Alien, Aliens, AlienCubed, Alien Resurrection
July 17, 2023 2:54 PM Subscribe
YouTuber Oliver Harper took four of his older individual movie videos and re-edited them together for Alien Quadrilogy (1979-1997) Retrospective/Review [2h18m]. These aren't movie recaps, these get into writing, production, plot, music, actors, directors, artists, technology developments, alternate versions, even tie-in videogames. It's an unusual and informative look back at all of the bits and pieces of one of the most influential science fiction film series of all time.
I like to sprinkle a little cubed Alien on my scrambled eggs sometimes.
posted by Greg_Ace at 3:10 PM on July 17, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by Greg_Ace at 3:10 PM on July 17, 2023 [2 favorites]
Oh, yeah, a bonus... the movie Dark Star mentioned in the part about the first movie... well, that's available on YouTube [1h22]. Not recommending anyone watch it, just had found it and wanted to put it here.
posted by hippybear at 3:16 PM on July 17, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by hippybear at 3:16 PM on July 17, 2023 [3 favorites]
Too bad he can’t make his own films instead of chopping up the work of others.
posted by Ideefixe at 5:33 PM on July 17, 2023
posted by Ideefixe at 5:33 PM on July 17, 2023
He's doing film criticism. The four videos he's chopping together are his own previous film criticism videos. Please consider actually interacting in any way with the content of the links instead of getting mad at version of the post you've made up in your head.
posted by cortex at 5:37 PM on July 17, 2023 [30 favorites]
posted by cortex at 5:37 PM on July 17, 2023 [30 favorites]
It's amazing these films are so influential, despite their many, many flaws. Don't get me wrong, I'm and HUGE Alien(s) et al fan, with a massive collection that includes VHS tapes, Laserdiscs, DVDs, Blu-rays and a ton of merch, but the first one is so ponderous (and the director's cut, wow), the third one was so hacked about by committee that it's almost nonsensical (the assembly edit at least makes a bit more sense), and the fourth one was a massive stretch to bring back a dead character, tainted by a Hollywood (lower-case "p") predator. The two AvPs are b-grade sci-fi (at least the second is rated R), and then Prometheus goes completely off the rails with Alien: Covenant being so bad I haven't been able to bring myself to watch it a second time.
If the first one hadn't been so visually stunning, and the second one so strong, you wonder if the franchise would have died there, or was there just something about the monsters and the universe that resonates in a way that means there will always be people that want to dip back into this world for new stories?
posted by krisjohn at 6:22 PM on July 17, 2023 [2 favorites]
If the first one hadn't been so visually stunning, and the second one so strong, you wonder if the franchise would have died there, or was there just something about the monsters and the universe that resonates in a way that means there will always be people that want to dip back into this world for new stories?
posted by krisjohn at 6:22 PM on July 17, 2023 [2 favorites]
There's a common misconception that there is more than one Alien sequel. There's Alien and Aliens, and some people think there are other movies past those two, but those people are wrong. There's just the two.
posted by zardoz at 6:36 PM on July 17, 2023 [22 favorites]
posted by zardoz at 6:36 PM on July 17, 2023 [22 favorites]
If the first one hadn't been so visually stunning, and the second one so strong, you wonder if the franchise would have died there, or was there just something about the monsters and the universe that resonates in a way that means there will always be people that want to dip back into this world for new stories?
¿Por qué no los dos? The Predator franchise is weaker--the first one is very much like Alien (although it has its own strengths), the second one a pale imitation of Aliens, and the rest... well, Prey was very good. But it took a long time to get there. And yet, it seems to scratch much the same itch, as witness the two AVP movies, although they generally weren't much of a much.
posted by Halloween Jack at 6:40 PM on July 17, 2023
¿Por qué no los dos? The Predator franchise is weaker--the first one is very much like Alien (although it has its own strengths), the second one a pale imitation of Aliens, and the rest... well, Prey was very good. But it took a long time to get there. And yet, it seems to scratch much the same itch, as witness the two AVP movies, although they generally weren't much of a much.
posted by Halloween Jack at 6:40 PM on July 17, 2023
the movie Dark Star
One fun thing about Dark Star: there's a whole sequence about one of the astronauts trapped in an elevator shaft and struggling to climb out. It looks pretty scary right up to the moment that you realize that the wall the actor is "climbing" is actually the floor. Once you see that, you can't unsee it and all of the tension goes "woosh" out of the scene.
posted by SPrintF at 6:59 PM on July 17, 2023 [3 favorites]
One fun thing about Dark Star: there's a whole sequence about one of the astronauts trapped in an elevator shaft and struggling to climb out. It looks pretty scary right up to the moment that you realize that the wall the actor is "climbing" is actually the floor. Once you see that, you can't unsee it and all of the tension goes "woosh" out of the scene.
posted by SPrintF at 6:59 PM on July 17, 2023 [3 favorites]
I remember when the first movie came out. I kept hearing that it was unlike anything else out there, and I talked my brother into going with me. We knew nothing about it beforehand, and the GASPS at the chest bursting scene momentarily drown out the audio. Being teenagers, we immediately had to stifle the teenage laughter that comes after the over-the-top gross. But I *remember* that moment.
Alien is a visually dense and interesting movie, and I still adore how they spent so much screen time to build the relationships of the crew before the horror happens. That’s the strength of the first one - it’s a crew. You care about all of them. You care about how they care about each other. Of course, and then the monsters, too.
Aliens is one of my comfort movies. It falls in a rare category I think of as “competency porn”: these aren’t super heroes; this is not a bunch of super-human Jason Bournes or James Bonds — it’s just a bunch of average people who are good at their jobs who employ what they know, together, to meet extraordinary experiences.
And it was the first - maybe the only one I can point to - movie that depicted the full panoply, all of what I saw at the time as culturally-female strengths: intelligence AND tenacity AND compassion AND tenderness AND courage AND nurturing AND physical strength AND competency AND leadership. It meant a lot, too, to see the clear romantic spark between Ripley and Hicks without there having to be a kiss. Having grown up with nothing but movies with people with bodies like mine being the “love interest”, or “tamed” (looking at you, Kate Hepburn), once a man loves them, it was so. fucking. liberating. Like, hard to explain how much that allowed me to just BE competent and comfortable with it.
I kind of agree that there are only two Alien movies, and the rest are high-budget fan fics. I’m glad it’s still being reworked.
posted by Silvery Fish at 7:46 PM on July 17, 2023 [18 favorites]
Alien is a visually dense and interesting movie, and I still adore how they spent so much screen time to build the relationships of the crew before the horror happens. That’s the strength of the first one - it’s a crew. You care about all of them. You care about how they care about each other. Of course, and then the monsters, too.
Aliens is one of my comfort movies. It falls in a rare category I think of as “competency porn”: these aren’t super heroes; this is not a bunch of super-human Jason Bournes or James Bonds — it’s just a bunch of average people who are good at their jobs who employ what they know, together, to meet extraordinary experiences.
And it was the first - maybe the only one I can point to - movie that depicted the full panoply, all of what I saw at the time as culturally-female strengths: intelligence AND tenacity AND compassion AND tenderness AND courage AND nurturing AND physical strength AND competency AND leadership. It meant a lot, too, to see the clear romantic spark between Ripley and Hicks without there having to be a kiss. Having grown up with nothing but movies with people with bodies like mine being the “love interest”, or “tamed” (looking at you, Kate Hepburn), once a man loves them, it was so. fucking. liberating. Like, hard to explain how much that allowed me to just BE competent and comfortable with it.
I kind of agree that there are only two Alien movies, and the rest are high-budget fan fics. I’m glad it’s still being reworked.
posted by Silvery Fish at 7:46 PM on July 17, 2023 [18 favorites]
Alien Resurrection was indeed poor, but has one interesting quality:
The crew of mercenaries that show up in it are clearly predecessors to the Firefly crew.
posted by Hatashran at 8:52 PM on July 17, 2023 [5 favorites]
The crew of mercenaries that show up in it are clearly predecessors to the Firefly crew.
posted by Hatashran at 8:52 PM on July 17, 2023 [5 favorites]
So my weird relationship with Alien Resurrection is I went to see it on about 300mg of dextromethorphan. So I wasn't really quite right while I was watching it. I will say, I really got deeply involved in Clone Ripley and the weird thing about her seeing the Alien hybrid as her child.
I mean, the entire series has kind of a tiny bit been about Ripley and maternity. In the first movie she's got Jones as a substitute foster but at the beginning of the second movie we learn her daughter has died of old age, I think. So she had a daughter she'd left behind when she left on her doomed mining voyage, and her time drifting in hibernation after the Nostromo incident left her away from her child longer than she'd expected, and she basically didn't get to meet her except maybe as a very young child. And then she finds Newt...
There are weird resonances of this going on in Alien3 with a lot of religious involvement of the brothers on the planet and Ripley carrying the embryo of the new alien queen so she's immune to its deadly rampage... The way Ripley clutches the chest burster to her as she falls into the furnace is very maternal, giving birth while committing to death.
And finally Alien Resurrection. This movie is so weird in so many ways. The scene where Ripley sees all the failed clones of herself, Sigourney specifically asked not to know about any of what was in that set before she walked in to film the scene. She wanted to play her reactions raw and live. But even in this, she's looking at daughters/sisters/mothers... The human-ish face of this Alien, I felt during that first viewing and still think, was really effective at creating a bridge across the alien/human divide to have Ripley see this alien as her child. And the sequence where it is sucked out into space, with Ripley staring, watching her surrogate child, yet another one, being torn apart because it is too dangerous to survive... It's actually heartbreaking.
The entire series is really heartbreaking if you look at it from the viewpoint of a mother who left her daughter behind for a few years to go earn bank on a mining voyage, and got waylaid and has been mourning the loss of having never seen her daughter again ever since.
posted by hippybear at 8:58 PM on July 17, 2023 [17 favorites]
I mean, the entire series has kind of a tiny bit been about Ripley and maternity. In the first movie she's got Jones as a substitute foster but at the beginning of the second movie we learn her daughter has died of old age, I think. So she had a daughter she'd left behind when she left on her doomed mining voyage, and her time drifting in hibernation after the Nostromo incident left her away from her child longer than she'd expected, and she basically didn't get to meet her except maybe as a very young child. And then she finds Newt...
There are weird resonances of this going on in Alien3 with a lot of religious involvement of the brothers on the planet and Ripley carrying the embryo of the new alien queen so she's immune to its deadly rampage... The way Ripley clutches the chest burster to her as she falls into the furnace is very maternal, giving birth while committing to death.
And finally Alien Resurrection. This movie is so weird in so many ways. The scene where Ripley sees all the failed clones of herself, Sigourney specifically asked not to know about any of what was in that set before she walked in to film the scene. She wanted to play her reactions raw and live. But even in this, she's looking at daughters/sisters/mothers... The human-ish face of this Alien, I felt during that first viewing and still think, was really effective at creating a bridge across the alien/human divide to have Ripley see this alien as her child. And the sequence where it is sucked out into space, with Ripley staring, watching her surrogate child, yet another one, being torn apart because it is too dangerous to survive... It's actually heartbreaking.
The entire series is really heartbreaking if you look at it from the viewpoint of a mother who left her daughter behind for a few years to go earn bank on a mining voyage, and got waylaid and has been mourning the loss of having never seen her daughter again ever since.
posted by hippybear at 8:58 PM on July 17, 2023 [17 favorites]
Oh lord, I just realized how deeply engrained the "five paragraph essay" format is in my psyche.
posted by hippybear at 9:18 PM on July 17, 2023 [18 favorites]
posted by hippybear at 9:18 PM on July 17, 2023 [18 favorites]
at the beginning of the second movie we learn her daughter has died of old age,
That’s in the extended release, right? It’s not in the theatric release - and, la la la, I can’t hear you, to me it’s not canon, lol.
Yes, that makes it heartbreaking, but I also have always felt that it’s a clunker of an unnecessary part of the story, a bad artifact of Men Writing Women. You don’t need that storyline to make Ripley a nurturing person, capable of caring for a child. To me, it’s a stronger story without it - Ripley identifies with Newt because they have both lost their entire worlds because of these monsters. Nobody else there gets it - yet. They are both refugees. You don’t need Ripley to be a mother to justify careful, nurturing capabilities.
((plus, having Ripley’s daughter die of old age introduces a lot of Bad Time Facts, because Ripley was only lost for 57 years, which means her daughter would have had to be…, what, in her 20s to justify the “old age” part of that, but Ripley is in her 30s, which makes it messy. /[endNerdShit]))
posted by Silvery Fish at 3:28 AM on July 18, 2023 [3 favorites]
That’s in the extended release, right? It’s not in the theatric release - and, la la la, I can’t hear you, to me it’s not canon, lol.
Yes, that makes it heartbreaking, but I also have always felt that it’s a clunker of an unnecessary part of the story, a bad artifact of Men Writing Women. You don’t need that storyline to make Ripley a nurturing person, capable of caring for a child. To me, it’s a stronger story without it - Ripley identifies with Newt because they have both lost their entire worlds because of these monsters. Nobody else there gets it - yet. They are both refugees. You don’t need Ripley to be a mother to justify careful, nurturing capabilities.
((plus, having Ripley’s daughter die of old age introduces a lot of Bad Time Facts, because Ripley was only lost for 57 years, which means her daughter would have had to be…, what, in her 20s to justify the “old age” part of that, but Ripley is in her 30s, which makes it messy. /[endNerdShit]))
posted by Silvery Fish at 3:28 AM on July 18, 2023 [3 favorites]
The following should be read in the voice of Comic Book Guy:
Amanda would have been 68 at the time of Aliens -- she died at 66 two years ago -- so she would have been 11 during Alien and presumably 9 or 10 when Ripley left. Weaver was about 30 at time of filming so using misogynistic Hollywood rules where actresses are always substantially younger than their characters, Ripley was probably intended to be in her late 30s during Alien.
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 4:07 AM on July 18, 2023 [1 favorite]
Amanda would have been 68 at the time of Aliens -- she died at 66 two years ago -- so she would have been 11 during Alien and presumably 9 or 10 when Ripley left. Weaver was about 30 at time of filming so using misogynistic Hollywood rules where actresses are always substantially younger than their characters, Ripley was probably intended to be in her late 30s during Alien.
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 4:07 AM on July 18, 2023 [1 favorite]
The youtuber CinemaTyler has a series of videos about the making of Alien. Absolutely fascinating: talking about writing the script, how the original artists that designed the Nostromo ended up sidelined, or how they bought pieces of decommissioned bombers to create the "lived in" appearance of the sets:
CinemaTyler: The Making of Alien
posted by LaVidaEsUnCarnaval at 4:37 AM on July 18, 2023
CinemaTyler: The Making of Alien
posted by LaVidaEsUnCarnaval at 4:37 AM on July 18, 2023
The following should be read in the voice of Comic Book Guy:
lol - heard and logged. (also acknowledging that “old” is a moving target, usually 20 years beyond one’s current age.)
But, please, don’t skate over the heart of the thesis: depictions of women have always been problematic in movies; we have barely begun to do a fair exegesis of depictions of motherhood or the comorbidity of “nurturing women must be mothers” (which bleeds into real life, as in female actors who are not mothers being passed over for roles of mothers, even thought the flip - childless male actors being cast as dads - isn’t an issue). Them be tires that deserve a lot of kicking.
i LIKE the story arc better without the childless mother bit. It maintains Ripley’s depiction as a complex HUMAN, and not a person reduced to her relationships to others (which is one of the cardinal sins of depictions-of-women-in-media). Heck, Hicks is just as caring, and doesn’t have a lost child in his backstory. Just sayin’. :)
(Edit to say: I love Cameron’s Ripley. For its time, it was so much fresh air into what women could be in movieland. I was extremely grateful for that person on my screen when it came out, and I still feel that way on re-watch, even as I, and my interrogation of depictions of women in media, has expanded).
posted by Silvery Fish at 5:17 AM on July 18, 2023 [1 favorite]
lol - heard and logged. (also acknowledging that “old” is a moving target, usually 20 years beyond one’s current age.)
But, please, don’t skate over the heart of the thesis: depictions of women have always been problematic in movies; we have barely begun to do a fair exegesis of depictions of motherhood or the comorbidity of “nurturing women must be mothers” (which bleeds into real life, as in female actors who are not mothers being passed over for roles of mothers, even thought the flip - childless male actors being cast as dads - isn’t an issue). Them be tires that deserve a lot of kicking.
i LIKE the story arc better without the childless mother bit. It maintains Ripley’s depiction as a complex HUMAN, and not a person reduced to her relationships to others (which is one of the cardinal sins of depictions-of-women-in-media). Heck, Hicks is just as caring, and doesn’t have a lost child in his backstory. Just sayin’. :)
(Edit to say: I love Cameron’s Ripley. For its time, it was so much fresh air into what women could be in movieland. I was extremely grateful for that person on my screen when it came out, and I still feel that way on re-watch, even as I, and my interrogation of depictions of women in media, has expanded).
posted by Silvery Fish at 5:17 AM on July 18, 2023 [1 favorite]
The crew of mercenaries that show up in it are clearly predecessors to the Firefly crew.
Alien: Resurrection is to Firefly as The American President is to The West Wing.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 6:21 AM on July 18, 2023 [1 favorite]
Alien: Resurrection is to Firefly as The American President is to The West Wing.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 6:21 AM on July 18, 2023 [1 favorite]
There's a common misconception that there is more than one Alien sequel. There's Alien and Aliens, and some people think there are other movies past those two, but those people are wrong. There's just the two.
I can outgatekeeper you and say there are no Alien movies.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 6:22 AM on July 18, 2023 [4 favorites]
I can outgatekeeper you and say there are no Alien movies.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 6:22 AM on July 18, 2023 [4 favorites]
What are y'all talking about, there are four Alien movies. Chronologically: Blade Runner, Blade Runner 2049, Alien and Aliens.
posted by thecaddy at 6:54 AM on July 18, 2023 [4 favorites]
posted by thecaddy at 6:54 AM on July 18, 2023 [4 favorites]
But, please, don’t skate over the heart of the thesis
Solid copy on that.
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 7:46 AM on July 18, 2023 [1 favorite]
Solid copy on that.
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 7:46 AM on July 18, 2023 [1 favorite]
Alien: Ridley Scotts second best movie. Tense survival horror. Beautiful sets, Giger creepy sex monsters. Absolutely iconic.
Aliens: Arguably Camerons best movie (yeah yeah yeah). Full of Cameron hallmarks: Strong, yet motherly female protagonist, sympathetic grunts, weaselly evil human face to evil faceless corporation. Also Iconic.
Alien3: GOD I WISH FINCHER WAS THE ESTABLISHED DIRECTOR HE IS NOW SO WE COULD HAVE GOTTEN THE REAL MOVIE. Design by committee mess, but anything with Charles S. Dutton has some redeeming qualities.
Alien Resuerrection: Watch it drunk with the sound off. Beautiful movie, stupid plot worse dialog. Sigourney made that shot, and aliens can swim!
posted by lkc at 9:01 AM on July 18, 2023 [2 favorites]
Aliens: Arguably Camerons best movie (yeah yeah yeah). Full of Cameron hallmarks: Strong, yet motherly female protagonist, sympathetic grunts, weaselly evil human face to evil faceless corporation. Also Iconic.
Alien3: GOD I WISH FINCHER WAS THE ESTABLISHED DIRECTOR HE IS NOW SO WE COULD HAVE GOTTEN THE REAL MOVIE. Design by committee mess, but anything with Charles S. Dutton has some redeeming qualities.
Alien Resuerrection: Watch it drunk with the sound off. Beautiful movie, stupid plot worse dialog. Sigourney made that shot, and aliens can swim!
posted by lkc at 9:01 AM on July 18, 2023 [2 favorites]
There's a common misconception that there is more than one Alien sequel. There's Alien and Aliens, and some people think there are other movies past those two, but those people are wrong. There's just the two.
Yep, just like there are just two Predator movies (Predator and Prey) and two Terminator movies (Terminator and Judgement Day). I've heard Alien: Isolation is a good video game spinoff of the two Alien movies. And Terminator had the tv spinoff The Sarah Connor Chronicles that was surprisingly decent. It's amazing these film duologies haven't had any more cinematic followups.
posted by Pryde at 9:20 AM on July 18, 2023
Yep, just like there are just two Predator movies (Predator and Prey) and two Terminator movies (Terminator and Judgement Day). I've heard Alien: Isolation is a good video game spinoff of the two Alien movies. And Terminator had the tv spinoff The Sarah Connor Chronicles that was surprisingly decent. It's amazing these film duologies haven't had any more cinematic followups.
posted by Pryde at 9:20 AM on July 18, 2023
It's amazing these film duologies haven't had any more cinematic followups.
It's the same with the Star Wars trilogy. Pity that they did not make any more movies. How epic would it have been to have a movie exploring the politics of the Republic before collapsing into an Empire? Sadly, we will probably never know.
Alien: Isolation is great, by the way. The main character is actually Ripley's daughter, who whas mentioned above. They nailed the 70s "retrofuturistic" vibe, with brown, beige and orange tones, and bulky monochrome computers. It will cause you a couple of heart attacks on your way to finish it, so be aware.
(They even got William Hope, Lt. Gorman from Aliens, to play one of the characters).
posted by LaVidaEsUnCarnaval at 10:51 AM on July 18, 2023
It's the same with the Star Wars trilogy. Pity that they did not make any more movies. How epic would it have been to have a movie exploring the politics of the Republic before collapsing into an Empire? Sadly, we will probably never know.
Alien: Isolation is great, by the way. The main character is actually Ripley's daughter, who whas mentioned above. They nailed the 70s "retrofuturistic" vibe, with brown, beige and orange tones, and bulky monochrome computers. It will cause you a couple of heart attacks on your way to finish it, so be aware.
(They even got William Hope, Lt. Gorman from Aliens, to play one of the characters).
posted by LaVidaEsUnCarnaval at 10:51 AM on July 18, 2023
I should reiterate -- I was high on cough syrup and saw Alien Resurrection and all my thoughts about Ripley and motherhood should be viewed through that lens.
posted by hippybear at 12:00 PM on July 18, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by hippybear at 12:00 PM on July 18, 2023 [1 favorite]
Maybe one day they'll make an Alien movie where a Ripley-like character's warnings are respected and they nuke the alien-infested planet from orbit and like the rest of the movie is about dealing with PTSD and visiting a cat adoption center.
posted by RonButNotStupid at 12:05 PM on July 18, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by RonButNotStupid at 12:05 PM on July 18, 2023 [2 favorites]
Hey, as long as you're not a WGA member, you could start that screenplay tonight!
posted by hippybear at 12:08 PM on July 18, 2023
posted by hippybear at 12:08 PM on July 18, 2023
how bout The Jonesy Chronicles?
posted by supermedusa at 12:41 PM on July 18, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by supermedusa at 12:41 PM on July 18, 2023 [2 favorites]
I should reiterate -- I was high on cough syrup and saw Alien Resurrection and all my thoughts about Ripley and motherhood should be viewed through that lens.
Hey, it’s ok! We get to new places by talking about them and poking hard at a lot of the cultural assumptions, and your comments made me think through and have to articulate a lot of stuff that’s been bubbling in my head - so, thank you for that. I also should say that I’ve been pulling on these threads in my own head for a couple of years now. Collectively, there’s been a lot of great disentanglement going on around depictions of women in film, but almost none of it around MOTHER in film, unless they are clearly there as METAPHOR. As if motherhood is not just a role in real life, one of many that needs to be juggled and balanced — NOT an entirety of a person.
In the Ripley case, the childless mother also skates too close to the “women are defined by their trauma, not depicted as a whole person” that constitutes the totality of backstory in a lot of movies. So, the question becomes: is that necessary for the Character? And I think not, in case.
Also, cough syrup will do that to you.
posted by Silvery Fish at 1:45 PM on July 18, 2023
Hey, it’s ok! We get to new places by talking about them and poking hard at a lot of the cultural assumptions, and your comments made me think through and have to articulate a lot of stuff that’s been bubbling in my head - so, thank you for that. I also should say that I’ve been pulling on these threads in my own head for a couple of years now. Collectively, there’s been a lot of great disentanglement going on around depictions of women in film, but almost none of it around MOTHER in film, unless they are clearly there as METAPHOR. As if motherhood is not just a role in real life, one of many that needs to be juggled and balanced — NOT an entirety of a person.
In the Ripley case, the childless mother also skates too close to the “women are defined by their trauma, not depicted as a whole person” that constitutes the totality of backstory in a lot of movies. So, the question becomes: is that necessary for the Character? And I think not, in case.
Also, cough syrup will do that to you.
posted by Silvery Fish at 1:45 PM on July 18, 2023
It wasn't a hero dose, but it was certainly first plateau.
posted by hippybear at 1:53 PM on July 18, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by hippybear at 1:53 PM on July 18, 2023 [1 favorite]
Vincent Ward has some things to say about his unmade Alien 3
Ward began work on the script, sets began being built, when eight months into production the new studio owner wanted to significantly advance the release date before the script was even locked down. The whole project was dropped into a pressure cooker and the studio became much more conservative. As production executive Jon Landau as since put it ‘we set out to make a release date not a movie’. The producers began to get cold feet – Ward was getting the message that his idea was after all perhaps too daring and too different. With studio politics slowly eroding his concept he saw he wouldn’t be able to realise his story, not wanting to simply do ‘a remake’ he and the producers decided to part ways. Ward was given a story credit in the eventual film, but in his opinion the more interesting material did not survive the studio system.
You can also see a bunch of concept arton his website, although the navigation is janky and the pending sections have been unchanged for years.
posted by WhackyparseThis at 3:08 PM on July 18, 2023
Ward began work on the script, sets began being built, when eight months into production the new studio owner wanted to significantly advance the release date before the script was even locked down. The whole project was dropped into a pressure cooker and the studio became much more conservative. As production executive Jon Landau as since put it ‘we set out to make a release date not a movie’. The producers began to get cold feet – Ward was getting the message that his idea was after all perhaps too daring and too different. With studio politics slowly eroding his concept he saw he wouldn’t be able to realise his story, not wanting to simply do ‘a remake’ he and the producers decided to part ways. Ward was given a story credit in the eventual film, but in his opinion the more interesting material did not survive the studio system.
You can also see a bunch of concept arton his website, although the navigation is janky and the pending sections have been unchanged for years.
posted by WhackyparseThis at 3:08 PM on July 18, 2023
Despite its flaws, I unabashedly love Alien3. Tywin Lannister vs an Alien, Charles S Dutton Charles S Duttoning the heck out of it... what's not to love.
posted by kokaku at 8:01 PM on July 18, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by kokaku at 8:01 PM on July 18, 2023 [3 favorites]
I liked the additional information about Ripley's daughter because it helps explain why Ripley is willing to return to Lv426. Otherwise it seems as if she would be willing to abandon her daughter once again which seems out of character.
posted by goddess_eris at 9:09 PM on July 18, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by goddess_eris at 9:09 PM on July 18, 2023 [3 favorites]
the movie Dark Star ... Not recommending anyone watch it
I'll jump in and do that, then. Everybody should have seen Dark Star.
Silent Running too.
posted by flabdablet at 10:54 PM on July 19, 2023 [1 favorite]
I'll jump in and do that, then. Everybody should have seen Dark Star.
Silent Running too.
posted by flabdablet at 10:54 PM on July 19, 2023 [1 favorite]
cute robots made me cry tho
posted by inpHilltr8r at 4:49 PM on July 21, 2023
posted by inpHilltr8r at 4:49 PM on July 21, 2023
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posted by hippybear at 2:54 PM on July 17, 2023 [9 favorites]