The first time I watched AVP was a Thursday night midnight showing, opening weekend. I went with my brother & 2 friends. I remember not hating it. I think I may have even liked it. I recall posting on these very forums in it's defense that same night. 2-3 days later, & the forum was no longer
The most recent viewing was tonight. It's hard to know where to begin. I don't hate this film. I'm willing to ignore setting it on Earth given it's isolated location. It tried. It tried to be big, & it tried to be epic, but it falls short. More charasmatic characters would have gone a long way towards fixing that. Better dialogue too, no doubt. Lex is perfectly suitable, & I liked Beaker, but everyone else are cardboard cutouts. Well, Lance is great. Lance is always great. Still, when you sign on board for a movie titled Alien vs. Predator, human characters aren't necessarily the focus. They're all canon fodder in the long run.
The Predators: I recall people disliking the ship because it differed in design from those seen in 1 & 2. A silly critism, in my opinion. I liked the alteration to their thermal vision then, & I still like it now. It was due for an upgrade. It got one, & people cried foul. Do I wish the creature designs were better? Yes, I do, but I'm not going to base the quality of the film on it. It's not as if leaner Predators with the ability to fully close their mouths would drastically change the outcome. The biggest issue is how easily 2 out of 3 are dispatched, & I know it's an issue shared by many. I loved the reveal, but ideally, I'd have 2 more Xeno's join the fight against Celtic, giving him a brief moment of badassery before biting it. Scar is decent.
The Aliens: They don't look good, but the coat of black paint offers an improvement over their appearance in Resurrection, at least to my eyes. I like Grid. I like that they gave us a single Alien to follow. The queen was gorgeous, & bad ass. I love the scene of her instructing Grid & co to release her. Much has been made of the quickened life cycle; again, I'll give it to them. Do you want to spend more time with nondescript characters putzing around a pyramid? If the quickest route to making the title card happen is instant Alien, I'll take instant Alien.
The back story is silly, there's no getting around it. Predators help humans build pyramids & in return are whorship them as gods, occassionally offering ourselves up as sacrifice so they can hunt Xenos? Not a good look. My least favorite aspect of it though is that the Predators within are juveniles. I would have prefered making them experts. As in, only they best & most proven hunters get the opportunity to hunt the ultimate prey in the ultimate battleground. I do love that pyramid though. It looks great & provides a wonderful setting. I wish more time had been spent following the characters after they became isolated, allowing a larger sense of dread to build before ultimately falling victim to the Aliens.
And I must say, I adore the opening scene on the satellite, silhouetting the Queen. Just gorgeous. At this point though, I reckon I've written more than anyone will care to read. I believe this film, in this iteration, was made with good intentions. Given the route it took, I don't think that it ever had a chance of being great, but I do believe it came close to giving us a solid AVP film. As Maxwell Smart would say, "missed it by that much." Setting it in space, in the future, doesn't automatically translate into us getting a better film.
Were I to assign a rating, I'd split it right down the middle:
5/10. It pales next to Alien, Aliens, Alien 3, Predator & Predator 2. I'd say it's on par with Resurrection. Maybe a touch better, even. It fares much better compared to the films that follow. AvPR was, & remains, a complete disgrace. Predators isn't good. I don't know if that's a popular opinion here or not, but it's instantly forgettable. Prometheus is better, but seems to be equally as divisive. So, to recap, it's not good, but it's not bad either. Thank you for your time.
