Is the movie Alians awesome or not?

Uhh... yeah.

I have no idea what Alians is

Is the movie Alians awesome or not?

Never seen it.

Aliens is pretty good, though.

(Seriously, though, I really like Aliens.)

StarCraft ripoff.

I hate those meathead space marines too much to enjoy the movie.

It is a Sci Fi original movie - by the same people who brought you Transmorphers. Full title is The Asylum Present's Alians.

Followed up by two terrible sequels; "Alians" and "Alien 3".

Aliens is pretty good as sort of a cheesy movie.

I like Alien better since it's much more subtle about pretty much everything.

i love alians especially the part where arnold schwarzenegger says "'until now, it's all been fun and games. cops and robbers, dunkin donuts. but you're in the shit now. metro command is a war zone."

Only horrible people don't like Alien and Aliens.

awesome as FUCK

what the fuck is an alian

Alians 3 was a piss poor sequel.

"Alians" is the sequel to "Alans" - in which jewel thieves Alan Arkin, Alan Alda and Alan Rickman are joined by Ian McShane and Ian McKellen for one last heist before they retire.

I want more new Alien movies; in the vein of the second alien movie called "Aliens". I wouldn't mind a reboot, a new star to carry the torch from Ellen Ripley; new plot, new locations, new enemy types, weapons; and hopefully inspired game developers to make new games for us to enjoy solo and in co-op/competitive multiplayer.

Oh shit ... didnt see the misspelling :(

I just want to add for some folks that the movie was made back in 1986; hence that as you check out effects and whatnot else. Imagine the impact this movie had on the sci-fi genre at the time.

it is fantastic

I made this huge wall of text about how I just watched Alien and Aliens back-to-back last night, and, despite Aliens's special effects holding up much better, why Alien is a much better movie.

But the website lost it. I'll just say this.

James Cameron made it so the aliens' blood miraculously became more alkaline once the alien was dead.

Aliens is good; cheesy, and with caricatures instead of characters, but good. Alien is fantastic. That's it.

FUCK YEAH

Won't bother with the 'Alians' mockery since I assume others have made good use of the head start they've had over me.

Aliens is a great movie. It's kind of easy to forget how cool it is, since it's an archetype of the kind of dudebro-soldiers-go-somewhere-and-get-fucked-up storyline which a trillion things have tried to emulate it since then. I don't think any have succeeded in surpassing Aliens, so fuck them all (especially Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within).

The atmosphere is thick. The characters are likeable. The weaponry is badass. The antagonists are more badass. Yeah, it scratches a different kind of itch to the first movie (which I also love), but I don't think it should be denigrated for the fact that it went for a bit more of an action-blockbuster flavour.

For me, the greatness of this film is cemented in place from the moment Ripley decides to go after Newt. IMO the whole the gearstick tears through the already half-melted gearbox to find a different gear at that stage. As a viewer, you've already had such a massive dose of badassery - the battle on subsector whatever (under the atmosphere processor), Ripley/Newt in Medical, the shootout in Medical, the escape - that it feels like it would be fair just to let Ripley and co escape by that point. But she says no, fuck it, instead of running from these countless walking mincing machines, I'm going straight to their nest to find a little girl who is probably dead. I love that aspect.

But more than that I love the way the film is put together from there on. There's practically zero dialogue and all the shots are amazing: the atmosphere processor coming to bits, the Alienised subsector of the atmos-processor, Ripley posing with her gaffer-taped weapon while the queen stands over her, all topped off with the calm robot-voice woman with her unreasonable countdown. Man, just fucking love all that. And then it doesn't even stop when they get back to the Sulaco. GREAT. FILM.

As a little addendum, I do like the Director's Cut and I completely disagree with what Drew said on the Aliens: CM QL about the Director's Cut not adding much. Some additional parts seemed clumsy, but others are critical for the pacing and logic of the plot - particularly the sentry guns. When the APC blows up, in the theatrical cut the stakes barely change at all, whereas in the Director's Cut it increases the sense of peril because salvaging the sentry guns is apparently the only thing that has given them a chance to survive the evening. Also, not to pick on lovely Drew, but one of the things he gets super excited about in the Aliens QL is only important due to the role it plays in the Director's Cut, so maybe his memory is a little muddled.

Aliens is good but it's no Alien 3.

Yeah that's right.

I have to disagree vehemently.

If you are seriously trying to pass off this half-baked notion that Alien had characters then puff puff pass, son. Just off the top of my head I can name Bishop, Hudson, Hicks, Vasquez, Drake, Ripley, Newt, Apone, and the Weyland-Yutani guy played by Paul Reiser. I always forget his name. Burke, is it? Point is, that's a stocked cast of characters that, even if some are little more than extras, all made a lasting impression that made you care when they were in peril and met an otherwise untimely conclusion.

Now compare and contrast with the memorable characters from Alien: Ripley (only memorable because she survived) and the Black Guy with the Bandanna I don't know why he's memorable. Probably because he was so fucking sweaty.

If you want to argue that Alien was a better horror movie, that it had better atmosphere, then I agree one hundred percent. But to slander what is objectively the best action movie ever made to make your point is tantamount to water sports. It's fine in the privacy of your own home, but don't bring that shit out in public.

@laivasse: Great post.

Yeah, Aliens is rad!

I don't think that Aliens will ever make a good video game because, well, it's already been made ten million billion times. Half-Life, Halo, Doom 3, Dead Space, name any sci-fi shooter, or pretty much any shooter really, that doesn't have an Aliens influence in it. We've done that song and dance so many times in everything except name so that whenever that song and dance is done with the name on it, we're going to write it off as generic and mediocre.

That said, an Alien video game is probably still possible. You know the Hunter in Dead Space 1, the regenerating one? The only thing that's actually scary in that game because it's literally unkillable by pretty much anything you can throw at it? Yeah, that, only somehow expand it to a full game where you feel like that thing is chasing you throughout it.

FUCKING FUND THIS SHIT

@believer258: Wasnt there a game for Sega CD or something (it was a sega plataform but not the Dreamcast) like that that was about a female character in a derelict spacecraft ... I remember seeing such a game in a videogame magazine , then again that was ages ago and dont know if the game actually went gold or not. Other things I remember that it was japanese and character looks like Aye Brea (not tht it is her but she looks alike)

I agree.

FWIW, it's become a bit of a fallacy in the wake of A: CM to say that 'oh the franchise is cool but it's really hard to make a good game from these elements' (referring to acid blood and alien lethality). I think that's bullshit. I played the original AvP back in the day and the Marine campaign is a fantastic evocation of the Alien movies, replete with satisfying combat, crazy acid blood spray and terrifying aliens. In the marine campaign, predators were relegated into being a kind of late-game miniboss - so that was basically an Aliens game. And it was great.

I never played AvP 2 but I heard that was good also. Before either of those, Alien Trilogy was a decent attempt at a PS1/Saturn era FPS with facehuggers that could end you in one hit. AvP 2010 has its fans, too, so I hear. So could we stop saying that it's fundamentally hard to make a decent FPS from Aliens-inspired elements? I heard it said on the Quick Look and I heard it from people defending the shit looking previews of Aliens: CM ages ago. It's not true. It's merely hard for Gearbox to do it.

@oldirtybearon: OK, I'm going to recreate it, just for you... Deep breath, now:

Gruff-talk-but-twinkle-in-the-eye black sergeant whose first priority after cryosleep is to grab his cigar, which apparently he had with him in the chamber. The distance from LV-426 to Earth is ten months, and the distance from the mining operation to LV-426 is twelve months. In Alien, the Nostromo's crew clearly takes a few hours to recover from the effects of cryosleep, but the marine crew is doing pullups ten minutes after waking in Aliens. They must use that caffeinated soap.

Ash is a brilliant character. He is prompted by his programmed devotion to the company, but he's driven by his infuriating inability to comprehend sexuality (his fascination with the impregnation process, his attempted rape using a makeshift, magazine phallus). Bishop is nothing more than a, "hey look another android I don't trust your kind after what happened last time but then at the end you'll do something I wasn't in a position to do and I'll suddenly realize that you were a true friend all along" hackneyed story device.

Alien is filled with Egyptian imagery. With the first shot of the cryochamber, the doors open and the stagnate air swarms, billowing a lab coat. It's not just a sleeping area: it's a tomb. Later, they desecrate the tomb of the Space Jockey and they carry the inevitable curse back to their home, just like every cursed tomb leaves an insidious, patient execration. And let's not forget Jonesy. As everyone knows, the ancient Egyptians worshiped cats. What some people may not know is that their specific cat goddess, Bastet, was the goddess of--you guessed it, curses and disease. Aliens eschewed all of that.

Alien had small-talk. Now, I don't mean that forced, manufactured stuff that Quentin Tarantino adores. When they were sitting around that table after waking, they were having groggy, muttered conversation. None of the, "like that poontang back on...," followed by an exaggerated clap-shake in Aliens.

We've got the aforementioned Gruff but Lovable Leader. We've got the Joker who's always being inappropriately lighthearted until he breaks down into the Helpless Kid he really is. We've got the Butch Girl who gets teased by the Joker and who can handle anything, but who is later shown to be not nearly so callous as she first appeared. We've got the Person Who Nobody Thinks Should Be Along Because They Aren't One of the Team, who in this case happens to the the Heroine. We've got the Heroine's Quiet but Attractive Sidekick who sticks up for her and so becomes a love interest while they're waiting to be turned into incubators. You don't remember the characters from Alien? Good. I don't remember the people I pass in the street. I do remember the street performers. But while those street performers put away their juggling balls and guitars and become regular people, the smears of archetype James Cameron called "characters" can't do that and so are permanently fixed in their ridiculous poses.

I remember watching Alien. I thought Ripley was going to be able to cancel the detonation in time and I was confused when she couldn't. This can't be right! But in Aliens, of course every turret but one would run dry, with a mere 10 rounds in that one. Was there any doubt? We follow procedure here. Of course the girl wasn't going to die.

Oh, boy, now we're here... The girl. The girl who managed to scavenge food and supplies for--let's say they managed to cut their travel time in half during those fifty years Ripley drifted--five months suddenly can't keep herself safe for ten minutes. If Ripley's arm isn't around her, then she's in danger. Heck, even if Ripley's arm is around her!

...Which brings us to one of my main sticking points. The entire point to the aliens in Alien was you didn't dare pierce its skin. A teaspoon of blood ate through three decks. In Aliens, at least two people were splattered: Hudson's arm and Vasquez's leg. Now, they never clarified what materials the aliens' blood would dissolve. We saw steel (the decking), polyethylene (the pen), polycarbonate (the visor), and fabric (the boots). James Cameron could have decreed that it wasn't reactive with human skin and it would have been fine. But instead he declared that the blood somehow gained alkalinity after the creature that had lost it had died. Not after a certain time period. It is literally said in the movie Aliens, by Bishop, that the alien's blood loses its acidity after the alien died. How else can we have Ripley and Newt attacked by two facehuggers in the medbay and have the marines shoot them with absolutely no ill effects to the ship? "Magic." - Mr. Bean

"Hey, don't you realize they're right below a fusion reactor and if they pierce the cooling tanks they will cause a thermonuclear explosion equal to a forty-megaton bomb?"

"Oh, that's right, I completely forgot."

"Hey, guys, no projectile fire while you're in there."

"Why not?!"

"...'Cause... Just don't. 'K?"

Oh, gee, the trigger-happy jack-offs kept some ammunition and ended up firing off quite a few rounds. We didn't want to take those four seconds to explain to them why they wouldn't want to melt their own bones. All's well that ends well. Good thing Sarge completely overlooked Hudson's shotgun when he collected mags.

The alien always impregnates before it molds its human host into a egg. Good thing it made the exception in Newt's case. How messed up would it be to have a chestburster pop out of the kid on the ride home, am I right?

I'm not even done, that's just off the top of my head. I understand that most people think Aliens is better than Alien, but between the characters and the story holes I just can't stomach it.

But, a peace offering: Aliens's effects still hold up. That queen looks just as good today. I do prefer Scott's external ship shots, mainly because he chose to avoid showing space altogether, but the upgrade in the appearance and movement of the mature aliens is striking.

EDIT: I tend to re-read my stuff to check it for clerical errors, and reading this again, I realize I look like a crazy person. Before last night, it's been two years since I last saw one of the Alien movies. Every fact or skewed memory is left over from last night. I do not own an alien costume. I do not remember the names of the characters from either movie (Ripley, Newt, Higgs, Hudson, Diego, Vasquez, and that's all I got). I do not have any weird feeling of superiority over anyone who likes the sequel more than the first. "...with absolutely no ill effects to the ship?" See that? I didn't even remember they were planetside at that point. The only thing that's come out of this mini-movie-marathon is I'm sorting my DVD collection differently.

I prefer Promathias

@mlarrabee: The thing is, everything you said is completely true, but for me (and I'm sure many Aliens over Alien people) that doesn't hold a candle to the memorability of the characters and how utterly easy it is to get behind the Marines in Aliens as opposed to the Nostromo crew in Alien. You're right that Alien is a better shot film and it has atmosphere by the Kardashian ass-load, but all of that, in my opinion, is wasted on characters that fail to stick with you (honestly they're as hollow as slasher fodder) and thus no personal investment is made in the unfolding events. If there's no personal investment, no empathy with the characters, why the hell do I care about what's going on?

Like I said earlier, Alien makes it by the sheer originality of the titular creature and the skill of Ridley Scott as a visual artist. I hate to say director because he's always been infinitely better at crafting striking images than cultivating performances. Maybe that's blasphemy, but I feel that out of Ridley's entire filmography his Sci-Fi stuff resonates because it allows him to get creative.

In any event, I get why you prefer Alien to Aliens. To me it's apples and oranges. For me, I need the protagonist to be someone I can empathize with or at the very least understand, and I just didn't get any of that in the original.

Still a scary fucking movie, though.

Aliens is dope as fuck man.

By the way, Directors Cut is the only way to fly for me. I did see that version first though, and I get the arguments for showing the colony before the attack removing all the tension, but I just love all the shit with the potbellied white-collar working stiffs complaining about bureaucratic bullshit surrounding their jobs. Seriously, it's the best. And you can't argue with the scenes about Ripley's daughter. That shit just adds a whole dimension to the relationship with Newt that you simply are not aware of in the theatrical cut. Also, that sentry turret scene is great. I always loved how you really don't see the actual aliens being shot in that sequence. So fucking tense man. Also, isn't Hudson's speech during the drop down to LV-426 cut out of the theatrical version? In my mind, Aliens is not Aliens if it doesn't have Bill Paxton talking about sonic electronic ball-breakers.

Fuck. I'm going to watch that now.

@mlarrabee: Dude chillax man ..... the characters are exagerated because that is the point , they think they are some tough marines and they get their ass kicked because of it , they serve that purpose so Ripley looks awesomer. Now they are space marines they ARE trained in space so maybe, I dunno get faster reaction than civilian pilots , also you said it yourself the Nostromo crew had more sleeping time which could mean more groggines , also they are not in tip top fisical condition , also at no point in either film we see an exact time after they wake up , it could be minutes or could be hours but we are never shown that so there is no point in breaking our heads over this.

"The alien always impregnates before it molds its human host into a egg. Good thing it made the exception in Newt's case. How messed up would it be to have a chestburster pop out of the kid on the ride home, am I right?" Dude when the first dude is impreganated there are no xenomorphs , so of course they wouldn´t make an egg , but once a colony is establlished by the xenomorphs it is a beter way to hold them still for proper "chest bursting". So this is no plot hole whatsoever (because the conditions were different in Alien than in Aliens 1 ... or what are you saying you created the life cycle of the xenomorphs?.

But dont get me wrong I love alien´s style (even more so) just as much as Aliens´.

Another thing .... the acidic blood from Alien was the facehugger´s not the alien´s one , so it could explain it. Also when they are in the medlab in Aliens they are still in the planet dude , not the spce ship. So there are no "story holes" as you claim. You may not like it but thats is your taste.

The alien lifecycle, as I understand it, goes something like this: Leathery eggs from queen -> Facehugger -> Actual egg in host's stomach -> Chestburster -> Mature in hours to full-sized alien -> More leathery eggs from queen -> Facehugger -> Actual egg in host's stomach -> Mature alien slime host to walls -> Chestburster -> and so on. That's why the comatose, impregnated people were molded into the walls, including the one that woke up and had a chestburster birth, in Aliens. The reason the impregnated crewmember in Alien wasn't turned into a wallflower is because the aliens hadn't completed one life cycle yet, so there were no mature aliens to create that wallflower. Not to mention that the other crewmembers found him quickly.

As for the mature alien blood, both Hudson and Vasquez are seen screaming and burning as the blood from mature aliens (Hudson at the door of the crawler with his shotgun, Vasquez in the vents just before her death) ate into their skin. But it subsided after about ten seconds, and Bishop, speaking about a captured facehugger, explains that the alien's blood loses acidity after death. It would have been a possible explanation that an alien's blood loses potency during maturation, but the fact that Bishop is talking about facehugger blood strongly suggests otherwise. And you're right, I completely forgot they were planetside during the medbay scene.

@mlarrabee: Your opinion's your own but a couple of the things you've highlighted are well off-base. Maybe it's because I read Alan Dean Foster's novelisation (which was based on the screenplay), and I could be confusing some of the extra detail in that with what actually happens in the film, but I feel like most of your gripes are adequately dealt with.

Acid blood in the med bay is fine since it doesn't occur on any ship. Acid blood on Hudson is just a couple of drops and it hurts a lot. Acid blood on Hicks nearly kills him and puts him out of commission even though it appears to be just a small amount. Acid blood on Vasquez leaves her stuck moaning in a vent, so she kills herself with Gorman. Acid blood on Drake is game over, man. They toned it down a bit but it still has plenty effect.

The atmosphere processor may well have gone critical due to a stray round during the firefight. It's never tied down to any sole cause. Apone only collects pulse rifle mags since it's assumed that's all the marines have. Hicks shotty is an antique (I think that's a novelisation thing), it's concealed from Apone (I think that's implied in the film too) and it's not armour piercing. Vasquez is the one who screws their cautious approach by busting out with the smartgun. In the book there is a little more elaboration in terms of marines passing around ammo that they withheld from Apone, but my recollection is that the film conveys the basic sense of the situation well too.

I'm not sure what you mean by 'the alien always impregnates before it molds its human host into a egg'. Sounds like you may have got that from the director's cut of Alien, which is a bit problematic in terms of what it implied about the alien life cycle. The impression you're supposed to take from Aliens is that humans are cocooned up, eggs are placed in front, facehuggerness happens, then they're left to incubate. It's completely consistent with what happens in the rest of the film.

Alian Rickman is cool, I guess.

Director's Cut > Theatrical Cut any day.

@mlarrabee: I was reading my replay and sorry if I come out as a cunt :P didnt meant to offend.

I much prefer Alien over Aliens.

Alians.

Jeff is fucking WRONG for disliking the Alien films. Even the third one is at least interesting. Aliens is one of the coolest sequels ever made, because it takes the source material in an entirely new direction.

I´d say go watch Alien, Aliens and Alien 3 in that order. Don´t bother with that other film. It has Winona Ryder´s big big eyes and a couple of cool scenes, but that´s about it.

@aetheldod: Oh, no, not at all. Actually, reading over my own post, my love for dissecting art and my (regretful) propensity toward biting sarcasm mixed unfortunately to paint me a pretty colossal douche!

@mlarrabee: I read your later posts so I know you're not trying to be an asshole, but you mentioned the distance from Earth to LV426 being pretty long. That's fine, but a) Couldn't space travel have become faster in the fifty some-odd years between Alien and its sequel and b) I thought they were on a space station, not Earth, and could have been, say, seventeen day's worth of trip to LV426.

Also, you mentioned how it took a little while for the space-truckers in the first one to wake up, but only about ten minutes for the marines to wake up? Again, a) the space truckers were definitely less fit than the marines. I've never seen an active marine waking up, but from my understanding he can be up and ready very quickly. As opposed to a space-trucker, who is far less disciplined both in body and mind, and probably isn't tending to things that have any real sort of immediacy. And b) Here's the advancing technology card again - maybe the cryo chambers are better designed to wake people up faster?

But after all this I do have a question of my own. In the first movie, the alien falls off of John Hurt's face. He immediately goes to eat something and then it pops out of him. I'd say that takes about 30 minutes, tops. In the later Alien movies, particularly 3, it takes a long time for any alien to pop out of anyone. There are some strange time differences in those movies.

The Aliens game for the DS reviewed decently. There was a quick look. The marines in it are pretty fragile and when they die you have to control one of the remaining one.

Hell yeah it's awesome!

I watched Alien and Aliens not that long ago and I didn't much care for either... I'm quite saddened by this. Here are some of my problems:

SPOILERS AHEAD

Alien

Basically nothing happens in the first hour or so. They hang in space, they go to the planet, they go to the ship... I was super bored. The big issue here is that they don't develop the characters during this time. I didn't care about any of them. I think that's really important later when they are all going to be killed that I really don't want them to be. Didn't happen with this film.

As a whole it's a really basic slasher film in a space ship. Everyone gets killed except one and after she "kills" the bad guy he/it comes back for one last "surprise". I don't think Alien pioneered this format and I have always found it uninteresting. Even if it did it obviously wouldn't change my perspective on it. I also thought the whole sinister robot twist was a pretty weak twist, although executed with considerable style.

It wasn't bad. I just didn't enjoy it. There was some highlight the obvious one being the visual style and special effects that hold up incredibly well. I mean later the alien is clearly just a guy in a suit, but that aside it's really impressive. I also loved the scene where the robot is on the table. Regardless of my feeling about the twist itself the way they twist a human character into such a inhuman situation... Remarkable. It would have been even better if the human character had been more established.

Aliens

Mediocre action film. I was quite bored by this on too. It felt way too long... On the other hand I love Terminator 2 which is a Cameron joint with equal length. I don't really know. Maybe it's just my lack of interest in scifi or something. There's basically the same problem as with the first one: I didn't care about any of the characters. It was sad when Arnold took a molten metal bath in T2.

SPOILERS END

As you can see I'm no movie critic and I this is a pretty pointless post. I should probably just delete the whole thing, but that would just make it even more pointless. On my personal 100% subjective movie enjoyment scale Alien is two stars for being boring but not offensive in any way. Aliens is three stars for some fun in a mediocre film. If someone is crazy enough you can get a better feel for my taste at Screened.

Short answer, pretty awesome. Saw Aliens 3 many years ago and thought it was a pretty entertaining movie but it never made me want to go back and watch 1 or 2. Last year, I saw Prometheus. I had low expectations because I heard so many negative impressions. Maybe because of that, I actually enjoyed it quite a bit. Yeah, the plot had some holes but I was really fascinated by the mythology and the creepiness of the creatures. This is what finally got me to go back and watch Alien and Aliens. Alien, I was mostly really impressed with. I thought it had amazing atmosphere and really enjoyed it's more serious tone. Aliens was entertaining but I really didn't like the action approach near as much. The biggest thing that jumped out to me was how bad/dated the actual xenomorphs were depicted in both movies. In the first one, you don't really see much of it until the end and once you do the presentation is really dated. They did do a good job though of sustaining the feeling of the xenomorph being this terrifying creature though, so I do give it credit there. In Aliens, it's like the xenomorphs are cannon fodder. They don't seem to be particularly fast or dangerous on their own. The danger comes from the their number and insect colony like nature. Not to mention the Queen at the end is really laughable now, it looks like a float in a parade. Overall, I think the mythology and world of the Alien franchise is the best part of it. It has this dark, heavy, dirty tone to it that it does so well. When done right, the xenomorph is an awesome creature and truly terrifying.

I think Alien 3 is the best one.