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When you mention Alien Resurrection you will almost unanimously get a negative response. Many people don’t like it and for a variety of reasons. I recently became quite fascinated with how a film with so many talented people involved in making it would turn away so many.

And so OmegaZilla, RidgeTop, Xenomorphine and I sat down to discuss Alien Resurrection for the latest episode of the AvPGalaxy Podcast as we dissected the work of Jean Pierre Jeunet, Joss Whedon, Brad Dourif and the rest.

We talked the good, we talked the bad and we talked the downright ugly (looking at you Newborn). It’s a fairly lengthy episode, clocking in at over 2 hours but we discuss quite a lot.

During the podcast we mentioned a few things that I thought you listeners might appreciate being able to see for yourself – the Fangoria interview that talks about the Alien design, the Chestburster prop with the cheeky grin and Den Beauvais portfolio with his concepts for Alien Resurrection figures.

As always, if you have any thoughts on the topic of Alien Resurrection or would like to leave us any comments, feel free to post down below! And be sure to check out our previous episodes for all your Aliens, Predator and Aliens vs. Predator podcast needs!

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Still say Alien 3 is a less enjoyable film.
By a LONG SHOT! XD

Pft! Alien 3 is a misunderstood masterpiece! It's a bit of a mess in terms of plot but it looks and feels much more like an Alien film.

Imagine if they had written Call's character as a human made by robots with the inner moral conflicts she would suffer from that. Instead of robot made by robots.

I remember when I first saw Resurrection. Renting it in the video store in about 1998/1999 but it wasn't until I got the Legacy set in the early 2000s that I started to hate it. Cloning was just an absurd idea, to bring Sigourney Weaver back so I was never on board with that. It has somewhat mellowed on me though and up until the Newborn, it's a fairly watchable movie. I still love the underwater aliens but I still rank the Newborn as the single most horrendous creation out of all the franchises and nothing in AvP Requiem came close to that.

Though I disagree Omega, I thought's ADI's work on Resurrection was terrible and by far their worst movie. Technically, I guess you can say it all works but in terms of design, everything they did there was atrocious.

When I say they outdid themselves I refer mostly to the sheer quality of the animatronics and make-up -- which is top of the line.

Quote from: Omegazilla on May 14, 2015, 06:32:14 PM
When I say they outdid themselves I refer mostly to the sheer quality of the animatronics and make-up -- which is top of the line.

Certainly!

Whilst the designs leave a lot to be desired - for both regular and the Newborn- the work that went into them is absolutely top-notch, especially that Newborn. You can fault the designs (despite working for what was needed of them) but the craftmanship was amazing.

If you guys do a podcast all about Alien 3 I wouldn't mind jumping in ;)

No plans as of yet but I'll keep that in mind mate.  :)

I've said it before and I'll say it again; Resurrection opened up a whole new world of possibilities that could lead to some truly amazing stories.

Quote from: Born Of Cold Light on May 16, 2015, 04:37:46 AM
I've said it before and I'll say it again; Resurrection opened up a whole new world of possibilities that could lead to some truly amazing stories.

It just wont unfortunately.  :-\ I would have loved to have had Ripley 8 explored properly!

Quote from: Corporal Hicks on May 16, 2015, 06:30:54 AM

Quote from: Born Of Cold Light on May 16, 2015, 04:37:46 AM
I've said it before and I'll say it again; Resurrection opened up a whole new world of possibilities that could lead to some truly amazing stories.

It just wont unfortunately.  :-\ I would have loved to have had Ripley 8 explored properly!

I'll just have to assume that she started transforming into a full blown Alien creature in a Cronenberg's The Fly manner

This movie was great. It open a ddor to more stories and possibilities.  Another thing it does is in a way bridge the alien franchise to blade runner with the cyborg,  being that un blade runner and in alien resurrection it is mentioned that the cyborgs are run aways and are wanted

I always liked Resurrection.  It wasnt prefect by any means, and the tone was a little too light hearted for an Alien movie, but overall it was pretty good and ive seen worse uses of the cloning gimmick.  That newborn was hideous though.

Alien 3 sucks hard, assembly cut is the only version that's even watchable.

Had no idea you guys had a podcast, I really need to come here more often!

Downloading now..

Quote from: JoseChung on May 17, 2015, 10:30:59 PM
Had no idea you guys had a podcast, I really need to come here more often!

Downloading now..

There's 26 of the suckers! Started like 3 years ago. Where have you been man?!

Quote from: EvilMark on May 16, 2015, 09:34:12 PM
Alien 3 sucks hard, assembly cut is the only version that's even watchable.

That's a whole other kettle of fish and one I'd completely disagree with.

Another great episode gentlemen. I hope future film-dedicated episodes will be of a similar length as I personally don't believe a good debate can be had over 30-40 minutes.

I agree with most points made. It's a fairly watchable movie until they reach the chapel, then I usually turn it off.

With regard to the Auriga not looking very high-tech, it always came across to me that this little experiment was 'off the books' so to speak and was Perez' and Wren's ticket to the big time. Perez comes across as very inept and I can't imagine him having much sway in the upper hierarchy of the USM, despite his rank. I believe he was a largely ignored man in charge of this crappy old research vessel and saw the cloning of Ripley as his chance to shine.
If this was an officially-endorsed USM experiment, then yes why such a primitive-looking ship with primitive facilities? Why the need to use pirates to smuggle in people to be used as breeding incubators?

I hate the aliens in this film. Someone said they sounded like dinosaurs which was a good point. I dislike ADI's work in this series wholeheartedly and I think they have completely bastardised the alien. The chin and jaws are horrible and the neck is just a mess. People use the excuse of 'well it's the director's vision', but underneath the minor, superficial changes the director's insist on such as the brown paint schemes - the xenomorphs look terrible. Had ADI's creature been in the original Alien, it wouldn't have been anywhere near as memorable. I won't even comment on the newborn. But Xenos were horrible looking and far, far too much slime. I pray that ADI do not return for Blomkamp's film. Please lord give someone else a go.

Characters were serviceable. I thought Michael Wincott's Elgyn was very interesting and severely under-developed. Christie was also good and I'm glad you guys pointed out his 'death' by falling in water from 10 feet! Di Stephano was forgettable and annoying as hell.

Direction was fine but a little out of place as you guys pointed out. The CGI-practical mix was also very inconsistent. I thought there were some needless CGI aliens strolling about such as the one stalking the characters down the corridor after Elgyn died and the alien dodging the gunfire on the ladder.

The action scenes were also a bit weak. It always gets me when they all huddle underwater waiting for the grenades to destroy the eggs that not a single person decides to fire at the lone alien swimming towards them.

What the hell was Ripley doing under the floor right beneath Elgyn's body? Why didn't anyone shoot at the alien in the corridor after Johner pulled Call back? If there were only 13 aliens running loose across the entire ship why were all the military personnel evacuated? Need I go on?

The musical score was also the weakest in the series by a long stretch.

The underwater water sequence and clone destroying scenes aside, this is a pretty poor movie.

For me the biggest mistake Fox ever made with the Alien saga was deciding it could not be carried without Signourney Weaver. Alien Resurrection should have been a complete reboot with fresh characters and a fresh story, with perhaps Weyland-Yutani being the common bond.

Loved the podcast guys, very informative and equal sided, nice to see the pros and cons pointed out so well, have to agree definitely with you guys on the missed opportunity of further developing ripley 8's connection to the aliens, the worse missed opportunity though has to be the newborn from a design aspect.

Quote from: Murfy426 on May 18, 2015, 05:29:26 PM
Loved the podcast guys, very informative and equal sided, nice to see the pros and cons pointed out so well, have to agree definitely with you guys on the missed opportunity of further developing ripley 8's connection to the aliens, the worse missed opportunity though has to be the newborn from a design aspect.

I'm still never sure about the Newborn. I get the intent behind its design and the animatronic work on it was simply fantastic but the design just wasn't suitable in my eyes. I would have loved to have seen something more like this:

(https://scontent-lhr3-1.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-xpf1/v/t1.0-9/11064859_861501840563923_8128088989394449130_n.jpg?oh=a1483c34efcfab3095085612803557de&oe=55FD9998)
(https://www.avpgalaxy.net/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi1-news.softpedia-static.com%2Fimages%2Fnews2%2FAlien-Creator-H-R-Giger-Has-Died-Reuters-441925-3.jpg&hash=292456265e6b40ee64640410c8dd94f9ecb93d5c)
(https://www.avpgalaxy.net/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.bfi.org.uk%2Fsites%2Fbfi.org.uk%2Ffiles%2Fstyles%2Ffull%2Fpublic%2Fimage%2Falien-1979-009-h-r-giger-and-model-00m-yml.jpg%3Fitok%3DrB4xhG0s&hash=2671fb3af5d423f796f2169abea38042ae08f586)

And use that empty human face to get that crossover of DNA across.

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Quote from: TheBATMAN on May 18, 2015, 05:23:56 PM
For me the biggest mistake Fox ever made with the Alien saga was deciding it could not be carried without Signourney Weaver. Alien Resurrection should have been a complete reboot with fresh characters and a fresh story, with perhaps Weyland-Yutani being the common bond.

Completely agree on the Ripley thing. Fox's reliance on her character is such a problem. It leads to things like her forced inclusion in Out of the Shadows or the family connection in Sea of Sorrows. I really think they need to step away from Ripley. All it would take it a decent writer to make it work without her. There are plenty of other directions they could go with the franchise and the best one would be a clean slate (not a remake!!!) with a new set of characters.

Thanks for the kind words fellas.

Quote from: Corporal Hicks on May 22, 2015, 07:20:30 AM

Quote from: Murfy426 on May 18, 2015, 05:29:26 PM
Loved the podcast guys, very informative and equal sided, nice to see the pros and cons pointed out so well, have to agree definitely with you guys on the missed opportunity of further developing ripley 8's connection to the aliens, the worse missed opportunity though has to be the newborn from a design aspect.

I'm still never sure about the Newborn. I get the intent behind its design and the animatronic work on it was simply fantastic but the design just wasn't suitable in my eyes. I would have loved to have seen something more like this:

(https://scontent-lhr3-1.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-xpf1/v/t1.0-9/11064859_861501840563923_8128088989394449130_n.jpg?oh=a1483c34efcfab3095085612803557de&oe=55FD9998)
http://i1-news.softpedia-static.com/images/news2/Alien-Creator-H-R-Giger-Has-Died-Reuters-441925-3.jpg
(https://www.avpgalaxy.net/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.bfi.org.uk%2Fsites%2Fbfi.org.uk%2Ffiles%2Fstyles%2Ffull%2Fpublic%2Fimage%2Falien-1979-009-h-r-giger-and-model-00m-yml.jpg%3Fitok%3DrB4xhG0s&hash=2671fb3af5d423f796f2169abea38042ae08f586)

And use that empty human face to get that crossover of DNA across.

---

Quote from: TheBATMAN on May 18, 2015, 05:23:56 PM
For me the biggest mistake Fox ever made with the Alien saga was deciding it could not be carried without Signourney Weaver. Alien Resurrection should have been a complete reboot with fresh characters and a fresh story, with perhaps Weyland-Yutani being the common bond.

Completely agree on the Ripley thing. Fox's reliance on her character is such a problem. It leads to things like her forced inclusion in Out of the Shadows or the family connection in Sea of Sorrows. I really think they need to step away from Ripley. All it would take it a decent writer to make it work without her. There are plenty of other directions they could go with the franchise and the best one would be a clean slate (not a remake!!!) with a new set of characters.

Thanks for the kind words fellas.

Yeah could you imagine that version of the alien nailing you in the vents on isolation that would be an epic scare. Gotta agree as well on ripleys constant presence in the series. Think that's the only doubt I have for the new movie but could be an advantage if Sigourney plays the character in a fresh way.

Hey guys! I finally got around to listening to this podcast. I know I'm super late, but it was hard for me to get motivated to listen to it because:

1) it was pertaining to my least favorite of the 4 movies
2) it was longer that the movie's duration! Lol

Good podcast though! After listening, I'd have to say I actually appreciate the movie just a tad bit more. It's been a while since I've watched it, and the featurettes; perhaps I should watch them again.

I particularly enjoyed the mention of the old PS2 game and the book "original sin." I briefly played the game and loved the mechanics; I've always wanted to go back and play it more thoroughly. And the "sequel" book I thought was terrible! One of the worst alien books I've read so far ("DNA war" is the worst in my opinion and I've read all of the dark horse books up to "steel egg" so far). But I forgot original sin even existed, and the reminder made me smile.

One thing I was surprised about though, was that no one mentioned the alien's breath! In terms of the alien design and how they were portrayed on screen, I was bothered more by the fact that they breathed so heavily than anything else, and in a lot of scenes you can see their breath as they exhaled! That bugged me more than the excessive slime even. I liked the fact that in the previous movies you couldn't really tell if they were breathing or not. I can get on board with the idea that since they were tained with human DNA, it might explain that, but it was still a design choice I wasn't fond of. And as for actually seeing their breath, maybe the room was cold (although I think you see it in a later scene after the aliens escape too), but to me it looked too much like mist or smoke being fired out of a nozzle stuffed in the back of the aliens' mouth; it didn't look natural to me.

Otherwise, great podcast! I enjoyed it, and look forward to the next one!

---

PS. I also wasn't fond of the hands using a 4-finger design compared to the original 6-finger design...

You know what? I can't say the breath ever bothered me but really good points. Thanks for the kind words.