Alien 3

[Eirik]

"I just found it ridiculous that they were as ignorant, prejudiced and violent as some Catholic villages from the 14th century."

Writers and film makers that set out to make anti-Catholic statements are rarely subtle.  Check out the hopelessly boring and heavy handed movie "Handmaiden's Tale" for a good example.

Some other cases of religion in Sci-Fi that comes to mind:

The three Muslims on Hajj to "New Mecca" in Pitch Black
The half-assed cross between Christianity and Lucas's "Force" in Wing Commander.
The "Jews in Space" bit from History of the World Part 1.

[Eirik]

"If the in-print stuff counts as canon, there are several sequences in various comic book series that show the xenomorphs surviving quite comfortably in the vaccum of space. My guess has always been that the queen simply latched on to the side of the ship and crawled inside unnoticed while Ripley was tucking Hicks in."

While I thought the ending scene of Aliens was unnecessary and made the movie too long, the Alien pretty clearly gets Bishop from a perch in one of the landing ship's big air intakes (something you wouldn't actually see on a vessel that operates in space, but hell it looked cool), not from within the ship.

[Cullen]

Brother Ragnarok wrote:

> If the in-print stuff counts as canon, there are several
> sequences in various comic book series that show the xenomorphs
> surviving quite comfortably in the vaccum of space.  My guess
> has always been that the queen simply latched on to the side of
> the ship and crawled inside unnoticed while Ripley was tucking
> Hicks in.
>
> Brother R
>

Two problems with that:

1.) As I recall it, the mother was clearly blown far and away from the main ship in Aliens.  I don't think there's any way for her to come back on board.  But, even if she had...

2.) Where's her corpse in Alien3?  Or, at least, evidence of her presence (beyond the eggs)?  She surely didn't come into the ship, drop off a few eggs, then pop back out again.

There had to be a better way of handling things, is all I'm saying.

(Don't mind me.  I recently rewatched Godzilla v. King Ghidorah.  That always leaves me grouchy.)

[FearlessFreep]

Writers and film makers that set out to make anti-Catholic statements are rarely subtle. Check out the hopelessly boring and heavy handed movie "Handmaiden's Tale" for a good example.

I didn't really take "Handmaiden's Tale" as anti-Catholic; mostly just anti-fascist

The three Muslims on Hajj to "New Mecca" in Pitch Black

I thought this was handled fairly well.  The main guy still had his faith in the end even with his followers dying but they didn't overplay him as a 'religious nut'

For the most part, though, I'm: a) Born-agin Christian b) Musician c) Computer Programmer.  I almost never see *any* of those groups treated with even a modicum of accuracy in movies so I pretty much assume that no other belief system or profession is either.  The writer/director/producer simply tell the story they want to tell and the various religions, professions and hobbies are merely there as vehicles

[Eirik]

"I didn't really take "Handmaiden's Tale" as anti-Catholic; mostly just anti-fascist"

I thought it equated the two.  Maybe I'm oversensitive.

"I thought this was handled fairly well. The main guy still had his faith in the end even with his followers dying but they didn't overplay him as a 'religious nut'"

I thought it was handled well too and added an interesting aspect to what was IMO an otherwise generic movie.  I guess the wording of my post may have implied that I was being critical, but I wasn't.

[Grumpy Guy]

Brother Ragnarok wrote:

> I'm with Dave, in the group that thinks Alien 3 kicks near as
> much ass as the first one.  I think it's at least as good,
> maybe even better than Aliens.

I'm of the group that thinks that the group that thought Alien 3 was good was watching a different movie than the one our group saw.
The film was, pretty much, crap.  Crap with atmosphere, but still crap none the less.

> Newt was annoying as hell.  She was a Kenny plain and simple,
> good riddance.

That's kind of a cruel attitude.  Other people's children are almost always annoying - but she was just a kid.  I know it's just a movie, but isn't it kind of cruel to be so off-hand about her death?
Personally, I liked Newt.  She acted just like, well, a kid - which is very unlike the way kids frequently act in movies.

> {ABRIDGED}
> And I think the computer talks about there being multiple life
> forms on board, so there's more than one facehugger.  The queen
> cranked out eggs pretty fast, remember.  She had plenty of time
> to lay a few before she iced Bishop.

This doesn't wash.  The eggs being on the ship at all doesn't wash.  For those who lacked the facility of attention, the Alien queen laid eggs through the use of an impressively large apparatus attached to its backend.  Now, while I have no doubt that it could have re-grown said apparatus after detaching itself from it (after Ripley shot it full of holes), it certainly didn't before its final battle with Ripley.  Since the apparatus is where the eggs were coming from, it couldn't lay eggs - and it's exoskeleton's structure supports this theorum.  The short version of this is THERE IS NO WAY THAT THERE COULD HAVE BEEN EGGS ON THE SHIP.  None.  Zero.  

Or, at least, there couldn't have been the way that Aliens ended.  But, hey, why should the makers of A3 bother with that?  They're here to make a MOVIE, and fans of movies are too stupid to, like, notice  things.

In the end, A3 was a complete betrayal of the series' fans.  Every triumph of the preceeding movies was wiped out.  Logic was simply ignored, and the makers of the film said "Ahh, f#&* the first two.  Who cares about the fans?  I wanna make a prison movie, and that's more important than things like logic or story."

However...  

> Alien 3 is all about the atmosphere, and as Dave said, what a
> great creepy isolated atmosphere it is.

I have to say that atmosphere was a very significant part of the movie.  It was creepy.  But you can get the same atmosphere in the film The City of Lost Children (same director as Alien 4, which also sucked) without having to watch a film that stomps on what came before it, and gives a rousing middle finger to the fans.

That's my story, and I'm sticking to it.



Post Edited (11-18-03 13:28)

[wickednick]

I think we are over annaylsing this movie.Its a crappy sequal as was Alien resurection.Personnaly I only view the first two movies as being true Alien movies.

[FearlessFreep]

I think we are over annaylsing this movie.Its a crappy sequal as was Alien resurection.

How many words did you devote to analyzing "The Matrix"?

[Cullen]

wyckednick wrote:

> I think we are over annaylsing this movie.Its a crappy sequal
> as was Alien resurection.Personnaly I only view the first two
> movies as being true Alien movies.

You might be right, but it's kind of fun, so long as everbody's being civil.

[jmc]

I do agree though that the last two ALIEN films aren't necessary.   The third one went through a ton of screenplay changes, and it shows.   I just got the sense that the movie had no real focus and was just slapped together because they wanted to cash in.  Which is probably the way most sequels  are put together, but it just seemed obvious the movie didn't really need to be made.  The fourth one was probably worse, though it wasn't as annoying since it didn't kill the survivors from the previous film.

[Drezzy]

> 1.) As I recall it, the mother was clearly blown far and away
> from the main ship in Aliens.  I don't think there's any
> way for her to come back on board.  But, even if she had...

Read his post again. He never said she came back on board after being blown out of the airlock. Ragnarok is right in the sense that the Queen could have latched onto the Drop Ship (and the Big Air vents DO make sense, to whoever said it before, because the United States Colonial Marine Corps standard Drop Ship is good for air and space travel) and sat their comfortably while in deep space. When blown out of the airlock, she was immediately pulled into the atmosphere of LV-426 (Acheron), and burned up.

> 2.) Where's her corpse in Alien3?  Or, at least,
> evidence of her presence (beyond the eggs)?  She surely didn't
> come into the ship, drop off a few eggs, then pop back out
> again.

As states in the beginning of ALIENS, there would be no physical evidence of the Queen's stay onboard the USS Sulaco due to it being blown out of the airlock. Also, as I stated in the above reply, the Queen was only in space twice: once when hitching a ride onboard the Drop Ship to the Sulaco, and once when flushed into space (and thus into Acheron's atmosphere to burn up) after Ripley kicked her ass via the Power Loader.

I'm guessing you, Cullen, have never read the first three series of Aliens comics that Dark Horse presented between 1987 and 1991? Check them out. The art varies, but the overall story is TREMENDOUS (and would have made a better Alien 3 than what we got, hands-down).

[I luv dolma]

I LOVED ALIEN 3 BETTER THEN ALIEN 1!

[Jim H]

"Writers and film makers that set out to make anti-Catholic statements are rarely subtle. Check out the hopelessly boring and heavy handed movie "Handmaiden's Tale" for a good example."

It wasn't ANTI-Catholic though..  At least it didn't seem to be.  If anything, it seemed to be pro-catholic, which made it even weirder.

But, about Pitch Black, I thought that was a great portrayal by Keith David.  Or is it David Keith.  Anyways, that was a good, well-written role and a good performance.

[Jim H]

I wish they'd used the earlier draft of Alien Ressurection I saw on the net.  It was way cooler, had a cooler Newborn birthing, and a lot more exciting action.  Sounded about 10x better then the real movie.

[devil clown]

i didnot like the 3rd instalment of Alien i carnt say why it just seemed to lose the scare of the first and second even though it was closer to the firt then any of he sequals but it just didnot feel right. overall Aliens is the best ( the dirctors cut) as you learn some more about the alien speices and has lors of violence as well.
(if anything is spelt wrong dont kill me)