Alien: Covenant Is A Better Aliens Sequel Than Alien 3

It doesn't get better. This is just nostalgia.

Some characters is solid, but plot is crap. This film has an interesting dialogue (thx to Dillon), but the environment is wretched. Xenomorph is crippled by the amateurish and cheap production of ADI - they thought the flesh was scary and terrible, and biomechanical is unnatural and not scary. But the Alien (shape) was never about terrible and disgusting - it is primarily the erotomechanic of Giger and an incredible elegant style. Fortunately, Giger’s style is not so easy to ruin.

This is a controversial film. This film deserves to be watched and rewatched many times. But it does not deserve to be part of continuity, part of canon. I easily agree to any retcon.

5/10

Alien 3 is like a dead poop that your beloved dog is lays aside and that you keep as a sentimental memory.

 dk 'theatrical or Assembly'

I prefer the theatrical ....I like the flow.

Assembled makes me ask questions and i'd rather just turn my brain off.

Aliens like Rambo ;)

I would agree in Part, as far as i also held ALIENS in a Higher Regard and saw Alien Resurrection as a bit of a Abomination when it came out, but as i got Older and Older then Aliens became more of a Starship Troopers kind of Flick...   while then i began to look Deeper at other Underlying Themes that Alien Resurrection had such as WHAT would Mankind do when they Successfully obtain a Xenomorph, purely using it to unleash Face Huggers that then Produce Snarling Aggressive Xenomorphs is MAYBE NOT the best way to USE/EXPLOIT the Organism.

I found Ripley 8 interesting as far as the Amalgamation of Human and Xenomorph, i thought the Failed Experiments was interesting from the Standpoint of what if we saw some Successful Hybrids.

Finally i found Call interesting and the whole Autons Subplot as something to Explore.  When Prometheus was released if felt it touched on some of the same Concepts/Themes (Exploiting, Experimenting with the Xenomorph DNA) and Subcreation.

This is just nostalgia.

Not sure what that means as I watched it two nights ago and like it even better than when I watched it two years ago. The environment is wretched- it is supposed to be. Regarding whether it deserves to be in the continuity is subjective, but the fact is that it is canon warts and all as is Resurrection.

It is and probably always will be controversial as this thread shows (we aren't even talking Covenant anymore). That's ok. It just goes to show how passionate people still feel about the movie.

My biggest critique of Ripley's dialogue was when she said the company thought of everyone as "crud". I think it would have made more impact to use even saltier language. Bit I guess it was the 90s.

Yeah language/dialog is painfully 1980's based. they're not going to speak this way in a 100 years...hopefully.

Look at difference between Jules Verne/H.G. Wells prose and 100 years later Ian Banks/Peter f. Hamilton.

I'll still take Alien:Covenant over Alien3:

AC:

More monsters.

Cool spaceships.

See the Juggernaut drop cargo.

Gun play.

Alien city.

Backburst...really like the spore idea.

Alien3:

Soundtrack is great.

Dark.

In other words: More cools stuff in AC.

Let’s rewrite Alien 3

The Sulaco never leaves the system, stays in orbit around LV-426.

After the crew enter hypersleep, Mother brings a backup synthetic online. That synth, Bishop 2, interfaces with the Bishop. It learns about the alien.

 Bishop 2 travels to the surface, returning with multiple eggs.(visits the derelict)

 It later uses Newt as a test subject.  Bishop 2 “Fascinating”  The newly born xeno damages the Sulaco causing a fire. 

As Bishop 2 fights the fire, Ripley, Hicks and Bishop are awoken.

Ripley “Where’s Newt!?”

They are trapped as Mother isolates the ship from the fire.

Bishop hacks into Mother...finds out the truth.(lots of gory Newt video and facehuggers running loose on the Sulaco)

They defeat Bishop 2 and the xeno/facehuggers(lots of action)

Bishop rigs the Sulaco for destruction(“Sulaco CAN”T reach  Earth!!”)...he stays on board to carry out the task.

Hicks and Ripley escape the Sulaco in the drop ship. (Sulaco *boom!*)

The movie ends with them landing on LV-426.

Alien 3 scene 8:

Hicks and Ripley continued observing the monitors. Out of the corner of her eye she saw someone or something….

Ripley “Ash?!”

Hicks “Wha...who’s Ash?”

Ripley “Tell me you saw that!…?”

Hicks “Saw what?......You alright?”

Ripley “.......I’m seeing things...seeing ghosts..” gives a nervous laugh.

Hicks  “Maybe you should try and get some rest?”, “Take a break”, “I’ll keep an eye on things”.

Ripley “......Yeah...for once, I think you’re right” smiling “..think I’ll lay down…”

Ripley gets up, turns around and walks straight into captain Dallas of the Nostromo.

----

Dallas “How is she?”

Ash “Good”, “I have her under sedation”

Dallas “Alright, keep me up to date” Dallas leaves the cabin

Brett and Parker look in from the corridor .

Ash closes the door to the compartment..

Ash “Ripley? Can you hear me?”

A dazed Ripley ever so slightly nods her head.

Ash “I’m afraid we have all been exposed to a virus”, "A pathological one...Hallucinations and more.."

Ash “We’ve also read your report and I can assure you the Nostromo and it’s crew are very much alive..”

-----

Hicks “What’s wrong with her?”

Ripley laying on the floor, comatose.

Bishop “Results of the scan are incoming…”

Hicks “One moment she was up...the next down..”

Bishop “She has been mind stemmed..”

Hicks “What! Super Soldiered...Who wou..”, realizing  “The company..Carter Burke!”

Bishop “Yes, they must have implanted the device on Earth, just before the mission”

Hicks “Bastards”, “Should have known they would monitor her every step…”, “But why did it activate?!”

Suddenly there was a loud *clank* and the Sulaco shuddered

Bishop “I’m afraid you have your answer”

The monitors showed a spacecraft docking with the Sulaco

-----

Ash took the laser scalpel and made a small incision to his index finger. Red blood trickled from the cut

Ash “Satisfied?”

Ripley sighed. It is over. All a bad dream. Amanda is alive, Jonesy is alive...so is Kane. No alien. No problems...Just a virus Brett and Parker  picked up ‘bar hopping’. Earth orbit soon. Then a desk job.

Dallas “Glad you’re feeling better..” adding “...Not to be a bearer of bad news...But your shift is starting in one hour” Dallas grinned

After watching A3 Assembly cut yet again, I still really like it despite some flaws. The thing that is most bothersome is the terrible dialogue/audio. The dialogue itself is fine, but it's mixed unevenly. There can be a mix of whispers, very quiet talking, normal sounding dialogue and dialogue that is difficult to understand since it is awash in reverb all in one scene. It is very uneven and it gets worse when the musical score comes in. That's the main reason why it is the toughest to re watch for me. Otherwise, it is a solid movie.

MonsterZero

I see your list about things that you like in AC and Alien 3. To me I think that it depends on what you find important. You mention the things in AC and even though I do not write those things off I still think that having characters that are written in an interesting way is more important and that is why Alien 3 is a better movie the way I look at it. No visuals, guns, and so on no matter how well done they are can replace the importance of characters.

There are probably not many things that I would change about Alien 3 although there are some. I have read your writings about what you would like Alien 3 to have been. While I enjoy to read what you have written I am still alright with killing Hicks and Newt off. Your alternative would be to still keep that family thing from Aliens intact, I am not a huge fan of it. Many movies have happy endings but I do not think that is the good alternative for the Alien franchise.

Correct me if I am mistaken but would you have left Ripley, Hicks, and Bishop in it? To me it would to repeat too much from Aliens, we already have Aliens so I do not think that we need another. I kind of look at it like being Ripley's story (1-3) the rest are not that important even though there are many characters that I enjoy.

 "..Alien 3 is a better movie..."

I agree. AC is uneven....But I think it'll will have a much greater following in 10 years, because of gunplay and spaceships. Nostalgia is gonna kick in on Prometheus and AC at about the same time. Amazon reviews and youtube comments are going to flip...just like Alien3 has recently.

I want Ripley and Hicks to meet their demise on the surface of LV-223.

Stranded on LV-426 and making their way to LV-223 in the dropship would be a cool chapter.

Hicks “We're not gonna make it”

Ripley “I thought you said we had the fuel?!”

Hicks “Well I was wrong..”  The plotted course showed an error and if landing was their purpose, a course correction was required.

     They’d been drifting towards LV-426’s sister moon, LV-223, for over a day.  Finding little water or food among the radioactive debris on LV-426, hunger pains were driving them to another moon. Luckily, system scans showed three Weyland-Yutani outposts on LV-223. 

The question was: did they have the fuel?

  The UD-4 Cheyenne hadn't been refueled after it’s return from Hadley’s Hope and they’d spent a great deal of fuel escaping the destruction of the Sulaco, not to mention the bumpy landing on LV-426.

Hicks “We’ll probably just burn up in the atmosphere…”

Ripley “great”

Ripley ”Can we jettison some weight and get our delta v..”

Hicks “Already ran the numbers” gesturing towards the display “Still not enough”

Ripley ”Maybe if we used the armament to increase our…”

Hicks “Yup, ran those numbers too” visibly deflated “No go, just burn up faster or bounce off the atmosphere” 

Ripley “Orbit” , “Can we establish an orbit?”

Hicks “Yeah, we can do that….” puzzled “So...what’s your plan?”

Ripley “No plan” smiling weakley “Just don’t want to burn up”

    Hicks wasn’t going to argue about that one, besides he was thinking about Vasquez’s recent birthday party, the squad had come down with something and that had left Drake and himself to scarf down most of the cake and pasta dishes….His stomach grumbled painfully….Lemon cake with banana topping, something Bishop had whipped up for her...Good times.

LV-223 loomed ever larger.

Hicks “I got something..”

Ripley “What is it?”

Hicks “It’s metallic..Hyperbolic orbit...Rotating..”, “I think it’s another ship”

Alien3 was released on this day! 1992.

      LV-426 was scheduled to be the latest of Earth’s penal colonies, it would be replacing the facilities on  Fiorina “Fury” 161.  Fiorina, with it’s vast ocean, was too valuable to waste on Earth’s criminals and with advancements in terraforming technology, it was time to upgrade the planet. Earth’s stock markets loved the news and the stock(symbol FIOA) soared, land options were purchased and the planet’s repurpose was in full swing.

       No such fate for LV-223, it’s lack of a global ocean and it’s sister moon, LV-426,  claiming a future penal colony(the moon wasn’t even listed on the stock exchange!)…...Well, it was a hard sell to any potential land owners. Weyland-Yutani did not give up so easily, they would place three permanent outposts upon the large moon, it was theirs and they would fight for it.

Alien3 for me is a modern masterpiece.