What's in your Personal Canon?

[Extroheal]

No one really knows exactly what Fox considers canon in the AvP universe and I couldn't care less. What I'm interested in is what you guys consider part of your own personal canon. There have been several arguments stemming from people have different personal canons so maybe this thread will let us understand each other better.

My personal canon is based on a story's popularity rather than whether or not I like it, since I like my personal canon to seem more objective. The best way to measure popularity I know of is the number of reviews a story gets on Amazon.com. If two stories contradict each other then the story with more reviews is canon. If a story has less than 10 reviews I disregard it entirely because it seems to mean that very few people have even heard of it. I also disregard any story that has an average rating of less than 3.0 stars because this means that the majority of fans have rejected it. And I disregard any story that hasn't been reviewed in two years because this seems to mean that it's been generally forgotten. I don't believe in taking certain elements from a story as canon and ditching others because a story is one whole piece that can't be separated into individual elements. The exception to this is the Colonial Marines Technical Manual since it's not one whole story but a collection of pieces of information.

Canon:

Alien
Ash's report about the alien life-cycle
Nostromo Flight Plan and Crew Biographies
Alien The Director's Cut
Aliens
Aliens Special Edition
Aliens 3
Alien Resurrection
AVP
AVP Extended Edition
AVP Unrated Edition
Aliens Colonial Marines Technical Manual (most of it)
Aliens versus Predator 2 (video game)
Aliens versus Predator 2 Primal Hunt
Predator Concrete Jungle (video game)
Predator Concrete Jungle (novel)
Predator Cold War (novel)

Not sure
Alien Resurrection Special Edition
Aliens versus Predator (video game)
Aliens Labyrinth (novel)
Aliens vs Predator Prey
Aliens vs Predator Hunter's Planet

So what do your include in your Personal Canon?

[SM]

Films.
Deleted/ restored scenes that don't conflict with the films.
Scripts/ novelisations/ production material that doesn't conflict with the films.
CMTM data that doesn't conflict with the films.

[Vader the White]

Alien
Aliens
Alien 3 assembly cut except the alien is still from a dog and the Queen Chestburster still pops out.
AR
AVP
Predator
Predator 2
The term Yuajta
AVP2
The Royal Jelly theory (That a chestburster is fed royal jelly to create a Queen.)
This Life Cycle I made:

[RakaiThwei]

My personal cannon follows in this entire order:

Predator
Predator 2
Alien vs Predator
Alien vs Predator 2
Alien
Aliens
Alien 3
Alien vs Predator: Prey
Alien vs Predator: War
Alien vs Predator: Hunter's Planet
Yautja
Yautja and Human pairings.

-Rakai'Thwei

[Darkness]

Alien/Aliens/Alien 3/Predator/Predator 2*
Alien Resurrection/AvP/AvP2*
Deleted Scenes
Script - Possible Missing Scenes.

*Includes SE/Director's Cuts too.

[Extroheal]

I though AvP Hunter's Planet and AvP War contradict each other about the death of Shorty.

I also consider the name Internecivus raptus canon since it was on the Alien DVD.

It's too bad the old Aliens novels can't be canon because they were contradicted by Alien Resurrection. There were so many interesting stories among them and so many new revelations about the alien species. Technology doesn't seem to have advanced between Alien 3 and Alien Res. The main differences are that Weyland-Yutani no longer exists and androids are rare. So it may be possible to retcon some of the old novels to take place after Resurrection as long as they don't mention Weyland-Yutani.

How can people say AVP2 is canon? It hasn't even come out yet.

Alien/Aliens/Alien 3/Predator/Predator 2*
Alien Resurrection/AvP/AvP2*
Deleted Scenes
Script - Possible Missing Scenes.

*Includes SE/Director's Cuts too.

But some of the SEs contradict the theatrical versions.

[Darkness]

How can people say AVP2 is canon? It hasn't even come out yet.

Because it's a movie. I still won't ever consider an AvP film as canon as the originals no matter what happens.

But some of the SEs contradict the theatrical versions.

Examples? A:DC - Cocoon Sequence, perhaps. But nothing else really hits me. Either way, they're still as canon as the theatrical versions.

[Extroheal]

I think the cocoon scene is canon since it doesn't really contradict Aliens (see 'Egg Morphing' thread) although I know SM disagrees with me. The Alien 3 Special Edition contradicts the theatrical version in multiple ways. The alien either came out of dog or an ox. Both versions can't be canon. The AVP Unrated Edition has a lot of CGI blood inserted into death scenes but I don't think volume of blood splatter really matters in terms of continuity since all the actions and dialogue is still exactly the same. I believe the theatrical version of AVP is simply a censored version of 'what really happened'. The Alien Resurrection Special Edition has a few continuity issues, most notably the Betty scenes which have been completely rearranged. I'll post a new thread about that to discuss it in detail soon.

[Meathead320]

Films.

DC's as long as the scenes don't contradict the theatrical versions.

[Darkness]

I think the cocoon scene is canon since it doesn't really contradict Aliens (see 'Egg Morphing' thread) although I know SM disagrees with me. The Alien 3 Special Edition contradicts the theatrical version in multiple ways. The alien either came out of dog or an ox. Both versions can't be canon. The AVP Unrated Edition has a lot of CGI blood inserted into death scenes but I don't think volume of blood splatter really matters in terms of continuity since all the actions and dialogue is still exactly the same. I believe the theatrical version of AVP is simply a censored version of 'what really happened'. The Alien Resurrection Special Edition has a few continuity issues, most notably the Betty scenes which have been completely rearranged. I'll post a new thread about that to discuss it in detail soon.

Alien 3 SE - yeah, I agree with you on the dog/ox. Obviously in that case, theatrical is canon.

AvP Unrated - It's still practically the same as theatrical. I'm not even going to try and make up something to explain the lack of blood other than the PG13 certificate. That's a film-making error.

[yautja99]

All of you people should take Alien 3 directors cuts scenes with The Ox-burster and the non-burst ending of Alien3 as alternate canonical

[fluxcap]

All films in both franchises I consider cannon. I see all novels and comics taking place in a duplicate universe but not the same one as the films. I think my stance on what's cannon or not really started with Alien 3 cause Dark Horse went back to change Hicks and Newt's names in three series'. I still consider those two characters from Earth Hive/Nightmare Asylum/Female War to be Hicks and Newt except its just an offshoot from the film cannon that starts there and all concurrent Aliens/Predator comic stories take place on the offshoot cannon. But then of course offshoots within the offshoot can happen.

[Extroheal]

All of you people should take Alien 3 directors cuts scenes with The Ox-burster and the non-burst ending of Alien3 as alternate canonical

Why should we do that? Contrary to what many people think, Alien 3 didn't have a director's cut. David Fincher wasn't involved with the Special Edition. The workprint of Alien 3 features many of the scenes from the Special Edition but includes the dog-burster so Fincher never intended the ox-burster to be in the final movie. I consider the theatrical version canon because it has more reviews on Amazon.com than the Special Edition (since both versions were released on the same DVD, every review for the Special Edition is also a review for the theatrical version). I'm not familiar with the term "alternate canonical".

[SM]

Well to get anal, the WP didn't technically include the dog-burster, since those scenes were shot after the WP was produced.  But yes the ox-burster had been ditched by that point.

Some stuff from the WP/ SE fits, but other stuff as mentioned, doesn't.  I don't have any problem including the stuff that fits,

"Alternate canon" sounds like a contradiction in terms.

[yautja99]

Look People the Alien canonical can be like this

Timeline 1

Alien
Aliens
Alien 3 (Directors cut)
Alien Resurrection


Timeline 2

Alien
Aliens
Alien 3 (Theatrical version)
Alien Resurrection




You see the Directors cut can be canonical but in alternate canonical timeline.