
EDIT: I couldnt find a better LV426 to work on btw...
Enjay wrote:Tragos wrote:I'm very much a purist when it comes to Aliens, anything to do with Predator does not belong within the same universe. Dark Horse should have never gave FOX the idea, now it seems though as the two are merged like conjoined twins.
I'm sure then that you have read the original idea behind the aliens; that they were a much more sentient race with their own reproduction pyramid-like temples (with hieroglyphs/writing etc on the walls) and complicated reproduction process. The human crew were originally to have found one of these temples, broken the seal (similar to breaking through the groovy laser-through-dry-ice effect in then actual movie) and this would have awoken the reproduction process. Inside the temple would have been a sacrificial altar table (with blood channels etc) and hieroglyphs depicting the aliens impregnating hosts and showing the reproduction process. The point being that their reproduction was complicated and difficult, relying on a host, and therefore their culture was built around the reproduction process.
The idea was primarily dropped because to have the astronauts discover and investigate the alien reproduction temple would have meant a lot of time (and money) spent with very little action and not moving the plot along much at all. So, the egg room was added to the space-jockey ship and the rest was simply deleted - also allowing the reduction of the aliens to a much simpler "hive mind with a queen" type of species in later movies. The only bit of evidence from the original idea that made it into the movie was near the end. Despite having been a fast, ruthless, unbeatable killing machine for nearly the entire movie, when Ripley meets the alien near the end and flushes it into space, it is a tired, docile creature that puts up almost no resistance. Why? Because it had completed its reproduction process (the captain had been impregnated) and its job was now done (note, no alien queen involved, no hive mentality etc etc).
So, anyway, yeah, I agree. The alien skull in Predator 2 was an acceptable cameo and in-joke (IMO) but the whole "OMG you can't have aliens without predators" thing pisses me off, especially as this once complex idea of a reasonably advanced civilisation was reduced to them being little more than captive dumb pets and ravening almost mindless beasts: the playthings of the Predators in AvP. As a general rule, I dislike crossover stories of this kind anyway. They always boil down to geek fanboy wank-fests of "OMG Who would win X or Y" (and, of course, the question is never even fully answered anyway) and most of the time the art style, story lines etc etc clash horribly.
Another thing about the early Alien ideas that I liked (as a by the way), and it was something that always confused me from the films, was the appearance of the alien ship/biology. It always confused me that the space jockey clearly had the same basic "biomechanical" biology/technology as the aliens yet was supposed to be a separate species, alien to the planet, that had been infected by the aliens. Then I found out the the original idea was to use three artists: one for the human technology; one for the aliens; one for the infected alien ship. There were even initial designs for the infected ship and its crew (apparently it looked a bit like a giant space lobster and IIRC the crew were dwarf-like). However, for reasons that I forget (lack of artist availability?, lack of time?, lack of money?, not wanting a giant space lobster crewed by dwarfs?) Giger ended up doing both the aliens and the infected ship, thereby confusing the hell out of me for many years.
Tragos wrote:The mistake your making Enjay is including all the awful ideas surrounding AVP. Giger's art is truly dark and fantastic, the Egyptian styled imagery that would later be woven into the fabric of the universe is a clever idea. However without that much of the story falls apart completely...
Tragos wrote:The original script for Aliens 3 was fantastic. It featured both HICKS and NEWT very much alive and in an active role in Aliens 3.
Tragos wrote:They chose instead to focus the story on Ripley.
Tragos wrote:Aliens 3 could have been better than the first two, but instead we end up with a C+ movie with provides more questions than answers.
Spoiler:
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