Howdydilliho once again. I have to say, that I agree with avpmaster13 that, in keeping with the first two movies and the original concept (which also began as pure horror), the aliens should indeed kill the predators and everyone else (with lucky and plucky survivors of course) with little trouble on their part. I do find it a little ridiculous that a pred with bladed weapons could somehow go toe to toe with an alien, and come off best. But we'll see; if the preds are actually effective against them (as they seem to be), then this could reduce some of the scare-impact of the film. These things are meant to be able to rend-steel with their talons (remember how Dallas died in 'Alien', originally [the awlfull book based on the screen-play] after being pulled through a gaping hole torn in the side of the air-duct), exist on another level of metabolism entirely (can evade super-sonic projectiles such as bullets to a degree), are armoured and have hydrolic bio-mechanical strength; so surely they would go right-through at least the lightly-armoured parts of a predators body like butter, and would easily overpower it. I also just thought of a theory for the four long spines along an aliens back; actually an observation which I just clicked to. In Cameron's film, they seemed to be used to suspend the aliens body away from walls and tunnels, giving them an amazing ability to roll, rotate and run at any angle in confined spaces without hurting themselves (not likely anyway), which would also make sense; considering their mobility, and intelligence, is what makes their steath that much more effective, and creepier. They seem to follow, in Aliens and other later films at least, the Japanese asthetic for horror, where you can tell evil by the way it moves (even though they aren't evil, they just need to be killed and avoided, if you have that option). Would I join the USMC were this vision of the future to exist? No, but i'd like to be recycled as fertilizer. Oh yeah; one silicon-based life form at least that I know of does exist-plankton. But these things (no not plankton, silly) clearly could not have evolved; they must be some kind of bio-weapon for some perhaps long-forgotten alien war. A weapon of genocide maybe, or designed primarily for combat aboard starships (could you even afford to kill just one? Acid wouldn't just burn through the hull potentially, but also life-support, essential ship systems, masses of electronics, wireing and cables e.t.c).
