Badmovies.org Forum

Information Exchange => Reader Comments => Topic started by: Andrew on August 13, 2008, 10:27:24 AM



Title: Alien 3
Post by: Andrew on August 13, 2008, 10:27:24 AM
Reader review by Lord Hades.  Despite the fact that she tossed the alien queen out of the airlock in "Aliens," and that she was safely aboard a military starship, Ripley wakes up on a prison planet with yet another alien problem on her hands.

Click here to go to the Review (http://www.badmovies.org/othermovies/alieniii/)


Title: Re: Alien 3
Post by: Andrew on August 13, 2008, 10:36:19 AM
I think my biggest beef with this film is that it cheats to get the emotional angle on Newt's death.  Hicks' is not a big deal, because, heck, he's a Marine and probably expects danger.  However, at the end of "Aliens," the victory was Ripley laying Newt down to sleep, with the expectation of them starting a new life after they returned home.

The alien queen obviously shot a few eggs out of her backside, torn as it was from the eggsack, while fighting Ripley.  Then the Sulaco's systems completely failed to register a xenomorph aboard, despite hand held motion detectors being standard issue for Marines.  Come on, that is just lazy writing.  They could have made this movie, but with a new main character.  In fact, that is how it should have been made.

You also have to wonder about the Company leaving the convicts on the planet, because doing so involves costs.  They have to be resupplied.  The superintendent and his toady get paid.  What the heck?

Bishop's character was fun, for the brief moments he appeared.  "How are you? Oh, I like your new hair cut."


Title: Re: Alien 3
Post by: Psycho Circus on August 13, 2008, 11:23:07 AM
I agree with all of those points Andrew, I also believe that a new character in the lead role would've benefitted Alien 3 and the franchise as a whole. Hell, we might have had a 4th (a better one) sooner. It's still a good film in my opinion, (bull alien is cool) but it is by no means the best of the Alien movies or my favourite. Really wish they'd have stuck by this ending and hadn't gone on to flog it all with Resurrection.


Title: Re: Alien 3
Post by: Mary Cherry on August 13, 2008, 12:26:51 PM
I think the idea for the queen having laid eggs on the ship must have come from the end credits of Aliens where you could hear a facehugger skittering around.


Title: Re: Alien 3
Post by: Jack on August 13, 2008, 12:56:23 PM
I didn't really mind that there was apparently an undetected alien aboard the Sulaco.  By the end it was just Ripley and Newt, with Hicks badly injured and the robot dude ripped in half.  I didn't notice any sort of onboard systems to automatically detect xenomorphs, and considering that the Sulaco was apparently a pretty big ship I don't think we can expect Ripley, all worn out after her big adventure, to walk around every square foot of the thing with a motion detector.  She was pretty confident she had killed the only alien, and just wnated to get in the sleep chamber and wake up safe at home.

I though Alien 3 was pretty good, not in the same league as the first two, but not bad either.  It was nice that they developed the characters pretty well, but I really didn't care about any of them.  Still it had an atmosphere about it.  The aliens themselves were pretty cool running on ceilings and stuff.

Alien Resurrection, now that's where it went straight down the freakin' toilet big time. 


Title: Re: Alien 3
Post by: AndyC on August 13, 2008, 03:05:29 PM
You also have to wonder about the Company leaving the convicts on the planet, because doing so involves costs.  They have to be resupplied.  The superintendent and his toady get paid.  What the heck?

I got the impression they were there as caretakers, looking after the place, making sure it didn't fall to pieces. They're essentially slave labour. The company sends a ship every so often to check on their assets and resupply the convicts, and pay two flunkies to make sure the work gets done. They otherwise don't really seem to care.


Title: Re: Alien 3
Post by: HarlotBug3 on August 13, 2008, 03:36:03 PM
Entertaining enough review, but it's obvious you were either too eager to love, or hate this one.

Worth seeing, if only for a look at a kind of missing link (other than jurrasic park) between puppetry and CGI monsters.

I have seen bits of the middle, and the ending to Alien Resurection. No further comment.



Title: Re: Alien 3
Post by: Torgo on August 13, 2008, 08:11:20 PM
I recommend for people who haven't already to watch the producer's cut of Alien 3 on the Quadrilogy set.   It's pretty much as close to a director's cut as we'll ever get of this flick.  It's a much better movie IMO than what got released in theaters.

But even with saying that, this is still a movie that you'll think is decent enough if you watch it by itself until you try to watch it after watching the 1st 2 Alien flicks.  That's when my disdain for a lot of the narrative choices really comes through.

There's some performances to admire and I do realize that they were trying to get back to the feel of the 1st movie in terms of being up against a single Alien without the proper weapons to battle it and survive. 

I'm a David Fincher fan and I think that anymore this movie remains more as a footnote in his career rather than a justifiable entry into the saga.

But at least it's not as god awful as Alien Resurrection was.   



Title: Alien 3
Post by: spastic on August 14, 2008, 08:01:39 AM
I'm surprised to find this film reviewed here on badmovies.
Hell.. Fincher made the best alien film of the entire franchise.

That's the only alien sequel that focuses on the original ambiance (Science Fictional Survival), and even surpasses the first one (which has seriously aged). Estheticaly, the film's a beauty. The plot, despite its simplicity, is more than sufficient for a thriller-based SF film.

The "dog-alien" thing isn't even a valuable argument against this film. If you're looking for realistic and rational plots simply don't watch any Alien film at all. If you want to easily criticize any alien film, review Alien 4 (there you have a good example of ridiculous host-combined alien) or directly the Predator/Alien crap (Predators and humans are friends now.. yeea riiight..).



Title: Re: Alien 3
Post by: Jordan on August 15, 2008, 12:24:09 PM
This movie seems to get a really bad rap amongst Alien fans (and well... the general public as well). As Torgo noted, the extended cut in the Alien Quadrilogy set is far superior to the theatrical cut, and oddly enough, the xenomorph in the film was (as I recall) born from an ox on the prison planet. I agree that the theatrical version is quite flawed, but I would suggest you take a glance at the longer cut before making a final decision on this one.

Quote
    Molten lead cannot kill an Alien, only p**s it off. Cold water, on the other hand, is devastating.

I know this was written for the sake of humor, but Lord Hades, have you ever seen what happens when cold water is tossed into a puddle of molten lead first hand? KABOOM!

As for the molten lead not killing the xenomorph: It has acid for blood and is hurt by, but not killed by, liquid nitrogen (as shown to us in "Alien: Resurrection"). With that in mind, I'm not so shocked that molten lead didn't kill this hardy and adaptable critter.


Title: Re: Alien 3
Post by: Shadow on August 15, 2008, 11:53:20 PM
I saw this film on opening day. The first showing of the day, in fact.

When it was over, I stood up and booed.

I have never watched it again in its entirety.


Title: Re: Alien 3
Post by: Kutter on August 16, 2008, 05:12:05 PM
I've held the position since I saw this movie in the theater on opening weekend that it actually is a really good Sci Fi thriller, if you take it out of the Alien franchise.  It's a tight, atmospheric thriller in an interesting setting with a credible monster. 

However, in the context of the Alien franchise, it's crap.  The movie obviously wasn't written for the franchise, and the backflips it had to do to wedge it in hurt both the movie and franchise considerably.  It's like the studio balked at the budget necessary for a proper follow up to Aliens and finally just said the hell with it. 

It's kinda sad, really.


Title: Re: Alien 3
Post by: J.D. on August 17, 2008, 01:18:14 AM
This explains why it sucked so bad. Not entirely the director's fault.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alien_3


Title: Re: Alien 3
Post by: Kutter on August 17, 2008, 04:27:55 AM
Funny thing is, this franchise could be fixed by making a new film that just decided that, while Alien3 happened, Newt and Hicks didn't get ejected and were eventually rescued.  Then we could pick up with Newt some 20 years later fending off an Alien invasion of Earth, either as it happens or in an Alien infested post-apocolypse. 

That would kick so much ass it wouldn't even be funny.  Especially if they got Micheal Biehn to reprise Hicks as kind of a Sarah Conner figure to Newt.

Fincher should be pushing for this.  He needs some redemption on the Alien front.


Title: Re: Alien 3
Post by: Cameron on August 17, 2008, 05:44:42 PM
LOL. I didn't even make the connection with the dog and the Alien (cf: cani-alien). I did not see the film until the Extended Edition of the quadrilogy came out a few years ago - having seen Aliens in the theater a few times and Alien on Showtime every time it was broadcast (I was 10). It was a disappointment - but not as bad as it was made out to be


Title: Re: Alien 3
Post by: Ken Hart on August 18, 2008, 12:00:04 AM
The Dog-Alien thing makes sense to me. Considering all the xenomorphs previously had been pretty much exclusively human-born, it isn't a stretch to assume that it is possible   for the host genetics to play a part. I mean, this is the same creature that grows from the size of an egg, to the size of a house python in several hours, then grows to what, like 6 or 7 feet tall in days or less.

Still, I have been p**sed about Hicks dying since I was like 8.


Title: Re: Alien 3
Post by: Intangible Skeleton on August 18, 2008, 07:20:18 PM
Alien 3 has a charm to me, and even though it can be called bad (I call it bold choices), the real stinker of the Aliens franchise is Ressurection. AR is an absolute abomination - there is not a single good scene, where as Alien 3 has quite a few.


Title: Re: Alien 3
Post by: AndyC on August 18, 2008, 09:50:46 PM
Alien 3 has a charm to me, and even though it can be called bad (I call it bold choices), the real stinker of the Aliens franchise is Ressurection. AR is an absolute abomination - there is not a single good scene, where as Alien 3 has quite a few.

Funny, I kind of thought Resurrection had some good characters and good scenes, although I agree it was the crappiest overall.

Alien 3, I agree, had a number of faults, but was an entertaining movie overall.


Title: Re: Alien 3
Post by: Scoldog on August 20, 2008, 06:38:26 AM
You know the crazy thing?  Since 3, the quality of the Alien franchise of films has steadily gone down, and yet they still keep churning them out.  I mean, WTF are they planning for AvP3 (Yes, they are actually making it). 

AvP2 has got to be a fairly rare movie, in the sense there was no point making or releasing it, and also the fact that it actually sucks much worse than AvP (That's got to be hard to do, even deliberately). God knows what the film studio who made it was on. How many people from that company not only believed it was OK, but that it could actually be released the way it was?


Title: Re: Alien 3
Post by: Panic_Attack on August 20, 2008, 01:37:13 PM
A SKULL? Seriously?

I like Alien 3 quite a bit.

The reviewer doesn't seem to even know what he's talking about. First off, it's not Bishop II, it's a human, and second, the alien died from thermal shock, not just a sprinkler.

And...other garbage like that all over.


Title: Re: Alien 3
Post by: AndyC on August 21, 2008, 09:55:11 AM
AvP2 has got to be a fairly rare movie, in the sense there was no point making or releasing it, and also the fact that it actually sucks much worse than AvP (That's got to be hard to do, even deliberately). God knows what the film studio who made it was on. How many people from that company not only believed it was OK, but that it could actually be released the way it was?

Alien 3 is a veritable masterpiece compared to the AvP movies.

I rented AvP2 a while ago, just to check it out. I was amazed. I expected it to be bad, but how can a movie with Aliens and a Predator loose in a small town actually manage to be so utterly boring for most of its length? I didn't much care for AvP, but it at least held my attention. Didn't help that much of AvP2 was so dark I couldn't tell what was going on.

The story seemed like it was just pulled out of somebody's butt. When things actually started to happen, the characters, including the highly-advanced Predator, were dumb as rocks and did things that made absolutely no sense. Nobody in the entire movie even entertained the thought that the Predator might be a potential ally, nor did the very intelligent Predator seem to consider that. Pretty obvious they both had the same enemy, but they kept blasting away at each other at every encounter, in spite of the circumstances.

And perhaps the worst thing about AvP2 was that once the action started, it seemed to make up for its initial slowness by going too far in places. For example, Aliens in the maternity ward were something I didn't need to see.

About the only thing I liked was the nuking at the end. It looked cool and it made sense. A shame they had to follow it up with the captured alien technology cliche, or the movie might have at least ended on a good note.

They might not measure up to the first two, but I'll take Alien3 or Alien Resurrection over the steaming crap that has come out since.


Title: Re: Alien 3
Post by: J.D. on August 23, 2008, 02:48:05 AM
I hated Alien 3 when I saw it the first time and I swear it ruined my year.   :wink: 
I don't think Weaver wanted to do anymore, which is fine. But the fans wanted more. The torch should have been passed to Newt like another poster suggested and Cpl. Hicks be her mentor. Maybe even making her a Colonial Marine! I think creators of Alien 4 got the ugliest cast they could find (and the worst except for Wincot) for some strange artistic reason. Everything about Alien 3 and 4 IMO just sucks. Now everyone for at least a decade wanted to see an Alien vs Predator movie. But that presented some problems. In all logic it would have to be in the future, but if it's in the future around the era of Aliens then humanity has taken to the Stars. They would have run into these "Predators" at some point in inter-galatic travels. Seeing as how they seem to spend almost all the waking hours hunting. The AvP concept of them coming to earth hunting for Aliens in rites of passage is stupid.
The big fear in the movie was the Aliens getting to Earth. Or Terra as I like to say. But wait! Now they're already on Earth? Opps scratch that. Why hunt something as dangerous as an Alien for a rite of passage then settle for hunting humans? The cast of AvP sucked worse than Alien 4! It was so Politically Correct it made me want to retch! Though I'm glad Lance Hendricksen was in Alien 3. In all the efforts to salvage something from the fallout of Alien 3 they only made it worse each movie.
The adoption of that woman by the Predator was such a corny idea I could not believe what I was watching! I don't even bother watching the rest. I just stick to the first and second movies.


Title: Re: Alien 3
Post by: Jack on August 23, 2008, 07:35:02 AM
AvP was like a Sci-Fi original.  They must have spent the first half hour of the movie talking about how enormously important it was to get this woman to lead them "across the ice", then as it turned out it didn't make a damned bit of difference - they just got in some trucks and it was a two minute drive.  And she's talking about how nobody needs guns in the Antarctic - yeah.  The label on the DVD box said "Alien vs. Predator" and now I've gotta listen to somebody talk about how they won't be needing guns.  And then everything was ripped off from some other movie.  The alien queen chasing them at the end looked exactly like the T Rex from Jurassic Park chasing the SUV, the pyramid thing moved around like Cube, the AvP fights looked like Robocop vs. Robocop 2, and we got so much Slo-mo cam crap that Ewe Boll would have been proud.  And what was with the predator using X-ray vision to see that Bishop was dying?  Like, huh?  And it was stupid  - after the predator takes some alien acid blood and etches something on its helmet, we then have to be told that this is some right of passage.  Oh gee, thanks, my IQ is borderline retarded, and I couldn't figure out what was going on.

Oddly enough I haven't bothered watching the second one.  :teddyr:


Title: Re: Alien 3
Post by: TheSam on August 25, 2008, 12:54:56 PM
What the hell? Whoever wrote this review should get a smacking. It's just hate and hate and hate piled on with a bunch of nitpicks.

Man, this brings me back to the Firefly reviews on Sadhoo, or that Call of Cthulhu on that one site. Anyway. I found this review as bad as its score, far to spiteful and hating to actually be entertaining, and also... well incorrect. Ok, granted the scoring is subjective, and Alien 3 might not be the next coming, but it sure as hell don't deserve a skull. I liked it. It was the first Alien movie I saw, and it was entertaining. And scary. And well made. Again, perhaps not the flawless perfection of some fanboy's wet dream, or simply not what he expected out of it, but. Well made.

Ps, being able to respond without having to register? *loveloveloveloveonwhoevercameupwiththis*


Title: Re: Alien 3
Post by: TheSam on August 25, 2008, 12:59:15 PM
PPS AvP is awesome. If you get a couple of friends over and maybe something to eat and then proceed to MST3K the crap outta it. The keyword here is not SciFi/Horror But Classical Romantic Comedy.  :thumbup:


Title: Re: Alien 3
Post by: Dogsledder on August 25, 2008, 10:44:55 PM
  If you think this was crap, wait for Alien Resurection. This excrutiating crap beggers belief. How was it funded ? And why give the 'fund finding' secret to whoever made Starship Troopers 3?


Title: Re: Alien 3
Post by: Floyd on August 26, 2008, 12:49:45 AM
The review is entertaining in the badmovies.org style, but so wrong. Alien 3 was terrific. Yes, I know it seems unlikely that the Queen Alien had time to leave an egg on the ship, but that didn't wreck the movie for me the way it did for you. For me, Aliens was an old style war movie only with Aliens instead of Nazis up against the cliched assembly cast of wimpy officer who finds his guts under pressure, macho dork who goes to pieces, plucky kid who just can't be killed by aliens and so on (maybe not all of those elements were found in old style war movies, but you know what I mean). 
  After the disapointment of Aliens, I loved Alien 3 - so depressing, so British (who do depressing and squalor very well)

cheers,

Floyd


Title: Re: Alien 3
Post by: J.D. on August 27, 2008, 02:52:40 AM
Yeah just the usual lies of the Left. The Leopard Seal is notorious for attacking people. Only one recorded death. But they have been known to stalk and hunt people. Breaking through the ice to snap at feet and attacking divers. Also the Killer Whale gets it name for a reason. It has been known to attack people.


Reply #22. Posted on August 23, 2008, 08:35:02 AM by Jack
AvP was like a Sci-Fi original.  They must have spent the first half hour of the movie talking about how enormously important it was to get this woman to lead them "across the ice", then as it turned out it didn't make a damned bit of difference - they just got in some trucks and it was a two minute drive.  And she's talking about how nobody needs guns in the Antarctic - yeah. 


Title: Re: Alien 3
Post by: frankenbelial on August 27, 2008, 03:40:25 PM
Dude at the top where it gives the title and rating of the film it says it's rated PG-13. This is incorrect it is rated R. Not that it matters because this movie sucks balls. Good job on the review. I laughed my ass off. I remember seeing this when it first came out and I feel asleep during it. I watched it again and realized I had missed nothing, although I do like the special fx in it.


Title: Re: Alien 3
Post by: J.D. on August 31, 2008, 04:27:26 AM
Great point dude!     :thumbup:   You could make a new song to it with the music from: Monkey vs Robot!  AlIEEEEEeeen VErsUs PredATOR!     :teddyr:   



PPS AvP is awesome. If you get a couple of friends over and maybe something to eat and then proceed to MST3K the crap outta it. The keyword here is not SciFi/Horror But Classical Romantic Comedy.


Title: Re: Alien 3
Post by: asimpson2006 on September 04, 2008, 01:45:27 PM
While I will admit that Alien 3 is weaker compared to Alien and Aliens it's still not that bad of a film.  I will agree with Torgo that the Assembly Cut (Which is what the Director's cut in a way is called) is better than the original as some scenes were removed or changed.  I won't say what they are to give the changes away but it is better in a way.  It's been a while since I have seen the original Alien 3 so I may have to watch it here in a few weeks to remember all the changes and what I may have forgotten.


Title: Re: Alien 3
Post by: LadyLLawliet on November 16, 2008, 06:01:21 AM
The problems with Alien 3 IS due to production problems and multiple script re-writes--not totally the fault of the director--and like someone suggested, if you go and read the wikipedia article you can see this. Actually, when I found out that there was another, longer version of this movie I really wanted to watch it, and I plan on buying the Alien Quadrilogy just for Alien 3. I love Aliens and it's one of my favorite movies (I really liked Hicks, too), but I agree with what someone said in that it's good if you look at it as though it were a standalone film.

And that idea of Newt facing aliens on the Earth would be so awesome...they should do that.  :smile:


Title: Re: Alien 3
Post by: droidguy1119 on February 06, 2009, 07:40:38 PM
I think this movie is remarkably underrated. One of the best of the series. Not following the happy ending set up by Aliens and going in such a stark new direction was ballsy. However, the DVD in the Alien Quadrilogy set has a version of the movie that is closer to what David Fincher was intending when he made it. The DVD also has the theatrical version, but I have never watched it. The workprint version may be much better than the theatrical, I don't know, but I think Alien 3 gets a lot of flak it doesn't deserve.


Title: Re: Alien 3
Post by: na on February 28, 2009, 05:22:26 PM
This review is so obviously biased, so wrong in everything  it is ridiculous.

Alien 3
is a great film, which *could have* been better certainly, but is really already very good. This is the only one in the whole series that can be compared to the original Alien movie.
It is the real sequel to Alien actually. Aliens (number 2) is just not up to par, although it is from J. Cameron. He just didn't get the idea and make an action movie, when Alien's purpose was far beyond that. With Alien 3, we return to the original idea, but reworked in a very clever way. It explores the religious ideas behind the first movie.

In Alien,  we 'discovered' that the monsters weren't these unexplained and wild creatures but human beings, ready to sacrifice other human beings to their greedy projects - the so-called 'company'. Placing this sequel in a custody takes the idea a bit higher : what is worth living for ? dying for ? Ripley replaces that false religion of the prisoners (since they do not really believe in it themselves) by a new idea. Mankind, meaning the sepcies  is more important than individual interest. She teaches them sacrifice. This is quite obvious in the final scene when she jumps and opens up her arms in a very symbolic gesture. But there are many hints of this all along the movie.

Goldenthal's music was also a really good part of this film. It just hints from time to time to the original musical score, but it is mainly a very new, very original creation, with great strange sounds that fit really well the plot (and the place).

As for your criticism of the storyline, well, what's the point of watching a sci-fi movie if you're not ready to accept unnatural things? That's the deal, even in Ridley Scott's masterpiece. Take it or leave it. You leave it, okay. That doesn't mean the movie isn't good!. It is your peronal point of view, your personal taste, nothing more.

There *are* flaws in this movie, like in many good films. But it is visually stunnig, very cleverly shot. it IS a good movie.


Title: Re: Alien 3
Post by: AlienFan1979 on October 04, 2009, 01:56:56 PM
Well I rather enjoyed Alien3 not a bad film as it turned out. Okay so it had re-writes re-shots every film has its problems ion dealing with the final look?

Saw Alien3 at UCI Tower Park Poole UK, presented in Dolby stereo SR on its theatrical release 1992.
 
One thing about the story is Ripley is screwed! If she had made it out of prison alive she’d be screwed by the company as psychotic mental person?

With very little evidence to hold water as the final bodies where cremated the planet or part of it atomized leaving very little evidence of an alien creature.

She would be buried by the company as crack pot!         

Which also leaves very little evidence at the end of the film except for a small blood sample that we all, know was birth to her resurrection in Alien Resurrection but its not all Ripley only half.

Still I’d rate Alien3
8/10
Alien Resurrection
7/10
Aliens
10/10
Alien
10/10


Title: Re: Alien 3
Post by: toddword on March 02, 2011, 01:37:08 AM
 :lookingup: I am constantly amazed at how...passionate people become when discussing a film. Why insult each other? Isn't film a communal art form? Geeeee...........
Anyway,this debate must have begun before the "assembly cut"( or whatever it's called these days) was made public. First of all,in Fincher's version of the film(which the studio butchered),
the alien was birthed from an ox,so it makes much more sense that it was as large as it was so immediately. Second, it made more fiscal sense to keep the convicts there,away from home,keeping the Company's interests on the cheap(much like a sweat shop in a 3rd world country,perhaps?). Third, Golic really threw a wrench in the mix when he insisted(as an insane dolt might possibly)on getting a look at the trapped alien. They all might have made a go of it if he hadn't let the damned thing out.
     Fans of the first two always seem incensed that Newt and Hicks were taken out. Remember,however,that this series is reknowned for portraying the future as a grimy,dirty place,NOT the
sanitized world of,say,"2001". Death is a real possibility EVERY DAY, no matter how much we love someone. Ripley has to deal with death and loss continually in the first two films-why should this one be different? Dorothy from "OZ" she is not,coming home to a happy ending. Look at it as a realist tract,as opposed to the stupid comic book that was "Resurrection", and you might see the film with different eyes.......


Title: Re: Alien 3
Post by: monster93 on December 24, 2011, 05:50:23 PM
In my opinion this movie wasn't bad :bouncegiggle: I like it. The beginning with the fanfare was amazing and also the ending was different to many films. For me is very original.  :hot: If you don't enjoy it is because you don't have an open mind
LOL


Title: Re: Alien 3
Post by: DinoGeekProductions on October 16, 2012, 12:30:19 AM
"Molten lead cannot kill an Alien, only p**s it off. Cold water, on the other hand, is devastating."  Forgive me now if this has already been addressed, but this is somewhat justified.  Remember that the Alien is biomechanical in nature, meaning that the molten led would've heated its carapace. The sudden application fo water, and therefore the rapid cooling of its carapace, is what allegedly caused it to explode.

Still a pretty bad movie, though.