Quote from: Alien³ on Mar 17, 2015, 06:45:16 PM
Quote from: NetworkATTH on Mar 17, 2015, 03:15:46 PM
Quote from: Alien³ on Mar 17, 2015, 03:14:52 PM
How is its plot not as thick as Alien or Aliens?
I never implied it wasn't.
Apologies, I must have been thrown off when you said...
Quote from: NetworkATTH on Mar 17, 2015, 03:12:38 PM
Quote from: Alien³ on Mar 17, 2015, 03:08:11 PM
It's plot is as thick as it's predecessors.
It's not but that's besides the point,
I thought we were discussing how rich and tick the plots are, comparing Ward's idea to the final product.
It was a mix up. I did actually say, that it didn't have a thick plot the second quote, but I'm just tired. I'm kind of on the fence about how thick its plot is, but I'm of the opinion that the Assembly Cut is capable enough, but the theatrical cut isn't. So the theatrical cut really isn't, as good as its predecessors, while the Assembly Cut is. Thus the mix up.
Quote from: Corporal Hicks on Mar 17, 2015, 06:50:08 PM
I must admit I'm somewhat confused about the point Network is trying to make. Can you clarify?
I'm not a native English speaker
But I'll try my best. All I'm saying, is that the Ward script, while pretty Out-There, had many elements, such as the development of Ripley's character, that should not have been changed as much. The logic of the change being, the Ward script had problems, so they recycled the ideas, but removed a lot that worked about the script.
The central idea of Ripley's character is as follows. You can read it from the basic Freud's structural understanding of the psyche. Although it is long out dated, it still is a great way, to analyze characters transformations, and balances within the self. Knowing how Freudian Alien is, it is perfect, that something along these lines, is put in the context of Alien.
The Id, is the basic part of the mind. It controls our urges for sex, water, hunger, sleep, and our impulses, it's our desire to survive. It's the trigger that shoots out when you think "Huh, my mouth is dry, I could use a glass of water." or in other circumstances "There is an Alien organism on board the Nostromo, I gotta get out of here alive at all costs." It is also, interpretable as sin. It's the easiest part of us that is subject for our desires, of all the seven deadly sins. Gluttony, Lust, Greed, Hubris, Wrath, Vanity, and Sloth. The easiest way to understand this, is that it is the part of you that helps you survive, but it's also the part of you that lacks serious impulse control, and so naturally comes into conflict with a Christian society. But most of all, one can see the Alien itself as a giant Id. It is a primitive being that is just, pure, total Id.
The Ego is the middle man, that manages between Super-Ego, and
Id.It seeks to please the id's drive in realistic ways that will benefit in the long term rather than bring grief. The ego is the judgment, tolerance, reality testing, control, planning, defense, synthesis of information, intellectual functioning, and memory, of what makes you, you! The ego separates out what is real. It helps us to organize our thoughts and make sense of them and the world around us. The ego is that part of the id which has been modified by the direct influence of the external world. Its task is to find a balance between primitive drives and reality while satisfying the id and super-ego. Its main concern is with the individual's safety and allows some of the id's desires to be expressed, but only when consequences of these actions are marginal. Consequences, that for Ripley in Alien and Aliens, did not exist, and she gave into pure Id, only the will to survive no matter the cost. A colony nuked from orbit? "You can bill me." Running down corridors with flashing light and fire and an Alien chasing you, with everyone you know killed, can throw things out of balance, into a state of trauma, of Id.
The Super-Ego reflects the internalization of cultural rules, mainly taught by parents applying their guidance and influence. It's tradition, religion, faith, you get the idea. The installation of the super-ego can be described as a successful instance of identification with the parental agency. The super-ego works in contradiction to the id. The super-ego strives to act in a socially appropriate manner, whereas the id just wants instant self-gratification. The super-ego controls our sense of right and wrong and guilt. It helps us fit into society by getting us to act in socially acceptable ways. Ripley, had to turn off her Super-Ego temporarily and thrive in the fight or flight/rush or die, manner, of Alien and Aliens. These are also the monks who are representative of it.
Bare in mind none of this is actually how human psychology works, this has been mostly proven false. Psychology actually relies more on your own health. But that's another story.
What does this all mean?
It means, from Ward's script, Ripley is exhausted after Aliens. She is floating in space, recovering from the trauma she endured. But the self is out of balance, there is an unbalance of Id within her that has to be corrected, so an inner turmoil must take place, she has to confront her demons, in one last mission.
She crash lands and it just is her. She's pregnant with an Alien (overload of Id). The monks exist as the Super-Ego extreme to the Alien. The Alien represents out of control Id. They see Ripley for what she is, Id, something they totally reject, they humiliate and ban her, because she is foriegn to them just as the Alien. Anthony and John that help her, is the Super-Ego trying to help a solution. The Wooden World itself is the ego Ripley left behind she cannot recognize, it is the protocol she followed in the beginning of Alien, her unwillingness to let Kane in, her suspicion of Ash, it is, installed memory. It's wooden, and old, the monks who live in it, is the Super-Ego of herself she does not recognize, from her old Ego. She, is just a representation of Ripley, self image.
The journey through the planet plays with the nature of this, I think you get my idea, or I hope I'm clearing up some confusion.
I'm just saying, along these lines, these are great ideas. But it's understandable how they got lost in the chaos of Alien 3's production. To a board room executive who doesn't know Id from Ego, Freud sounds like a bunch of unprofitable horse shit. So, Giler and Hill try their best to adapt elements of it, and David Fincher probably tries to fight for ways to bring this forward, met with combat from Giler and Hill and Fox, and everyone else. On top of him being anti-social and really mad, that production isn't going the way he really wanted.
In the end, what's
good, from Ward's script, what they were going for, in Ripley's character progression, exists in a way, but it's really not given the same sense of urgency of the development of Ripley's character in relation to her past memories and past life aside from the line "You've been in my life so long I don't remember anything else" which Fox fought Fincher not to include.
In other words, it's a visually stunning film I love in assembly format, but wouldn't it have been great if the visuals reflected what they implied.