Aliens: An Analysis

[Engineer]

That feels like a gross simplification considering the Anesidora actually brought it onboard Sevastapol, which was in the process of a handover.

It's not. Because that women in the game (can't even remember her name), turns out to be a WY employee with exactly the same motives as Burke. Even though she is nearly killed 5 times she still wants money!

Except that:

Xenomorph incident

    "There's something on this station. Something you wouldn't believe."
    ―Axel, to Amanda Ripley (from Alien: Isolation)

On November 11, 2137, Captain Henry Marlow arrived at the station aboard the salvage vessel USCSS Anesidora, requesting emergency medical attention for his wife, Catherine Foster, who had been attacked by a Facehugger but was safely kept in stasis. Head of Medical, Dr. K. Lingard, believed she could remove the parasite herself, but Seegson Chief of Operations B. Ransome blackmailed Lingard into telling him about the creature. Ransome then convinced Colonial Marshal Jethro Waits to choose to break quarantine procedure upon discovering that Anesidora's crew had found the flight recorder unit from USCSS Nostromo, meaning that Sevastopol's crew stood to get a cut of the reward for the unit.

On November 14, a Chestburster hatched from Foster, killing her. The creature escaped into the bowels of Sevastopol and soon began to establish a Hive on the engineering decks, capturing humans to breed new Xenomorphs. Waits attempted to cover up the disappearances whilst he and his men hunted for the culprit, but the situation soon escalated wildly out of control as more and more creatures began preying on the station's population. On November 17, having somehow learned of the ongoing Xenomorph incident, Weyland-Yutani purchased Sevastopol from Seegson and sent APOLLO new operational directives, including Special Order 939.

On December 11, Amanda Ripley, Christopher Samuels and Nina Taylor came aboard Sevastopol via USCSS Torrens to retrieve the Nostromo flight recorder unit. Ripley worked with Waits in a plan to trap the Xenomorph in the Gemini Exoplanet Solutions module, separating it from the station towards the gas giant. The plan succeeded, but Ripley barely escaped, and she later discovered there was more than one Xenomorph on the station.

Also relevant to the story line... the black box data was corrupted by Marlow when he tried to access it himself prior to reaching Sevastopol. So the black box turns out to be useless to everyone; something Amanda discovered when she locates the black box early on... but in a twist, Marlow did secretly have at least some of the data captured on his ship's computer which Amanda accesses later. The part Amanda accesses is a message from her mother, which is then destroyed when Marlow's ship blows up shortly after. Thus, leaving no recoverable data from the black box available to anyone, including WY.

[Eal]

That feels like a gross simplification considering the Anesidora actually brought it onboard Sevastapol, which was in the process of a handover.

It's not. Because that women in the game (can't even remember her name), turns out to be a WY employee with exactly the same motives as Burke. Even though she is nearly killed 5 times she still wants money!

Burke is a better character because he isn't nearly killed 5 times, he isn't separated from the Marines like that women is separated from your character and anyone else.

I understand the story of Isolation. I just don't agree with the 2 things that are Ripley's daughter also goes through the same trauma (what are the odds?). And also that WY "positioned" another WY employee into their spacestation. That means they knew all along. Or it means the character is a copy of Burke but not realistic.

I understand the Sevastipol blows up at the end and all "Aliens" are presumed dead.

I prefer the original Canon that the Derelict sustained damage from earthquakes and the beacon was cut off. And that Ripley's daughter died of old age and had no clue what happened to her mum.

That feels like a gross simplification considering the Anesidora actually brought it onboard Sevastapol, which was in the process of a handover.

Would've been interesting had they made the game about the Anesidora and Sevastapol and didn't include any connection to Alien outside of finding the flight recorder and a few non-telling radio exchanges from Ripley and Co. They try to do that in Alien: Isolation when showing Nostromo logs, but it wasn't as effective as it could've been imo.

This would have been slightly better.

Normally I'd agree with you on all of this, but the game does a pretty good job of justifying its existence. I'd believe the odds of Amanda having her own encounter with the alien are pretty good if she were actively looking for answers about what happened to her mother, and the opportunity to find those answers came up in the way presented in the game. It works for me, but, ya know, different strokes and all...

I can totally understand the logic behind accepting it, and I'm okay with it. For me, on an emotional level, it's just too similar of a Star-Warsey Vibe in terms of "look at this person who's connected to this person you know!".

[Necronomicon II]

Speaking of Isolation I finally finished it last night, everything in ultra settings. It deserves every bit of praise it gets. So lovingly crafted within every inch of its world. There's some repetition yes but it's such an immersive, harrowing experience that no other survival horror can touch. Make sure to play it on hardware past 2014, I experienced zero glitches.

[Engineer]

Speaking of Isolation I finally finished it last night, everything in ultra settings. It deserves every bit of praise it gets. So lovingly crafted within every inch of its world. There's some repetition yes but it's such an immersive, harrowing experience that no other survival horror can touch. Make sure to play it on hardware past 2014, I experienced zero glitches.

You just now beat it?? Or is this a re-play?

[Necronomicon II]

Lol I only ever played half way, too much anxiety. 😂

[Local Trouble]

They should put out a DLC that gives you a pulse rifle.

[Engineer]

Understandable.
My first play through took me about 3 months to get to the hive, then I shut it off and didn't go back for 5 years lol I did eventually beat it though

[Eal]

Yeah, Amnesia: The Bunker is killing my nerves. It reminds me of Alien: Isolation as far as stress levels go.

[ralfy]

@ralfy

You're just being impossible now. You're incorrect simple as that. Cameron made the movie and he states Burke was working alone. So every point you make is invalid.

WY don't believe Ripley, for the millionth time.

You keep mentioning things Ripley "didn't say" in the board meeting and the movie and using that as a point to back up your claims. But you really have to calm down and remember it's a movie that doesn't give us every bit of dialogue between every character! Movies are typically around 2 hours long some stuff just has to be inferred without actually showing it to us. My point is we only see 2 minutes of what is inferred to be an hours long board meeting!!! You have no idea what Ripley actually said during it! You're supposed to fill in those gaps yourself but at the same time you can't use non existance dialogue as proof for your claims! That dialogue doesn't exist. You've no idea wether Ripley said all those things You're saying she didn't! Because you don't see that part on film!!!

And as for the Aucturians, there's no evidence those are aliens! Could just be colonists for all we know.

@ralfy

Oh and here is the other thing.

"I just checked the company logs signed Carter J Burke. You sent them out there, you sent them out there and you didn't even warn them"

"But they'll know about it Burke, from me. Just like they'll know you are responsible for the deaths of 157 colonists".

Right here the dialogue is telling you plaon and simple he acted alone.

Ripley doesn't blame Weyland Yutani as a whole here. In fact she doesn't once blame WY throughout the entire movie.

She SPECIFICALLY blames Burke.

The company logs signed by Carter J Burke!

No the "company" didn't send anyone to check the Derelict. Only BURKE did.

I'm also getting really bored of your argument regarding the Derelict location. Yes clearly that was retrieved from the Narcissist flight recorder. But why do you keep bringing it up? WY don't believe Ripley! They dont want to spend money and have anyone investigate these co-ordinates because they think she's nuts and there is nothing there. Hence Burke then later retrieves the co-ordinates and of his own initiative contact's the colony.

Why is this so hard to understand? If you enjoy the movie more by having this wild and inaccurate perception of the story that's fine. But you can't tell everybody else and the Director/Writer of the movie they're incorrect because you enjoy it more believing WY is a cartoon super villain company similar to something like Umbrella from a video game! Because it just isn't!

Your points make no sense:

If the only thing that's acceptable is what Cameron states, then what's the point of coming up with an analysis of the film at all?

Also, have you never heard of the idea of the "death of the author"? That means readers (and in this case, viewers) can give an interpretation of a work as they see fit. What's wrong with that? It's like the Greeks who saw the Iliad as fact and modern readers seeing it as myth.

What is the rationale for WY not believing Ripley? Is it to recover the costs due to the loss of the Nostromo and its cargo? If so, how will Ripley be able to pay for that? At best, she has backpay for the journey and some benefits with interest, but that's it. In short, they're targeting a nobody, and they get nothing for doing that.

OTOH, didn't they have a long-standing policy of monetizing finds? That's raised in the first movie and decades later Burke makes that perfectly clear. Given so, why would WY even bother investigating Ripley? Why not just check the landing location? That's not so hard as Burke was able to do that easily.

You don't need dialogue for everything to be established. For example, you don't see any dialogue between Burke and the colony, and you know that he contacted them, right? The same applies to Ripley: the fact that she's surprised by knowing that the colony existed means she never bothered to raise it during the hearing. Otherwise, van Leuwen would have told her about the colony then. Get it?

Here's here it gets worse: she didn't even bother contesting van Leuwen's excuse about not needing to investigate the landing site. All that was needed was to ask someone in the colony to check it out, which is precisely what Burke did.

Put simply, there's no excuse for the company to prosecute Ripley because there's nothing they'd get from doing so, and no excuse to investigate the site as all they had to do is send someone from the colony to do so.

What about Arcturians? The best we can get is seen here:

https://avp.fandom.com/wiki/Arcturian

"Hey, I sure wouldn't mind getting some more of that Arcturian poontang, remember that time?"

"Yeah, Frost, but the one that you had was male."

"It doesn't matter when it's Arcturian, baby."

What the ---- is that? LOL. Anyway, this is debatable, but since some nerd caps here refer to something like Colonial Marines manuals, then might that help?

What about that dialogue you gave? Ripley also said that he's doing it over a percentage. At the same time, Burke refers to mineral rights and the Colonial Admin granting the company such, which means the company owns everything underground and the government surface rights. In short, no one gets exclusive rights on anything on the rock, which is why a percentage is given. That also means if Burke works alone, then it's because he's fronting for the rest.

What about Ripley blaming only Burke? Besides referring to Burke working for a percentage, don't you remember the points where she refers to bioweapons divisions, finding out about the special order, almost being killed by Ash after discovering such, and then getting hysterical after finding out about Bishop being a synth? Do you understand? You don't need a character to say specifically what she thinks. Instead, you can read between the lines. Give it a shot, and you'll understand my argument.

Last point: why do you think that arguing that the company is in on it is similar to portraying them as some cartoonish villain and yet arguing that Burke is acting alone isn't? Think about it: arguing that the company didn't care even though there are too many instances across three movies where it showed otherwise, and where even Ripley revealed such, and that Burke was able to act independently given a mission that's supposed to be under military jurisdiction and regarding a rock where everything is owned by company and government is the perfect way to create a "cartoon super villain". Why? Because conspiracy is for adults.

That's why when you go back to the OP and my subsequent posts, what do you see? Conspiracy, with references to special orders, crew and company assets being expendable, etc. Do you see connections between that and the Reagan era and even the Vietnam War? And even the third movie?

https://www.logicallyfallacious.com/logicalfallacies/gish-gallop.html

That only applies to a slew of arguments that wants to show Burke as a "cartoon super villain". Examples:

- a company suing for no logical reason and suddenly not caring about the landing site;

- Ripley not raising the issue about the landing site until it's too late;

- Burke suddenly having "connections" to drop penalties against Ripley and control of the military in what turns out to be part of military jurisdiction;

- exclusive rights to a rock owned by a Colonial Admin, and for which the company is granted mineral rights;

- board arguing that they've seen no such life forms vs. Marines who talk about "Arcturians" and, according to Burke, are heavily armed to engage in "situations" (perhaps there are rival human groups attacking the colony, and they need Ripley because she's an expert on that?);

and more.

That's gish gallop.

"Did IQs just drop sharply while I was away?" 😑

No need to think anymore when the AI can do it for you.

Right Local?

Can't handle the heat, so they're pretending that they're passing on the burden to ChatGPT. LOL.

[Engineer]

There's no heat
Hence the lower effort of outsourcing to AI

[ralfy]

@ralfy

I was a bit blunt and rude in my latest response. I apologise for that!

I'm just getting frustrated but that's my problem not yours. My points still stand. And I understand when people debate it usually means they aren't agreeing on what they are debating on!

All I'm going to say is you are being a bit stubborn about it!

Dear ralfy,

Thank you for your continued engagement in this discussion. I would like to address the point you've brought up about the relevance of the landing location of the derelict.

In the context of Ripley's account during the inquest, and the evidence presented therein, the absence of the beacon is a crucial factor that casts doubt on her entire story. This is because the beacon, if active, would have been a strong, undeniable piece of evidence supporting her claims. It would have been detectable by any ship in proximity to the Zeta II Reticuli system, or by the colonists on LV-426 itself, long before they needed to consider landing coordinates.

However, as it turns out, no beacon was detected by any ships or by the colonists on LV-426. This was an unexpected development that Ripley herself was not aware of prior to the inquest. As far as she was concerned, the beacon was a concrete piece of evidence that anyone could independently verify.

Given this, mentioning the precise landing coordinates of the derelict during the inquest would have been moot from Ripley's perspective. The confirmation of her story did not hinge on anyone visiting the exact location of the derelict on the planet's surface. Instead, the presence of the beacon in space would have provided immediate confirmation of her story. When the beacon was found to be absent, the entire account fell under suspicion.

It's also important to remember that the coordinates would only be relevant if a ship was already in the vicinity of LV-426 and actively planning to land. However, if Ripley's story was doubted due to the absence of the beacon, then there would be little motivation for anyone to travel to the location to investigate further. Thus, the coordinates would indeed become irrelevant.

I hope this clarifies the point regarding the importance of the beacon vs. the landing coordinates in validating Ripley's story.

Best regards,

ChatGPT

You make the perfect point in regards to the Beacon. I haven't read the novel in a long time but doesn't it explain this away by saying there was seismic activity that damaged the Derelict and cut off the beacon? I know Cameron also explained something of similar lines because the Derelict model from the first movie had "snapped in half" and I'm sure he used it again but his reasoning was it was damaged by volcanic activity.

Obviously Alien Isolation the video game explains someone else turned it off but in the context of my arguments I'm really only including the movies.

Don't waste your time with Local. All he's doing now is trolling because he can't handle debate.

I don't care about the beacon because it's not hard to argue that it must have went offline after, which is why the colony never found the ship.

The problem, which Local can't address, is that the flight recorder contained the landing location, but for some reason Ripley didn't bother to raise it during the hearing, and only Burke decided to investigate further.

Why is this a problem? Because it's the only evidence that Ripley had to prove her case. Since it's a board of inquiry, then it would have passed on that information to the investigative team. If it was so meticulous such that it analyzed the lifeboat centimeter by centimeter to find existence of the alien, then why would it ignore something so blatant as the landing location of the Nostromo?

As for Burke, what excuse would the company give for not caring? It has been doing more than that all along, and that can even be seen in the third movie, where they gave instructions to the prisoners about the alien. Given that, why did they start believing Ripley's report about the alien? The only way they could have done so was through information from the Sulaco and what they found in the colony.

Last point: the Marines referred to a time before they were "declared overdue" and would expect to be rescued. If so, then that means the government and military would have known about the mission, which is further proof that the claim that Burke was working alone is illogical.

Perhaps all they were told that the colony went offline and that they have to find out what happened. If so, why send an armed contingent, and why bring Ripley along?

See what I mean? Each point raised counters the fanboi view that Burke was some sort of cartoon villain, working alone.

Speaking of Isolation I finally finished it last night, everything in ultra settings. It deserves every bit of praise it gets. So lovingly crafted within every inch of its world. There's some repetition yes but it's such an immersive, harrowing experience that no other survival horror can touch. Make sure to play it on hardware past 2014, I experienced zero glitches.

Why is this being discussed in a thread about the movie Aliens?

[Necronomicon II]

So we're straw-manning now. Burke isn't a supervillain, he's just a greedy corporate slimeball. The technical manual is a stronger source than a wiki page.

Also discussing Isolation is healthier discourse than going around in circles. 😂

[SiL]

Last point: the Marines referred to a time before they were "declared overdue" and would expect to be rescued. If so, then that means the government and military would have known about the mission, which is further proof that the claim that Burke was working alone is illogical.

Burke is not in charge of the marines. Burke does not send the marines. Burke has no authority on the mission to the colony. He is there as a civilian advisor.

He is working alone to secure a specimen of the Alien. The Company hasn't directed him to do it, nor has the government.

That's what people mean when they say he's working alone.

Why is this a problem? Because it's the only evidence that Ripley had to prove her case. Since it's a board of inquiry, then it would have passed on that information to the investigative team. If it was so meticulous such that it analyzed the lifeboat centimeter by centimeter to find existence of the alien, then why would it ignore something so blatant as the landing location of the Nostromo?

Van Leuwen's line about the colony would've just been brought earlier into the scene as further justification -- along with the survey finding no ship -- for why they won't bother checking it out.

Burke also provides details later, stating that if they did check it out, they would need to make a major security situation.

All you can do is argue Van Leuwen is lazy, dismissive, and incompetent. And that would be accurate.

[Engineer]

So we're straw-manning now. Burke isn't a supervillain, he's just a greedy corporate slimeball. The technical manual is a stronger source than a wiki page.

Also discussing Isolation is healthier discourse than going around in circles. 😂

Dude had a hot take, and now that he's getting replies from ChatGPT he thinks it's because of "the heat" lol

[BlueMarsalis79]

Speaking of Isolation I finally finished it last night, everything in ultra settings. It deserves every bit of praise it gets. So lovingly crafted within every inch of its world. There's some repetition yes but it's such an immersive, harrowing experience that no other survival horror can touch. Make sure to play it on hardware past 2014, I experienced zero glitches.

You dig the remix?

Big on this one: