Briggs' script is actually
very different to the comic. The setting is a jungle canopy with lot's of swamp, instead of the dry desert. The characters have almost completely different roles except for Machiko. The interactions between Alien and Predator are all completely different. The relationship between Broken Tusk and Machiko, though ultimately the same, is setup and plays out very differently until the end. There is one description in the script that basically says the aliens are using all the wild life to generate new variations we've never seen before. The entire young queen being born in the hive... Lot's of shit.
In my Oasis project I actually lifted some of the redneck stuff. I love when science fiction mixes in a bit of that southern flavor. Ties in nicely with the frontiersmen spirit of space.
As to Vincent Ward's script, it already has a (partially finished) graphic story on his website:
http://vincentwardfilms.com/project/concepts/alien-3/graphic-novel-in-8-parts/part-1/I hope that get's finished someday, the art is beautiful. Very evocative of the religious imagery that no doubt inspired Ward's direction.
I know, everybody thinks the wooden planet is bat shit, but I think if Ward had been given a chance to actually see that project through to the end it would have been a far more special piece than what we ultimately got, which was choice cuts from his story with the more conventional "prison planet" grafted into place.
By no means would it have been a mainstream hit. Hell no. I think Fox pretty much knew that it had doomed the project.
Gibson's Alien III was the most sensible of all the proposals. For me the idea of seeing all the Soviet-inspired space stuff would have been so much fun. It's one of things I love about 2010, seeing that big ol' industrial space ship. Or seeing Cherno in Pacific Rim. Something about that Cold War inspired imagery is just really fun.
Not to mention, thematically, it's doing what a natural progression from Alien and Aliens should be doing. Expanding on the themes and narrative threads. This isn't just one corporation being greedy, this is an interstellar cold war. This isn't just about Ripley, this is about the whole of the human race now being put on the line.
Plus, the original Alien is still there, and it has one of my favorite reveals in any of the old scripts. Hiding amidst a piece of machinery, blending in, unseen, until it stirs...