Aliens: An Analysis

[Local Trouble]

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?

 

I wonder how many more times I have to address it before he acknowledges that I've addressed it.

[Corporal Hicks]

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

I played it through in 2 sittings over 2 days once the game showed up through my letter box. When the doors to the hive opened was when I took my first break. "Nope."

[SiL]

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?

 

I wonder how many more times I have to address it before he acknowledges that I've addressed it.

He seems to think people who say Burke works alone are saying he's in control of the marines, so he's clearly not reading a f**king word of what anyone is actually saying.

[Necronomicon II]

Commands the marines, gets his authority thwarted by a grunt. 😂

[SiL]

> Commands marines
> Gives them authority over the entire mission

Like what

[Necronomicon II]

😂
Occam's Razor (substantiated by the film and writer/director James Cameron):

Burke is an unruly corporate executive who instigates the disaster on the colony. He sends the wildcatters to search for a specified grid reference, without knowing whether there was anything there; providing scant information to prevent interference from the Colonial Administration, as suggested by his confession to Ripley, "no exclusive rights for anyone..." This results in lost contact from the colony, prompting the Colonial Administration to dispatch the marines. Burke, seizing the opportunity, tags along under the pretense of the company's "substantial dollar value" investment and the likelihood of a damaged transmitter. He assumes the dual role of corporate representative and advisor alongside Ripley, a demoted flight officer who previously visited planet 426 before its survey and whose claims about aggressive lifeforms may now hold some credibility.

[SiL]

And that Burke only has the opportunity to do this because the investigative team was too ready to dismiss Ripley when they could have just asked someone to check it out, even if it was annoying.

"Let's wait until we know what to call it in as."
"No, remember they said it's a derelict alien spaceship with a dangerous organism inside?"
"Shit, right, yeah. Let's call it in and head home."

Roll credits.

[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

I played it through in 2 sittings over 2 days once the game showed up through my letter box. When the doors to the hive opened was when I took my first break. "Nope."

That moment the hive was revealed gave me more anxiety than I thought was possible

[Eal]

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

I played it through in 2 sittings over 2 days once the game showed up through my letter box. When the doors to the hive opened was when I took my first break. "Nope."

That moment the hive was revealed gave me more anxiety than I thought was possible

I noped the heck out of the game and had to finish it a week later. After all the time playing, only to run into that...Other than that? The fanboy part of me gets squirmy and a little disappointed that they never bothered including egg-morphing. Odd that they elected to include a deleted scene of Aliens as a basis for setting the plot up, but can't be arsed to do the same for a deleted scene in Alien, even if there's no Queen shown and the outbreak just sort of happens without further elaboration.

[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

I played it through in 2 sittings over 2 days once the game showed up through my letter box. When the doors to the hive opened was when I took my first break. "Nope."

That moment the hive was revealed gave me more anxiety than I thought was possible

I noped the heck out of the game and had to finish it a week later. After all the time playing, only to run into that...Other than that? The fanboy part of me gets squirmy and a little disappointed that they never bothered including egg-morphing. Odd that they elected to include a deleted scene of Aliens as a basis for setting the plot up, but can't be arsed to do the same for a deleted scene in Alien, even if there's no Queen shown and the outbreak just sort of happens without further elaboration.

Well to be fair, the game makers did say there was a queen, they just didn't show it because then us players would have been expecting a final showdown with it, which would have taken away from the alien-experience they were shooting for. No need for egg morphing if there was a queen, but who's to say there wasn't egg morphing taking place anyway? Just like the queen, nothing is shown, so it's open to interpretation...

Also, they did add in a deleted scene from alien... sort of... there was a scene in the script for alien where they manage to lure the alien into the airlock but ash intervenes to save it. The DLC "crew expendable" is supposed to be THAT scene, but they didn't re-create the scene exactly; they made some changes to it so that it would work as a game.

[Eal]

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

I played it through in 2 sittings over 2 days once the game showed up through my letter box. When the doors to the hive opened was when I took my first break. "Nope."

That moment the hive was revealed gave me more anxiety than I thought was possible

I noped the heck out of the game and had to finish it a week later. After all the time playing, only to run into that...Other than that? The fanboy part of me gets squirmy and a little disappointed that they never bothered including egg-morphing. Odd that they elected to include a deleted scene of Aliens as a basis for setting the plot up, but can't be arsed to do the same for a deleted scene in Alien, even if there's no Queen shown and the outbreak just sort of happens without further elaboration.

Well to be fair, the game makers did say there was a queen, they just didn't show it because then us players would have been expecting a final showdown with it, which would have taken away from the alien-experience they were shooting for. No need for egg morphing if there was a queen, but who's to say there wasn't egg morphing taking place anyway? Just like the queen, nothing is shown, so it's open to interpretation...

Also, they did add in a deleted scene from alien... sort of... there was a scene in the script for alien where they manage to lure the alien into the airlock but ash intervenes to save it. The DLC "crew expendable" is supposed to be THAT scene, but they didn't re-create the scene exactly; they made some changes to it so that it would work as a game.

I know what the makers say, but also a bit disappointed they don't explore that process further. Also, Brett is clearly pulled into the air shafts and mentioned as such too, director's cut or no director's cut, yet they show him hanging out dead on a catwalk above the landing claw.

And also...regarding the Sevastapol hive...it's like, they show 1 lone drone on the Sevastapol?
And you know there's people killed initially, but then the hive just sort of happens and is there in the game.

[Engineer]

Yea but that's what I am getting at... if they intended for there to be a queen that we just never see, then there's not much reason for them to invest in the egg morphing angle from a narrative perspective.

And yea, we deal with a lone alien for the first several missions, but that changes after the hive reveal. That was one of the big twists; there wasn't just one alien, there were several all along. After that reveal, you do have regular encounters with multiple aliens patrolling the same area at once too.

[ralfy]

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. 😂

FWIW, many of them operated in the same way. Remember Brett and Parker looking for assurances that they'd get a share of what was monetized from findings, and Ripley's response?

Brett: I'm not doing any more work unless we get full shares.


Ripley: You're guaranteed by law that you'll get a share... Now both of you knock it off and get back to work.

Remember the Jordens, too?

Add to that Bishop following what "Mr. Burke" wants and we find out the real reason why we're going around in circles: some want to maintain the "supervillain" storyline, with Burke in the starring role. What's more plausible is that all of them--the Nostromo crew, Jordens, and Burke wanted a cut of the profits, and characters like Ash, Bishop, and even the Marines work to serve both company and government, which work together. And that can be taken from the movie scripts, with technical manuals needed for a few points.

The premise is that seeing WY as an "evil" company is a cartoonish view, but claiming that Burke was working alone isn't. Now, it turns out that it's the other way round.

BTW, the wiki entry shared is based on one manual.

Last point: it's interesting to study Bishop, too. He's supposed to be working for Burke, but it was pointless because Burke choose to let loose the 'huggers on Ripley and Newt. One can argue that his actions later involve self-preservation, but one wonders if the company made sure that he continues working to serve the same.

[Engineer]

Dude, we're talking about isolation now. Don't change the subject. Lol

[ralfy]

😂
Occam's Razor (substantiated by the film and writer/director James Cameron):

Burke is an unruly corporate executive who instigates the disaster on the colony. He sends the wildcatters to search for a specified grid reference, without knowing whether there was anything there; providing scant information to prevent interference from the Colonial Administration, as suggested by his confession to Ripley, "no exclusive rights for anyone..." This results in lost contact from the colony, prompting the Colonial Administration to dispatch the marines. Burke, seizing the opportunity, tags along under the pretense of the company's "substantial dollar value" investment and the likelihood of a damaged transmitter. He assumes the dual role of corporate representative and advisor alongside Ripley, a demoted flight officer who previously visited planet 426 before its survey and whose claims about aggressive lifeforms may now hold some credibility.

That still doesn't counter the fact that the board and even Ripley had information on the same landing location, that both company and government had a stake in such findings (as seen in what they did in the first movie and the third), that the government has surface rights (i.e., since it granted the company mining rights) which means there are no exclusive rights but, as Ripley eventually pointed out, percentages, and that the same percentage issue, i.e., full shares, are also raised in the first movie (and that time the rock wasn't owned by anyone yet, but likely theirs as the Nostromo crew was working on company time and using company assets, like the ship).

Additional problems for your "Occam's razor":

The company and government are not supposed to believe Ripley, but why do they send a heavily armed contingent which, according to Burke and implicitly acknowledged by Gorman, deals with particular "situations" involving "state-of-the-art firepower"? Why does Burke want to bring Ripley along? Given the point that it's a mission under "military jurisidiction," wouldn't Gorman be working under orders from superiors who, like him, have also read Ripley's brief?

That explanation plus the fact that you just acknowledged that the government (and not Burke) dispatched the Marines and that Burke works as a company rep shows that the narrative about Burke acting alone falls apart.

Last point, if all that is based on Ripley's story being credible, then why does she have to accept Burke's assurance that her flight status be reinstated and that the company "has" picked up her contract? She should have probably gotten a lawyer for that, too, with new contracts drawn between the company rep and her.

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

I played it through in 2 sittings over 2 days once the game showed up through my letter box. When the doors to the hive opened was when I took my first break. "Nope."

That moment the hive was revealed gave me more anxiety than I thought was possible

I noped the heck out of the game and had to finish it a week later. After all the time playing, only to run into that...Other than that? The fanboy part of me gets squirmy and a little disappointed that they never bothered including egg-morphing. Odd that they elected to include a deleted scene of Aliens as a basis for setting the plot up, but can't be arsed to do the same for a deleted scene in Alien, even if there's no Queen shown and the outbreak just sort of happens without further elaboration.

 To remain on-topic, that was an issue for the end of the second movie, and in light of the third.

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

I played it through in 2 sittings over 2 days once the game showed up through my letter box. When the doors to the hive opened was when I took my first break. "Nope."

That moment the hive was revealed gave me more anxiety than I thought was possible

I noped the heck out of the game and had to finish it a week later. After all the time playing, only to run into that...Other than that? The fanboy part of me gets squirmy and a little disappointed that they never bothered including egg-morphing. Odd that they elected to include a deleted scene of Aliens as a basis for setting the plot up, but can't be arsed to do the same for a deleted scene in Alien, even if there's no Queen shown and the outbreak just sort of happens without further elaboration.

Well to be fair, the game makers did say there was a queen, they just didn't show it because then us players would have been expecting a final showdown with it, which would have taken away from the alien-experience they were shooting for. No need for egg morphing if there was a queen, but who's to say there wasn't egg morphing taking place anyway? Just like the queen, nothing is shown, so it's open to interpretation...

Also, they did add in a deleted scene from alien... sort of... there was a scene in the script for alien where they manage to lure the alien into the airlock but ash intervenes to save it. The DLC "crew expendable" is supposed to be THAT scene, but they didn't re-create the scene exactly; they made some changes to it so that it would work as a game.

I know what the makers say, but also a bit disappointed they don't explore that process further. Also, Brett is clearly pulled into the air shafts and mentioned as such too, director's cut or no director's cut, yet they show him hanging out dead on a catwalk above the landing claw.

And also...regarding the Sevastapol hive...it's like, they show 1 lone drone on the Sevastapol?
And you know there's people killed initially, but then the hive just sort of happens and is there in the game.

To remain on-topic, that was an issue in the movie, i.e., how many of those were killed or cocooned. One pointed out that given the latter for almost everyone plus the use of the sentry guns, then there'd be few left. But it's not that big a problem as Newt was captured and put in the nest.