They keep want to bring her back. Her cycle ended with alien 3, it was not a perfect film but a good ending for the Ripley saga. They brought her back cloned in Alien 4 and then Blomkamp wanted to bring her back for alien 5.
Why do producers and writers think the alien can't exist without ripley? We as alien fans love Ripley but we love the alien more... just a write a new movie with different characters, clean slate. Not a remake or a reboot either just a new film in the universe.
Anyway the upcoming tv show will probably do that so that's good lol
It should be pretty telling that in the "modern" era (that being, after the AVP movies when the franchises separated) none of the Ripley-centered ideas have moved forward, and that we have instead gotten Prometheus, Alien: Covenant, and the upcoming Noah Hawley series, all of which do not feature Ripley.
Certain people (like Neill Blomkamp and Walter Hill, in the last few years) have tried to bring Ripley back but it seems like the studio (be it pre-sale 20th Century Fox or post-sale 20th Century Studios) doesn't have much interest in returning to Ripley.
Yeah true but then again Prometheus is hardly an alien film and it would be impossible for Ripley to show up in the prequels.
Adding the character in a "vs" film wouldn't make much sense either.
In the main continuous alien franchise they clearly are looking for a way to bring Ripley back.
I don't get it really, the star of the franchise is the monster not the characters.
Watching Alien last night I wondered if they would re-boot it, but decided the film is perfect. It would be like re-booting Jaws.
Simple fact is now Sigourney is too old to star in any Alien Film.
The TV series is 100% the right move for both fans and story tellers.
My bet is on they will reboot it with a new ripley charachter since franchises like this must have it.(looking at you star wars and that its disney).
but yes, since Aliens I would argue we should have gone on from ripley and create new stories with new people etc, but franchises and fanbases for the most part depends on same hero to be in it, and the movie makers know this, its why Ripley is in all movies and they want sigourney in it.
From an EU fan's point of view, the alien is the reappearing star, just as nanison said.
But from the studio's point of view, following Aliens, a Weaver-less Alien film would be like a Die Hard movie without Bruce Willis.
With Prometheus, Ridley Scott had the power to convince Fox that he had the ability to kickstart the franchise with a completely different vehicle to drive it forward—namely, the dangerous android narrative, with Fassbender as its star.
As for a reboot: There's a reflex reaction against such a thing by many fans, because traditionally a reboot means the studio retires all support for the old stuff and encourages the fans to forget about its existence too, putting all their support behind the new reboot instead. When films were exclusively distributed in theatres, it made good business sense not to have your new stuff competing in the same marketplace as the old.
But that's rather old fashioned thinking. These days we have home video and streaming with which audiences continue to revisit original films at will. And philosophically, the current storytelling landscape is showing us over and over again that "alternate universe" stories are valid forms of franchise-making, especially when jumping to a different medium.
Quite apart from Noah Hawley's project, I could see a "remix" of the entire feature film series (and even incorporating EU material like Seegson, the Cold Forge, etc) rewritten as a streaming show, pulling Shaw and David, Ripley, the Nostromo, Hadley's Hope and Newt, Fiorina, and the Auriga all into a single, contiguous, saga, not being spread out over a hundred year long narrative the way they currently are. The kernel of the plots would remain, but the characters and details of the storylines would be reimagined, much like Marvel's "Civil War" comic book was reimagined for the Avengers MCU.
TC
ALIEN 3 was the perfect ending of the original Alien saga. They should've just continued with new characters from there on. We would've probably had Alien 5, 6 & 7 by now if it wasn't for A:R. I don't know if that's actually a good or bad thing, but from a sequel perspective A:R made it extremely hard to make a sequel or a prequel to A:R (as in set not that far after A3).
Quote from: Local Trouble on Oct 10, 2018, 12:10:30 AM
At least Alien 3 left all the worldbuilding intact...then Alien Resurrection flushed it all down the toilet.
Quote from: nanison on Aug 02, 2021, 10:40:51 PM
They keep want to bring her back. Her cycle ended with alien 3, it was not a perfect film but a good ending for the Ripley saga. They brought her back cloned in Alien 4 and then Blomkamp wanted to bring her back for alien 5.
Why do producers and writers think the alien can't exist without ripley? We as alien fans love Ripley but we love the alien more... just a write a new movie with different characters, clean slate. Not a remake or a reboot either just a new film in the universe.
Anyway the upcoming tv show will probably do that so that's good lol
The main reason (from a studio perspective) is that it's simply easier to wheel out a well-loved character with built-in audience traction, rather than put in the hard yards establishing new ones. It's a microcosm of the larger sequel vs original property tug of war. What they often don't factor in is that bad writing will inevitably ground the character down to the point that they cease to be interesting. There's an art to making a sequel that truly expands upon and enriches the characters it inherits from previous movies. But studio execs aren't writers.
Quote from: Local Trouble on Aug 05, 2021, 10:04:08 PM
Quote from: Local Trouble on Oct 10, 2018, 12:10:30 AM
At least Alien 3 left all the worldbuilding intact...then Alien Resurrection flushed it all down the toilet.
As much as I dislike Prometheus, Resurrection was the movie that almost killed the franchise.
Yeah alien 4 was really stupid, though I really loved it back then as it was my first alien film in the cinema. That end boss beast thing looked terrifying to me as well as properly nasty.
These days I don't like much of it, Ripley was not Ripley anymore, the queen and other locked up aliens don't sit well with me, the crew of heroes are irritating. I did like the underwater sequence though.
I had the opposite reaction with Resurrection – didn't care for it much at all to start with, and I still don't like Whedon's script, but these days I get a lot of enjoyment out of it as a showcase of the Alien universe through Jeunet's nutso stylings. Almost like a Dark Horse comic come to life.
I hated the tone of the fourth film. It is a script designed to laugh at itself. There is nothing to take seriously. I can tolerate up through the underwater and ladder sequence, then I can barely sit through the last third of the film.
I've come to be somewhat neutral toward it but would cry no tears of sorrow if they started remaking the movies and nuked the old franchise for it like I would for the other three films.
Prometheus has drawn my ire of the new lot of films.
I like A:R as a stand-alone spoof of an Alien film, but it really doesn't fit in or make sense with the rest of the movies. Way too much humor and comedy (albeit dark and morbid as hell) and with cartoony characters and almost slapstick-like scenes. It's like a visually appealing grotesque random fever dream with its own sense of logic, inhabited by a plethora of oddball caricatures.
Money, money, money money
MONEY!!!
Was just about to say that.
Quote from: Whiskeybrewer on Aug 08, 2021, 12:00:07 PM
Money, money, money money
MONEY!!!
Always sunny
In a rich men's world
AHAAAAAAAAAAAAAA !
Quote from: TC on Aug 05, 2021, 05:53:37 PM
Quite apart from Noah Hawley's project, I could see a "remix" of the entire feature film series (and even incorporating EU material like Seegson, the Cold Forge, etc) rewritten as a streaming show, pulling Shaw and David, Ripley, the Nostromo, Hadley's Hope and Newt, Fiorina, and the Auriga all into a single, contiguous, saga, not being spread out over a hundred year long narrative the way they currently are. The kernel of the plots would remain, but the characters and details of the storylines would be reimagined, much like Marvel's "Civil War" comic book was reimagined for the Avengers MCU.
TC
Hmm. I like the way that sounds. 8)
Quote from: TC on Aug 05, 2021, 05:53:37 PM
But that's rather old fashioned thinking. These days we have home video and streaming with which audiences continue to revisit original films at will. And philosophically, the current storytelling landscape is showing us over and over again that "alternate universe" stories are valid forms of franchise-making, especially when jumping to a different medium.
TC
I also really like this. Alternative universes, the "What if" or even the stories that didn't' make the cut like Dan O'Bannon's original Alien or William Gibson's Alien 3. There is already a recent media about that, but I wonder what a live action would be like. 🤔
Quote from: SpreadEagleBeagle on Aug 08, 2021, 08:43:04 AM
I like A:R as a stand-alone spoof of an Alien film, but it really doesn't fit in or make sense with the rest of the movies.
I feel the same way about it. Like if you watch it immediately before or after the original
Alien it is just so far away in tone that it's like they're not even in the same series. I've never considered it canon, but more like a comic book live action adaption for a bit of fun.
It's quite sexy too
(https://www.denofgeek.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/alien405.jpg)
Quote from: SpreadEagleBeagle on Aug 05, 2021, 08:35:31 PM
ALIEN 3 was the perfect ending of the original Alien saga. They should've just continued with new characters from there on. We would've probably had Alien 5, 6 & 7 by now if it wasn't for A:R. I don't know if that's actually a good or bad thing, but from a sequel perspective A:R made it extremely hard to make a sequel or a prequel to A:R (as in set not that far after A3).
As much as Alien 3 is a good film, I would argue it's not a "perfect ending" since the Alien wins and the hero dies.
I was thinking about that last night watching Aliens again and funnily enough it was the Cat that made me think that lol
How does Alien win though ? Alien's goal is to spread and to procreate - it does not achieve that. Ripley's goal is to not let Alien spread and procreate - she achieves that even if by sacrificing her own life
Yeah, the Aliens very much lose. Ripley kills the "last" one, thwarting both them and the Company. Humanity survives.
I think it's supposed to have one of those "mixed fortune" endings; both positive and sad at the same time. Alien 3 has the kind of story that you would normally think this should work well.
The trouble is Ripley spends the whole movie feeling depressed and in despair, which makes her end feel less like a heroic sacrifice than an act of suicide. It's kind of hard to cheer for a suicidal person's success at killing themself.
TC
She wins until Alien 4 then *insert other Alien stuff.
The Alien took her friends, her family, her new friends, her new family, then her life.
I'd say that's a definite loss. It would have been a brilliant installment in a bigger picture, but as the end? It's a no from me.
You wouldn't find a single Alien Fan knocking back another Ripley movie. I think Alien 3 is still as good if she lives.
I'm an Alien fan knocking back another Ripley movie.
Alien 3 ended her story in an incredibly satisfactory way for me, and Resurrection is fun for what it is, but what it is is an eccentric, oddball one-off within the franchise. I dig it on its own merits but it isn't something that I want to dictate the core future direction of the franchise.
Quote from: Highland on Aug 19, 2021, 12:56:29 PM
...
It would have been a brilliant installment in a bigger picture, but as the end? It's a no from me.
...
If I was asked to reboot the original films (conveniently ignoring
Resurrection), my way of making
Alien 3 an "installment in a bigger picture" would be to make it the 2nd film, then cap the trilogy off with
Aliens.
George Lucas had the right idea with the OT Star Wars films: Act 1
A New Hope, Act 2
Empire, Act 3
Return of the Jedi. The 2nd act is always the darkest one.
TC
You've just voiced something I've only recentky started to think about: the first 3 Alien movies don't exactly follow traditional movie trilogy formula in a way that second and third installments are kinda inverted so middle chapter is the most optimistic and up-bit one while the final is dark and depressing. You've mentioned Star Wars OT. I would add to that Dark Knight and Kung Fu Panda trilogies.
The thing with first 3 Alien movies is that they were never intended as one cohesive story. Each instalment was a one-off and represented unique style and vision of its director
Quote from: Highland on Aug 19, 2021, 12:56:29 PM
The Alien took her friends, her family, her new friends, her new family, then her life.
I'd say that's a definite loss. It would have been a brilliant installment in a bigger picture, but as the end? It's a no from me.
OK, on her personal level Ripley definetly lost a lot. But what you've listed didn't just happened in Alien 3 - it happened through the course of 3 movies. Ripley loses something in each one: she lost her friends in Alien (I think its safe to assume Nostromo's crew were her friends), in Aliens she lost her family, specifically her daughter plus she lost her job, was proclaimed insane, became an outcast in a world where nobody recogmises her anymore.
You can argue she lost the most in Alien 3 in a form of Newt, Hicks, Bishop and finally her own life. But as SiL and I pointed out on a bigger level she had the last laugh and essentially said "f**k you" to Alien and Company while saving the universe and humanity from Alien's plague. Her jumping in a vat of molten lead is not a suicide - it's clear act of defiance
Quote from: TC on Aug 19, 2021, 12:13:42 PM
I think it's supposed to have one of those "mixed fortune" endings; both positive and sad at the same time. Alien 3 has the kind of story that you would normally think this should work well.
The trouble is Ripley spends the whole movie feeling depressed and in despair, which makes her end feel less like a heroic sacrifice than an act of suicide. It's kind of hard to cheer for a suicidal person's success at killing themself.
TC
Interesting to hear someone interpret it that way, which is not at all how I've ever taken it. To me Ripley is the only constant optimist in the film, not in the sense that she's all sunshine and roses but that she refuses to just lay down and die despite knowing that a fairy tale ending is a forlorn hope.
Far from suicidal, she had the strongest tenacity for survival of anyone on FIORINA, and ultimately doesn't kill herself so much as ensure that the alien dies while also giving a massive middle finger to the company. It's a sacrifice, not a suicide, and making the best out of a hopeless situation.
#RipleyDidNotKillHerself
Quote from: Kradan on Aug 19, 2021, 01:59:44 PM
Each instalment was a one-off and represented unique style and vision of its director
And that right there is the core appeal to me of Alien as an ongoing franchise.
Same here
In some ways I'm surprised there is a mystery on why the franchise finds it hard to drop Ripley? Its the same reason Harrison Ford is still playing Indiana Jones. They are iconic characters in their franchise. Harrison Ford has way more years than Sigourney. And considering I have heroine's in real life such a Jane Goodall age is not an issue for me.
I don't expect Sigourney to be physically "fighting" ALIENS in future films. But I can see her in an advisory role or planning strategy's. She has always been a voice of reason when it concerns ALIENS. I don't think that will ever change.
That is not to say I don't welcome other characters to take over new and major roles. I hope it is so. I'm just not writing off Ripley. ;)
Quote from: Highland on Aug 19, 2021, 12:56:29 PM
You wouldn't find a single Alien Fan knocking back another Ripley movie. I think Alien 3 is still as good if she lives.
Wrong.
Quote from: Nightmare Asylum on Aug 19, 2021, 03:55:34 PM
Quote from: Kradan on Aug 19, 2021, 01:59:44 PM
Each instalment was a one-off and represented unique style and vision of its director
And that right there is the core appeal to me of Alien as an ongoing franchise.
Not wrong.
This is what makes the alien trilogy different and refreshing, the downbeat ending took everyone by surprise, the constant soul destroying losses Ripley undergoes. We see Ripley grow as a leader then find happiness and purpose again only to see everything go to shit in the last part. I love it when films don't have the obligatory happy ending. alien 3 is not a perfect film mainly due to a bad and confusing finale and horrible special effects but Weaver absolutely kills it and the film overall is very refreshing and atmospheric.
I agree that each film is different in style, none of the sequels feel rehashed. Brilliant trilogy!
Like others said: Ripley didnt lose, she sacrificed herself to make sure the xenomorphs would die out and weyland yutani to never get their hands on them and in making so saving earth. The xenos lost as the runner failed in its mission and the queen died and last chance for them to breed.
All that ripley lost and went through and knowing getting out of there alive is just meters away and chosed to sacrifice herself for those who died earlier and saving humanity, its a great ending to her arch.
I love alien3 due to this and they didnt go the safe route like star wars or other big franchises where you know the hero will win and nothing bad can ever happen to him/her, alien3 and the franchise itself shows how gritty and dark nature and space is and no one is safe and will have to do hard choices to remain alive. Alien3 made the xenos a big threat again and not a family safe movie like aliens movie did in a way. Like the youtubers: off the shelves said in their review: alien movies are gritty and brutal and cold and nothing is guaranteed, humans are meat for the xenos and people will die, xenos are the perfect organism and having ripley survive them again and hicks and newt too, would make them less dangerous and the audience would never fear for the heroes, here the movie has the balls to kill them.
Alien3 was a good ending of the trilogy and ripley.
In my opinion having her survive and get even more movies with her running around, killing xenos like nothing would just harm the main star: the xenos.
Jaws took that route and its silly when the sharks is hunting the family and kids of the star of the first movie, traveling halfway around the sea to get after that old lady.... same for seeing ripley face the xenos againa nd again, what are the odds for that to happen?
No I dont want to see more ripley vs aliens again, its like eating same food: first time its nice but after 4-5 time you get sick of eating the same.
Give me new charachters and setting, maybe have a small cameo at best but else I prefer there to be no ripley. The xeno is the star and only thing we need for a good movie.
Quote from: TC on Aug 19, 2021, 01:39:20 PM
Quote from: Highland on Aug 19, 2021, 12:56:29 PM
...
If I was asked to reboot the original films (conveniently ignoring Resurrection), my way of making Alien 3 an "installment in a bigger picture" would be to make it the 2nd film, then cap the trilogy off with Aliens.
George Lucas had the right idea with the OT Star Wars films: Act 1 A New Hope, Act 2 Empire, Act 3 Return of the Jedi. The 2nd act is always the darkest one.
TC
This is exactly what I was about to write. Aliens is the last film. That's when she wipes out the Planet, Queen and all and essentially gets a new family. That's a win.
Also the "other Ripley" part was more about in the past , not now. She wouldn't fit into a movie now.
Alien3 was a last ditch job with an average script saved only by the people involved, the soundtrack and made multiple times better by the passing of time.
Quote from: Highland on Aug 20, 2021, 12:13:37 AM
Quote from: TC on Aug 19, 2021, 01:39:20 PM
Quote from: Highland on Aug 19, 2021, 12:56:29 PM
...
If I was asked to reboot the original films (conveniently ignoring Resurrection), my way of making Alien 3 an "installment in a bigger picture" would be to make it the 2nd film, then cap the trilogy off with Aliens.
George Lucas had the right idea with the OT Star Wars films: Act 1 A New Hope, Act 2 Empire, Act 3 Return of the Jedi. The 2nd act is always the darkest one.
TC
This is exactly what I was about to write. Aliens is the last film. That's when she wipes out the Planet, Queen and all and essentially gets a new family. That's a win.
Also the "other Ripley" part was more about in the past , not now. She wouldn't fit into a movie now.
Alien3 was a last ditch job with an average script saved only by the people involved, the soundtrack and made multiple times better by the passing of time.
Well, there is a movie that is no longer
"Ripley vs. Alien" with the bad guy winning at the end. It's like
Revenge of the Sith from Alien. ;D
(https://i.ibb.co/k5q3hbF/Alien-Covenant-screencaps-kissthemgoodbye-28570729-removebg-preview.png)
Now Going back to the original series, it could be said that we have the optimistic happy ending and the depressive happy ending with
ALIENS and
ALIEN³ respectively. In Cameron's movie, Ripley destroyed the Aliens and won a family. It will sound controversial, I know, but maybe that should have been the end of Ripley. Then they could have explored other things, like the Space Jockey, maybe another Derelict, and a story with new characters.
But yes, probably back then, for FOX an Alien movie without Ripley would be like Return of the Jedi without Luke or something. And so came the Fincher movie, with all the problems of its development as the true closing of Ripley's arc, a darker and more depressing one as you have already pointed out.
Maybe Ridley Scott was unsuccessful, but he was the only one who tried to do something different. Although I wonder if Shaw and Daniels were attempts to create a new Ripely, but for better or worse the prequels ended up being the arc of a villain rather than a hero. It's like having Ash as the lead in the original movies :laugh: and that's without mentioning the controversial direction that the director took with the concepts that years ago seemed more striking; the Space Jockeys and the supposed origin of the Alien.
I still think you can have a good Alien movie if you go back to basics, without Ripley of course. New characters, Giger's Alien (seriously, we've already seen so many variants and abominations, that I think it's time to go back to the beautiful original design ::)), the tension and the grity setting of the two first flicks. Not LV-426 offcourse, but something that trully looks otherworldly, weird, ghostly, or uncanny.
David is outstanding in the new ones. It's the other characters that let those movies down. When the Audience knows whats about to happen the characters should too.
I love the way James Cameron structures his films in the opposite way. Like imagine the power loader scene at the end of Aliens out of the blue, ridiculous, but because he set up the loading bay scene earlier in the movie it flows beautiful. I love that type of writing that sets up scenes later without you knowing.
I genuinely think it's Alien 3 resentment syndrome. Bringing her back means Aliens' "happy" ending is intact again. People just need to move on.
People have been born, grown up, and had families of their own in the length of time some people have been salty about that ending getting subverted.
True, but most people (fans and critics) thought Alien 3 was garbage on release and here we are.
Tbf, people are never going to "move on" when they think a film has ruined (or at least tarnished) their favourite franchise. And, regardless of your own personal opinions of Alien 3, I don't think there's much doubt that the series has never recovered from the hammering that movie took upon release.
Going back to the initial topic, following on from Aliens was always going to be a tough proposition, no matter what they did. But if they were ever going to move on from Ripley, that third film would have been the time to do it imo. Her story had been resolved, and although she was obviously the star of the first two films, I don't think any fans of the series would have walked away from it just because she wasn't there. Obviously that didn't happen, and I can understand why fans want the series to go back to Ripley (the real one, not Resurrection's hybrid nonsense) after the two poorly received entries that have followed Aliens.
In saying that, after initially being a big fan of Neill Blomkamp's proposed film, I would in hindsight only want to see an alternative Alien 3 in either animated or graphic novel form. Too much time has passed for Sigourney Weaver and Michael Biehn to be dragged out to fight more xenos, and I don't think there's a satisfactory way to explain the age difference.
"what if" Alien 3!
I'm pumped they went for the TV show. We've seen how good the short films can be. Imagine an 8 part series.
Quote from: Rankles75 on Aug 21, 2021, 01:08:50 PM
Tbf, people are never going to "move on" when they think a film has ruined (or at least tarnished) their favourite franchise. And, regardless of your own personal opinions of Alien 3, I don't think there's much doubt that the series has never recovered from the hammering that movie took upon release.
That's an unfortunate dependence on media for them then. Even though I enjoy Rez and Covvie well enough and kinda love Prometheus, I think it would have been better over all if 3 really had killed the franchise dead.
The franchise killed after Alien 3? That would elevate Ripley's sacrifice to a whole metafiction level. :laugh:
But you know what they say,
"good things last a little",
"less is more" and
"quality instead of jada jada".🤑
Quote from: Rankles75 on Aug 21, 2021, 01:08:50 PM
In saying that, after initially being a big fan of Neill Blomkamp's proposed film, I would in hindsight only want to see an alternative Alien 3 in either animated or graphic novel form. Too much time has passed for Sigourney Weaver and Michael Biehn to be dragged out to fight more xenos, and I don't think there's a satisfactory way to explain the age difference.
I'd love to see the wooden planet. People say it doesn't make sense, but then I say
"it's an alternate take, so who cares?" 8)
Prometheus didn't make sense, didn't stop them from making it.
A3 was mostly well-received outside out of the U.S., mostly... especially in Europe. There was only a 5-year gap between A3 and A:R and in the meantime we had plenty of Alien(s) comics, novels and video games coming out.
What handicapped and nearly "killed" the franchise was the decision to place A:R about 150 years later in the future, making it clear and unlikely that humans ran into any Xenomorphs during that long period of time as the scientists' only hope to get their hands on a specimen was to clone Ripley. Then add Jeunet's oddball characters and unique cinematography and the world presented yet not elaborated on, and you have a very limited appeal to continue from. People want Colonial Marines, W&Y; "realistic" down-to-Earth almost outdated tech; biomechanic xenos, realistic civilian characters, outer space; not too far into the future etc. ...A:R skipped all of that. The only three instances of anyone trying to continue from where A:R ended is Alien: Destroying Angels, that godawful Aliens arcade gun game with flying facehuggers and chest Bursters, and Alien vs. Predator vs. Terminator. I'm sure I'm missing some, but the point I'm making is that there's is no real interest in the era presented in A:R.
Blaming A3 for the franchise going downhill is just pure A3 resentment syndrome. A3 still left the possibility to go back to the site of the Derelict to try to find eggs, W&Y is still around and the Colonial Marines are still a thing. The only thing A3 did was ending Ripley's story. If you argue that Ripley IS the Alien movies franchise, then yeah - A3 ruined it. But if you think that Alien is more than Ripley, then no - A3 did not end it or ruin it - it opened up for new movies with new characters.
QuoteThe only (...) instances of anyone trying to continue from where A:R ended is Alien: Destroying Angels
I am 99.9% sure that one is contemporary with most of the franchise.
There are at least three post-Resurrection novels I can think of off the top of my head. Original Sin, from the Dark Horse Press era, and Titan's Sea of Sorrows and Phalanx. I haven't read Original Sin or Sea of Sorrows, though I'm pretty sure that Original Sin uses Resurrection's surviving cast and serves as something of a direct sequel to the film (and returns to the Derelict, if I'm not mistaken).
As far as crossover stuff goes, I don't really follow AVP material but isn't the "Rage War" book trilogy also set post-Resurrection?
AvPvT has Ripley 8 in it.
Quote from: Nightmare Asylum on Aug 22, 2021, 10:15:48 PM
There are at least three post-Resurrection novels I can think of off the top of my head. Original Sin, from the Dark Horse Press era, and Titan's Sea of Sorrows and Phalanx. I haven't read Original Sin or Sea of Sorrows, though I'm pretty sure that Original Sin uses Resurrection's surviving cast and serves as something of a direct sequel to the film (and returns to the Derelict, if I'm not mistaken).
As far as crossover stuff goes, I don't really follow AVP material but isn't the "Rage War" book trilogy also set post-Resurrection?
Thank you. I totally forgot about those, although I don't know if I would count
Phalanx as an A:R era story per se as the story takes place in a very medievalish setting with no real contact with the outside world - it could've been set during any era really. I have to admit that I haven't read
Sea of Sorrows and
Original Sin, even so, you can kind of count on a hand and a half when it comes to Alien story lines that utilize concepts (or/and characters) that take place in the era of A:R.
Quote from: Trash Queen on Aug 22, 2021, 11:18:29 AM
Prometheus didn't make sense, didn't stop them from making it.
Yeah I mean, if handsome SquidWard can have his own live action, why on Earth my wooden planet remains as an unproduced screenplay?! ::)
Quote from: SiL on Aug 22, 2021, 11:30:33 PM
AvPvT has Ripley 8 in it.
You are absolutely right! :o
(https://i.ibb.co/mRZFYh1/Avpvt3.jpg)
Pretty much.
Quote from: Immortan Jonesy on Aug 23, 2021, 05:23:08 AM
Yeah I mean, if handsome SquidWard can have his own live action, why on Earth my wooden planet remains as an unproduced screenplay?!
Because one is golden age sci fi updated visually but not narratively for a huge budget and modern tech, and the other is an incredibly weird high concept niche product.
Quote from: [cancerblack] on Aug 23, 2021, 06:51:16 PM
Quote from: Immortan Jonesy on Aug 23, 2021, 05:23:08 AM
Yeah I mean, if handsome SquidWard can have his own live action, why on Earth my wooden planet remains as an unproduced screenplay?!
Because one is golden age sci fi updated visually but not narratively for a huge budget and modern tech, and the other is an incredibly weird high concept niche product.
A shame cos it sound like the kind of quality nonsense I usually enjoy. :'(
I personally don't think A3 ruined anything. I just don't think it's a good finisher.
Clone Ripley and clone Aliens pretty much sums that up.
I am all for Vincent Ward's script honestly.
Never had the beef with Alien 3.
It has always been Resurrection and Prometheus that have been the low point of the series.
Some good points going around. Alien 3 is okay, it was my introduction into the universe and has a hold on me for that reason. The film has some good elements but it's a mess. We're lucky someone as competent as Fincher was involved and able to slightly lift it out of the Giler fire. But a satisfying conclusion to Ripley or a sequel to Aliens? No, far from it. Alien 3 did have ADI's only good suit tho, so there's that.
We're back under Covid lockdown where I am so, with spare time on my hands, I decided another viewing of Alien 3 was in order. It's been a few years since I last watched it. (By the way, this was the special edition in the Alien Anthology, the version with the ox-burster. Is this the same thing as the "Assembly Cut" everyone talks about? It looks like no roughly drafted assembly I've ever seen.)
And, well, it is different from the way I remembered it. Ripley is not miserable throughout the entire film as I thought. Sure, after learning of Newt and Hicks' deaths she's pretty depressed, but flirting with Clemens seems to perk her up quite a bit. Actually, that in itself is kind of weird—but no time to ponder that, there's a time immediately following when she seems quite galvanised into action, getting the prisoners organised. So contrary to my recollection, she is quite focused on survival at this point.
But she goes downhill from there.
There's the scene where the prisoners get together and confront her with blame for their predicament, and (I think it's) Morse says they should kill her by smashing her into a wall. And Ripley rather dourly says, that's fine by her. This is not a way for her to avoid the horror of the chest burst, btw, since this is before she learns she's been impregnated. So it sounds like she's back to being depressed and having suicidal thoughts even at this early stage.
Of course, once she learns about the chestburster she's carrying there's no doubt that suicide is on her mind. She goes down to the basement hoping the alien will kill her, and clearly, she's disappointed when that plan fails. So she goes back to Dillon (very strange transition there, btw, as though there's a sequence missing) to beg him to cave her skull in with the fire axe. This is one severely desperate woman looking for a way out of life.
Thankfully, the action scenes that follow do a lot to leaven the depressing atmosphere, as they all work to lure the alien down the maze-like passageways into the foundry. It's not really scary since there's no one whose survival you really care about—it's only Ripley we care about—but we've already learned the alien won't kill her. But even if it would, she's already showed us that she herself wanted death by alien, so maybe that would be a good thing? But all that aside, the chasing through the passageways is quite thrilling. And we do get to see Ripley back in action mode, which is a welcome change up.
But the real question is, is Ripley's death a triumphant sacrifice ("giving the middle finger to the man" and all that), or the suicide of a broken woman?
I have no doubt the movie wants us to feel like it's the former, but whether by wrecked storytelling or inadvertent, unintended effect, there's a lot of the latter mixed in there as well. In my opinion, as I said earlier, it's a bit of both.
This is not the same heroic ending that, say, Captain Miller (Tom Hanks) gets at the end of Saving Private Ryan, which is also a "mixed fortune" ending. Miller's death is clearly the noble sacrifice of a man who had everything to live for. Audiences responded well to this ending. Not so much with Alien 3. In fact, I think the audience reception to Alien 3 would have been positive, even with the death of Newt and Hicks, if only Ripley's sacrifice had felt much more triumphant, instead of what felt like the relief of death for a woman with no hope for the future.
TC
Some of us like the "suicide of a broken woman" aspect but I get why a general audience does not.
OT, you getting up to anything else in lockdown? Pretty much just beer and yardwork for me.
It's definitely a bit of both -- she's tired of fighting and this is the best way to put a stop to all of it. Bishop II dangles a carrot in front of her but she isn't biting any more. She's done.
But there's still the element that she decides to definitely get rid of the Alien rather than maybe chance having it taken out and maybe living some kind of life. She has a moral obligation to the human race to not let the Company get the Alien, so she does the noble thing and yeets herself into the furnace.
As much as Alien3 is about nihilism the film's final conclusion is to reject nihilism. The universe is unquestionable shitty and uncaring -- but there is still value in moral action.
Also, would you even really trust the company? Might've just let her burst and used Morse as a host.
I will also maintain that the death of Ripley has less to do with the film being disliked than the abandonment of the Hicks/Newt/Ripley nuclear family storyline with their character's deaths. People wanted them to confront the Alien menace together and be able to finally live a peaceful life.
Quote from: [cancerblack] on Aug 29, 2021, 08:38:36 PM
Some of us like the "suicide of a broken woman" aspect but I get why a general audience does not.
OT, you getting up to anything else in lockdown? Pretty much just beer and yardwork for me.
The only comparable film I can think of is Mike Figgis'
Leaving Las Vegas. Basically, Nicholas Cage decides to drink himself to death and gets involved in a relationship with prostitute Elisabeth Shue in which she agrees not to criticise his choice of suicide, of which, by film's end, he succeeds in. Yay for him.
Lots of critical success and Oscars all round. But (and I guess this says as much about me as it does the sentiments of the filmmakers) I hated it. You might like it though.
Yard work. Yeah, a lot of that. Also taking the time to watch lots of movies and streaming shows I missed.
Quote from: SiL on Aug 29, 2021, 10:09:06 PM
...
As much as Alien3 is about nihilism the film's final conclusion is to reject nihilism. The universe is unquestionable shitty and uncaring -- but there is still value in moral action.
Yep, I'm with you. I do not understand the belief that Alien films teach us that, nihilistically, nothing in life is worth fighting for.
Quote from: Kimarhi on Aug 29, 2021, 10:46:05 PM
...
I will also maintain that the death of Ripley has less to do with the film being disliked than the abandonment of the Hicks/Newt/Ripley nuclear family storyline with their character's deaths.
...
So the opposite of what I think, then. :D
Well, your thoughts have some validity. After all, many well-liked and successful films finish with the death of the main character.
Saving Private Ryan, Titanic, Braveheart, Thelma and Louise, Gladiator, Million Dollar Baby... What's the main difference between them and
Alien 3? Well, as you say,
Alien 3 gets off to a bad start with the unceremonious deaths of two loved characters (and never really recovers). But also
Alien 3 defied audience expectations of a happy ending, unlike the other films I mentioned in which audience's were more open about how it would end.
Alien, and especially
Aliens, had established a prior formula in which the movie ends in victory.
I know what some people are thinking: defying audience expectations is a good thing. But this is only partly true. Every story brings with it a "genre expectation". The Hollywood maxim is, "Give the audience what it wants, but not the way it expects." Would
Predator have been a better film if Arnold had died like a pathetic dog? That would certainly have defied audience expectations! But no, Arnold had to win. This is the genre expectation we are set up with going into the movie. But he had to win in a way we couldn't exactly predict.
Alien 3's ending was not what we expected.
This also explains why repeated viewings make the film seem better and better. By this point, we have no mismatched expectations. We already know how it ends.
TC
I'm with Kimarhi that the opening of Alien3 was much more influential on its reception than its end. I think audiences are more than OK with a bittersweet ending -- but they historically aren't ok with sequels opening by obliterating much of what was left of the previous film in the opening scenes. It leaves a bad taste in the mouth.
Nobody expected a happy ending after that.
It also really doesn't help that the middle of the movie wasn't all that exciting either.
Quote from: TC on Aug 30, 2021, 06:03:44 AM
Would Predator have been a better film if Arnold had died like a pathetic dog?
TC
For me probably yes actually depending on how it's handled.
Quote from: Lost_Hunter on Aug 29, 2021, 05:24:56 PM
Some good points going around. Alien 3 is okay, it was my introduction into the universe and has a hold on me for that reason. The film has some good elements but it's a mess. We're lucky someone as competent as Fincher was involved and able to slightly lift it out of the Giler fire. But a satisfying conclusion to Ripley or a sequel to Aliens? No, far from it. Alien 3 did have ADI's only good suit tho, so there's that.
Yes, it's their best Alien so far, and probably the last time the creature really looked intimidating on big screen.
Quote from: TC on Aug 30, 2021, 06:03:44 AM
Quote from: SiL on Aug 29, 2021, 10:09:06 PM
...
As much as Alien3 is about nihilism the film's final conclusion is to reject nihilism. The universe is unquestionable shitty and uncaring -- but there is still value in moral action.
Yep, I'm with you. I do not understand the belief that Alien films teach us that, nihilistically, nothing in life is worth fighting for.
Quote from: Ripley in ALIEN³When they first heard about this thing, it was "crew expendable". The next time they sent in marines - they were expendable too. What makes you think they're gonna care about a bunch of lifers who found God at the ass-end of space? You really think they're gonna let you interfere with their plans for this thing? They think we're - we're crud. And they don't give a f**k about one friend of yours that's - that's died. Not one.
Yup, she definitely doesn't want mankind to be treated like shit in favor of a penis-headed monster by a cold and unscrupulous company.
Quote from: TC on Aug 29, 2021, 06:10:09 PM
We're back under Covid lockdown where I am so, with spare time on my hands, I decided another viewing of Alien 3 was in order. It's been a few years since I last watched it. (By the way, this was the special edition in the Alien Anthology, the version with the ox-burster. Is this the same thing as the "Assembly Cut" everyone talks about? It looks like no roughly drafted assembly I've ever seen.)
And, well, it is different from the way I remembered it. Ripley is not miserable throughout the entire film as I thought. Sure, after learning of Newt and Hicks' deaths she's pretty depressed, but flirting with Clemens seems to perk her up quite a bit. Actually, that in itself is kind of weird—but no time to ponder that, there's a time immediately following when she seems quite galvanised into action, getting the prisoners organised. So contrary to my recollection, she is quite focused on survival at this point.
But she goes downhill from there.
There's the scene where the prisoners get together and confront her with blame for their predicament, and (I think it's) Morse says they should kill her by smashing her into a wall. And Ripley rather dourly says, that's fine by her. This is not a way for her to avoid the horror of the chest burst, btw, since this is before she learns she's been impregnated. So it sounds like she's back to being depressed and having suicidal thoughts even at this early stage.
Of course, once she learns about the chestburster she's carrying there's no doubt that suicide is on her mind. She goes down to the basement hoping the alien will kill her, and clearly, she's disappointed when that plan fails. So she goes back to Dillon (very strange transition there, btw, as though there's a sequence missing) to beg him to cave her skull in with the fire axe. This is one severely desperate woman looking for a way out of life.
Thankfully, the action scenes that follow do a lot to leaven the depressing atmosphere, as they all work to lure the alien down the maze-like passageways into the foundry. It's not really scary since there's no one whose survival you really care about—it's only Ripley we care about—but we've already learned the alien won't kill her. But even if it would, she's already showed us that she herself wanted death by alien, so maybe that would be a good thing? But all that aside, the chasing through the passageways is quite thrilling. And we do get to see Ripley back in action mode, which is a welcome change up.
But the real question is, is Ripley's death a triumphant sacrifice ("giving the middle finger to the man" and all that), or the suicide of a broken woman?
I have no doubt the movie wants us to feel like it's the former, but whether by wrecked storytelling or inadvertent, unintended effect, there's a lot of the latter mixed in there as well. In my opinion, as I said earlier, it's a bit of both.
This is not the same heroic ending that, say, Captain Miller (Tom Hanks) gets at the end of Saving Private Ryan, which is also a "mixed fortune" ending. Miller's death is clearly the noble sacrifice of a man who had everything to live for. Audiences responded well to this ending. Not so much with Alien 3. In fact, I think the audience reception to Alien 3 would have been positive, even with the death of Newt and Hicks, if only Ripley's sacrifice had felt much more triumphant, instead of what felt like the relief of death for a woman with no hope for the future.
TC
You're missing the very significant part in the exchange with Dillon where she admits that she "can't do it [herself]", i.e. commit suicide. Even knowing that her death is now unavoidable in a very short time, and resolved to find a way to kill the queen in order to keep it from the company and prevent its destruction being loosed on mankind, she can't bring herself to do it.
Why that is the case is open to interpretation, but to me it speaks of someone who's will to survive is relentless. It's the only thing that got her through the imminent death and increasing despair of the two previous encounters, along with losing her entire life and family as collateral damage, but still she can't let it go. You see it even at the bitter end (at least in the Assembly Cut) where she hesitates on the gantry before finally closing her eyes and letting herself fall.
So again, I think there's a crucial distinction to be made between knowing that your demise is near, and feeling a duty to hasten it in order to save other people and simply feeling suicidal. I don't believe she ever wants to die, even when plummeting into the furnace, but it's an inevitability that she is finally able to accept. As I said earlier, to me she doesn't commit suicide.
To be fair try writing a happy ending to A3 even without killing her at the end. It doesn't matter what you put in the last 10 minutes when you've run the course of the movie, it wouldn't change it.
Also the bad transition between the Ripley confronting the Alien and going back to Dillon is different ( I can't remember if it's in the audio book , I think it is). It's a bit more fleshed out with her trying to hit the Alien with a pole and some more self dialogue.
They should instead go with her daughter or something. I like how Alien Isolation is about her daughter trying to find her mother. Something like that could be made into a movie.