Alien 3.. Has it aged well?

[Mr. Clemens]

Alien3: Sigourney's finest performance in the series.

[Alien³]

Alien3: Sigourney's finest performance in the series.

[Hemi]

duh... I was talking about the quality of picture, not props/SFX etc lol. Still, Aliens looks a bit meh. Even on the BR version. Somehow Aliens never got that 'wow' factor that the BR versions of Alien and eg the Thing had.

Might just be that film-stock Cameron used or something. Shame it can't be restored, I would love to see Aliens in full glory without that fcking grain. Even worse watching it in a cinema.

[426Buddy]

I love the grain of the film stock in aliens, i feel its part of the films identity.

[Mr. Clemens]

I love the grain of the film stock in aliens, i feel its part of the films identity.

Yes, film stock is an aesthetic choice just as much as lenses and lighting. The greater crime would be if they'd scrubbed the whole film with DNR, thereby making everyone look like they're made out of rubber.

The blu-rays of Battlestar Galactica even say something to the effect of 'Do not adjust your set! The show looks like this on purpose!' 

[Scorpio]

I don't mind grain so long as the picture quality is what was intended at the film's release.  Most films cleaned up look absolutely amazing, even those made in the 1920s.  Expecting an old film to look like something made recent is a tall order.  It's like colourising black and white films, it doesn't work.

[Hemi]

You seen the Thing BR?.... fcking hell that looks good. Like it could have been shot yesterday.

[HuDaFuK]

The only thing that hasn't aged well in Alien 3 is the terrible puppet compositing, which I doubt looked especially stellar back when it was released. Otherwise, the rest of the film looks really good for something 25 years old.

Ironically, the CGI shot of the newborn Runner they finished up for the Special Edition looks quite dated now.

[PsyKore]

The only thing that hasn't aged well in Alien 3 is the terrible puppet compositing, which I doubt looked especially stellar back when it was released. Otherwise, the rest of the film looks really good for something 25 years old.

Yeah, I agree with this. As far as set designs and the artistry behind it all, it's a timeless film. Would love it if they just replaced the puppetry with CGI though.

On a similar subject, I watched ALIENS again for the first time in a long while, and it struck me how dated some of it looks with regards to how rubbery some of the shots of the Aliens and Queen are.

[Corporal Hicks]

The only thing that hasn't aged well in Alien 3 is the terrible puppet compositing, which I doubt looked especially stellar back when it was released. Otherwise, the rest of the film looks really good for something 25 years old.

Yeah, I agree with this. As far as set designs and the artistry behind it all, it's a timeless film. Would love it if they just replaced the puppetry with CGI though.

To be honest, I'd love to see them go back and just try and redo it with the original puppet footage. I'm not sure how feasible that'd be be, though.

[HuDaFuK]

Yeah, the puppetry itself is really good. It's just the compositing that kills it.

[Russ]

In answer to the original question, I remember walking out of the cinema and being really disappointed. It's always annoyed me that what was established in the previous film was effectively hand-waved ... and there are a hundreds of pages on here as to where the facehugger came from right *lol*.

You have to remember this was pre-internet... we had books and zines and things, but the level of discussion and scrutiny was minuscule compared to what it is today (well, amongst my group it was). We had Alien / Aliens - we'd seen them countless times on video. We knew what had happened in Aliens... so I have to say we were really ... well... shell-shocked by what transpired.

[PsyKore]

In answer to the original question, I remember walking out of the cinema and being really disappointed. It's always annoyed me that what was established in the previous film was effectively hand-waved

I remember being a bit disappointed, not in the direction the film took, but in the many nondescript characters which are hard to keep track of and the bad Alien effects. But I loved its darker tone and the focus on Ripley up to her last minutes. I also love that it did hand-wave what had been done to remind us that this is a horror series. Nothing is safe.

[DemonicD13]

Does anyone know where I could find the DDK cut of Alien 3? Supposedly it is essentially a 50/50 mix of Theatrical and Assembly cut.
With significant color-correction, music/sound mixing and post-processing has been done to clean up (as best as possible) the puppet shots in the film. The only CGI shot in the film (the Dragon's head cracking) has been removed. Pulse rifles have been tweaked to sound as they should. The Dog is the host for the dragon. The Queen emerges from Ripley during her suicide. I would be very interested in seeing this cut. Particularly the composite clean up.

[Scorpio]

Ironically, the CGI shot of the newborn Runner they finished up for the Special Edition looks quite dated now.

That's not CGI, it's a rod puppet.