ALIEN and ALIENS Thread...

[ambac]

I think what a lot of modern horror films are attempting (emphasis on "attempting") to do is to convey the point that we need look no further than ourselves to be terrified and that we are our own worst enemy. These are the themes that were explored effectively in films like Invasion of the Body Snatchers and The Thing that it is our own psychological paranoia that gets the best of us and drives people to commit unspeakable acts that humans are capable of where everyday familiars, the people that you know, there is something not quite right with them. Somehow, they are different. That's a powerful way to convey fear. I just watched The Astronaut's Wife. I groaned when I saw the trailer in the theater but I thought it at least had one thing going for it. It played on the fact that something was not quite right with Depp the whole film and there is this uneasy tension and creepiness that is building. The film is basically a rip off of Rosemary's Baby meets the X-Files and if it didn't have that going in its favor, would have been a complete dud.

My personal take on the 'we are our own worst enemy' in horror is that the Romero zombie movies are the best example of this type of genre. We have huge numbers of dead, decaying former human beings out to eat us alive, two great primal fears of man. Not to mention that often times in his movies, the living are worse than the dead and are the ones that make the situations spiral out of control, another aspect of the 'we are our own worst enemy'. His orignal trilogy really are dim views of people working together. I think someone once analyzed the reasons of failure in each movie like this;

Night Of The Living Dead-Stupidity (The survivors could not get along and trust each other and made bad decisions)

Dawn Of The Dead-Greed (Everyone wanted the mall and could not share)

Day Of The Dead- Ego (Everyone thought they were more entitled or was more right than the other group. This movie is a little harder to analyze because our main hero characters are actually pretty sympathetic and more likeable than the previous two installments)

But let's get back to the Alien series of movies!

 

[Sachiel]

How I understand the brown SS Alien...someone else got the Grid exclusive...

https://www.blister.jp/item5470.html

SSC seems to be getting the shaft with Robocop and the Alien. I think Blister also has a different Predator, but they both where in the beginning (and the SSC looks cooler).

 

[PosterBoyKelly]

OK another question on the Ripley toy, is it going to look more like the first page of this thread, darker hair, or more like the one up on SS site, lighter hair? I just prefer the version on the first page of this thread, much more accurate and I'm wondering if I'd have to repaint (for the first time!) this to make it more Weaver-ish.

 

[dekadentdave]

OK another question on the Ripley toy, is it going to look more like the first page of this thread, darker hair, or more like the one up on SS site, lighter hair? I just prefer the version on the first page of this thread, much more accurate and I'm wondering if I'd have to repaint (for the first time!) this to make it more Weaver-ish.

Looks like we're gonna have to repaint her to look like the original prototype. I'm pretty sure HT had to lighten her hair and make her eyes blue because of issues to Sigourney's likeness, not having her consent. But the sculpt is there.

 

[pjam]

Well the SDCC proto looked damn good according to most who've seen her, certainly better than the prod pics, maybe someone has a ref shot?

As far as hair color, remember Vasquez also had an orangey hair color on the HT prod pics and shipped dark brown so I don't think we'll be seeing a redheaded Ripley either...

EDIT:

Okay, found a Ripley proto display pic from SDCC 06 and her hair WAS painted lighter, still think it will be corrected, but mine will need a repaint anyway...

 

[customizerwannabe]

Nice thing is the HT pototype sculpts are pretty close to the production version. Wish I could say the same for SS.

 

[dekadentdave]

Yes, if you compare that to the first image that was posted in this thread, you can see the obvious differences. For one, her lips are too red and her eyelashes too feminine and her eyes are not light blue, they should be dark brown and her hair is dark brown (almost black) with reddish/brown highlights. That original prototype is a dead-ringer for Sigourney so just use that image as a reference and it should bring the Sigourney out of that sculpt. And yes, if only Sideshow sculpts were perfect likenesses. Even Obi-Wan isn't perfect although Olug did a great job, the beard still bugs me.

 

[pjam]

Yes, the great news is the sculpt IS there, maybe with some slight modifications as Gruff pointed out some time ago in this thread.

I already have her Bomber jacket waiting for her!

 

[gdb]

Good point Ambac. Cameron changed the whole shebang with that Queen.

I agree DDave, if looked at coldly, the life cycle of the Alien is very consistant, and the killing/coccooning etc., of characters is consistant with all that life cycle stuff. No doubt.

But, in 1979, when this was new, this was more than the average bugaboo scary critter!

So, to borrow a quote, This is rumor control...these are the facts....

There is an EGG,
out of which comes a FACEHUGGER,
which, for lack of a better term, rapes it's host, orally, and in so violating them, it deposits a live embryonic form that will rip and tear it's way, brutally, out of the host, killing them. Total host violation is already the order of the day. This is, metaphotically speaking, a very male attribute in nature.
This embryonic form, The CHESTBURSTER, which ironically, looks like a phallus, sheds it's skin, and becomes a fully formed adult in a very short amount of time. Disregarding it's nutritional requirements (conjecture: some of the kills are perhaps food, hence Brett? It has just undergone a HUGE metabolic development and would need immediate nourisment, regardless of whether that body can become an egg or not...)
Back to facts: This ADULT WARRIOR then attempts to catch and coccoon as many hosts as it can, for either, impregnation by eggs/facehuggers, or, it makes them into eggs (somehow) for future waves of hosts.

This is all that was set up in ALIEN.
As for ALIENS, the addition of the Queen makes this either one aspect of Alien biology, or there are several.

All that matters is, it does all this regardless of the host species, and regardless of the hosts desires or wants. This alien exists to exist. Plain. Simple.

If there are other aspects or attributes, or motivations, they must fall under the realm of speculation. Hence, all this debate and interest.

I still say, there is more to them than just reproduction and basic behavior. They are designs, and are therefore, representitive of the original creator's idea. In the case of ALIEN, they are also darkly, sexual. I didn't create them this way, the filmakers did. This is also an area that can be easily bypassed, as it is, quite disturbing.

My four cents. OK, I'll shut up now.

You've touched on the one thing that has always kinda annoyed me and that is that the chestburster turns into the eight foot tall monster in a very short amount of time. In the original all they would have had to do was tweak the story a little -- a line about, "it's been 3 days since..." Today, with CGI, there's no reason not to show us pre-adolescent aliens, if you will -- four foot tall monsters that aren't fully grown, etc. Maybe some cool chestburster attributes could be added to the design.

Anyway, don't sell you're self short. That was worth at least a nickle.

 

[PosterBoyKelly]

Yeah that sculpt is amazing. Guess I should hone up on some painting. Maybe SS Han first to practice.

 

[dekadentdave]

I must be the only person in the world that actually enjoyed AVP. I wasn't paying attention to the incubation period and stuff like that. It's really kind of irrelevant in this kind of film. It's like going to see Jurassic Park. You don't go see Jurassic Park and care about the scientific accuracies of their evolution or the characters or the acting, you just want to see people getting eaten by really cool looking dinosaurs. I wanted to see Aliens fighting Predators and that's exactly what I got. Sweet! I read the Dark Horse comic back in the early 90's and they quickly glossed over the Aliens incubation period in the heards of Rynth the same way and I thought the movie was very much like the comic book in story and style so I got exactly what I was expecting and was thoroughly entertained. Is it canon with the sacred franchises? Who cares. Just watched it again last night and it was a helluva lot of fun.

 

[creecher]

You're not alone, oh decadent one.

What surprises me is all the Predators Hot Toys managed to make out of this film. I couldn't tell one from t'other. Don't even recall seeing the Elder, come to think of it, and I don't really care, Hot Toys Predators all rock.

 

[dekadentdave]

He's there Creecher. At the end, he hands the woman the spear. And all of the HT Predators make an appearance; Chopper, Celtic and of course Scar. They're all there.

 

[ambac]

AVP. Blech! Never let Paul Anderson near a camera or word processor again. Please.

 

[creecher]

He's there Creecher. At the end, he hands the woman the spear. And all of the HT Predators make an appearance; Chopper, Celtic and of course Scar. They're all there.

Really? OMG, talk about cashing in on a scene.

 

[dekadentdave]

They're not all in the same scene of course! Chopper and Celtic are killed off earlier on. The Elder shows up after Scar's death to see his body carried back to the ship but he recognizes Scar's symbol burned onto her cheek and hands her the spear as a trophy. Very reminescent of the final scene in Predator 2 when the that Elder hands Danny Glover the flintlock.

 

[creecher]

Wow, spot the Predator.

I only watched it, for the first time, the other day, and to me, cause I don't try to dissect films, just watched a gang of Predators on the hunt. It did what it was supposed to do, in my opinion, and take me away from my own reality, for a fly's point of view. I liked it.

As you said, the time frame for the incubation is a side issue. After all they're Aliens. Whose to say what their incubation period is from one galaxy to the next. It certainly didn't bother me. The pace was good, I thought. Would it have made that much difference if the Predators had arrived earlier, using the humans from the base camp to incubate the Aliens? I think so. Sometimes too many explanations can spoil the momentum, the plot, and the whole film. Then again, I thought Batman Begins wasn't what everyone else seems to think.

 

[dekadentdave]

I agree, Creecher. Batman Begins is seriously overrated. Granted it's a masterpiece compared to Joel Shumacher's ambiguously gay duo Batman and Robin but it took far too many liberties and deviated from the comics (more so than even Tim Burton did) and strayed from what Miller's Year One (the definitive Batman Begins IMO) was all about. Batman had to learn how to survive on the urban streets and rely on his detective skills and strike fear into the criminals of Gotham. He had no high tech arsenal like the Tumbler (what the hell was that?) and no Lucius Fox as Q supplying him with limitless gadgets like he's James Bond. I walked away from that film terribly disappointed the same way that most people complain about liberties taken with AVP. The only difference being is that AVP is not meant to be taken as seriously as this epic Batman film pretends to be. I have a legitimate gripe with Batman Begins and it's a pretty big one.

 

[PosterBoyKelly]

AVP May not be the best (I'm a huge Alien fan and a casual Predator fan, I actally prefer Predator 2 BUSEY!) but AVP was just fun and stupid IMO. It was one of those "Oh I don't need to think" movies that had some awesome action and cool effects and that I'm glad I saw on cable for free. I didn't think it was bad, it certainly kept my attention. It seems kind of obvious they wrote it for Ripley, but Weaver was probably like "F' That!" and so they re-wrote it for some generic strong female lead. I don't kno if that's what really happened but it looks that way. Anyway, Busey rules, that's my point

 

[PsychoCenobite]

I quite liked AVP as well. I've watched it quite a few times on DVD... more times than I've watch Alien or Predator... and I love those!

I find it's great as a pass the time film that's quite good.

PsychoCenobite