Weyland Yutani's prior knowledge of the aliens

[maledoro]

After recently watching the director's cut of the first alien film, its quite clear that Weyland Yutani knew about the aliens before the events of that film.

It was quite clear in the original version.

We know that the nostromo was re-routed on their orders, and ash was put on board to make sure a specimen was brought back from lv-426. If all they knew was the beacon was a warning or a distress signal and that it merely could be alien in origin, how did they know it was the type of alien life that you could receive a specimen from? Rather than peaceful, sentient life or what not.

All the Company knew was that there was an alien lifeform that was dangerous to the senders of the signal. They had no idea as to how dangerous it was to humans, hence detouring one of their ships to find out.

This implies they new a type of  non-humanoid life.

Considering that it was on a planet that hadn't been explored by humans, that follows.

They knew it must have been deadly or else they wouldn't want it for their bio-weapons division. The decoding of the signal didn't have that specific of a warning did it, if so, why would dallas not have seen the special order, he had access to mother as the captain?

He didn't see it because he didn't ask the Magic Question: "Request clarification on Science inability to neutralize alien."

Is that due to weyland yutani's policy of having dallas only see non-science related priorities?

No, it's due to Dallas asking routine questions and not suspecting Ash of anything.

Ash was playing dumb through the movie as well, when questioned what the embryo is, he says he doesn't know and turns off the monitor. The way he looks at Kane and around the room before it bursts out, implies he knew what was going to happen. Sure these points may just be because he found out about what the facehugger was doing once he analyzed it while it was on Kane, but maybe not.

It's pretty obvious he knew something was going on in Kane.

So therefore if the signal from the derelict spacecraft on lv-426 did not contain specific information about the danger, then clearly this implies prior knowledge of the alien was gained by them. Therefore the events in avp-r, would not necessarily break continuity by having the government or certain people in it, be aware of the aliens in some capacity.

The prior knowledge came from either an off-course ship or probe that had passed through that region of space. Since there was no evidence of the aliens left over from AVP, we'll have to see if the same thing happens at the end of AVP: Requiem.

[Kimarhi]

Dallas said pretty much the same thing.  Why would he lie to the crew.  They had to investigate the transmission.  He knew it, and he used Ash as confirmation.

As for letting Kane in, it was the chance to investigate an alien lifeform.  One that might've had commercial applications.

And your STILL not answering why they didn't investigate the ship once in 57 years.

Well the information died with the crew of the nostromo. Weyland Yutani could have found the signal, but it was the nostromo and mother that determined the coordinates of the derelict ship. That info died with the nostromo being blown to smithereens.
Or maybe it was only the nostromo that recieved the beacon, even upon deciphering it, it probably wouldn't have too many details, it was a rudamentary non-linguistic warning. In this case prior knowledge of the aliens could have existed but not of the derelict craft.

How do we know that the impetus for even imposing regulations that say any potential source of alien life must be investigated, was not prompted by their desire to find the exact alien species they had at least some data on before?

Wait a minute.  Its somehow easier to believe that WY would make new laws on a mission rather than sending out new coordinates and rerouting a ship to investigate?  Dallas was familiar enough with the laws that he would've called bs on anything Ash said that wasnt true.  Since Ash was familiar with what it said, he told the unwilling members of the crew what they had to hear to complete the mission of the derelict exploration.  Since Dallas says something similar to what Ash says BEFORE Ash says anything, I think the law (or mandate or whatever you want to call the corporate policy) was legit. 

And who says they had some data from previous encounters?  Your the only one.  AvP ended with Lex the only survivor on a desolate island where the closest humans were in a ship landlocked by ice.  There isn't even a guarentee she made it back, let alone that anybody would believe her.

[Munkeywrench]

Well really...the only time has to be near "Aliens" because of AR and the genius who wrote it make it sound as if Ripley killed them all the only other option would be for it after AR and the aliens be back again...who knows lol probally they won't even say the date jsut make the movie in space

I like the story of the first AvP computer game.  It takes place on LV-426 ten years after the events of Aliens.  Apparently, the detonation at the end of Aliens destroyed the colony but not the derelict space craft.  A new research facility is established which is built around the derelict craft. 

It would be nice if they could ignore Alien Resurrection altogether.  I had heard a rumor that one of the ideas for Alien Resurrection was that Alien 3 was a dream that Ripley had in hyperspace.  I don't know if this is true or not.  I thought it would have been awesome because Hicks could have survived.  Have any of you dudes ever heard of this?  Just wondering.

Yeah I have that would have been awesome

[maledoro]

that Alien 3 was a dream that Ripley had in hyperspace. I thought it would have been awesome because Hicks could have survived.

[Munkeywrench]

Its possible that maybe the Nostromo wasnt the first ship (after AvP) to encounter the Aliens, another ship could have landed on lv-426 and discovered the eggs (yet no one got close enough to be implanted) and reported their findings to the company back on earth.

[maledoro]

Its possible that maybe the Nostromo wasnt the first ship (after AvP) to encounter the Aliens, another ship could have landed on lv-426 and discovered the eggs (yet no one got close enough to be implanted) and reported their findings to the company back on earth.

It's more possible that the Nostromo was the first ship (after AVP) to encounter the aliens as there is nothing to base the idea of a previous ship's visit on....

[Major Alan Schaefer]

Its possible that maybe the Nostromo wasnt the first ship (after AvP) to encounter the Aliens, another ship could have landed on lv-426 and discovered the eggs (yet no one got close enough to be implanted) and reported their findings to the company back on earth.

It's more possible that the Nostromo was the first ship (after AVP) to encounter the aliens as there is nothing to base the idea of a previous ship's visit on....

exept the fact that the company seemed to know about them

[Porkus Maximus]

They were aware of the transmition, nothing more.

[SM]

Yep.  All they had was a transmission that warned people to stay away from an organism on LV-426 (almost certainly hostile, otherwise why warn people to stay away?).

There's no link between Weyland knowing about the Aliens from AvP (which they didn't by the end anyway) and them knowing about them in Alien.

[Nightmare]

in alien the company must have knew about the alien.....or ash must have somehow contacted them once he knew about it....unlikly since they tried to contact earth before and failed....

i think some ship must have been sent there...then everyone died and the company foudn the ship lost in space with a dead alien on it.....

so tehy sent ash with 1st crew because he was an android and hopefully he could put the creature in cryosleep and have it alive for the company....

i mean, ash wouldnt get killed unless the alien tough it was a threat....no good for food...no good for egg morph (i guess it needs a live person...or a dead person that was alive before....person or animal...)..no good for facehugh....

so why kill him?

[Porkus Maximus]

so why kill him?

It doesn't need a reason, its motives are totally alien to us.  We don't know why it killed the other crew members besides egg morphing in the DC, in the theatrical cut it has no obvious reason for threatening most of the crew.  On the issue of being unable to contact earth;  the way I figure it, they were broadcasting over short-range transmission.  Mother was their only direct link to "the network".

[Irritator]

This implies they new a type of  non-humanoid life. They knew it must have been deadly or else they wouldn't want it for their bio-weapons division.

It's only Rilpey's speculation. There's nothing in the movie to back it up. But they could have known the Alien is dangerous, before of the warning transmission, as said earlier.

Technically he wouldn't have to contain it, just prevent the crew from killing it.  Once the crew were all dead the alien could be left to do whatever the hell it wanted, it wasn't exactly going anywhere.

Exactly. The Nostromo would go back on auto-pilot and when it came back the Company could hide and contain it, then search for the Alien with appropiate caution.

well he was the one keeping the company informed, so was of at least some minimal value to them. Also they wouldn't know where the hell the alien is on the ship. Without ash, they could open a door, alien is right there, and it starts killing them.

And Ash would know the exact position of the Alien how...?

There's no link between Weyland knowing about the Aliens from AvP (which they didn't by the end anyway) and them knowing about them in Alien.

Yeah, and that's why it's so f**ked up. It doesn't link to the Alien movies nor explain anything, yet it's not completely apart either, messing with the continuity. It's there for no good reason at all. I'd prefer it to go either for a full-scale explanation (that's just one of the lesser evils, I don't like merging AvP and Alien continuities) or to sever the connection completely (the best resolition IMO). Otherwise it's just stretched in between and frustrating, because it doesn't actually add anyhting yet generates confusion and doubt.

[SM]

or to sever the connection completely (the best resolition IMO).

Amen.

[Ballzanya]

Yep.  All they had was a transmission that warned people to stay away from an organism on LV-426 (almost certainly hostile, otherwise why warn people to stay away?).

There's no link between Weyland knowing about the Aliens from AvP (which they didn't by the end anyway) and them knowing about them in Alien.

whoever said that the signal actually contained such specific details. For all we know it just said to stay away from the planet, if it had specific coordinates where to stay away from, i think the nostromo would have landed a little closer to the derelict so that kane, lambert and dallas wouldn't have to walk as far and ash would have had his specimen sooner.
So expecting to find a hostile organism, provided that special order 2037 was given prior to them investigating the planet, does indeed imply weyland yutani was highly eager to find a hostile species for the bio-weapons division. This also implies that they didn't have any such species anywhere near as potentially effective and deadly as the alien species from the franchise.
So something had to initially prompt them to want to use alien organisms as weapons. You don't just wake up out of the blue and decide to include alien lifeforms in your bio-weapons division, which most likely would have originally pertained to microscopic things/germ warfare.
There is nothing in the events of alien that contradicts some event which could take place after avp-r and before the events of the first film, that could have made the aliens known. There is no direct evidence, but it remains possible.

[Kimarhi]

There was a warning from the ship.  That warned of a dangerous speciman.  However, we don't know if that was the primary reason the company wanted to explore the ship.  It was an alien spacecraft afterall.

The bioweapons intervention might've been brought up after Ash reported back to the company that the thing in the warning was whacking all his crew mates.