Quote from: SiL on Jan 28, 2010, 09:16:32 PM
Quote from: ridetofight on Jan 28, 2010, 05:00:56 PM
artistry aside - aliens introduced you to a creature that you could actually see pursuing the protagonists - up walls, across ceilings, jumping, tail-whipping... wereas alien had a creature the protagonists had to come to - he hung, hid, crouched... was generally a big unexciting pussy of a creature.
Surely you're not dumb enough to not realise that has nothing to do with the people making the creature, and everything to do with the script and director, therefor has zero relevance on the subject, right? That's like saying ADI did the best Aliens in AvPR because they did nothing.
Besides - The first Alien did have personality (And did persue its prey - air vent sequence). You could see its brain ticking over, it was a thinking organism with alien thought-processes.
The Aliens in Aliens were zombies, totally devoid of any individuality, rocking up en masse when the script called for to get shot down and rack up the tension. No single Alien outside the Queen is worth paying attention to because, despite Winston's habit of creating characters, Cameron's direction removes any character from them.
Which is totally gay, as you would say.
no, i'm pretty dumb, but not that dumb. winston's cohorts did not come up with the idea or write the story - they were able to make what was in the script a reality - by problem solving with what techniques and materials were available. sure, the big chap LOOKED far more legit, but how much of him did we see. it's design is beautiful, and thats fine for something you just need to look at. but not something you need to run from. i personally hold functional design over aesthetics.
c'mon, air vent sequence? it wasn't the alien moving. it was a dot on a screen and an accompanying audio cue. then dallas moves to where he is crouching and "aaahhhh!!" monster hands! like someone jumping out of a bush on halloween. and justly, it can be argued that all that was asked for out of giger's creature by the director and the writers was to sit and wait, and was designed as such. thats why winston and cameron pushed the envelope again and again as an effects team - cameron had the radical ideas, and functional ideas for them, and winston had the artists and the functional knowledge to make them actually "come alive". no one asked the big chap to come running and leaping because it was the status quo not to. the design for the creature was impressive, the character itself (aside from the reproductive methods) - redunant. and thats not "totally gay", as you would put it, but just plain "gay" as i would put it.