Egg on Sulaco

[HuDaFuK]

How many times do I have to quote myself?

As much as you like, it doesn't mean I have to agree with your ideas.

[Perfect-Organism]

Nobody has to agree with anybody's ideas.  The truth is, nobody knows how the egg got there other than the people who put it there in the film.  It's largely immaterial to the film anyway.  It's just a friendly discussion.   

[HuDaFuK]

Just pointing out his repeated quotations don't solve the issue.

[Local Trouble]

You seem pretty insistent that the egg was stuck to the ceiling and don't even seem open to the possibility that it was elsewhere.  That's not disagreement, it's just obstinance.

[SM]

The Rex Pickett draft of Alien3 produced a few weeks prior to principal photography says Ripley's bioscan showed "thousands upon thousands of MICROSCOPIC eggs".  She later relayed this to Dillon.  Taking that into account she's born with every egg she ever going to lay and saying she can't produce them anymore because she loses her eggsac isn't accurate.

She may have simply laid a small one, that lacking the eggsac it couldn't grow to full size.  Or maybe it could, but took much longer - hence the time difference between Aliens and Alien3.

[Local Trouble]

Also noteworthy from that script is scene 13:

EXT. DEEP SPACE

Movement through the void.
Turning, as though altering course.

That's before the fire started.

[windebieste]

I hadn't heard about Ripley being host to thousands of micro eggs before, but hey, why not. 

Aphids have an amazing reproduction system.  A female aphid is born pregnant.  Factually, a female aphid can be born with the next generation inside and that may also already be pregnant.  Aphids can be born and have multiple generations inside them.  Weird, huh.  Add that fact to Alien life cycle and see where it takes you.

As far as removing the Queen's egg sack and ovipositor goes, we have a very real 'parallel' to that process as well.  Women do not stop ovulating when their uterus is removed via hystorectomy.  Their menstrual cycle will cease, but the ovaries still function with the gamete (egg) still forming once a month.

So maybe the Queen can still make 'eggs' without the need for an egg sack.  I'd say it's highly likely - and a worthy possibility to consider if you genuinely want to explain how the egg gets aboard the Sulaco.  After all, the Queen is on board.  It is 'alien' by all counts and anything is possible.  The fact that an established egg laying organism of unknown biological definition is present means it's certainly not out of the question.

It's entirely possible that the Queen may be able to generate proto-facehuggers within its body and the egg is formed around them in the eggsack.  If the sack is not present, it may be of worthy consideration to entertain the notion  that the Queen may drop as yet unformed larvae, say, what amounts to a legless facehugger and consists of just the tail and and the bare basics it needs to survive and a rudimentary mobility.   It might find a location and build its own safe incubation chamber - an  Alien egg - from here the egg fully forms from the nutrients draws from it's immediate environment. 

After all, the egg and facehugger stages of the Alien is one area of its life cycle that has not been fully explored onscreen and may yet potentially answer this question of the egg aboard the Sulaco.

It's not that hard to speculate when so much of the Alien's life cycle has been so malleable to date.  Only those fans adamant that the 3rd movie should be ignored are the ones not genuinely wanting an answer will do what they can to disavow any. 

-Windebieste.

[Vermillion]

ProtoSack?!.   Haha!!!!

Lol

[windebieste]

^ Case in point.

-Windebieste.

[Local Trouble]

I hadn't heard about Ripley being host to thousands of micro eggs before, but hey, why not. 

More accurately, the neuroscanner zooms into Ripley's embryonic queen to show us the microscopic proto-eggs inside of her.  Obviously, the final product didn't show that to us though.

[Perfect-Organism]

I hadn't heard about Ripley being host to thousands of micro eggs before, but hey, why not. 

Aphids have an amazing reproduction system.  A female aphid is born pregnant.  Factually, a female aphid can be born with the next generation inside and that may also already be pregnant.  Aphids can be born and have multiple generations inside them.  Weird, huh.  Add that fact to Alien life cycle and see where it takes you.

As far as removing the Queen's egg sack and ovipositor goes, we have a very real 'parallel' to that process as well.  Women do not stop ovulating when their uterus is removed via hystorectomy.  Their menstrual cycle will cease, but the ovaries still function with the gamete (egg) still forming once a month.

So maybe the Queen can still make 'eggs' without the need for an egg sack.  I'd say it's highly likely - and a worthy possibility to consider if you genuinely want to explain how the egg gets aboard the Sulaco.  After all, the Queen is on board.  It is 'alien' by all counts and anything is possible.  The fact that an established egg laying organism of unknown biological definition is present means it's certainly not out of the question.

It's entirely possible that the Queen may be able to generate proto-facehuggers within its body and the egg is formed around them in the eggsack.  If the sack is not present, it may be of worthy consideration to entertain the notion  that the Queen may drop as yet unformed larvae, say, what amounts to a legless facehugger and consists of just the tail and and the bare basics it needs to survive and a rudimentary mobility.   It might find a location and build its own safe incubation chamber - an  Alien egg - from here the egg fully forms from the nutrients draws from it's immediate environment. 

After all, the egg and facehugger stages of the Alien is one area of its life cycle that has not been fully explored onscreen and may yet potentially answer this question of the egg aboard the Sulaco.

It's not that hard to speculate when so much of the Alien's life cycle has been so malleable to date.  Only those fans adamant that the 3rd movie should be ignored are the ones not genuinely wanting an answer will do what they can to disavow any. 

-Windebieste.

Um, Windebieste, you are not implying that women produce new eggs each month are you?  As in completely fresh ones?  If I recall correctly, women have a finite number of eggs from when they are born and they carry them around with them for several decades before somebody gets lucky.  Yes there are new studies which suggest women are also capable of producing new eggs, but the general idea is that it isn't a monthly process.  If a woman is menstruating, she basically matures one egg, but does not "form" a new egg each month.

[windebieste]

My error.  Not a big one; but seeking clarification is always good.  I  meant to say "Their menstrual cycle will cease, but the ovaries still function with the gamete (egg) still released once a month."  By the way, 'menstruation' and 'ovulation' are different.

Either way, I'm saying the initial process still functions despite a major component of the plumbing no longer being present after an hysterectomy and the egg is still released into the system once a month.  This is true for women; and a parallel may be true for Queen Aliens, too.

With this in mind, it's not outside the realm of credibility for the Queen to still be capable of reproduction without the egg sack as the egg itself may form further inside its body and then travel to the eggsack where it then develops further inside this organ to a fully formed egg. 

Speculating here, but in order to completely sterilise the Queen, removing the egg sack may not be enough.  You may need to remove whatever passes as gonads it has inside its body.  And because it's Alien, who knows what it's actually capable of doing? 

But if you genuinely want an explanation of how that egg possibly got aboard the Sulaco, then thee presence of the Queen and further speculation about its biology and reproduction is as good a place to start as any. 

After all, who really does know everything there is to know about the Queen's reproductive system? 

Especially when there's such a abundance of weird sexuality on our own planet.  Male pigs have a corkscrew penis. Tapirs have a penis that is half their body length*.  Male cats have a barbed penis.  Female kangaroos have 3 vaginas.  Just try and imagine the orgy if these 4 animals get together on a Saturday night after too many beers.  After all, they're not all that far removed from us.  They're all mammals.

-Windebieste.

*I mean seriously huge.  So big in fact, I figure female tapirs must be hollow all the way up to the shoulders.  ...and no. I'm not going to post images.   You can google that one for yourself.  I'm sure tapir penis was the inspirational design for 'Prometheus's hammerpede.  lol.

[Perfect-Organism]

Damn!  What will the nice people at Google who spy on my think of me after those searches?  Polar bears actually have a bone in their penis called a baculum that, get this, actually BREAKS during copulation most of the time.  Kangaroos are marsupials but your point is well taken.  I would be shocked to find that the queen's reproductive organ is completely in the egg sac and not inside her.  It would make sense that she carries internal reproductive organs.

The bottom line is that the aliens are capable of whatever the script writer comes up with and Fox approves.  Its that simple.  I am sure we make those folks very happy by continuing this polemic on blogs like this one.  Fox WANTS us to be a crazy-ass fan base.

[Local Trouble]

Gotta give props to windebieste for the doing the heavy-lifting in the biology department here.  I never had the energy to get into so much detail, but that's the general idea behind the ooze theory I've been shilling for.

[windebieste]

If I recall correctly, mammals without a baculum are significantly in the minority.  Of course, that means humans as well.   That 'boner' you got?  Aint nothin' compared to how most male mammals are endowed.  Even viagra for life just doesn't cut it.  lol.

Yes.  It really does come down to how 20th Century Fox perceives what will reward them the most without too much controversy.  I love this 'crazy-ass' fan base.   This is a fantastic Community to be a part of!   Fox should love it, too.  This fan base has everything.  It has so much to offer; and Fox would be wise to appreciate that.   

After all, it's their phallic headed monstrosity that brings all together.  lol.

EDiT:  It's just very general layman's appreciation of biology but I believe it's conceptually reasonable in the context of its use here.

EDiT again:   Marsupials are mammals.  As are monotremes.  You might want to look them up if you're not familiar with their specialised breeding characteristics. 

-Windebieste.