbula

The equivalents to 'Plaga B' in the original game are the Mandíbula (obviously, Spanish for 'mandible'), whose heads are replaced with gigantic masses of Plaga tissue that open up in a giant flower-shaped mouth, similar to the Majini from Resident Evil 5. Just like the Plaga B from the original game, the Mandíbula are have an instant-kill grapple attack where they grab Leon's head and try to force it into the giant mouth. They also gain an acid-spitting attack, though I don't 100% remember if the original Plaga B was able to do this or not. I think they could?

Anyway, I absolutely love the look of the Mandíbula. I honestly really just like the giant splayed-out four-petaled mouth look in general, which was what really endeared me to Resident Evil when I was first exposed to this franchise in the first place. 

Araña

And the final form of the evolution is the Araña (Spanish for 'spider'), which replaces Plaga C -- who normally take the form of an entire Facehugger replacing the head of their victim. Instead, the Plaga bursts out from the back of the poor Ganado's head, with its spidery claws and tentacles whiplashing around menacingly. The end result makes it look a bit more distinct compared to the Mandíbula/Plaga B, and it makes full use of the remake's far more detailed and menacing model for the Plaga parasites. 

I don't know how far they're planning to do the remakes, but these also remind me of the J'avo parasites from Resident Evil 6! The Araña can spit acid, and upon the death of their host, they can scuttle around and attack Leon like funny little Facehuggers... something that the original Plaga C could also do. The Araña is much stronger when controlling its host, and becomes severely weakened when detached from their hosts... again, a nice little nod to how some real-life obligate parasites can survive outside of their host... but not for long. Thus, detached Araña can jump and latch onto the back of lesser Ganado, hijacking them with their tendrils... though being parasitized by two Plagas at the same time often drives these Ganado into a frenzy. 

Brute

Replacing the generic bigger men with hammers in the original game are these far more sinister Brutes. Taking the 'Ganado' epithet rather literally, these Brutes walk around with giant cow heads covering their heads. They could be masks, but it's far more likely for these psychopaths to butcher the local cows and use them as masks. These are obviously just big, stronger people, and there are several variants -- some wielding large hammers and some wielding an auto-repeating crossbow (replacing the 'Gatling Man' miniboss in the original). I do like this little change, it makes the Los Illuminados feel more like a psychotic cult. 

Chainsaw Man, Giant Chainsaw Man, Chainsaw Sisters

Chainsaw Man's back! So are the Chainsaw Sisters! They're joined with a 'giant' variant wielding a double-bladed chainsaw! I assume that they still serve as minibosses that menace you through the game. Love that they have creepier head-wrappings. The eyes of the Chainsaw Man in particular looks a bit more sinister since the holes on his bag-mask are a bit bigger, while Giant Chainsaw Man's got a creepy clown face drawn on his bag. 

Colmillos

Oh yeah, the Colmillos ("Fangs") are so much more grislier in the remake! The base wolf form now looks hideously mutated, with gigantic fangs and teeth that are way too large for the gums and mouth, making them look unnatural even before they blow apart into gigantic tentacles. And when they do, it's not just like five tentacles as in the original game, but a mass of... well, you can see that it's like a bunch of intestines, tentacles and bone-spikes out of their body. It's a bit more over-the-top compared to the original game's Colmillos, but I appreciate the additional grotesqueness. 

Armadura

Armadura ("Armour") also make a return, and the added definition to the Plaga parasite tentacles make these things a lot more grislier as opposed to being comical. Just look at that mass of tentacles just pushing the helmet slightly ajar. The remake canonizes some additional explanation that's only told to us in supplementary material in the original game, noting that Plagas (presumably Arana) that have lost their hosts will inhabit these armoured suits, remaining dormant and stretching out their tentacles to manipulate the suit of armour when needed. That's a nice little detail, and helps to make the Armadura make a bit more sense in the context of this game. 

It also makes sense to explain why some Armadura are able to move around and chase Leon and Ashley, while some fall apart after swinging their weapon once -- those are presumably the ones where the Plagas are already on their last legs. 

Garrador

Oh yeah. Y'know I really don't have too much to say about a lot of these enemies, since for the most part the RE4 remake is extremely faithful to the original. Garrador ("Clawer") is a bit more heavier-set than his original RE4 counterpart, and he's got a lot more chains hanging off of his neck and arms to symbolize the whole 'beast locked up until he's let loose', but so many of the Garrador's important aspects are retained here. The over-the-top gigantic Wolverine claws, the torture gimp mask, the exposed Plaga on his back... I guess the fact that the Garrador's eyes are sown shut is a bit more obvious in this incarnation with the higher detailing!

Regenerator

Apparently called 'Regenerator' instead of Regenerador this time around, I always consider these guys to be one of the creepiest enemies in the original RE4. The others were more 'cool' or 'icky', but the Regenerator is always one that struck me as 'oh fuck this is unsettling. And with visible, beady creepy eyes and a model that really makes this thing look like a walking bodysuit instead of just a white humanoid makes the Regenerator somehow so much creepier. Look at that slightly slouched gait, and the rubbery skin, and the lumps on his feet. It's meant to represent how the constant high-speed regeneration has given them some rather cancerous-looking lumps. 

It's a couple small changes, but it does help fix my complaint about the original Regenerador -- it relies more on ambience, setting, its heavy breathing and the sheer indestructability for them to be scary. And kudos to the original game for doing that. I'm also happy that the RE4 remake understands this and didn't make the new Regenerator as over-the-top as something like the Rasklapanje, but changes just enough to make the Regenerator look terrifying on sight. Just like the original game, you need to hunt down the 'cores' wiggling within the Regenerator and shoot them to stop the corpse from constantly regenerating. 

Iron Maiden
The spikes for Iron Maiden are far longer than their original version, and I love just how tortured their face looks with the added definition and pixels. Taking a cue from the lesser Plagas minions, however, the designers decided to actually do the smart thing and straight-up make the Iron Maiden as 'evolved' Regenerators the way that the Guanadas and Aranas are 'mature versions' of the Ganados. It folds two 'repaint' enemies into a single species. Not too much to say here, they sure do look painful!

Novistadores

Novistadores are back! The actual design of the Novistadores ("Unseener") didn't really change all that much, surprisingly. Sure, we've got more joints and more grimy detailing on their bodies, and some extra spiky antennae, but the Novistadores look remarkably similar to the PS2 models from almost 20 years ago. Which really does speak to how well that game's design is, really! They still go invisible and still swarm and fly around and attack you as giant monstrous bug-men, but the remake actually offers some explanation as to why there's a nest of monstrous cockroach-people in the castle. 

The Novistadores are now given the codename "U-II", marking the Novistadores as the previous incarnation of the U-3 boss! That's a nice sense of continuity! And it's now specifically noted that the Novistadores are former humans, being an "experimental application" of Plagas/human fusion with insectoid genes. I've always enjoyed the Novistadores, and considering how much of RE3 they butchered, I was worried they'd cut out the bug-men that frankly don't have much to do with the Plagas plot. But I'm happy that they kept the cockroach-men around, but also even integrated them into the storyline. 

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Del Lago

Bosses, now! I really do think that these are going to be pretty short, since I'm going off of their visual appearances only. Del Lago ("From the Lake") gets a much nastier-looking upgrade than I expected, with its salamander maw turning from being rather stretched-out into a monstrous, multi-fanged lamprey. It's also got more defined rear legs, and the Plaga tentacles now don't just sprout from Del Lago's mouth but also trail behind it.

I've always loved Del Lago for being such an impressive set-piece and being such a visually intimidating and impressive giant boss, and we still even get to fight Del Lago on top of a boat! 

El Gigante

El Gigante ("The Giant") gets to be a fair bit more mutated, being a bit more exaggerated in being a giant LOTR troll. The artwork here also makes the giant parasite sprouting of Gigante's back a bit more obvious. But... I really othrewise don't have much to say about him. 

Father Bitores Mendez

Oh! Father Mendez! I think I like the almost zombie-like, exaggerated look of the original Mendez better, but it's really just nitpicking about the art style difference more than anything. Of course, just like the original game, Mendez would eventually be transformed by the Plagas and I love the update here. I don't know how many times I can repeat this, but we keep all of the important parts of the design -- the fact that his legs still look human, that his spine has turned into a fucking centipede, and that the upper body is a combination of his human torso and head, as well as a bunch of giant bug-parts. Just like the upgraded Plagas, Mendez's claws look a lot more like the jointed legs of an arthropod mixed with sinew, and I think the points of connection of the 'centipede spine' with Mendez's upper body looks so much grislier in this incarnation. 

Verdugo

I really don't think they changed a lot of the Verdugo's design, other than the obvious addition of extra details and more pixels. The upper body looks a bit bulkier and the tail segments have some extra grooves, but that's about it. The Verdugo ("Executioner") being bizarre Sith-looking armoured bug-men have always been pretty cool to me. Interestingly, the Verdugo are also given the codename "U-III" in the remake, which means that the original "U-3" (which still shows up) is a mutated, imperfect strain of this one? 

Ramon Salazar

Probably the biggest change is that Ramon Salazar now gets changed from being a literal man-child into a short, stunted old man that wouldn't look out of place among the cast of Resident Evil VIII: Village. He looks like a lunatic, but it's also rather interesting that his lack of growth seems to be because of the Plagas? The remake adds a lot more to the Salazar family and whatnot which we won't really cover here, even after I play the game... but it's also very nice to see that all the named characters get a fair bit of expansion. 

As with the original game, Salazar merges with the Queen Plagas into his gigantic boss form, and unlike most remake bosses, I can actually tell what's going on with Queen Plagas a lot better than the original. Most of the details are still preserved, but it's a bit more clear that it's a giant flower with Salazar sticking out of it. The original Salazar has always been one of the more underwhelming designs in the game (though the boss fight is fun), and while my mileage may vary when I play through the game myself, from a visual standpoint I do like this one a fair bit more. 

U-III "Pesanta"

The original game's U-3 enemy is now given the alternate name "Pesanta", or Spanish for peasant. The design is still the same with the original one and is as disturbing as the original, although the monstrous scorpion-tail-bug-mouth part gets way more parts and detailing to make it clear that it's a nightmarish amalgamation of random zombie parts. I love the fact that the giant monster mouth is actually made up of a bunch of skulls. The Pesanta's new arms also make it resemble a Verdugo a lot more, and since the remake also calls the Verdugo as a 'U-III', I guess 'Pesanta' here is a particularly evolved Verdugo... and the Verdugo's giant clawed arms does look far more threatening than the otherwise human hands that the original U-3 has. The Pesanta also has inherited the original Verdugos' face-mask thing, which makes the tongue a bit less gross... but the tongue is still there. 

U-III Pesanta in this game appears in Ada Wong's campaign in this version -- basically, while every detail from the original game is maintained, some pathways are now only explored by Ada Wong. And as such, U-III gets a backstory... he's actually Salazar's housekeeper, who was experimented upon and transformed into this hideous monster. U-III actually spends most of the game as one of the two Verdugo, and only mutates into this Pesanta form after a typical Resident Evil 'last-ditch mutation after nearly being killed'. 

Martinico

Martinico ("ghost") is the only real new enemy here, also only fought in the Ada Wong campaign. He's a particularly deformed test subject for the Los Illuminados, but is extremely powerful so the cult keeps him in one place. There are some nice detailing here like the hideously large maw, but he's otherwise just a big brute with chains... not the most exciting addition to the Los Illuminados family, I'm afraid. 

Major Jack Krauser

Jack Krauser! I... kinda forgot you're a boss fight, actually. But he sure gets a revamped backstory with Leon, and it's kind of interesting that he gets probably one of the most drastic reimagining. The original game's Krauser's monster form just has him replace one arm with an admittedly cool Plagas blade, but it really did feel kind of underwhelming, especially for a boss fight that happens so late in the game. While I appreciate Krauser not transforming into an over-the-top blob monster like U-III, Salazar or Saddler, I kind of expected more. 

The remake gives us something a bit nicer, where Krauser keeps 90% of his body, but both his arms have transformed into blades or crab claws, and those are really large claws. I like that his arms are a bit mottled from the Plagas mutation, but otherwise he still feels like he's intelligent and human underneath all that. 

Osmund Saddler

And we come to the final boss, Osmund Saddler, the lord of the Los Illuminados cult. Saddler's Plagas staff has gotten a massive upgrade to look more ragged and nasty, with multiple tentacles thrashing and squirming on it. I'll have to play through the game to experience how much they've upgraded his story component, but his boss form most certainly is improved a lot compared to the original. I've always liked the idea that Saddler's body is still hanging on the bottom of this monstrous form, but the original design had the limbs be a bit too spindly and the end spider-crab creature feels a bit ... underwhelming? 

The remake improves on this in almost all aspects, while still keeping the spiny 'hands' and the eyeballs on the legs, and even makes Saddler's detached head visible on the center of the monster form. The legs are far more armoured, and there seems to be a larger mass of tentacles and bones in the core of the figure, making it look less fragile. It ends up looking like a monster crab without actually having the silhouette of one. I like it. 

...and that's it! This is kind of a short little writeup for me to tie in to Halloween. And... I'm kind of pumped to play the remake, honestly, if nothing else just to see how much they improved the storytelling aspects of RE4. 

One Piece 1096 Review: We Built This City on Rock(s) and Roll

One Piece, Chapter 1096: Kumachi

This one came a bit later than usual for me. Bit hectic for me IRL, but this was also a very hectic chapter as well! So much shit happened in this chapter, and this is a chapter where the second half arguably didn't have much content to it after the God Valley conflict got off-screened and saved up for a later flashback. I do admit that we got a lot more than I thought we would be getting, though. 

The first two-page spread has all of the citizens of God Valley run around in terror. Or, as the Celestial Dragons refer to them, "Rabbits". An announcer talks about the killing bonus as the Celestial Dragons assemble around a throne, and we get some quick shots of Celestial Dragn facial designs. The ones we focus on -- presumably the God's Knights -- don't wear the stupid bubble helmets, though one guy does have a gas mask. We don't dwell on it much but people are being slaughtered left and right by the Celestial Dragons, even the children. 

Instead, we cut away to Marine HQ, where Kong is yelling at Garp and arguing about Garp's deployment. It's interesting that Garp is just chilling in some beach, refusing to go and help out the Celestial Dragons' "little field trip". It's a whole can of worms to unpack what good people like Garp and Sengoku are doing when the Celestial Dragons are enacting such heinous shit like their little rabbit hunt, and how they could justify it to themselves... but we haven't really seen the God Valley incident from Garp's side of things, so I'll reserve judgement. 

Garp did note that it's the Celestial Dragons' fault for "poking around Hachinosu", and how the Celestial Dragons apparently succeeded in stealing the "crown jewel of Pirate Island". Piecing things together, it does appear that the Celestial Dragons stole something precious, probably one of the Devil Fruits we see later in this chapter. And then Kong tells Garp that "Roger is coming", which gets Garp all a-flustered and immediately ready to deploy. 

There's a brief shot, interestingly, of other pirates on Hachinosu being pissed off that Rocks have sailed without them, so every other pirate also wants to protect whatever this enigmatic 'crown jewel' is. 

And we cut back to God Valley, with Ivankov giving a whole speech about how desperate their situation is. Celestial Dragons killing people wily-nily, Marine ships blockading the island, and Ivankov is also quick to dash Kuma's hopes with a harsh sense of realism -- there was no way that the Celestial Dragons would let any slave live, regardless of whether they survived the allotted 3 weeks or not. The false hope is just to make the 'rabbits' run faster and give them a more fun hunt.

We briefly see that jackass Garling run around stabbing people. A random shark Fishman frees Ivankov and the others from their chains, and Ginny is... a hacker. I guess she just happens to be that good? She manages to find out that the two prizes in the competition is the Uo Uo no Mi Fruit, Model Seiryu, as well as the Nikyu Nikyu no Mi. Ginny also reveals something far more impressive. She's a wiretapper, and she's leaked all this information to the outside world. Kuma briefly volunteers as decoy for the slaves there, and Ivankov is impressed by this... and vows to keep Kuma alive. 

Now obviously in the modern day, all the information about God Valley has been silenced by the government, but the implication is that Ginny was the reason Rocks and Roger knew to attack God Valley in the first place. 

But it's not just Rocks and Roger, oh no. They each bring in their own crews of all-stars. As Rocks and his fleet arrive, we get a wonderful large panel of all of Rocks' crew gathering. "Whitebeard" Edward Newgate, the future strongest man in the world. Buckingham Stussy, looking like her modern-day clone counterpart clinging on Whitebeard's sholder.  "Golden Lion" Shiki, dual-wielding swords as he makes his glorious canonical appearance. "Big Mom" Charlotte Linlin, holding Prometheus in one hand like a fireball. Gloriosa, Empress of the Kuja Tribe and a very unexpected addition to this crew. The drunkard Captain John. And choreboy Kaidou of the Beasts, still young and with legs that are proportional to his body. Plus two faces that the manga call attention to but didn't give dialogue, presumably Silver Axe and Wang Zhi/Ochoku, the other two names in the Rocks Pirates that we've heard name-dropped here and there. 

One notable exception? Rocks D. Xebec himself, the man who gathered all of these all-stars, who rushed on ahead so he doesn't get caught on screen.

But the rest of the Rocks crew, as advertised, don't work together cohesively as a unit at all. Whitebeard is just shit-talking Rocks for his yolo tactics. Stussy is simping all over Whitebeard and arguing with Gloriosa. John is just drinking. Shiki and Big Mom are both yelling about how they will claim victory. And Kaido's actually just casually being told to shut up and know his place as a rookie. 

And then the future Pirate King, Gol D. Roger, makes landfall on another part of the island. Accompanied by Silvers Rayleigh, Scopper Gaban, a viking-looking dwarf guy and a giant in the background -- people in his crew that have names but I can't be bothered to look them out -- they all charge in for their own fight. Love to see Roger still with the straw hat, since this all happens pre-Shanks, and I love the little banter that Scopper tells Roger that he's not allowed to use the captain card to call dibs. 

The God's Knights also deploy, with Garling showing up with a lady and some freak with a goat skull hat, about to protect the Celestial Dragons and trash-talking the Marines. 

And as the random generic Marines of the island despair... Vice Admiral Monkey D. Garp, the Fist, the Hero, who's going to fight all of the worst pirates of all time with his fists comes charging in with a small army of his own. Including Bogard! Bless Bogard, he did jack-all in present-day Hachinosu. 

...and that's the big hype panels. We cut to see Kuma, Ivankov and Ginny escape from their POV from this point onwards, and I have to be honest that this is kind of blueballing me a bit. But I do admit that it's a fair bit more than we otherwise would've gotten to see. Team Kuma uses this chaos to get to the prizes... and Kuma and Ivankov each have one of the prize Devil Fruits. 

Then Big Mom just pops up and slams Ivankov into the wall, and... doesn't exactly kill Ivankov, but at least reclaims that fruit. Ivankov has to be hell of durable to survive that slam, too, since Big Mom does already have insane giant-murdering strength. Kuma eats that fruit while Ivankov yells about the importance of at least being able to get people off of this island... and then Saint Jaygarcia Saturn shows up with his fucking Sith-Force powers, mocking Kuma for his Buccaneer blood. Kuma gives an epic comeback about how 'are you born important', then pisses Saturn the fuck off by stating that he's going to rescue people just like Nika. 

And just as Saturn gets a death-glare, Roger and Rocks clash in the background... we cut away to several days after God Valley. At least with the Paw-Paw Fruit it's not too hard to imagine how Kuma and his allies got away safely, but the clash between Rocks, Roger, Garp and Garling all have to wait for the future, I suppose. 

Kuma, Ivankov and Ginny have moved over to the Sorbet Kingdom, with sweet Kuma still praying in a church about how he thought he could've saved much more people in God Valley... in a nice contrast to how none are even supposed to be alive. Ivankov told Kuma he saved a total of 500 people... a drop of water compared to the 10,000 in the country, but still exponentially more than "none shall survive". Ivankov bids farewell to Kuma and Ginny, heading off to sea to return to his kingdom for some hijinks, one would presume. 

And the last two pages could just be summarized by Kuma and Ginny just... just living peacefully. Cutting wood, getting into fights with bullies, curing bullies... and they just share a meal with each other and cry in joy. It's kind of an abrupt ending, and one that's jarringly happy-go-lucky. We also get the all-but-explicitly-said confirmation that Ginny is Bonney's mom with Kuma calling her a "Big Eater". But we all know things aren't going to be happy for ol' Kumachi for too long, huh? This might be the end of God Valley for now, but I really don't think it's the end for Kuma's suffering in the flashbacks... 

Random Notes:

• Among the nameless generics in the Rocks crew panel, there are 4 or 5 unidentified, unnamed people. And in the background just above Whitebeard's head is a guy with Wolverine claws. We do know Blackbeard uses Wolverine claws, so maybe this is Blackbeard's dad?
• The first two-page spread name-drops another Celestial Dragon family, the Mannmeyers.
• Between the four designs we see in the hunting spread and the two that hang out with Garling, we actually are starting to fill in the designs for the God's Knights. Assuming, of course, all these guys without astronaut helmets are all God's Knights, and they're all active to this day. 
• This is a 'big year' for Kong, huh? After being MIA for so long, he shows up in the edges of the credit maps for the Netflix One Piece. And now he's in a single panel yelling at Garp!
• There is a nice little hourglass plot as Garp is in the past yelling at Kong about how stupid it is for someone to 'poke around Hachinosu', because you'll get stung, but in the present day he's the one poking around Hachinosu to rescue Koby. 
• The 'Rabbits' all have targets on their shirts, which just really adds to the fucked-up dehumanization going on in here.
• This isn't the first bloody competition with Devil Fruits on the line. Did Doflamingo model his Mera Mera no Mi tournament on these purging Celestial Dragon hunts?
• How cool is it to see Shiki finally show up outside of generic tie-in mentions to Strong World? It's so nice to see him properly acknowledged as a canon character instead of this weird-ass limbo that he normally finds himself in. 
• So Shakky isn't part of the Rocks Pirates as the fandom had speculated for the last couple of years, with the recent revelation that she's the captain of the Kuja Pirates... but another old Kuja Pirate turns out to be a member all along! Gloriosa is Granny Nyon from the Amazon Lily arc... I don't really know how I feel about this. To be honest I don't really care about either of the characters, but it's nice to have the confirmation.
• Could you imagine dragon Ivankov in the timeline where he eats the fruit instead of monologuing? A giant HEE-HAW-ing dragon wreaking havoc in Marineford?
• Ivankov calls Kuma's hands the "Hands of Liberation". Okay, sure. 

Reviewing Monsters: Prey

 

Prey is a 2017 video game by Bethesda that surprisingly ended up really gripping me. On the surface, it does really seem like it's a system similar to games like Deus Ex: Human Revolution or the new Resident Evil 2 remake, but with a slightly-more-large-scale version of the plot of Alien and Aliens combined... a space station isolated from the rest of humanity where the containment procedures surrounding a group of shapeshifting aliens (called the 'Typhon') end up obviously failing, causing the Typhon to break free, reproduce out of control and slaughter many of the station's staff. 

And on the surface, that's a pretty basic and understandable setup for a sci-fi survival horror video game. Except... well, it's far more than that. A combination of great sound design and a lot of amazing subplots being told in the background (mixing the usual 'long-term government conspiracy' and 'super-large company isn't valuing human life' and general unethical experimentation and exploitation) with a healthy dose of paranoia, multiple factions that drag your quasi-amnesiac main character along, and generally great atmosphere and gameplay made me really get sucked into this universe in a way that I don't think I've had before. 

But while I really adore this game, I only really talk about video games in this blog if there are monsters. And in the space station of Talos 1... there definitely are monsters!

Mimic

So the very basic enemy you meet in this game is also seemingly the most 'basic' version of the Typhon 'species', and is colloquially called a 'Mimic' by the characters in-universe. Around one-third of the way through the game you unlock an item called a Psycho-scope that allows you to scan these enemies and give access to the station's database on their research, revealing that each and every kind of these Typhon are given a scientific name. The basic Mimic here is called Typhon cacoplasmus. 

And the visuals of the Mimic isn't the most interesting on a still image, and I really do have to emphasize how great the execution of this creature is. On paper, it's just a mixture of the crab/spider-based Facehugger from Aliens with the goopy, tendril-like consistency of Marvel comics' Symbiotes. And if we're judging by that alone, the Mimic isn't the most interesting thing out there. 

...except that they can mimic things. And this is the biggest source of paranoia and survival horror in the early stages of the game, where any two objects next to each other has the potential for one of them to explode out into a goopy spider-creature and attack you. A coffee mug? A toilet roll? One of the books on the shelf? Some particularly devious Mimics even mimic precious weapons, resources and med-kits. It's pretty fun from a horror-movie standpoint that you're basically trying to figure out just how many Mimics are in a room, and if you've got them all. When not hidden, the Mimics are pretty cute, and some of them will actually extend two of their four legs up as if trying to mimic a bipedal human.

We also quickly learn that the 'Facehugger' comparison is pretty apt, since when they attack a human, the Mimic will drain and desiccate their corpse, before exploding into four brand-new Mimics, using the human as a reproductive medium. Pretty standard stuff on paper, but amazingly executed!

Greater Mimic

Later on in the game, your Psychoscope is able to detect hidden Mimics even in disguise... but around the same time, you start encountering Greater Mimics. A pretty standard video game trope that these creatures exist in 'greater' versions, but a major theme that you learn as you proceed through the Talos station is that the Typhon are also adapting to the humans -- specifically you, the one human going around killing all of its buddies. The Greater Mimic is basically a slightly bigger Mimic with spikes, but they're also completely unable to be detected with your Psychoscope. 

While the lore note that Greater Mimics are able to mimic sophisticated machinery like turrets and operators (basically hovering robots), we never actually ever get to see this in-game. It's interesting that the in-universe scientists are actually baffled about just how the Mimics are able to transform so well into their disguises, with a particularly fun set of discussion notes giving various theories that range from mundane (changing the atomic structure) to far wilder sci-fi stuff like being able to access an alternate pocket dimension to draw the matter from there.

Phantom

The other poster enemy for this game is the Phantom, or Typhon anthrophantasmus. Again, on paper they're not the most scary enemy monster. They're basically goopy Symbiote-lookalikes, with a larger-set upper body and a face that could be best described as a bunch of glowing eyes that kind-of form a skeletal visage. Again, a lot of this boils down to execution, with the Phantoms being particularly threatening in the early-game where they can really do a number on you. The guttural mumbling that they keep making makes it extra-creepy when you meet them... particularly if you turn subtitles on and realize that they're saying rather disturbing stuff. Not sure if it's more or less creepy when you realize that the Phantoms are mimicking the actual humans in the station.

While bipedal and humanoid-looking, Phantoms fight by launching balls of kinetic energy that explode at you, and sometimes they unfurl their hands to reveal that they're actually a bunch of tentacles wrapped together into being hands. Even more creepily, they are able to do little bursts of super-speed to phase through objects and chase you down and/or disorient you, making it rather crucial that you either are able to immobilize or take out a Phantom stealthily, or you're just good enough to keep up with the Phantom blitzing all over the map.  

While a bit of a minor mystery about where they show up from, we later find out that the Phantom is created by another type of the Typhon called a Weaver from human corpses -- where the human corpses are reanimated and making the Phantoms' name a bit more literal than it originally seems. It falls into the idea that the Typhon are 'mimicking' not just human items but even humans themselves. Again, this feels very much Alien, with the Phantom being the equivalent of the 'adult' Xenomorph stage that takes traits from human hosts. 

Thermal Phantom

We also have a bunch of 'superpowered' versions of the regular phantoms. Because shape-shifting parasitic murderous aliens aren't quite enough, they're also psychic -- the regular Phantom, after all, shoots telekinetic blasts. Some other Phantoms are mutated to be able to utilize other types of psychic abilities. The Thermal Phantom here, Typhon anthrophantasmus psychothermal, is consistently on fire and is able to generate explosive fields of fire wherever they point, which the game identifies as a 'spontaneous eruption of superheated plasma'. The Thermal Phantoms are also able to 'radiate lethal levels of infrared energy'. In video-game terms, they have an aura that constantly damages you and melts your GLOO Gun -- which is the go-to item to immobilize regular Phantoms in the early game. 

Voltaic Phantom

Meanwhile, the Voltaic Phantom doesn't actually have a formal entry, indicating that the Talos 1 breakout is the first time that the Voltaic Phantoms are first encountered and created, which leads to credence that these things are actively adapting to face off against the technology used by humans. One of the first Voltaic Phantoms that your main character Morgan Yu encounters is actually shown to be created in front of you from a human corpse, and as its name implies, the Voltaic Phantom emits massive auras of electricity all over the place...

...which disables all your technology. Your guns, your Q-Beam lasers, your Psychoscope... it really is kind of interesting to see that the Phantoms are, in-universe, adapting in real time to your character as he/she also gets stronger. That's fun. It's a bit rare to see in-game, but the Thermal and Voltaic Phantoms can apparently 'charge' Mimics to share the same abilities as them temporarily. 

Etheric Phantom

The coolest and the most 'psychic' of the Phantom variants is the Etheric Phantom, Typhon anthrophantasmus psychoetheric, which glows purple and zips around with its phasing abilities a bit more than the regular Phantoms. Their most surprising ability, however, is to split itself into two bodies. Or to 'clone' itself, to use a more video game-y jargon. One of the Etheric Phantoms has much-reduced health, but depending on how much resources you have at the time and how many other enemies are also in the area, Etheric Phantoms can spell disaster for you. I like the Etheric Phantom the best because it does really feel like it fits more into the 'psychic' aliens theme of the Typhon. 

And when the Etheric Phantom dies? It leaves behind a cloud of toxic gas that is 'disruptive to normal matter'. The Mimics and Phantoms all have this effect where they seem to be vibrating in place or seemingly phase in and out of existence, and this cloud seems to be a representation of everything that's not quite right with these Etheric Phantoms. 

Weaver

With the Mimics and Phantoms forming the bulk of the 'common' enemies in the game (plus 'corrupted operators', but those aren't quite as interesting to talk about as enemies), the rest of the game's bestiary are basically other more specialized members of the Typhon reproductive line. Again, there's a very Aliens vibe to all of this, particularly with the Weaver, or Typhon geneocratis. Our main character Morgan Yu gets to witness a very old video of one of the first encounters where the human scientists have locked up the Typhon, seeing a group of Mimics gang up and 'stab' one of their own, causing it to transform into a Weaver. While the specifics are obviously different, it's rather similar to how certain types of ants are able to 'promote' the healthiest soldier into a reproductive queen should the original queen die. 

The design of the Weaver is basically a floating, glowing version of the Mimic, looking a little bit like an octopus. It's able to move around and create a substance known as 'Coral' (which we'll cover below) and generate other types of Typhons -- if there are corpses nearby, the Weaver will turn them into Phantoms. It's also got a 'Backlash' shield that negates damage and strikes the 'fear' effect to our main character. Failing that, it'll divebomb our hero with Cystoids, all the while flying around and trying to keep out of reach of our guns.

And it's this Weaver that's recovered from the original Russian satellite that the Typhon were first discovered in that was the original source of many of the controlled Mimics and Phantoms studied by the Talos 1 base... before, of course, all hell breaks loose. While initially built up to be a counterpart of the 'Alien Queen' from Alienx, the Weaver in practice shows up a fair bit more, with multiple representatives of its subtype showing up all over the station. Pretty interesting, and the name 'Weaver' really does imply that this thing is just specialized at expanding the colony and creating soldiers like the specialized Phantoms as needed. If the Typhon colony works similarly to an ant or termite colony, perhaps it's these Weavers that gauge the amount of resources to be spent to create certain amounts of other Typhon? 

Coral

Not exactly an enemy, but a feature that is 'woven' by the Weavers through their spinnerets. The crew of Talos 1 call it 'Coral' for lack of a better term, but these things aren't even like, vines or webbing that can be cut down. They're just static strings of light that humans can just pass through with no problem, as if they're just holograms. But as the Typhon infestation becomes worse and the Weavers are able to access more parts of the space station, they begin to infest the locations with more and more Coral. 

The Talos 1 staff would realize that these Corals are very similar to a neural network, and the aesthetics are partially based on scans of electromagnetic signals travelling through nerves. Worryingly, some reports of the Coral note that there's a similar pattern of Coral connections and the psyche-scans of the staff of Talos 1, making some researchers theorize that the Typhon are mimicking or even storing the minds of Typhon victims within the Coral. Whatever it is, however, it's definitely 'calling' for something, which we don't learn what until the end of the game. 

Poltergeist

Oh yeah, this motherfucker's creepy. The Poltergeist, or Typhon dysmorpha, really does look like it crawled out of a far more horror-themed setting than the other goop aliens. The Poltergeist is basically portrayed as a straight-up ghost, particularly the first couple of Poltergeists that don't really give any indication that there's even an enemy until you start to see things move around. No, it's not a game glitch or the space station shaking... it's an invisible, psychic enemy that lobs heavy crates at you and sometimes creates gravity-nullifing fields that toss you into the air. 

It's a bit hard to really see because you inevitably turn and rapidly try to shotgun or GLOO-gun everywhere you see that has the slightest bit of visual disruption to try and hit the invisible Poltergeist (invisible even to your scope!), but the actual model is basically the crawling upper-half of a humanoid with a tail-like 'spinal cord' trailing behind him. Unlike the Phantom or the Nightmares below, the two pinpoint eyes on the Poltergeist also look a fair bit more 'human', so to speak. The end result really does look like the upper half of a human zombie crawling around on its skeletal and very well-defined hands. 

There has interestingly been a fair amount of data collected by the Talos 1 staff on the Poltergeist, identifying them as a 'rare mutation' that occurs in <5% of the creation of Phantoms by Weavers, making it an especially powerful mutant that doesn't fall into the well-defined 'normal Typhon ecology', though obviously our human scientists have a very limited idea of what normal Typhon ecology is like. But the fact that these things are explicitly created during 'Phantom genesis', which involves human corpses, does mean that the Poltergeist is yet another thing that's artificially added to these things' reproductive strategy. 

Cystoid / Cystoid Nest

It's a bit hard to tell these in the official 'database' entries, but the Cystoid Nests are basically huge balls of radioactive tumours that are implanted and immobile on the walls of certain parts of the station. At the slightest hint of movement, however, the Nests explode and out roll a half-dozen spiky balls of Typhon organisms called Cystoids, which glow and spin around and chase down anything that moves and explodes.

It's really interesting that these Cystoids are explicitly identified as being unable to detect humans by conventional means like the Mimics and Phantoms, instead relying on proximity movement, which means that the most efficient way to deal with the Cystoids is to grab something like a chair (or your NERF gun) and cause the Cystoids to self-destruct by chasing a completely unrelated item. These guys are particularly numerous in the outer-space 'microgravity' segments of the game, which I really appreciate the execution of. The microgravity segments are so disorienting and really does sell the 'there's no real way up' vibe of working in a space station... which also makes the Cystoids' ability to chase you down from any direction to be a bit more scary and forces you to try your best in cleaning out areas as you travel through them. 

The Cystoids or their Nests are not explicitly given a scientific name, because a lot of the researchers identify them as more of a 'living mine' that Weavers leave behind to mark their territory from intruders. They're also constantly leaking radiation, which is yet another thing that can afflict your character. 

Telepath

The last three enemies here probably are the ones that count as true 'minibosses' in the sense that they are much tougher to take down and tend to be located in specific rooms that you need to enter to get a plot coupon or two. The Telepath, or Typhon psychocratis, was foreshadowed very early on in the game when you start finding signs of the Typhon being able to do much more than just mimicry and generic energy beams -- when you find the brain-fucked Trevor Young held within an isolation chamber. There are also a lot of notes about how a lot of members of the staff (your main character included) have been experiencing terrible dreams, a nice highlight to how psyche-breaking these Typhon actually are. 

The design of the Telepath also makes it look very distinct, looking like a giant, bulky jellyfish with tendrils trailing behind it as it floats around, and it has a single glowing white 'eyeball' in the center of its orb-like body, from where it shoots psychic blasts. This kind of reminds me of a floating enemy like Dungeons & Dragons's Beholder or Zelda's Arrrghus, actually. 

And, as mentioned before, the Telepath is able to mind-control humans and all Telepaths tend to have a couple of your crew members under its thrall. These mind-controlled humans won't just attack you, they'll also bum-rush you and have their heads explode, meaning that it does fall into your skills and how much you care about these (mostly innocent) crewmembers on whether you just let them die for an easier takedown, or subject yourself to a sneak attack or to stock up on specific anti-psychic grenades to take down the Telepath. 

Interestingly, despite being an eldritch psychic tentacle-eyeball from deep space, the Telepath are recorded to actually be rather selective with the people they dominate, with the mind of a particularly vile serial killer (who also serves as a non-Typhon antagonist) being so repugnant to the Telepaths that they actually refuse to make mental contact with him. 

Technopath

The most artificial-looking Typhon, the Technopath, seems to have merged with several metal blocks, giving the general silhouette of what seems to be a corrupted, bloated version of an Operator -- the hovering robots that serve the space station. I don't think we ever really learn if the smooth, sleek metal-looking parts of the Technopath's anatomy are natural parts of its carapace or if it's merged with the technological parts of the station. 

Where the Telepath controls humans, the Technopath is able to take control of Turrets and Operators and turn them into corrupted, malfunctioning robots that is intent on taking you apart with blowtorches. In a detail that's more plot than gameplay oriented, Technopaths are also able to hijack elevators and life-support systems and disable them.

And, just like the Telepath and Weaver, the Technopath is able to float around out of reach, leaving its thralls to fight their battles. I do feel like these 'miniboss' enemies to not quite have the same vibe of survival horror creepiness as their lesser siblings, but I do find their existence to be very cool... and the Technopath's presence at all really does show just how much these Typhons are able to mutate to match the humans and the technology they're facing off against. 

Nightmare

And the most recurring and sometimes most difficult enemy you'll face is the Nightmare, which is a dinosaur-sized hulking brute. Again, like the Phantom, design-wise the Nightmare isn't the most spectacular. It's just a really big Phantom, all hulking with a lot of extra eyes... but the way that the Nightmare is executed is that it (or rather, they) are this game's equivalent of Mr. X/Tyrant from Resident Evil 2 where they're super-powerful and they will hunt you down throughout the map if they find you. And they hit really hard and can tank a lot of punishment. 

The difference is that the Nightmare can be killed, and it's not ultimately that hard if you're well-equipped with Turrets, Recycler Grenades and maybe some Typhon powers of your own. It's just that the Nightmares will constantly respawn, particularly if you dawdle in exploration a bit too long. Again, a lot of the sound design and musical cues to indicate the Nightmare's arrival is pretty well-done. 

Also, while it initially looks like just a big hulking humanoid brute, the Nightmare is actually more amorphous, being able to reduce itself into masses of tentacles to get through doors, and its long 'neck' and 'head' can actually split apart to reveal itself to be tendrils. Far more interesting is that the Nightmare are basically the 'white blood cells' of the Typhon, if we're taking the Corals to be the nervous system -- they're being created to hunt down anomalies in their new habitat... which, by the way, is you. The Nightmare is literally created to hunt you down as an anti-Morgan-Yu Typhon. There's even a sidequest to create an anti-Nightmare technology, but that will only work for the next three or four Nightmares you meet until the Nightmares actually adapt to it as well. 

The Apex

The gigantic Apex is the true Typhon, with the revelation that all of the threats we've been facing all throughout the game being just extensions of itself. The big blobby screenshot really doesn't do it justice, because it literally just tears into existence out of space like and really makes us feel like we're plankton faced with some vast, giant whale. Except this whale is a mass of radioactive tentacles that is destroying the space station and is actively hunting you. 

 A very cosmic horror vibe, with the revelation that the complex ecosystem created by the Weavers and all of the Phantoms and Mimics and other Typhon is just a way to signal for the true giant organism (or colony?) that the game dubs 'the Apex' to arrive. Again, from a visual standpoint the Apex is basically just a giant version of the Typhon, essentially a space Venom-Kraken, but the buildup to this thing, and the visual imagery of it wrapping itself around the gigantic space station and dwarfing a structure that the game spent its entire runtime in, makes the Apex as a pretty cool final spectacle for the game.