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The movie is better than the narratives. I don’t think anything is “wrong” with the writing it’s got a lot most don’t see because they’re emotionally mad about Newt to start things off so they start from a bad spot. The film is not this bad. Best to ignore the comments about what the film is and isn’t before watching.
ooh, just refreshed the front page, and saw this treat. I know number 3 had a hell of a rocky road, but its part of the lore so, ya know. same with 4 which got a bit slammed, but its good clean fun, and memorable. just like this one. so despite the trouble or low box office etc, at least they aren't forgettable movies. I hope you guys do the predator flicks too so you can the Alien vs Predator films. something us comic nerds had read stories of for years before the films. and then the sequels like Prometheus and Covenant, and then the newest one if its still gonna happen.....phew. that's a whole lotta franchise right there man. I don't know how you guys do it, but I'm glad you do. It's cool to be here to see the channel grow, and now 2.0 as well. Okay that's enough glazing, i nee to balance it out with some shade.....erm......Ari's....fvcking....i don't know, hoodies are always too damn smart. nailed it.
What you think is CGI is not CGI at all. They used a miniature rod puppet and layered it into the shots. The issue is the compositing doesn't work well.
I came here to say just that but figured someone would beat me to it. The behind the scenes showing how they puppeteered it is pretty amazing to watch. But I had the same thought when I first saw it. The compositing looks so janky I figured it had to be CG. That being said, the puppet work done on the chest burster running out of the room at the beginning still looks phenomenal.
The curious thing is that there is a second ending where Ripley throws herself into the fire but during the fall, the alien comes out of her belly and Ripley holds it with both hands to prevent it from escaping death.
Yes, that ending is in the original theatrical release. Like a lot of the movie, it's a nice idea, but the actual execution of it leaves much to be desired.
the horrible theatrical ending. Unnecessary in every way. You can tell that came from higher up "we have to see the Alien Queen in this film" nah. we get it. its in there. its gonna die with her. the end.
Personally after seeing both a few times. I do like the chestburster ending. 1) a chest burst scene is always great 2) controversial opinion but even if they aren't great I love seeing all the alien varieties/hybrid. (Where else would we see a queen in baby form, especially since ridley Scott doesn't like the idea of a queen) 3) the extended falling to focus on the chest burst scene was a little corny especially with her basically coddling it. I think it would've been cool if it chest busted RIGHT before falling the in the fire. But the green screen fire put made that difficult
That's the real ending and the greatest one, this one is dumb, but those that hate the movie like this one and those that like the theatrical version love that ending scene.
The official story is there were two facehuggers that came out of the one egg. The Queen and a guardian. The Queen hugger got into Newt's cryo tube, but cut itself, the acid caused an electrical fire that brought down the pod. Due to the hole in Newt's tube, she drowned, fully awake and screaming. After death, the Queen Embryo crawled out of her mouth and with Hicks being impaled by a beam, Ripley was the only living being to inhabit. That's why she has the sore throat, the nosebleeds, etc. Because an already growing embryo clawed down her throat. It's also why it took so long for the embryo to incubate inside of her. Yeah, I'm a big Alien nerd ;p
Charles S. Dutton is a criminally underappreciated actor (no pun intended). He was a professional streetfighter from Baltimore who accidentally killed his opponent in a fight. So he did a lot of years in prison for manslaughter. While locked up, he taught himself to act by reading the books of Shakespeare plays he checked out of the prison library. So while his fellow inmates were learning how to make license plates and buttsmuggle heroin, he was learning to act. And so that's what he became when he got released. And a fantastic actor he is.
I think the reason why Alien 3 mostly got hated was the decision to kill off important characters from the last movie. However, I don't think everything has to have a happy ending and things can indeed go wrong. That's why I find the take of Alien 3 relatively realistic and very depressing. It was risky, yes. Some of the criticisms were definitely justified, yes! But it showcases that life has no mercy and doesn't spare you just because of "plot armor". I love the dark atmosphere the movie gives. It's an art in itself.
People don't hate that important characters got killed. They hate it because those characters got killed off-screen, with no respect to their development. And the fact the beginning makes no sense. Where did those 2 eggs came from? Pretty sure the Queen had no time to spread eggs around. Personally, despite the bad special FX, I liked the movie. Loved the running around the corridors from the Alien POV.
Nah, killing off important characters isn't an issue. It's killing them off screen between movies after spending so much time in the previous movie building them up and saving them. For the record I love this franchise, including this movie, but 3, Resurrection, and Covenant all do the same.thing of taking the ending of the previous movie and making it almost meaningless.
Same. It would have been lame for everyone to just magically get out of cryo...for the second movie in a row. It feels more realistic not to get outof there unscathed. Alien doesn't need a love story to be good anyway.
I saw ALIENS and ALIEN 3 in theaters. No one in this movie besides Ripley was cared about by theatre goers whereas ALIENS actually had characters the audience gave a shit about.
@@VBSuperhow did the queen get on the drop ship? Bishop could’ve had a directive to sneak an egg back since Weyland-Yutani would have multiple plans to get an alien back. And things like this can happen. Did you forget most of the characters we got to know in titanic died. It’s kinda like this
As a kid, Aliens was my number one favourite film. I could pretty much quote/re enact the whole script. Two of my favourite characters of all time are Ellen Ripley and Dwayne Hicks. Hicks even acted as a sort of role model for me. To this day Aliens is in my top 5 films of all time. When Alien 3 was released I was 14 years old. When i finally got to see the film i absolutely loved it. The stellar cast. The sense of loss and everything that everyone had sacrificed was encapsulated in this movie. Meanwhile 'the company' still gives zero regard to any of that. Ultimately it sends Ripley off, giving her life to destroy her mortal enemy. Sure, I was upset that two of my most beloved characters were gone. But it all made sense to me. There was never going to be a happy ending for any of them, not in the dystopia we see them living in. As an ending to the trilogy, it was perfect. Is it my favourite 'Alien' film? No. But it ranks quite highly for me, probably in my top 20. I've never really understood the negativity surrounding it, I suspect, like you said, it's probably from die hard fans of the second film, but, as a die hard fan of the second film, I still don't get it. However, if we want to talk about Alien Resurection....... there is a good reason I said Alien 3 was the perfect end to the trilogy.
"We're all gonna die. The only question is when. This is as good as place as any...to take your first steps to heaven. Only question is how you check out. Do you want it on your feet...or on your f**king knees, begging? I ain't much for begging, nobody ever gave me nothin'! So I say f**k that thing! Let's fight it!" This is my team talk every week as a safety officer at my work. 👌 Classic underrated movie. Thank you for the video!! 🙏🙏🙏
Approaching any piece of art with a neutral pov is always the best way. It might not be always as good as you expect it to be, but that doesn't mean it's as bad as others claim it to be.
I personally love this film. It expanded the lore so much and doesn't discredit the past films in anyway. I understand why so many didn't like it, but the amount of hate this film gets I feel is unfair personally.
So the reason why they killed Ellen Ripley in this film was because of the many, many talks by the Fox executives of an Aliens versus Predator film being made. Sigourney hated the idea of a shared universe for the two franchises so she wanted her character to die.
So interesting - honestly we are so glad we gave this a shot. It truly does not deserve all the hate it gets, the film is genuinely good! But yes, there were some decisions made here that were risky. And sadly, risks don't always pay off.
@@OfficialMediaKnights Have you guys ever considered doing a cut comparison video series? Where you two watch the theatrical cuts as well as extended cuts and analyse the differences and give your opinions on them and which version you prefer?
I was surprised the knights didn’t really enjoy the fifth element, but that’s the thing about movies/art. It’ll never please everyone and what others think of something shouldn’t affect peoples own personal views.
Props to Charles Dance for his sensitive and subtle performance as Clemens, including his on-screen chemistry with Sigourney Weaver. My favourite performance in the entire franchise, aside from those of Sigourney, herself.
This was filmed in my hometown! Or the outdoor bits were, anyway. Seaham, a mining village in Northeast England - we had a beach called the Blast, the runoff from the coal mines poured into the sea and turned the beaches black. Basically when they wanted to film a location that was borderline uninhabitable for humans, they went to where coal miners had to go swimming. There was a super successful cleanup initiative on that coastline, it's beautiful now.
@@AdeboFunkyVoodoo Aye, they used to send us on field trips to Beamish and I was sat there like 'This is practice, isn't it, for when they hoy a pickaxe at us and tell us to get to work-' Explains why they built a DWP office there too.
@@Geth-Who This was so interesting to read, thank you! I spent some time looking at pictures, and you're right, the beach at Seaham looks really beautiful now. Your bit about Beamish (also had to look this up) made me laugh; I grew up in the D.C. area of the US, and they used to send our field trips to a similar sort of place called Colonial Williamsburg.
In response to the end discussion, Sigourney Weaver had no intention whatsoever to make a 3rd film but Fincher intrigued her with his first question “How do you feel about shaving your head” and then surprised her that he wanted such a dark movie, especially wanting to kill off Hicks and newt straight away, stripping any hope Ripley’s character found in Aliens (that’s gonna hook any actor) and also wanted to go back to the original horror of a single but different xenomorph. I believe they always intended to kill Ripley and end her story here as Weaver said she was done and The film closes with a repeat of Ripleys log from the Nostromo in the first film “this is Warrant Officer Ripley, last survivor of the Nostromo, signing off” (that might not be verbatim 😂)
She said one of her conditions for doing the movie is that ripley must die. the premise of the alien movies was always pretty basic. A haunted house you had to escape. It was always and has been proven, to come up with a new way to tell the same basic premise. Which is why Ripley then chose to do prometheus with no alien. As he said he thought the alien was done, no longer any mystery to it, it had become such a well known creature. Unfortunately Prometheus had lots of problems, and ridley then back tracked with alien covenant because people wanted to see more aliens again.
@@markwebster7435 the problem with prometheus is not the lack of alien, is the bad writing and terrible dumb characters. the lore about the creators and the black goo was good, but the explination was zero. what really kill covenant is the fact that the origin of the aliens as we know is that a crazy generic robot with god complex created them.
@@OHJAJOH Many years later with a very different context and a different Sigourney Weaver. Who knows, maybe she had a boat to pay off. Maybe Jean-Pierre Jeunet convinced her with an interesting character or plot idea. But notice Sigourney has not come back again.
Glad you guys decided to watch this one! Most people tell reactors not to watch past the first two. Once you get over the initial disappointment of the early deaths off screen, it's good movie. Great atmosphere, interesting characters, cool setting, and amazing soundtrack. David Fincher had such a miserable experience making the movie he pretty much disowns it. It's only been until recently that he even briefly talks about it.
First version I ever saw -- I will stand by this movie being much better than anyone gives credit for. A great third act for the alien franchise. Rather than a triumphant ending, it's a sad crash back down to reality after the false hope and over the top action of alien 2
Like we mention in the discussion. We were expecting a complete train wreck of a film! This movie is far from that. Much better than a lot of the Sci-Fi we get nowadays. Most of the issues we can attribute to the editing decisions and general direction of the story. But that really comes down to preference. At the end of the day David Fincher left a mark on the Alien franchise and that is all an artist can ask for ❤️
@@OfficialMediaKnights watching the assembly cut helped you a lot ! The trainwreck most people still have in mind is the awful theatrical release : the editing is all over the place, it's more uneven and leave an after taste of unachieved
But that's absolutely not how the previous movies end. Ripley survives alien with Jonesy the cat. It ends on a sad but hopeful note, with her mourning the loss of the crew, and waiting to be rescued in the escape pod. Alien 3 is the equivalent of a toddler throwing all his toys out of the pram. It's a complete shitshow right from the start.
@@malificajones7674 Just because the movie goes darker doesn't mean it's a complete shit show, it's completely valid not to like that Newt and Hicks are killed off, but it's not really accurate to state that this objectively makes it worse. It's different than both previous movies yes, but the real issues with the movie is wonky special effects and shitty editing and reshoots. Personal distaste for where the story went is not enough to call something objectively bad.
Really appreciate you doing Alien 3. So many channels have just done the first two and quit, and everybody already knows that they're classics. It's nice to get some fresh perspectives on the more polarizing entries in the franchise.
He definitely brought his artistic vision to the franchise. We truly appreciated the darker grittier tone that is now such a staple of his style. It worked well with the concept and made Alien feel like that original film again. The tone is one of the things we liked the most about it. Dark and gritty!
@@OfficialMediaKnights Exactly. More so since Ripley is surrounded by the most disgusting humans on Earth compared to Alien and Aliens. It was a different type of survival. I really liked Charles S. Dutton's character and while his death was brutal and sad, since he was really evolving overall towards the end gaining respect for Ripley, was also bad ass 😂 taking the alien head on with no fear
What's sad is that this movie is a great film. The events unwind in a natural way for the story closing out a heroine's journey. Unfortunately, people's assessment always come across unfairly due to certain characters dying. Some of us love all 3 initial movies equally. It's more grounded instead of the constant need to turn a protagonist into some type of Die Hard figure to milk.
@jynxce this is not "a great film." The acting was good. As a sequel in the Alien franchise the story was horrible. How did a face-hugger get onboard that ship? They don't even come out of their eggs unless there is non-alien movement in very close proximity to them. And where the queen was laying her eggs in Aliens gave them no chance to get one on Bishop's ship.
I agree. I even like Resurrection extended cut, but not as much, the sequel with Ripley back on earth as a human/alien hybrid has some interesting paths they could explore.
I get why people were angry with what this film did to the previous cast, but I personally love it. This IS the Alien franchise after all...I don't think happy endings are in store for anyone, nor should they be. It's a relentlessly bleak and ugly film, and I love that aesthetic. It's not for everyone, and the film definitely has its flaws, but I will defend it any day. I hope Fincher knows there ARE people out there who appreciate his film, even if he hates it.
Agreed totally. The end of Aliens was very, feel-good, so the immediate loss of Hicks, Newt, and Bishop was a tough pill to swallow. Then the pieces of this one start coming together and we see that she's landed in an all male high security prison... With no real weapons...? Yeah, no happy ending is coming here!
Yup, I'm on the same page. Looking at it objectively. You're a woman alone in a male max prison, you have no weapons, no tools, no tech, and when finding out she carries a queen, no hope. So, considering that context, actually, Ripley dying was the happiest possible ending you could hope for. Ripley saved all from the Aliens. In this worlds, this is as happy an ending as you will get. She went out on her own terms, carrying with her, literally and figuratively, the ultimate evil. This movie is, to me at least, totally on point with the brand, with the story previously told, and keeps it real. I always thought Ripley surviving this unscathed would be pandering to the audience.
My all-time favorite movie series. I love Alien 3 as much as Alien & Aliens. It has its own unique atmosphere, phenomenal soundtrack, acting and even the most epic ending. Also, it adds so many fresh and unique ideas to the Alien lore: xenomorphs taking features of their hosts, royal facehuggers etc. The final tunnel chase scene is one of the best scenes in the entire series. Not to mention the legendary Ripley/Xenomorph close-up moment
Alien is a classic franchise for a reason, I love all 4 movies. Yes, some things may have been different but I wish there was more "bad" sci-fi horror movies as alien 3 and 4. AvP is also very good, nothing is perfect. Prometheus great movie with big issue when you expect alien, but on second watch it is great sci-fi movie. Covenant is more alien with terrible characters, but as a sci-fi movie still good. Romulus looks really good so far.😊
The element I enjoy most about this is how it establishes stakes that are an inversion of the previous two entries of the series - _sometimes surviving is a fate WORSE than death._ It changes a lot of how Ripley views her own responsibility as well as how she looks at the struggle of her own survival since the first film, where things get worse if she survives. She's existing alongside other humans who are seen as nothing but monsters, and humanizing people who are usually as dehumanized as the other "human resources" that the company constantly sacrifices for their own goals. Even the most horrible dregs of society are people who Ripley still works with to try and prevent the Xenomorph from surviving. It reinforces that same message from the original film. If you do end up looking into the production, it's CRAZY how they managed to get this together with all of the studio interference and issues they had. I feel like this really still stands up despite everything working against it. The scene of Ripley with the Xenomorph pressed up against her face and refusing to kill her is _SO_ iconic. Also the PoV shots of the Xenomorph moving are _exactly_ what the old *_AVP2_* computer game looks like because of it. Lastly 54:08 - A very astute observation given the company's reputation…
Thank you for giving the movie a fair shake and appreciating it for what it is. Fanboys get wayyy too bitter about Hicks and Newt dying off-screen - I get not being crazy about this decision, but pretending like the movie is terrible because of it is just childish. The first film was haunted house horror, the second was a heroic action story, the third is a tragedy, exploring themes of grief, sacrifice and redemption. They work well as a trilogy, even if Alien 3 is the most flawed. I always get emotional at the ending - Ripley sacrificing herself is such a powerful, ballsy finale, and the wonderful score gives it such melancholy and gravitas. Not a perfect movie, but a worthy entry - shame they didn't end the series there.
"You've been a part of my life so long I can't remember anything else." That line breaks my heart - It's the epitaph of Ellen Ripley and the entire Alien series. Ripley's journey to this point is what keeps me watching Alien3. I love this movie. Not because it's the best - but because it end-caps the series just about as perfectly as anyone could ask for. It leaves her (us) with nothing. That's a hard way to end a series, but it's perfect for Alien (tm).
That line is actually very cheesy. She was asleep for 57 years. Her time of being awake and dealing with the aliens amounts to only a few months, at most. Pretty corny and melodramatic. Furthermore, the first two movies had her definitively destroy the aliens and live to see another day. She was not originally intended to be a tragic character; Alien 3 made it that way. To say "that's what Alien is ultimately about" is, at best, a flawed, circular logic.
Alien 3 is a textbook example of what happens when studio execs interfere with a director's vision while he's trying to make his movie. It definitely doesn't deserve the hate it got, especially considering Fincher pulled off a miracle being given less than a 3rd of the budget he was promised, which forced him to not only change the script, but also which characters he was allowed to use, how his alien's effects would be shot, and even what breed of alien he would get to use. I'm glad it's finally finding some love decades later, because it truly is an underdog in filmmaking history. Edit to add: I don't know if it's been mentioned, but at no time was the xenomorph CGI. It was a mix of animatronics, a suit, and a practical rod puppet on a blue screen, which is why it looked so dated, even for the time. They didn't have the budget for quality CG, so Fincher gambled on the puppet, which unfortunately didn't pay off. Also, this version of the film uses the xeno that came from a dog in the theatrical cut (the dog chestburster scene is amazing, btw), but in the pre-production designs, the original xeno that came from the bull was going to feature horns. Also, if you rewatch the opening of the film, it shows a face hugger attached to a skull in a CT Scan-like image, so it basically spoils there were two face huggers on board, laid by the queen during the finalé of Aliens.
"Alien 3 is a textbook example of what happens when studio execs interfere with a director's vision while he's trying to make his movie." It's actually even worse. Fox released a teaser and set a release date without a director, script, writer, or even concept. There was a revolving door of writers and directors, no coherent vision, and Fincher ultimately hired not because he had a "vision" but because they needed someone, ANYONE, direct this movie and get it done so they could make their release date. Fincher did the best he could with what he had (incomplete fragments of something like six different scripts), and yeah, the executive meddling didn't stop once they hired him, but it was less "interfering with the director's vision" and more "we have no bloody idea what we're doing." As someone says on the "Wreckage And Rage" documentary, "Fox didn't set out to make a movie, they set out to make a release date."
The theatrical cut dog birth scene is so much better than the ox and it makes more sense being a dog because the alien behaves like a dog. The ending is also better when Ripley dies the queen bursts out of her chest as she’s falling and I think it’s much better.
@@ryans413 I agree. I appreciate that Fincher was allowed to show [kind of] what he originally envisioned, but, as you said, some of the director's cut scenes and even the alien itself don't make sense because the director's cut is still an incomplete film.
yeah, he tried to turn back the franchise to its origins, the second movie Aliens was a good movie, but a product of his time, action oriented and missing the point of the original Xenomorph. Fincher's direction is an underrated one
The root problem is that there isn't David Fincher's direction in here as there is almost not a single scene that wasn't heavily coreographed and forced by the producers / studio. But his visual style is very apparent.
Denise... You are seriously a sharp and brilliant mind. I've watched you pick apart elements of stories and situations countless times and its extremely impressive to see how much you can capture and process all at the same time.
Most people were very unhappy about Hicks and Newt being killed off. They could have been included in this movie. Alien 4 is about the same as this movie, rating wise. Totally different movie story. Ripley is in the next movie, all star cast. Not a spoiler......
I think David Fincher succeeded in putting his stamp on this franchise and the wonderful group of actors on show here, certainly did no harm to their reputations. I saw it the week after it released and always felt that it could have been edited better and didn't agree with Ripley's demise, but on reflection understand the nuance behind it. Thanks for sharing. ❤
He definitely did what he set out to do with the film. People might disagree on his decisions but this is not a case of a director being bad. It’s just people disagreeing with the general direction of things. That being said we too had a few problems with the film. But overall it’s a film in a fantastic franchise that, if you’re a fan of the universe, should definitely watch!
Yup. That shot of the Alien up against Ripley's face is one of the iconic Alien shots from all time. Charles Dance and Charles S. Dutton are incredible in this. Dillon stands face to face and actually hold his own for ten seconds before the Alien can kill him. Absolute bad ass.
Yeah, the film is quite a bit uneven, in both cuts, which ultimately seems like it boils down to studio interference, the assembly cut is in my opinion mostly an improvement on the original but it's still incredibly uneven and rough in many parts.
@@o0pinkdino0o exactly! They used that shot of Ripley and the Alien right up in her face in a lot of the packaging shots for the complete Alien(s) boxsets over the years (from VHS and still now on some BluRays), so that much says a lot. I agree that Fincher left his mark, and just so glad he decided to return to Hollywood after the backlash from this, I mean the guy nearly quit and went back to shooting music videos etc!
I grew up with Alien 1-3 all being out already so I love them all 3. They are totally different, but all tell a great story. I love the setting and suspense here. Really thrilling.
I wished they kept going with this one, it was great to put the story in the future, to see the first Terminators, the post apocalypse... Fans were just stupid, this movie was great for me
Best part of Terminator Salvation was when Connor got a pipe through the chest. That whole movie suffered from him surviving shyt that would kill anyone else. But because it was John Connor you knew he was going to survive. Idk yawn.
I can't tell you guys how happy I am to see someone in the review world give this film some attention. I've been a staunch supporter of it since 1993. It's definitely not for everybody, especially after the rip-roaring, crowd pleasing ride Aliens was. Despite its flaws, I think it's a minor masterpiece, and people get on the A3 bashing train because they think they're supposed to.
I'm a fan of Alien 3, but I totally get why it's not everyone's cup o' tea. Like with Fight Club and Se7en, Fincher's grit and grime is stamped firmly into the atmosphere, which is so doom-laden and oppressive I can't help but love it. For all its shortcomings and studio interference, it retains the Alien feel. Where Aliens was the same plot as the first beat-for-beat, it had it's own character and feel, and Alien 3 does too. It's a shame a lot of the cast were spent frivolously, but there's only so much you can do in the face of studio execs. Anyway, ramble over! I'm so glad you took the time to watch this one, great video as always. You guys are knocking it out of the park! 🤟
To be honest, Alien³ is a little bit chaotic but still Alien in Core. Sadly Alien Ressurection is very cheesy in comparison to The first three Movies. If you want to watch even the 4th one, you will see what i mean ;-) Love Your Reactions, keep up the great Work 🤘
A lot of reviewers tend to leave off after Aliens; so glad you continued on to Alien 3! I think you get diminishing returns after the first two, but I definitely think this film is worth a look. I particularly enjoy how grimy and lived-in this place looks, and it makes me wonder what it was like in its prime. This film has a special place in my heart despite its shortcomings. Thanks again for sticking with it!
I love this movie so much. This cut in particular, to me, is almost up there with the first two films and likely would be had some of the effects been better. That being said, this particular variation of the xenomorph is my favorite and whenever the effects are produced with the suit, it's one of the best looking efffects in the whole franchise. I think a lot of us have spent decades wondering what could have been had they chosen to use the pieces Cameron left on the board at the end of the last one instead of starting fresh but what we got is such a captivating story set in one of the most haunting/beautiful sets of the franchise. Also, great choice waiting a bit between this one and the last! I often suggest that because it allows it stand on its own.
People Complain about what happened to newt etc but practically there was only three options: 1. None of the characters from aliens survived and this follows different people. 2. Newt is recast with a new actor who matches her age and has her talent 3.This option where she dies offscreen. The actor who played newt not only aged 5 years between aliens and alien 3. From 12-17 and you’re not meant to age in cryo. The actor who played Newt had no interest in being an actor and wouldn’t come back for anything
Yeah, by far the best acted out of the trilogy and on par with Alien for the big-boy pro-level cinematography and score. Honestly, the Alien trilogy discussion sort of reminds me of discussions around the best (aka favourite) Mass Effect game in that trilogy -- it's 3 different styles of telling 3 different types of stories in 3 different types of movies that are woven together through a few common & underlying themes and one compelling protagonist.
Yeah it's really well made and the acting is solid. Not sure if most people know this but David Fincher directed it. He also did Fight Club, Seven, Girl with the dragon tattoo, and many other really good films. He's one of the most underrated directors of our time. I still think the original and Aliens are better films overall, but this is a solid movie. They definitely went down hill though after this one.
Finch should have gone with the original story set in a monastery with monks. Much more believable and would have been more dark. Alien meets the name of the rose.
I honestly have considered you two to be my favorite reactors for a while now. This cements it. I’m a long time alien fan, Alien is in my top five favorite movies of all time, Aliens is one of the greatest sequels ever. Having said that, I have an undying love for Alien3. Oddly enough, this was the FIRST alien movie I saw. I was a kid and it came on very late on tv and even not having any context from the previous films, I was hooked and eventually got to the original two. I was very surprised when I got a little older and in high school and realized so many people hated it. I HIGHLY recommend you both watch the documentary they put out for the quadrilogy set on dvd and also was on the Blu-ray set. It really shows you a lot of what they were dealing from the studio and all the different versions of the script. Also, there is some cg in alien 3 but the shots of the xenomorph you referred to as cgi were actually done with a rod puppet and compositing. The xenomorph’s head cracking was cg and I think some of the outside shots with debris flying are cg. It didn’t work out but they were very committed to making the movement different. Also you have to realize they never really finished it. The studio pulled the plug for a bit and they had to do reshoots but they weren’t able to ever really find a way to nail the movement. I really appreciate how you both approached it and you both appreciated it for its strengths and acknowledged its weaknesses, as any good critic should. You both nailed down a lot of what it was going for in theme and tone. I also recommend you check the theatrical cut. It is VERY different. If you liked the editing and the dark humor, there is a lot more of that because some of the cuts expertly go to something else at perfect comedic timing. Also in theatrical the chestburster comes out of a dog. Named spike. If you noticed in the assembly cut, the guy that got killed at the fan was calling for a dog named spike that you never meet in that cut. But that is how it goes down. It’s very brutal because the dog is alive too. Also the queen bursts out of ripley’s chest as she jumps and she heroically holds it to her chest as she falls into the mold. I actually prefer that part but I know some people hate it. Fincher disowns this and hardly ever talks about it and has never done recorded interviews about it since it was made. Again that doc is a must to check out if you appreciate the making of film which I know you both do! Love you guys!
Here’s how I feel about Alien 3. I’ll use a food analogy. There’s a restaurant I’ve eaten at twice. Loved my first meal there, so I go back. I order something else from the menu and I love it just as much, if not more than the first meal. Since I had two great but different experiences at that restaurant I go back for a third time and order something else. This time the waiter punches me in the gut when he brings my food. I eat that meal, and it’s well made, but when the waiter comes with the check he punches me in the gut a second time. Then he asks “how was the meal?” How do you think I enjoyed that meal? The chef knew what he was doing, on its own I’d enjoy it. But the only thing I’m taking away from the experience is how it was bookended by two gut punches.
The Assembly Cut over the theatrical cut. Yessssss! So glad you listened to the comments on your Aliens reaction video. The Assembly is the far better edit, and much closer to director David Fincher's vision. The production of this film was a nightmare. So many clashes with the studio heads, so much so, to this day Fincher refuses to discuss it.
I generally think people hate on this one because it’s such a downer so to speak, bleak and without a shred of hopefulness. But this movie tried to set up that in the end ripley wiped out the existence of the alien. Ripley in her conversation with the human bishop if you notice was focused on her own life being saved, her only concern was that the alien be killed, in the end that’s what she care most about, the only way everyone who died at the hands of the alien would not have died in vain is if Ripley wiped out the species.
Oh man the Assembly Cut is actually so tight. It’s not Alien or Aliens, but it’s a good conclusion to the original trilogy. Just wish they didn’t kill some major characters off-screen.
I saw this when it released in theaters back in 92 as a kid. I remember not knowing what to make of it, but over the years, I've grown to appreciate it for what it is. It's definitely rooted in the era (early 90's) when it released and now knowing what went on behind the scenes almost from it's conception, it's amazing it was made. This one isn't as cut and dry as which version is superior, like with Aliens. Both the theatrical and extended or assembly cut have elements that work and don't work in the movies story. I wish the director would be allowed to combine the 2 together, the scenes that add context from the Assembly and while trimming down the long meandering scenes from the Assembly, because there's some scenes that just linger on that are honestly unnecessary. I will say that it's unfair to expect this to be like Alien's, from its original conception that clearly wasn't the direction the movie was headed, they weren't just going to rehash it.
I love this movie, especially in this version, I know a lot of people hate this movie, but I love it… And if I watch Alien and Aliens, I gotta watch this one too right after, when having myself an Alien movie marathon. Can’t wait to see your reaction to this…
I don't know if you've already seen the theatrical version but there's one scene I prefer way more than this cut and that's the Ripley's death - in the other version the queen hatches as she's falling, Ripley clutching it to her chest like a baby as they both calmly fall to the inferno down below which also looks much more immense in that version. I love that scene.
I'm actually so glad you enjoyed this because I was in the exact same boat. I grew up with the Alien Franchise (From a questionable age but that's neither here or there) but I'd never watched them as an adult and upon rewatching the whole series, taking the dated CG into account I was left baffled as to why Alien 3 and Alien Resurrection were shredded the way they were. I was holding my breath through the whole door maze sequence I thought the straight up intensity of this movie was up there for the franchise in my opinion. The claustrophobia that felt scorching as opposed to cold leaving us feeling nauseous through the whole thing, just like Ripley and the rest of the cast, the speed and ferocity of the Xenomorph, somehow making me grow to like r*pists and murderers just because of the culture in the prison made them feel so human. Like the tiny bit of laughing when the two guys scare each other just looking for a glimpse of light to cope with the dire situation (By no means do I condone what they've done to be stuck there). And I only watched the Theatrical Release so it was nice to see some of those gaps filled in. I imagine people were hurt because of Newt and Hicks dying in the beginning, I was too but there's also the realism that I loved, sh*t just kinda happens in life sometimes and while it was unfortunate and made Aliens feel a bit redundant, it also felt grounded and as you mentioned, it really drove her character to her sacrifice in the end but it would have been cool to see their dynamic. The Queen was a time bomb and Ripley's death was the explosion. Her path was set. I just wish we got some more explanation about how she was infected. There was a theory I read about facehuggers being on the ship, 1 cut itself and probably died trying to get to newt which started the fire that launched the escape pod, the damage is likely how she drowned while another impregnated Ripley and there had to be at least one more because it ended up in the prison and got the dog. But I don't remember it being explained in the movie at all. Can't wait to see what you think of Resurrection! There's a lot to love about it even now, some of the sequences in that movie were actually incredible and I'll always love it. Side note, you're the only react channel I enjoy, So thank you!
THANK YOU for trying the film. Many TH-camrs don't. Yes it's controversial, yes it has some bad effects and yes it's not as good as the previous 2... But to me, it was still a good scary Alien film with a unique idea. It makes me sad when so called fans of the franchise absolutely hammer this film and state everyone should stay away from it, especially knowing how hard it was to make/film it and what it is being compared to. David Fincher hates this movie due to the torment... but i wish i could pat him on the back and convince him otherwise. Edit: There is actually little CGI in this film... the bits that look like bad CGI are infact blue screen miniature models... but due to time constraint's, were badly implemented. Signorney Weaver did not want to do another Alien film... she insisted that if she does it... she must "pass/go"... and she was the reason why there were no weapons, she absolutely hates working with them and hates everything they stand for.
I've seen it at the cinema and I loved it. I was also devastated to see Ripley dying, not only because she died but for me she was carrying the franchise, so no Ripley=no more Alien movie
I've only seen one other film reactor react to Alien3. Most everyone stops at Aliens (probably due to the comments section relentlessly badmouthing Alien3), but I will go to bat for this film any day.
@@steve8510 And the deaths of the other 174 women, children, men, crew and marines to Xenomorph is fine!? Wake up to the reality of the story... As long as Xenomorphs exist... there is only death and there are no happy endings.
the first 4 alien movies are my favorite monsters movies of all time. each one had a unique style. alien: lovecraftnian horror. aliens: action/horror. alien 3: back to the roots and expanded the lore (the dog xenomorph was a sick adition) alien 4 resurrection: cyberpunk.
This is such a powerful movie and I really don’t connect with the criticisms lobbies at it. In fact, I don’t think I’ve seen much genuine criticism of this movie, almost everything I hear from people is how upset they were that two characters from the previous movie are killed off and that’s not criticism. This movie is far from perfect but it’s engaging all the way through and brings a powerful and meaningful conclusion to Ripley’s arc. This movie is haunted and bleak as hell, but I can’t understand why anyone would expect anything less from the Alien trilogy.
Many people disliked this movie because Hicks, Newt and Ripley died. I for the matter liked the fact Fincher brought the sense of dread and desperation to this universe. Alien 4 Resurrection got even more flak, but it's my guilty pleasure. It's a self-depreciating, fun horror comedy. Give it a try!
Fincher probably thought he'd never make another movie again after this, but he bounced back nicely and then made his second movie, Se7en, in 1995. He's made 12 movies all together. That's a pretty good track record.
Happy that he got such a hit on his hands with “Se7en”. Clearly his signature style works! I don’t think his direction was an issue with this film. The problems seem to stem from both the editing room and the writers room!
How insane is it that his first film was such a terrible experience for him, and yet he bounces back with a masterpiece like Se7en only three years later? He's definitely one of my favorite directors of all time. He has such a meticulous, controlled style.
The reason behind the negative feelings and the continued negative feelings is that the people behind the Aliens IP swore this was a nightmare she had in cryosleep. Then Alien 4 came out and pissed the fans off more. The people behind the IP again said it's a nightmare she had in cryosleep. But as the years turned into decades the fans (like myself) are still unhappy with their BS. They actually HAD a script for the movie that would have Ripley, Hicks, and Newt return and establish that they were in fact nightmares. They decided NOT to make it. Personally, I hope A: Romulus reignights the franchise and they make a movie actually establishing that 3 and 4 were nightmares. Open with Ripley giving a voice over where she talks about nightmares and how she adopted Newt and then married Hicks, who is now a retired General. The Corp approaches them with news of an "incident" and both of them say pound sand. Newt, the New Ripley, takes the assignment because she needs closure. You'd have to recast Newt as Carrie Henn went on to become a teacher. But you'd have a new generation of Strong Female Lead in Rebecca "Newt" Ripley. Another reason Fans hated this movie, and by extension 4, was because there wasn't any way for not one, but THREE facehuggers to get on the Sulaco. The Facehugger that got on Ripley, the one that died trying to get to Newt, and the Main Antagonist. All the eggs got killed when Ripley burned them. The Queen ripped loose and left without anything so she could chase Ripley down. All and all, I don't "Hate" 3 and 4... as long as I keep in mind they are just nightmares she's having going home. Last I heard, both asigourney Weaver and Michael Bein were on board for another Alien movie. They were on board for the one that got canceled, the actual successor to Aliens.
Thank you for this reaction for this great movie. I am glad you also liked the dark tone, cinemagraphics, visuals of this movie. Also the music track is very good. I saw this movie in 90s as a child and I never knew that people hated this movie. I totslly dissagree with people who dislike this movie. Mostly they just had some different ideas how this movie should be. Its not an action is drama and horror. I always have loved Alien 3. Actually I think its better than Aliens becouse it brings back the original horror elements and has special gothic religious dark tone in it. Also Ripley cannot survive forever and alien movie is not about happy endings. Yes this is sad movie but its is almost perfect ending for the trilogy. All other alien movies after this one are not even count to be alien movies.
For what happened behind the scenes it’s still a terrific film…I think many people like to see think of the first two films as the same way as we see The first two Terminator movies, absolutely masterpieces, however alien 3 is light years better than T3
I think if i remember the original cut when ripely dived into the furnace the alien queen bursts out of her chest and she cradles it stopping it escaping almost saying your coming with me. You will be happy when you watch alien resurrection.
I don't necessarily think Alien3 is necessarily "bad", it's just a different way of telling a story. Alien was a survival horror film, Aliens was an action film, while Alien3 leaned more towards suspense and drama. Since the target audience for each genre is different, it is understandable why fans of the first two Alien films found it more difficult to resonate with Alien3.
This right here. Killing characters off screen is not ok but riply dying isn’t a bad choice. She was being the hero she has been since the first movie.
I understand this feeling, but on the otherhand.... this is exactly what Ripley is feeling too and that's the point. Just like how she survives the Nostromo, only to find out she slept for decades and missed her daughters entire life and death, so too did she miss out on the life she was imagining she'd have with newt and Hicks after beating the queen.... as much as we want her to get a reward for her hardships, the theme of the start of both 2 and 3 is that the Universe just does not care.
I think you might like the next film, Alien: Resurrection. Like Alien 3, it gets hate that it doesn't completely deserve. Sigourney is back in it, with another amazing performance, completely different from her previous ones (I wont tell you why). Plus it was directed by a mad French guy known for surreal arthouse movies. I'm interested in what you make of it.
37:51 The thing about Aaron is, it's easy to believe that he's a true believer in the Company, like Andrews was, but he's not. His moniker of "85", suggestive of his IQ, suggests that's he's not intelligent enough to make the cognitive leap that Ripley did and cast away any trust he has in Weyland-Yutani. He can't connect the dots to see that their greed overrides any sense of humanity or even self-preservation. It can be intuited that nothing in Aaron's experience lends any credence to that notion, so he has no reason or inclination to believe that the Company could have anything other than his best interests in mind. That inability to make such a connexion and begin to distrust Wey-Yu is simply another form of helplessness, as Lambert suffered from in the original film, and like her fear, his innocence eventually becomes his undoing.
It's so heartbreaking that Aaron attacked the Weyland people who were armed with guns, because he did it to save his friends, including Ripley. In the short amount of time together, he formed a connection with her enough to risk his life. His low IQ was what made him a good person, but also his demise. He had family back home, and could've just done nothing to stay alive, yet he just couldn't let himself see his friends be harmed. Brave, but foolish. It sucks how majority of people do not notice these tiny little subtle nuances of character traits showcased in Alien 3.
@@MIZZKIE Brave, foolish and ultimately futile. It wasn't until Ripley arrived on Fiorina 161 and their troubles with the Xenomorph started that Aaron began to see any evidence at all that the Company had less interest in their situation than they did in acquiring the Xenomorph Queen gestating in Ripley. If she hadn't been infected by a _manumala noxhydria reginensis_ (Royal Facehugger) she wouldn't have a reason to run a CAT scan on herself, and Aaron wouldn't have had a reason to be so concerned for her well-being other than keeping her safe from a prowling Xeno. No transmission wouldn't have gone out to the Network and Wey-Yu wouldn't have sent back an "Absolute Highest Priority" message for Aaron to see or dispatched the _Patna_ to Fiorina to collect Ripley within two hours of transmitting the reply, even going so far as to repeatedly demand acknowledgement of their message. (Of course he intuited that the Company was dispatching a ship to evacuate them from the planet and terminate the Alien, even mere hours after seeing the message insisting that "Come _on,_ they're gonna take us HOME!"). His brain just didn't have the time it needed to actually connect Ripley's words to the communiqué from the Company and come up with a scenario that would cause him distress. It was just too little for him and certainly too late.
I realise I'm in the minority, but I think this movie is brilliant. Absolutely brilliant. It has so many fantastic elements. First: Elliot Goldenthal's score. Awesome. So emotional. And scary, for real. I have it on CD and it's tough to listen to in the dark. The latin named tracks especially - Agnus Dei, Lento, and the grand finale Adagio - are majestic and bring a solid tear to my eyes. Every time. Second: the atmosphere. Dark. Gritty. Tragic. The ending, although so utterly sad, is so right. Personally, I would not have wanted it any other way. Third: the dialogue. Brilliant. So many memorable bits. So much dark humor. Dillon's speech towards the end, "I ain't much for begging. Nobody ever gave me nothing", especially in combination with Goldenthal's score, is breathtaking. Fourth: the characters. So many solid seconds. Clemens was fantastic, so tragic when he died. Dillon was brilliant. Even the superintendent and 85. To sum it up, It's so sad how underrated this movie is. 6,4 on IMDb is a travesty. For me, it's a solid 8. I first saw it in the movie theater upon release in 1993. I watched it for the tenth time with my 14 year old daughter just yesterday, the second time for her, and we both loved it. It will always have a special place in my heart.
Theatrical Version has a dog as the host, you see the Queen erupts from her chest, and she holds it to her body, Ripley was on the EEV in the cryotube. You see the Facehugger with the dog barking.
At the time, Sigourney Weaver was (and probably still is) a proponent of gun control. She said on the Aliens documentary "Superior Firepower" that she felt uncomfortable even holding the weapons in that film, so one of her stipulations for returning was that Alien3 have no firearms in it. She had a lot of influence going into the film, and she leveraged that to get that written into the script. Some people think the conceit of a prison with no weapons is ridiculous, but I think it works in the film. Even if the prisoners killed Andrews, Aaron and Clemens, where would that get them? There's no way off the planet. They're not being mistreated and have free reign to do mostly whatever they want.
I'm of the rare opinion that the theatrical cut is superior. It feels more like a finished film than the Assembly Cut. Neither version of the film is particularly good, though. Also, Fincher has publicly disowned this movie and had nothing to do with the Assembly Cut. He gave the producers his blessing to put together an alternative version of Alien 3, but there's a reason why it's not called the "Director's Cut."
I never understood the hate for Alien 3, even the theatrical version. I remember watching it in 1992 opening night, and instantly feel in love with the different tone. The cinematography, the color grade and sound made it very different from the previous films. Also, even though Fincher hates the film (obviously due to studio mismanagement), it still has his distinctive fingerprint and style all over it. I have dug his style since that night in 1992.
It's always the same. L.A. audiences. They hated Blade runner because the metropolis didn't look like L.A. Unless the film doesn't glorify Hollywood or America for that matter they pour scorn on it. This then informs producers to demand a watering down of certain elements in movies. Must be a love story, America must be presented in her primacy at all times. Things like that. Producers have cooled down a lot since those days but they were always worried about Hollywood society rejecting any experimental ideas. For instance Alien 3 was meant to be set in a monastery with monks and an Abbot. Producers weren't happy with that.
In this case, the masses are right on the money. Alien 3 is derisive because it craps all over the previous movie, which is widely acknowledged as one of the best sequels ever made. Alien 3 also starts with one of the dumbest and most obvious plotholes I've ever seen on film.
Of course, watch it. But this movie suffered because of Sigourney Weaver and her not wanting guns in the movie. Don't let the actor make decisions, then write a movie around it. You end up with the worst Alien movie.
Fun fact: The 2013 video game Aliens: Colonial Marines reveals that Hicks is still alive. In the game, Hicks explains that Weyland-Yutani had boarded the Sulaco. The fire then happened and, in the chaos, a Weyland-Yutani man swapped places with Hicks in his pod and got jettisoned to Fiorina 161 along with Ripley, Newt, and Bishop.
Alien 3 doesn't deserve the hate that many fans have for it. It didn't give the fans what they wanted, but I don't think that makes it a bad movie. If there's one thing we can learn from the Alien movies, it's that life can be pretty shitty, bad things happen, but we have to get over them, no matter what. I think it's a good movie, especially the special edition.
@@doubleexia8375 its only merit is to show Ripley giving birth to the alien queen in the last scene. Why is that absent from the assembly cut? Never made sense to me.
The thing with this film is you have to understand the context of the era in which it was made. ALIEN was a classic. You don't make sequels to classics. EVER. James Cameron almost faced a mutiny on the set of ALIENS because the entire English crew thought making a sequel to ALIEN was sacrilege. In the 1980's, sequels was garbage made to please children and slack-jawed yokels in the audience and sequels DID NOT MAKE MONEY unless your name was George Lucas (he was thought of as the weird exception to the rule) or you were a SLASHER franchise which studios KNEW was garbage, but studios also 'knew' that teenagers and horror movie fans were tasteless morons who could be conned to part with their money with almost anything. ALIENS proved everyone wrong including the studio who greenlit the film and expected the movie to be a luke-warm videotape rental store filler. They had no faith in the film or James Cameron, but the budget was small enough and enough time had passed from the original film's release that the studio was like "ahh what the hell, the guy wants to make it. Let's see if we can make a few bucks." And when ALIENS went gangbusters, the potential of sequels began to finally make studios understand that they can make money and also attract adult audiences who usually sneer at anything that has "part II" on it. ALIENS in 1987 is the reason why we had the "Summer of Sequels" in 1989 with INDY 3, GHOSTBUSTERS II and BACK TO THE FUTURE PART II. That summer melted people's brains because they couldn't believe studios were trying to get on the "sequel wagon". Then you get to ALIEN3 - the studio doesn't know how to make a sequel for it. James Cameron doesn't know either because his script for ALIENS was actually an original sci-fi movie he had written called MOTHER and he just changed up the names of characters, he never planned a sequel so he didn't have any clues on what to make next (and honestly kind of felt that "trilogies" are a marketing thing, not a storytelling thing). All the ideas Cameron pitched was not to the studio's taste. And also Sigourney Weaver didn't want to make any more ALIEN films, her career was blossoming into the territory of a "real actress" and despite getting an Oscar nomination, starring in a sci-fi series in the 80's was seen as 'bad' for her career. She was 'slumming it'. Plus they waited too long and the actress playing Newt was now a teenager and replacing an actor in a movie was generally seen as an absolute disaster, so they knew they couldn't use Newt unless they did a time-jump (which also was not a thing studios, audiences nor critics had the stomach for - again this was seen as bad writing back in the day). So Sigourney wants out. Studio has no clues how to make a sequel or what its about. They shop the project to tonnes of people including some very interesting and artistic auteur directors and they get all manner of weirdness including a movie set on a fake planet made entirely out of wood and filled with space-monks, a non-Ripley movie set on a space station written by William Gibson of all people and lots of other stuff. Some of the pitched versions ended up becoming the very gory, dark and grisly ALIENS comic-book series published by Dark Horse. The studio goes back to Sigourney and begs her to come back. She agrees, but only on the condition that they kill Ripley. Eager to get the film off the ground ASAP, they take several of their past scripts and smash them together into this movie and they do the one artistic thing of making the whole film about sacrifice and death (hence all the religious and Christian imagery intercut with horrific gut-punch deaths of literally everyone). Script's not great, but they hire David Fincher and he "gets" the film thematically and leans as hard as he can into the concept that this movie is all allegory about dying, sacrifice, death, loss and grief. And the film goes into production. And a whole lot of shit goes wrong and the studio doesn't like the death motif coz its too grim, but too much of the film is already shot and there's politics and firings and rehirings and studio meddling and the script is still not as polished as it could be....but basically after a LOT of production problems, the film is finished and released. Long story short: Ripley was always meant to die and the film was always meant to be a horrific dark gut punch. It just probably wasn't what audiences ever wanted to see. Audiences still wanted "real" movies and thought comic book films and sci-fi was for children and dumb people. but they still CARED about the characters in a way that was different and maybe a little unexpected. Basically the filmmakers tried to lean hard into the 'arthouse' way of making a "Ripley must die" movie and the public didn't care for it, despite how well the movie is made and how beautiful it actually is.
Also it is worth noting that tastes in the 80's and 90's which made general audiences sneer at sequels is also why they thought killing her would be interesting. Getting invested in the multi-movie arcs of characters, again, was the realm of children's content; comic books and bad detective novels and shitty soap operas on TV. People were generally thought to be uninterested in following characters lives, but rather how a character dealt with a singular situation and what an audience member could take away from that. The "one and done" approach to storytelling was thought to be superior writing as a whole: you get 90 minutes and you say what you want to say about the world through your movie. And adult audiences knew that's what movies were; experiencing an event filtered through on-screen characters. Being invested in fictional characters in movies and wanting to see more of them was childish and that's why it was reserved for movies for children (i.e. STAR WARS). It's why there's no character continuity in the original INDY trilogy. It's why slasher movies play fast and loose with their continuity. And its why the very rare genre films made in the 80s and early 90s that focussed on character's stories over themes and finely crafted one-off stories were all made by filmmakers who cited comic books and movie-serias as a lifelong inspiration. Fast, easy, junkfood for the masses as these mediums were considered back then. ALIEN movies having a 'continuity' was a novelty and one that the studio and its filmmakers and its cast - including the lead actress - didn't really understand or think was 'good art'. Whether you agree with them or not, that's what filmmaking and storytelling was back in the day. 80's adult audiences would likely look at cinema and television of today and consider it to be 'infantile' because it prioritizes being over-invested in the fictional lives of fictional characters OVER using characters to explore a real-world idea or theme in the tightest and most finely tuned writing possible.
This film went through many rewrites & directors like Renny Harlin b4 David Fincher signed on. im glad you watched the assembly cut as it way better than the theatrical which omits the first capture of the Alien altogether, the alien bursts out of a dog not a ox & the alien bursts out ripleys chest in theatrical which she holds as she falls into the fire. This at the time was supposed to be the final alien film so killing Ripley gave the series closure. Hicks & Newt were meant to appear & Michael Biehn was gutted when he found out Hicks was killed. Killing Newt i have mixed feelings part of me thinks its ballsy part me thinks a copout after how her & ripleys surrogate mother daughter relationship was wondefully explored in Aliens. Brilliant discussion, you pair always give vaild points on the good & bad on every movie you react to & you are one of my favourite reactors.
oh man as a writer learning the lesson that "Am I killing this character for story value, because it serves the story or shock value?" the very very hard way. The same can be said with memory loss/ amnesia if its not temporary. I really appreciate your point of view as a writer yourself and both of your views as story tellers. Very insightful.
As a teen I wasn't as comfortable with the general feel of the movie, as it is a lot "darker" than "Aliens". But I always liked it and like it even more today. I never understood why people wouldn't like it. One of the most interesting things about the Alien trilogy is, that every movie is completely different, from the making, the story, to even the genre and all three feel very authentic and consistend. This one definitely deserves more than it usually gets.
I thought Alien e was a logical next step in the Alien franchise and not just a rehash of 1 and 2. Too bad Hicks and Newt didn't survive, but it probably was to take away Ripley's every hope and reason for living.
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The movie is better than the narratives. I don’t think anything is “wrong” with the writing it’s got a lot most don’t see because they’re emotionally mad about Newt to start things off so they start from a bad spot. The film is not this bad. Best to ignore the comments about what the film is and isn’t before watching.
Ok guys. Alien Resurrection is next. Please review that one and hopefully u will enjoy the final film so far
thank you guys this has made my day 🥰✌️❤️
ooh, just refreshed the front page, and saw this treat. I know number 3 had a hell of a rocky road, but its part of the lore so, ya know. same with 4 which got a bit slammed, but its good clean fun, and memorable. just like this one. so despite the trouble or low box office etc, at least they aren't forgettable movies. I hope you guys do the predator flicks too so you can the Alien vs Predator films. something us comic nerds had read stories of for years before the films. and then the sequels like Prometheus and Covenant, and then the newest one if its still gonna happen.....phew. that's a whole lotta franchise right there man. I don't know how you guys do it, but I'm glad you do. It's cool to be here to see the channel grow, and now 2.0 as well.
Okay that's enough glazing, i nee to balance it out with some shade.....erm......Ari's....fvcking....i don't know, hoodies are always too damn smart.
nailed it.
Dillon: The only human to ever say:
"Is that as hard as you bite, mothf*cker?"
As a Xenomorph is tearing him apart.
It's like "Is that the best you can do, or do you wanna get your mum to help you?"
Almost as badass as Marv in Sin City saying: “ Is that the best you can do?”
He doesn't say that, though lol ;-)
Dillon: "i use to f*** guys like you in prison"
alien: "we are in prison"
@@garethjohnstone9282Dillon? He sure does.
What you think is CGI is not CGI at all. They used a miniature rod puppet and layered it into the shots. The issue is the compositing doesn't work well.
I did not know that. 😮
@Ender7j There is a video someone made a few years ago that goes into some detail th-cam.com/video/1kmjUPEd1wg/w-d-xo.htmlsi=WtPEY1JDskXCqjiA
I came here to say just that but figured someone would beat me to it. The behind the scenes showing how they puppeteered it is pretty amazing to watch. But I had the same thought when I first saw it. The compositing looks so janky I figured it had to be CG.
That being said, the puppet work done on the chest burster running out of the room at the beginning still looks phenomenal.
You beat me to it, except(!) I believe they DID use CGI when the Xenomorph's skull cracked.
@@pellevinken ah, good call. Forgot about that one.
The curious thing is that there is a second ending where Ripley throws herself into the fire but during the fall, the alien comes out of her belly and Ripley holds it with both hands to prevent it from escaping death.
Yes, that ending is in the original theatrical release. Like a lot of the movie, it's a nice idea, but the actual execution of it leaves much to be desired.
the horrible theatrical ending. Unnecessary in every way. You can tell that came from higher up "we have to see the Alien Queen in this film" nah. we get it. its in there. its gonna die with her. the end.
@@52BLUE Alien 3 in general is a giant clusterf*** thanks to constant studio interference from Fox. It's a miracle it even got to theaters.
Personally after seeing both a few times. I do like the chestburster ending.
1) a chest burst scene is always great
2) controversial opinion but even if they aren't great I love seeing all the alien varieties/hybrid. (Where else would we see a queen in baby form, especially since ridley Scott doesn't like the idea of a queen)
3) the extended falling to focus on the chest burst scene was a little corny especially with her basically coddling it. I think it would've been cool if it chest busted RIGHT before falling the in the fire. But the green screen fire put made that difficult
That's the real ending and the greatest one, this one is dumb, but those that hate the movie like this one and those that like the theatrical version love that ending scene.
Deadpool: "Ripley! From Alien 3!"
Negasonic Teenage Warhead: " F**k you're old."
😂😅🤔😢
It's honestly sad how many peoples heads that joke goes right over (they don't get it).
Because they are not old.@@JarofMayonaise
"Ha!
Fake laugh, hiding real pain."
Halfway between millenials and boomers. Last survivors of Earth. Signing off.
@@csabagall8811I already feel old even though I recently turned 20
The official story is there were two facehuggers that came out of the one egg.
The Queen and a guardian.
The Queen hugger got into Newt's cryo tube, but cut itself, the acid caused an electrical fire that brought down the pod.
Due to the hole in Newt's tube, she drowned, fully awake and screaming. After death, the Queen Embryo crawled out of her mouth and with Hicks being impaled by a beam, Ripley was the only living being to inhabit.
That's why she has the sore throat, the nosebleeds, etc. Because an already growing embryo clawed down her throat. It's also why it took so long for the embryo to incubate inside of her.
Yeah, I'm a big Alien nerd ;p
Also worth noting that Sigourney only agreed to be in a part 3 as long as her character died.
Also ALSO worth noting, Sigourney frequently demanded there be a scene where she gets to fuck and Alien... No seriously
And we all know how long that lasted.
@@danieldickson8591money talks
@@danieldickson8591 and the fact the game Colonial Marines made it canon this isnt the real Ripley anyways but a clone
@@Ugnutzthat game and story sucks
Charles S. Dutton is a criminally underappreciated actor (no pun intended). He was a professional streetfighter from Baltimore who accidentally killed his opponent in a fight. So he did a lot of years in prison for manslaughter. While locked up, he taught himself to act by reading the books of Shakespeare plays he checked out of the prison library. So while his fellow inmates were learning how to make license plates and buttsmuggle heroin, he was learning to act. And so that's what he became when he got released. And a fantastic actor he is.
Charles Dutton is marvelous in this. Such an underrated character he ended up playing.
Dutton has always been a great actor. I wish he had worked more.
So is Charles Dance (Mr. Clemens) 14 years before becoming Lord Tywin Lannister
Both Dutton & Dance are amazing in this. Along with Weaver, obviously, but she's a known commodity by this point.
@@8RBrainHasn't aged a day.
Love how he's such a hard case who never releases his hands from his stress ball. Until he's slayed. I wonder what all that was meant to mean?
I think the reason why Alien 3 mostly got hated was the decision to kill off important characters from the last movie. However, I don't think everything has to have a happy ending and things can indeed go wrong. That's why I find the take of Alien 3 relatively realistic and very depressing. It was risky, yes. Some of the criticisms were definitely justified, yes! But it showcases that life has no mercy and doesn't spare you just because of "plot armor". I love the dark atmosphere the movie gives. It's an art in itself.
People don't hate that important characters got killed. They hate it because those characters got killed off-screen, with no respect to their development. And the fact the beginning makes no sense. Where did those 2 eggs came from? Pretty sure the Queen had no time to spread eggs around. Personally, despite the bad special FX, I liked the movie. Loved the running around the corridors from the Alien POV.
Nah, killing off important characters isn't an issue. It's killing them off screen between movies after spending so much time in the previous movie building them up and saving them. For the record I love this franchise, including this movie, but 3, Resurrection, and Covenant all do the same.thing of taking the ending of the previous movie and making it almost meaningless.
Same. It would have been lame for everyone to just magically get out of cryo...for the second movie in a row. It feels more realistic not to get outof there unscathed. Alien doesn't need a love story to be good anyway.
I saw ALIENS and ALIEN 3 in theaters. No one in this movie besides Ripley was cared about by theatre goers whereas ALIENS actually had characters the audience gave a shit about.
@@VBSuperhow did the queen get on the drop ship? Bishop could’ve had a directive to sneak an egg back since Weyland-Yutani would have multiple plans to get an alien back. And things like this can happen. Did you forget most of the characters we got to know in titanic died. It’s kinda like this
As a kid, Aliens was my number one favourite film. I could pretty much quote/re enact the whole script. Two of my favourite characters of all time are Ellen Ripley and Dwayne Hicks. Hicks even acted as a sort of role model for me. To this day Aliens is in my top 5 films of all time.
When Alien 3 was released I was 14 years old. When i finally got to see the film i absolutely loved it. The stellar cast. The sense of loss and everything that everyone had sacrificed was encapsulated in this movie. Meanwhile 'the company' still gives zero regard to any of that. Ultimately it sends Ripley off, giving her life to destroy her mortal enemy.
Sure, I was upset that two of my most beloved characters were gone. But it all made sense to me. There was never going to be a happy ending for any of them, not in the dystopia we see them living in. As an ending to the trilogy, it was perfect.
Is it my favourite 'Alien' film? No. But it ranks quite highly for me, probably in my top 20. I've never really understood the negativity surrounding it, I suspect, like you said, it's probably from die hard fans of the second film, but, as a die hard fan of the second film, I still don't get it. However, if we want to talk about Alien Resurection....... there is a good reason I said Alien 3 was the perfect end to the trilogy.
"We're all gonna die. The only question is when. This is as good as place as any...to take your first steps to heaven. Only question is how you check out. Do you want it on your feet...or on your f**king knees, begging? I ain't much for begging, nobody ever gave me nothin'! So I say f**k that thing! Let's fight it!"
This is my team talk every week as a safety officer at my work. 👌
Classic underrated movie. Thank you for the video!! 🙏🙏🙏
I don't think OSHA would approve 😂😂😂
Approaching any piece of art with a neutral pov is always the best way. It might not be always as good as you expect it to be, but that doesn't mean it's as bad as others claim it to be.
I personally love this film. It expanded the lore so much and doesn't discredit the past films in anyway. I understand why so many didn't like it, but the amount of hate this film gets I feel is unfair personally.
So the reason why they killed Ellen Ripley in this film was because of the many, many talks by the Fox executives of an Aliens versus Predator film being made. Sigourney hated the idea of a shared universe for the two franchises so she wanted her character to die.
So interesting - honestly we are so glad we gave this a shot. It truly does not deserve all the hate it gets, the film is genuinely good! But yes, there were some decisions made here that were risky. And sadly, risks don't always pay off.
@@OfficialMediaKnights Have you guys ever considered doing a cut comparison video series? Where you two watch the theatrical cuts as well as extended cuts and analyse the differences and give your opinions on them and which version you prefer?
I was surprised the knights didn’t really enjoy the fifth element, but that’s the thing about movies/art. It’ll never please everyone and what others think of something shouldn’t affect peoples own personal views.
What is like about the first three Alien movies is that they always introduce something new about the xenomorphs
Props to Charles Dance for his sensitive and subtle performance as Clemens, including his on-screen chemistry with Sigourney Weaver. My favourite performance in the entire franchise, aside from those of Sigourney, herself.
Mad respect for you guys continuing the series and going beyond Aliens. Hardly any creators do.
This was filmed in my hometown! Or the outdoor bits were, anyway. Seaham, a mining village in Northeast England - we had a beach called the Blast, the runoff from the coal mines poured into the sea and turned the beaches black. Basically when they wanted to film a location that was borderline uninhabitable for humans, they went to where coal miners had to go swimming. There was a super successful cleanup initiative on that coastline, it's beautiful now.
Seaham was basically uninhabitable to humans until around 2015. So it was an excellent location choice.
@@AdeboFunkyVoodoo Aye, they used to send us on field trips to Beamish and I was sat there like 'This is practice, isn't it, for when they hoy a pickaxe at us and tell us to get to work-' Explains why they built a DWP office there too.
@@Geth-Who This was so interesting to read, thank you! I spent some time looking at pictures, and you're right, the beach at Seaham looks really beautiful now. Your bit about Beamish (also had to look this up) made me laugh; I grew up in the D.C. area of the US, and they used to send our field trips to a similar sort of place called Colonial Williamsburg.
I love going to Seaham!
Just mentioned this in my comment on lol, Seaham is just up the road from me
In response to the end discussion, Sigourney Weaver had no intention whatsoever to make a 3rd film but Fincher intrigued her with his first question
“How do you feel about shaving your head” and then surprised her that he wanted such a dark movie, especially wanting to kill off Hicks and newt straight away, stripping any hope Ripley’s character found in Aliens (that’s gonna hook any actor) and also wanted to go back to the original horror of a single but different xenomorph.
I believe they always intended to kill Ripley and end her story here as Weaver said she was done and The film closes with a repeat of Ripleys log from the Nostromo in the first film “this is Warrant Officer Ripley, last survivor of the Nostromo, signing off” (that might not be verbatim 😂)
She said one of her conditions for doing the movie is that ripley must die. the premise of the alien movies was always pretty basic. A haunted house you had to escape. It was always and has been proven, to come up with a new way to tell the same basic premise. Which is why Ripley then chose to do prometheus with no alien. As he said he thought the alien was done, no longer any mystery to it, it had become such a well known creature. Unfortunately Prometheus had lots of problems, and ridley then back tracked with alien covenant because people wanted to see more aliens again.
Alien ressurection.
@@markwebster7435 the problem with prometheus is not the lack of alien, is the bad writing and terrible dumb characters. the lore about the creators and the black goo was good, but the explination was zero.
what really kill covenant is the fact that the origin of the aliens as we know is that a crazy generic robot with god complex created them.
The shaving her head.....they doubled her pay for that. Those were the 2 reasons for her to come back for alien³
@@OHJAJOH Many years later with a very different context and a different Sigourney Weaver. Who knows, maybe she had a boat to pay off. Maybe Jean-Pierre Jeunet convinced her with an interesting character or plot idea. But notice Sigourney has not come back again.
every alien film with ripley has it's own unique flavor, and i really love them all.
Glad you guys decided to watch this one! Most people tell reactors not to watch past the first two. Once you get over the initial disappointment of the early deaths off screen, it's good movie. Great atmosphere, interesting characters, cool setting, and amazing soundtrack.
David Fincher had such a miserable experience making the movie he pretty much disowns it. It's only been until recently that he even briefly talks about it.
First version I ever saw -- I will stand by this movie being much better than anyone gives credit for.
A great third act for the alien franchise. Rather than a triumphant ending, it's a sad crash back down to reality after the false hope and over the top action of alien 2
Like we mention in the discussion. We were expecting a complete train wreck of a film! This movie is far from that. Much better than a lot of the Sci-Fi we get nowadays. Most of the issues we can attribute to the editing decisions and general direction of the story. But that really comes down to preference. At the end of the day David Fincher left a mark on the Alien franchise and that is all an artist can ask for ❤️
Yep, that's exactly how I view this film. Ugly and nihilistic, which suits the franchise.
@@OfficialMediaKnights watching the assembly cut helped you a lot !
The trainwreck most people still have in mind is the awful theatrical release : the editing is all over the place, it's more uneven and leave an after taste of unachieved
But that's absolutely not how the previous movies end.
Ripley survives alien with Jonesy the cat. It ends on a sad but hopeful note, with her mourning the loss of the crew, and waiting to be rescued in the escape pod.
Alien 3 is the equivalent of a toddler throwing all his toys out of the pram.
It's a complete shitshow right from the start.
@@malificajones7674 Just because the movie goes darker doesn't mean it's a complete shit show, it's completely valid not to like that Newt and Hicks are killed off, but it's not really accurate to state that this objectively makes it worse. It's different than both previous movies yes, but the real issues with the movie is wonky special effects and shitty editing and reshoots. Personal distaste for where the story went is not enough to call something objectively bad.
Really appreciate you doing Alien 3. So many channels have just done the first two and quit, and everybody already knows that they're classics. It's nice to get some fresh perspectives on the more polarizing entries in the franchise.
YES!!! Thank you. David Fincher's vision being so unique provided an added beauty to the story in the special edition that was originally conceived.
He definitely brought his artistic vision to the franchise. We truly appreciated the darker grittier tone that is now such a staple of his style. It worked well with the concept and made Alien feel like that original film again. The tone is one of the things we liked the most about it. Dark and gritty!
@@OfficialMediaKnights Exactly. More so since Ripley is surrounded by the most disgusting humans on Earth compared to Alien and Aliens. It was a different type of survival. I really liked Charles S. Dutton's character and while his death was brutal and sad, since he was really evolving overall towards the end gaining respect for Ripley, was also bad ass 😂 taking the alien head on with no fear
The original story was meant to be set in a giant monastery with monks.
What's sad is that this movie is a great film. The events unwind in a natural way for the story closing out a heroine's journey. Unfortunately, people's assessment always come across unfairly due to certain characters dying. Some of us love all 3 initial movies equally. It's more grounded instead of the constant need to turn a protagonist into some type of Die Hard figure to milk.
@jynxce this is not "a great film." The acting was good. As a sequel in the Alien franchise the story was horrible. How did a face-hugger get onboard that ship? They don't even come out of their eggs unless there is non-alien movement in very close proximity to them. And where the queen was laying her eggs in Aliens gave them no chance to get one on Bishop's ship.
I agree. I even like Resurrection extended cut, but not as much, the sequel with Ripley back on earth as a human/alien hybrid has some interesting paths they could explore.
It's not great at all. Nice try
It’s a good film. I actually enjoyed it more than aliens
@@Whoo_Boyhow did the Queen get on drop ship. It’s too big to jump on the drop ship unnoticed
I get why people were angry with what this film did to the previous cast, but I personally love it. This IS the Alien franchise after all...I don't think happy endings are in store for anyone, nor should they be. It's a relentlessly bleak and ugly film, and I love that aesthetic. It's not for everyone, and the film definitely has its flaws, but I will defend it any day. I hope Fincher knows there ARE people out there who appreciate his film, even if he hates it.
Fully agreed! We are talking about the perfect killing machine and a company willing to do anything to get it... how is a happy ending possible?
Agreed totally. The end of Aliens was very, feel-good, so the immediate loss of Hicks, Newt, and Bishop was a tough pill to swallow.
Then the pieces of this one start coming together and we see that she's landed in an all male high security prison...
With no real weapons...?
Yeah, no happy ending is coming here!
Yup, I'm on the same page.
Looking at it objectively. You're a woman alone in a male max prison, you have no weapons, no tools, no tech, and when finding out she carries a queen, no hope. So, considering that context, actually, Ripley dying was the happiest possible ending you could hope for. Ripley saved all from the Aliens. In this worlds, this is as happy an ending as you will get. She went out on her own terms, carrying with her, literally and figuratively, the ultimate evil.
This movie is, to me at least, totally on point with the brand, with the story previously told, and keeps it real. I always thought Ripley surviving this unscathed would be pandering to the audience.
They let the actor write the script and pretty much erased everything from the first two movies. Total failure.
@@crimsonjedi
Which actor are you referring to? And how did it erase anything from the two previous films?
My all-time favorite movie series. I love Alien 3 as much as Alien & Aliens. It has its own unique atmosphere, phenomenal soundtrack, acting and even the most epic ending. Also, it adds so many fresh and unique ideas to the Alien lore: xenomorphs taking features of their hosts, royal facehuggers etc. The final tunnel chase scene is one of the best scenes in the entire series. Not to mention the legendary Ripley/Xenomorph close-up moment
Completely agree 🙏
100%. Best in the franchise and top 10 best films of all time IMO.
Alien is a classic franchise for a reason, I love all 4 movies. Yes, some things may have been different but I wish there was more "bad" sci-fi horror movies as alien 3 and 4.
AvP is also very good, nothing is perfect. Prometheus great movie with big issue when you expect alien, but on second watch it is great sci-fi movie. Covenant is more alien with terrible characters, but as a sci-fi movie still good. Romulus looks really good so far.😊
Alien 3 aint Canon. Only alien and aliens thats why they want to do the real alien 3
@@laves820 All Alien films are canon so far
The element I enjoy most about this is how it establishes stakes that are an inversion of the previous two entries of the series - _sometimes surviving is a fate WORSE than death._ It changes a lot of how Ripley views her own responsibility as well as how she looks at the struggle of her own survival since the first film, where things get worse if she survives.
She's existing alongside other humans who are seen as nothing but monsters, and humanizing people who are usually as dehumanized as the other "human resources" that the company constantly sacrifices for their own goals. Even the most horrible dregs of society are people who Ripley still works with to try and prevent the Xenomorph from surviving. It reinforces that same message from the original film.
If you do end up looking into the production, it's CRAZY how they managed to get this together with all of the studio interference and issues they had. I feel like this really still stands up despite everything working against it.
The scene of Ripley with the Xenomorph pressed up against her face and refusing to kill her is _SO_ iconic. Also the PoV shots of the Xenomorph moving are _exactly_ what the old *_AVP2_* computer game looks like because of it.
Lastly 54:08 - A very astute observation given the company's reputation…
Thank you for giving the movie a fair shake and appreciating it for what it is. Fanboys get wayyy too bitter about Hicks and Newt dying off-screen - I get not being crazy about this decision, but pretending like the movie is terrible because of it is just childish. The first film was haunted house horror, the second was a heroic action story, the third is a tragedy, exploring themes of grief, sacrifice and redemption. They work well as a trilogy, even if Alien 3 is the most flawed. I always get emotional at the ending - Ripley sacrificing herself is such a powerful, ballsy finale, and the wonderful score gives it such melancholy and gravitas. Not a perfect movie, but a worthy entry - shame they didn't end the series there.
"You've been a part of my life so long I can't remember anything else." That line breaks my heart - It's the epitaph of Ellen Ripley and the entire Alien series. Ripley's journey to this point is what keeps me watching Alien3. I love this movie. Not because it's the best - but because it end-caps the series just about as perfectly as anyone could ask for. It leaves her (us) with nothing. That's a hard way to end a series, but it's perfect for Alien (tm).
That line is actually very cheesy. She was asleep for 57 years. Her time of being awake and dealing with the aliens amounts to only a few months, at most. Pretty corny and melodramatic.
Furthermore, the first two movies had her definitively destroy the aliens and live to see another day. She was not originally intended to be a tragic character; Alien 3 made it that way. To say "that's what Alien is ultimately about" is, at best, a flawed, circular logic.
Alien 3 is a textbook example of what happens when studio execs interfere with a director's vision while he's trying to make his movie. It definitely doesn't deserve the hate it got, especially considering Fincher pulled off a miracle being given less than a 3rd of the budget he was promised, which forced him to not only change the script, but also which characters he was allowed to use, how his alien's effects would be shot, and even what breed of alien he would get to use. I'm glad it's finally finding some love decades later, because it truly is an underdog in filmmaking history.
Edit to add: I don't know if it's been mentioned, but at no time was the xenomorph CGI. It was a mix of animatronics, a suit, and a practical rod puppet on a blue screen, which is why it looked so dated, even for the time. They didn't have the budget for quality CG, so Fincher gambled on the puppet, which unfortunately didn't pay off.
Also, this version of the film uses the xeno that came from a dog in the theatrical cut (the dog chestburster scene is amazing, btw), but in the pre-production designs, the original xeno that came from the bull was going to feature horns.
Also, if you rewatch the opening of the film, it shows a face hugger attached to a skull in a CT Scan-like image, so it basically spoils there were two face huggers on board, laid by the queen during the finalé of Aliens.
"Alien 3 is a textbook example of what happens when studio execs interfere with a director's vision while he's trying to make his movie."
It's actually even worse. Fox released a teaser and set a release date without a director, script, writer, or even concept. There was a revolving door of writers and directors, no coherent vision, and Fincher ultimately hired not because he had a "vision" but because they needed someone, ANYONE, direct this movie and get it done so they could make their release date. Fincher did the best he could with what he had (incomplete fragments of something like six different scripts), and yeah, the executive meddling didn't stop once they hired him, but it was less "interfering with the director's vision" and more "we have no bloody idea what we're doing." As someone says on the "Wreckage And Rage" documentary, "Fox didn't set out to make a movie, they set out to make a release date."
Technically, there is a single CGI shot of the Alien in this movie: The one second bit of its skull cracking just after it got doused with Water.
Film starts with the killing off of Cpl Hicks & Newt. Yeah it deserves all the hate.
The theatrical cut dog birth scene is so much better than the ox and it makes more sense being a dog because the alien behaves like a dog. The ending is also better when Ripley dies the queen bursts out of her chest as she’s falling and I think it’s much better.
@@ryans413 I agree. I appreciate that Fincher was allowed to show [kind of] what he originally envisioned, but, as you said, some of the director's cut scenes and even the alien itself don't make sense because the director's cut is still an incomplete film.
What a great surprise. I wasn’t expecting this today. AWESOME.
It was a little curveball! We’ve been meaning to revisit this universe and we are so glad we did 😄
Despite the problems, I like David Fincher's direction here.
yeah, he tried to turn back the franchise to its origins, the second movie Aliens was a good movie, but a product of his time, action oriented and missing the point of the original Xenomorph. Fincher's direction is an underrated one
The root problem is that there isn't David Fincher's direction in here as there is almost not a single scene that wasn't heavily coreographed and forced by the producers / studio. But his visual style is very apparent.
He did what he could with what he had. If only the studio idiots stopped cutting his balls, he could have gotten this movie to even better shape.
Denise... You are seriously a sharp and brilliant mind. I've watched you pick apart elements of stories and situations countless times and its extremely impressive to see how much you can capture and process all at the same time.
Most people were very unhappy about Hicks and Newt being killed off. They could have been included in this movie. Alien 4 is about the same as this movie, rating wise. Totally different movie story. Ripley is in the next movie, all star cast. Not a spoiler......
Hicks is known in real life to be trouble. He wants to be the main character and demands vastly more money than the rest of the cast.
Hicks and Newt would be useless if they had lived. They wanted a dark movie and killing them two off made it 10x more brutally dark.
I think David Fincher succeeded in putting his stamp on this franchise and the wonderful group of actors on show here, certainly did no harm to their reputations. I saw it the week after it released and always felt that it could have been edited better and didn't agree with Ripley's demise, but on reflection understand the nuance behind it. Thanks for sharing. ❤
He definitely did what he set out to do with the film. People might disagree on his decisions but this is not a case of a director being bad. It’s just people disagreeing with the general direction of things. That being said we too had a few problems with the film. But overall it’s a film in a fantastic franchise that, if you’re a fan of the universe, should definitely watch!
Yup. That shot of the Alien up against Ripley's face is one of the iconic Alien shots from all time. Charles Dance and Charles S. Dutton are incredible in this. Dillon stands face to face and actually hold his own for ten seconds before the Alien can kill him. Absolute bad ass.
Yeah, the film is quite a bit uneven, in both cuts, which ultimately seems like it boils down to studio interference, the assembly cut is in my opinion mostly an improvement on the original but it's still incredibly uneven and rough in many parts.
@@o0pinkdino0o exactly! They used that shot of Ripley and the Alien right up in her face in a lot of the packaging shots for the complete Alien(s) boxsets over the years (from VHS and still now on some BluRays), so that much says a lot. I agree that Fincher left his mark, and just so glad he decided to return to Hollywood after the backlash from this, I mean the guy nearly quit and went back to shooting music videos etc!
@@bloodaxis the movie is well know for being a mess on set, the script was been constantly rewritten.
I grew up with Alien 1-3 all being out already so I love them all 3. They are totally different, but all tell a great story. I love the setting and suspense here. Really thrilling.
Terminator Salvation is the perfect example of a film that got hate and shredded by fans and flopped but was actually an amazing movie.
I wished they kept going with this one, it was great to put the story in the future, to see the first Terminators, the post apocalypse...
Fans were just stupid, this movie was great for me
I like it a lot!
Best part of Terminator Salvation was when Connor got a pipe through the chest. That whole movie suffered from him surviving shyt that would kill anyone else. But because it was John Connor you knew he was going to survive. Idk yawn.
@@ScottOlsen-di1gb bro you could say that about the entire original 3 movies..
I can't tell you guys how happy I am to see someone in the review world give this film some attention.
I've been a staunch supporter of it since 1993.
It's definitely not for everybody, especially after the rip-roaring, crowd pleasing ride Aliens was. Despite its flaws, I think it's a minor masterpiece, and people get on the A3 bashing train because they think they're supposed to.
I'm a fan of Alien 3, but I totally get why it's not everyone's cup o' tea.
Like with Fight Club and Se7en, Fincher's grit and grime is stamped firmly into the atmosphere, which is so doom-laden and oppressive I can't help but love it.
For all its shortcomings and studio interference, it retains the Alien feel. Where Aliens was the same plot as the first beat-for-beat, it had it's own character and feel, and Alien 3 does too.
It's a shame a lot of the cast were spent frivolously, but there's only so much you can do in the face of studio execs.
Anyway, ramble over! I'm so glad you took the time to watch this one, great video as always.
You guys are knocking it out of the park! 🤟
To be honest, Alien³ is a little bit chaotic but still Alien in Core.
Sadly Alien Ressurection is very cheesy in comparison to The first three Movies.
If you want to watch even the 4th one, you will see what i mean ;-)
Love Your Reactions, keep up the great Work 🤘
A lot of reviewers tend to leave off after Aliens; so glad you continued on to Alien 3! I think you get diminishing returns after the first two, but I definitely think this film is worth a look. I particularly enjoy how grimy and lived-in this place looks, and it makes me wonder what it was like in its prime. This film has a special place in my heart despite its shortcomings. Thanks again for sticking with it!
I love this movie so much. This cut in particular, to me, is almost up there with the first two films and likely would be had some of the effects been better. That being said, this particular variation of the xenomorph is my favorite and whenever the effects are produced with the suit, it's one of the best looking efffects in the whole franchise. I think a lot of us have spent decades wondering what could have been had they chosen to use the pieces Cameron left on the board at the end of the last one instead of starting fresh but what we got is such a captivating story set in one of the most haunting/beautiful sets of the franchise. Also, great choice waiting a bit between this one and the last! I often suggest that because it allows it stand on its own.
People Complain about what happened to newt etc but practically there was only three options:
1. None of the characters from aliens survived and this follows different people.
2. Newt is recast with a new actor who matches her age and has her talent
3.This option where she dies offscreen.
The actor who played newt not only aged 5 years between aliens and alien 3. From 12-17 and you’re not meant to age in cryo.
The actor who played Newt had no interest in being an actor and wouldn’t come back for anything
I've never understood why people dislike this movie. I love it. It's the film noir version of an alien flick. Gorgeous.
I agree with you there. It will garner more appreciation with time.
Yeah, by far the best acted out of the trilogy and on par with Alien for the big-boy pro-level cinematography and score. Honestly, the Alien trilogy discussion sort of reminds me of discussions around the best (aka favourite) Mass Effect game in that trilogy -- it's 3 different styles of telling 3 different types of stories in 3 different types of movies that are woven together through a few common & underlying themes and one compelling protagonist.
Yeah it's really well made and the acting is solid. Not sure if most people know this but David Fincher directed it. He also did Fight Club, Seven, Girl with the dragon tattoo, and many other really good films. He's one of the most underrated directors of our time. I still think the original and Aliens are better films overall, but this is a solid movie. They definitely went down hill though after this one.
Even the original DTS or Dolby track is so rich. The audio is insane.
Finch should have gone with the original story set in a monastery with monks. Much more believable and would have been more dark. Alien meets the name of the rose.
I honestly have considered you two to be my favorite reactors for a while now. This cements it. I’m a long time alien fan, Alien is in my top five favorite movies of all time, Aliens is one of the greatest sequels ever. Having said that, I have an undying love for Alien3. Oddly enough, this was the FIRST alien movie I saw. I was a kid and it came on very late on tv and even not having any context from the previous films, I was hooked and eventually got to the original two. I was very surprised when I got a little older and in high school and realized so many people hated it. I HIGHLY recommend you both watch the documentary they put out for the quadrilogy set on dvd and also was on the Blu-ray set. It really shows you a lot of what they were dealing from the studio and all the different versions of the script. Also, there is some cg in alien 3 but the shots of the xenomorph you referred to as cgi were actually done with a rod puppet and compositing. The xenomorph’s head cracking was cg and I think some of the outside shots with debris flying are cg. It didn’t work out but they were very committed to making the movement different. Also you have to realize they never really finished it. The studio pulled the plug for a bit and they had to do reshoots but they weren’t able to ever really find a way to nail the movement. I really appreciate how you both approached it and you both appreciated it for its strengths and acknowledged its weaknesses, as any good critic should. You both nailed down a lot of what it was going for in theme and tone. I also recommend you check the theatrical cut. It is VERY different. If you liked the editing and the dark humor, there is a lot more of that because some of the cuts expertly go to something else at perfect comedic timing. Also in theatrical the chestburster comes out of a dog. Named spike. If you noticed in the assembly cut, the guy that got killed at the fan was calling for a dog named spike that you never meet in that cut. But that is how it goes down. It’s very brutal because the dog is alive too. Also the queen bursts out of ripley’s chest as she jumps and she heroically holds it to her chest as she falls into the mold. I actually prefer that part but I know some people hate it. Fincher disowns this and hardly ever talks about it and has never done recorded interviews about it since it was made. Again that doc is a must to check out if you appreciate the making of film which I know you both do! Love you guys!
*THANK YOU* for giving Alien 3 a chance. This film's severely misunderstood. Flawed, but misunderstood.
Here’s how I feel about Alien 3. I’ll use a food analogy. There’s a restaurant I’ve eaten at twice. Loved my first meal there, so I go back. I order something else from the menu and I love it just as much, if not more than the first meal. Since I had two great but different experiences at that restaurant I go back for a third time and order something else. This time the waiter punches me in the gut when he brings my food. I eat that meal, and it’s well made, but when the waiter comes with the check he punches me in the gut a second time. Then he asks “how was the meal?” How do you think I enjoyed that meal? The chef knew what he was doing, on its own I’d enjoy it. But the only thing I’m taking away from the experience is how it was bookended by two gut punches.
The Assembly Cut over the theatrical cut. Yessssss!
So glad you listened to the comments on your Aliens reaction video. The Assembly is the far better edit, and much closer to director David Fincher's vision.
The production of this film was a nightmare. So many clashes with the studio heads, so much so, to this day Fincher refuses to discuss it.
Yusss THANKYOU!
So rare to find good reactors actually doing Alien 3.
Don't feel intimidated. You can like the movie. They are all unique and one of a kind.
I generally think people hate on this one because it’s such a downer so to speak, bleak and without a shred of hopefulness. But this movie tried to set up that in the end ripley wiped out the existence of the alien. Ripley in her conversation with the human bishop if you notice was focused on her own life being saved, her only concern was that the alien be killed, in the end that’s what she care most about, the only way everyone who died at the hands of the alien would not have died in vain is if Ripley wiped out the species.
Oh man the Assembly Cut is actually so tight. It’s not Alien or Aliens, but it’s a good conclusion to the original trilogy. Just wish they didn’t kill some major characters off-screen.
Alien III is such an underrated film. The movie age like wine...
Great reaction! A3 is my favourite and the most art-house of all alien movies. Cinematography is outstanding in this movie.
Yes! Returning to one of my favorite sagas.
I saw this when it released in theaters back in 92 as a kid. I remember not knowing what to make of it, but over the years, I've grown to appreciate it for what it is. It's definitely rooted in the era (early 90's) when it released and now knowing what went on behind the scenes almost from it's conception, it's amazing it was made. This one isn't as cut and dry as which version is superior, like with Aliens. Both the theatrical and extended or assembly cut have elements that work and don't work in the movies story. I wish the director would be allowed to combine the 2 together, the scenes that add context from the Assembly and while trimming down the long meandering scenes from the Assembly, because there's some scenes that just linger on that are honestly unnecessary. I will say that it's unfair to expect this to be like Alien's, from its original conception that clearly wasn't the direction the movie was headed, they weren't just going to rehash it.
You have no idea how happy I am that you guys watched the assembly cut and not the theatrical cut. It is like night and day with this film.
I love this movie, especially in this version, I know a lot of people hate this movie, but I love it… And if I watch Alien and Aliens, I gotta watch this one too right after, when having myself an Alien movie marathon. Can’t wait to see your reaction to this…
I don't know if you've already seen the theatrical version but there's one scene I prefer way more than this cut and that's the Ripley's death - in the other version the queen hatches as she's falling, Ripley clutching it to her chest like a baby as they both calmly fall to the inferno down below which also looks much more immense in that version. I love that scene.
If I remember it right it was struggling to get away and she held on to it to keep it from escaping
I'm actually so glad you enjoyed this because I was in the exact same boat. I grew up with the Alien Franchise (From a questionable age but that's neither here or there) but I'd never watched them as an adult and upon rewatching the whole series, taking the dated CG into account I was left baffled as to why Alien 3 and Alien Resurrection were shredded the way they were.
I was holding my breath through the whole door maze sequence I thought the straight up intensity of this movie was up there for the franchise in my opinion. The claustrophobia that felt scorching as opposed to cold leaving us feeling nauseous through the whole thing, just like Ripley and the rest of the cast, the speed and ferocity of the Xenomorph, somehow making me grow to like r*pists and murderers just because of the culture in the prison made them feel so human. Like the tiny bit of laughing when the two guys scare each other just looking for a glimpse of light to cope with the dire situation (By no means do I condone what they've done to be stuck there). And I only watched the Theatrical Release so it was nice to see some of those gaps filled in.
I imagine people were hurt because of Newt and Hicks dying in the beginning, I was too but there's also the realism that I loved, sh*t just kinda happens in life sometimes and while it was unfortunate and made Aliens feel a bit redundant, it also felt grounded and as you mentioned, it really drove her character to her sacrifice in the end but it would have been cool to see their dynamic. The Queen was a time bomb and Ripley's death was the explosion. Her path was set. I just wish we got some more explanation about how she was infected. There was a theory I read about facehuggers being on the ship, 1 cut itself and probably died trying to get to newt which started the fire that launched the escape pod, the damage is likely how she drowned while another impregnated Ripley and there had to be at least one more because it ended up in the prison and got the dog. But I don't remember it being explained in the movie at all.
Can't wait to see what you think of Resurrection! There's a lot to love about it even now, some of the sequences in that movie were actually incredible and I'll always love it.
Side note, you're the only react channel I enjoy, So thank you!
I just love you guys and your naturally positive outlook and appreciation for film. It is so refreshing! Thanks for what you do❤
THANK YOU for trying the film. Many TH-camrs don't.
Yes it's controversial, yes it has some bad effects and yes it's not as good as the previous 2... But to me, it was still a good scary Alien film with a unique idea. It makes me sad when so called fans of the franchise absolutely hammer this film and state everyone should stay away from it, especially knowing how hard it was to make/film it and what it is being compared to.
David Fincher hates this movie due to the torment... but i wish i could pat him on the back and convince him otherwise.
Edit: There is actually little CGI in this film... the bits that look like bad CGI are infact blue screen miniature models... but due to time constraint's, were badly implemented. Signorney Weaver did not want to do another Alien film... she insisted that if she does it... she must "pass/go"... and she was the reason why there were no weapons, she absolutely hates working with them and hates everything they stand for.
I've seen it at the cinema and I loved it. I was also devastated to see Ripley dying, not only because she died but for me she was carrying the franchise, so no Ripley=no more Alien movie
I've only seen one other film reactor react to Alien3. Most everyone stops at Aliens (probably due to the comments section relentlessly badmouthing Alien3), but I will go to bat for this film any day.
my eyes can forgive bad vfx sometimes if the story grasp more attention of me.
Killing off Newt was pathetic
@@steve8510 And the deaths of the other 174 women, children, men, crew and marines to Xenomorph is fine!?
Wake up to the reality of the story... As long as Xenomorphs exist... there is only death and there are no happy endings.
the first 4 alien movies are my favorite monsters movies of all time. each one had a unique style.
alien: lovecraftnian horror.
aliens: action/horror.
alien 3: back to the roots and expanded the lore (the dog xenomorph was a sick adition)
alien 4 resurrection: cyberpunk.
This is such a powerful movie and I really don’t connect with the criticisms lobbies at it. In fact, I don’t think I’ve seen much genuine criticism of this movie, almost everything I hear from people is how upset they were that two characters from the previous movie are killed off and that’s not criticism. This movie is far from perfect but it’s engaging all the way through and brings a powerful and meaningful conclusion to Ripley’s arc.
This movie is haunted and bleak as hell, but I can’t understand why anyone would expect anything less from the Alien trilogy.
Many people disliked this movie because Hicks, Newt and Ripley died. I for the matter liked the fact Fincher brought the sense of dread and desperation to this universe.
Alien 4 Resurrection got even more flak, but it's my guilty pleasure. It's a self-depreciating, fun horror comedy. Give it a try!
It was just 100% bleak, especially after Ripley finds out she is a queen-carrier.
Fincher probably thought he'd never make another movie again after this, but he bounced back nicely and then made his second movie, Se7en, in 1995. He's made 12 movies all together. That's a pretty good track record.
Happy that he got such a hit on his hands with “Se7en”. Clearly his signature style works! I don’t think his direction was an issue with this film. The problems seem to stem from both the editing room and the writers room!
How insane is it that his first film was such a terrible experience for him, and yet he bounces back with a masterpiece like Se7en only three years later? He's definitely one of my favorite directors of all time. He has such a meticulous, controlled style.
He's a fine director.
The reason behind the negative feelings and the continued negative feelings is that the people behind the Aliens IP swore this was a nightmare she had in cryosleep. Then Alien 4 came out and pissed the fans off more. The people behind the IP again said it's a nightmare she had in cryosleep. But as the years turned into decades the fans (like myself) are still unhappy with their BS. They actually HAD a script for the movie that would have Ripley, Hicks, and Newt return and establish that they were in fact nightmares. They decided NOT to make it.
Personally, I hope A: Romulus reignights the franchise and they make a movie actually establishing that 3 and 4 were nightmares. Open with Ripley giving a voice over where she talks about nightmares and how she adopted Newt and then married Hicks, who is now a retired General. The Corp approaches them with news of an "incident" and both of them say pound sand. Newt, the New Ripley, takes the assignment because she needs closure. You'd have to recast Newt as Carrie Henn went on to become a teacher. But you'd have a new generation of Strong Female Lead in Rebecca "Newt" Ripley.
Another reason Fans hated this movie, and by extension 4, was because there wasn't any way for not one, but THREE facehuggers to get on the Sulaco. The Facehugger that got on Ripley, the one that died trying to get to Newt, and the Main Antagonist. All the eggs got killed when Ripley burned them. The Queen ripped loose and left without anything so she could chase Ripley down.
All and all, I don't "Hate" 3 and 4... as long as I keep in mind they are just nightmares she's having going home. Last I heard, both asigourney Weaver and Michael Bein were on board for another Alien movie. They were on board for the one that got canceled, the actual successor to Aliens.
You should definitely watch the Directors Cut of Alien 4 though.
Thank you for this reaction for this great movie. I am glad you also liked the dark tone, cinemagraphics, visuals of this movie. Also the music track is very good. I saw this movie in 90s as a child and I never knew that people hated this movie. I totslly dissagree with people who dislike this movie. Mostly they just had some different ideas how this movie should be. Its not an action is drama and horror.
I always have loved Alien 3. Actually I think its better than Aliens becouse it brings back the original horror elements and has special gothic religious dark tone in it.
Also Ripley cannot survive forever and alien movie is not about happy endings. Yes this is sad movie but its is almost perfect ending for the trilogy. All other alien movies after this one are not even count to be alien movies.
For what happened behind the scenes it’s still a terrific film…I think many people like to see think of the first two films as the same way as we see The first two Terminator movies, absolutely masterpieces, however alien 3 is light years better than T3
You have horrible taste.
I think if i remember the original cut when ripely dived into the furnace the alien queen bursts out of her chest and she cradles it stopping it escaping almost saying your coming with me. You will be happy when you watch alien resurrection.
Yes I just watched that version too, was waiting for their reaction to that scene!
I love this film. So glad you watched it. Great reaction guys
I don't necessarily think Alien3 is necessarily "bad", it's just a different way of telling a story. Alien was a survival horror film, Aliens was an action film, while Alien3 leaned more towards suspense and drama. Since the target audience for each genre is different, it is understandable why fans of the first two Alien films found it more difficult to resonate with Alien3.
Charles Dutton I think brings a gravitas to his roles due mostly to his prison experience. He had such strength in his roles.
Maybe Aliens set the bar so high that no sequel could ever compete. Alien 3 was a very valiant attempt though
It's not that the movie is awful we just couldn't forgive losing Newt and Hicks without even the chance to say goodbye.
This right here. Killing characters off screen is not ok but riply dying isn’t a bad choice. She was being the hero she has been since the first movie.
A writer killing a character off screen because the character annoyed him, is such asinine bullshit.
I understand this feeling, but on the otherhand.... this is exactly what Ripley is feeling too and that's the point.
Just like how she survives the Nostromo, only to find out she slept for decades and missed her daughters entire life and death, so too did she miss out on the life she was imagining she'd have with newt and Hicks after beating the queen.... as much as we want her to get a reward for her hardships, the theme of the start of both 2 and 3 is that the Universe just does not care.
Love this film. Criminally underrated. It's down beat but is so well acted and interesting to look at.
A REACTOR FINALLY DID ALIEN 3!!! IM SO STOKED THANK YOU!!
I think you might like the next film, Alien: Resurrection. Like Alien 3, it gets hate that it doesn't completely deserve.
Sigourney is back in it, with another amazing performance, completely different from her previous ones (I wont tell you why). Plus it was directed by a mad French guy known for surreal arthouse movies.
I'm interested in what you make of it.
So glad you gave Alien 3 a chance!
37:51 The thing about Aaron is, it's easy to believe that he's a true believer in the Company, like Andrews was, but he's not. His moniker of "85", suggestive of his IQ, suggests that's he's not intelligent enough to make the cognitive leap that Ripley did and cast away any trust he has in Weyland-Yutani. He can't connect the dots to see that their greed overrides any sense of humanity or even self-preservation. It can be intuited that nothing in Aaron's experience lends any credence to that notion, so he has no reason or inclination to believe that the Company could have anything other than his best interests in mind. That inability to make such a connexion and begin to distrust Wey-Yu is simply another form of helplessness, as Lambert suffered from in the original film, and like her fear, his innocence eventually becomes his undoing.
It's so heartbreaking that Aaron attacked the Weyland people who were armed with guns, because he did it to save his friends, including Ripley. In the short amount of time together, he formed a connection with her enough to risk his life. His low IQ was what made him a good person, but also his demise. He had family back home, and could've just done nothing to stay alive, yet he just couldn't let himself see his friends be harmed. Brave, but foolish.
It sucks how majority of people do not notice these tiny little subtle nuances of character traits showcased in Alien 3.
@@MIZZKIE Brave, foolish and ultimately futile. It wasn't until Ripley arrived on Fiorina 161 and their troubles with the Xenomorph started that Aaron began to see any evidence at all that the Company had less interest in their situation than they did in acquiring the Xenomorph Queen gestating in Ripley. If she hadn't been infected by a _manumala noxhydria reginensis_ (Royal Facehugger) she wouldn't have a reason to run a CAT scan on herself, and Aaron wouldn't have had a reason to be so concerned for her well-being other than keeping her safe from a prowling Xeno. No transmission wouldn't have gone out to the Network and Wey-Yu wouldn't have sent back an "Absolute Highest Priority" message for Aaron to see or dispatched the _Patna_ to Fiorina to collect Ripley within two hours of transmitting the reply, even going so far as to repeatedly demand acknowledgement of their message. (Of course he intuited that the Company was dispatching a ship to evacuate them from the planet and terminate the Alien, even mere hours after seeing the message insisting that "Come _on,_ they're gonna take us HOME!"). His brain just didn't have the time it needed to actually connect Ripley's words to the communiqué from the Company and come up with a scenario that would cause him distress. It was just too little for him and certainly too late.
What someone doesn't like someone else loves, best to have your own opinion about it
IMO the only truly bad Alien movie was AVP Requiem. I loved this one. Hell I loved Resurrection! They're not 1 or 2 but they still hit my fun button.
Yes, couldn't agree more about AVP2, absolutely horrendous film
Resurrection was definitely a decent entertaining movie, way better than most films these days
All the AvP movies are terrible. All the regular Aliens are fun to great.
I realise I'm in the minority, but I think this movie is brilliant. Absolutely brilliant. It has so many fantastic elements.
First: Elliot Goldenthal's score. Awesome. So emotional. And scary, for real. I have it on CD and it's tough to listen to in the dark. The latin named tracks especially - Agnus Dei, Lento, and the grand finale Adagio - are majestic and bring a solid tear to my eyes. Every time.
Second: the atmosphere. Dark. Gritty. Tragic. The ending, although so utterly sad, is so right. Personally, I would not have wanted it any other way.
Third: the dialogue. Brilliant. So many memorable bits. So much dark humor. Dillon's speech towards the end, "I ain't much for begging. Nobody ever gave me nothing", especially in combination with Goldenthal's score, is breathtaking.
Fourth: the characters. So many solid seconds. Clemens was fantastic, so tragic when he died. Dillon was brilliant. Even the superintendent and 85.
To sum it up, It's so sad how underrated this movie is. 6,4 on IMDb is a travesty. For me, it's a solid 8. I first saw it in the movie theater upon release in 1993. I watched it for the tenth time with my 14 year old daughter just yesterday, the second time for her, and we both loved it.
It will always have a special place in my heart.
The crazy guy that calls the alien the dragon is played by Paul McGann the 8th Doctor
Theatrical Version has a dog as the host, you see the Queen erupts from her chest, and she holds it to her body, Ripley was on the EEV in the cryotube. You see the Facehugger with the dog barking.
At the time, Sigourney Weaver was (and probably still is) a proponent of gun control. She said on the Aliens documentary "Superior Firepower" that she felt uncomfortable even holding the weapons in that film, so one of her stipulations for returning was that Alien3 have no firearms in it. She had a lot of influence going into the film, and she leveraged that to get that written into the script.
Some people think the conceit of a prison with no weapons is ridiculous, but I think it works in the film. Even if the prisoners killed Andrews, Aaron and Clemens, where would that get them? There's no way off the planet. They're not being mistreated and have free reign to do mostly whatever they want.
Mostly...
The alien pov running & chasing them at the end was mind blowing way back then!!!
13:16 is like finding an empty roach egg in your house.
I'm of the rare opinion that the theatrical cut is superior. It feels more like a finished film than the Assembly Cut. Neither version of the film is particularly good, though.
Also, Fincher has publicly disowned this movie and had nothing to do with the Assembly Cut. He gave the producers his blessing to put together an alternative version of Alien 3, but there's a reason why it's not called the "Director's Cut."
I never understood the hate for Alien 3, even the theatrical version. I remember watching it in 1992 opening night, and instantly feel in love with the different tone. The cinematography, the color grade and sound made it very different from the previous films. Also, even though Fincher hates the film (obviously due to studio mismanagement), it still has his distinctive fingerprint and style all over it. I have dug his style since that night in 1992.
It's always the same. L.A. audiences. They hated Blade runner because the metropolis didn't look like L.A. Unless the film doesn't glorify Hollywood or America for that matter they pour scorn on it. This then informs producers to demand a watering down of certain elements in movies. Must be a love story, America must be presented in her primacy at all times. Things like that. Producers have cooled down a lot since those days but they were always worried about Hollywood society rejecting any experimental ideas. For instance Alien 3 was meant to be set in a monastery with monks and an Abbot. Producers weren't happy with that.
This movie is good. Don't listen to the masses. They are dumb.
We didn’t We always give movies a chance and form our own opinions 😃
@@goaway152 take the advice of your own username. 🥱🙄
In this case, the masses are right on the money.
Alien 3 is derisive because it craps all over the previous movie, which is widely acknowledged as one of the best sequels ever made.
Alien 3 also starts with one of the dumbest and most obvious plotholes I've ever seen on film.
@@malificajones7674 You are still wrong.
Of course, watch it. But this movie suffered because of Sigourney Weaver and her not wanting guns in the movie. Don't let the actor make decisions, then write a movie around it. You end up with the worst Alien movie.
Love Alien 3 and films that don't wrap the hero's in cotton wool. It shows you how high the stakes are, and that no-one is safe.
I wish at least one film will finally get the alien to that DAMN fricking weapons department!!!
Fun fact: The 2013 video game Aliens: Colonial Marines reveals that Hicks is still alive. In the game, Hicks explains that Weyland-Yutani had boarded the Sulaco. The fire then happened and, in the chaos, a Weyland-Yutani man swapped places with Hicks in his pod and got jettisoned to Fiorina 161 along with Ripley, Newt, and Bishop.
Alien 3 doesn't deserve the hate that many fans have for it. It didn't give the fans what they wanted, but I don't think that makes it a bad movie. If there's one thing we can learn from the Alien movies, it's that life can be pretty shitty, bad things happen, but we have to get over them, no matter what. I think it's a good movie, especially the special edition.
Am i the only one who saw the version where the Xeno busted out of a dog instead of a cow?
No I saw it too. You’re referring to the theatrical version.
@@adrienla1666 Same. And I hate it.
@@doubleexia8375 its only merit is to show Ripley giving birth to the alien queen in the last scene. Why is that absent from the assembly cut? Never made sense to me.
@@adrienla1666 Makes sense.
The thing with this film is you have to understand the context of the era in which it was made.
ALIEN was a classic. You don't make sequels to classics. EVER. James Cameron almost faced a mutiny on the set of ALIENS because the entire English crew thought making a sequel to ALIEN was sacrilege. In the 1980's, sequels was garbage made to please children and slack-jawed yokels in the audience and sequels DID NOT MAKE MONEY unless your name was George Lucas (he was thought of as the weird exception to the rule) or you were a SLASHER franchise which studios KNEW was garbage, but studios also 'knew' that teenagers and horror movie fans were tasteless morons who could be conned to part with their money with almost anything.
ALIENS proved everyone wrong including the studio who greenlit the film and expected the movie to be a luke-warm videotape rental store filler. They had no faith in the film or James Cameron, but the budget was small enough and enough time had passed from the original film's release that the studio was like "ahh what the hell, the guy wants to make it. Let's see if we can make a few bucks." And when ALIENS went gangbusters, the potential of sequels began to finally make studios understand that they can make money and also attract adult audiences who usually sneer at anything that has "part II" on it. ALIENS in 1987 is the reason why we had the "Summer of Sequels" in 1989 with INDY 3, GHOSTBUSTERS II and BACK TO THE FUTURE PART II. That summer melted people's brains because they couldn't believe studios were trying to get on the "sequel wagon".
Then you get to ALIEN3 - the studio doesn't know how to make a sequel for it. James Cameron doesn't know either because his script for ALIENS was actually an original sci-fi movie he had written called MOTHER and he just changed up the names of characters, he never planned a sequel so he didn't have any clues on what to make next (and honestly kind of felt that "trilogies" are a marketing thing, not a storytelling thing). All the ideas Cameron pitched was not to the studio's taste. And also Sigourney Weaver didn't want to make any more ALIEN films, her career was blossoming into the territory of a "real actress" and despite getting an Oscar nomination, starring in a sci-fi series in the 80's was seen as 'bad' for her career. She was 'slumming it'. Plus they waited too long and the actress playing Newt was now a teenager and replacing an actor in a movie was generally seen as an absolute disaster, so they knew they couldn't use Newt unless they did a time-jump (which also was not a thing studios, audiences nor critics had the stomach for - again this was seen as bad writing back in the day).
So Sigourney wants out. Studio has no clues how to make a sequel or what its about. They shop the project to tonnes of people including some very interesting and artistic auteur directors and they get all manner of weirdness including a movie set on a fake planet made entirely out of wood and filled with space-monks, a non-Ripley movie set on a space station written by William Gibson of all people and lots of other stuff. Some of the pitched versions ended up becoming the very gory, dark and grisly ALIENS comic-book series published by Dark Horse.
The studio goes back to Sigourney and begs her to come back. She agrees, but only on the condition that they kill Ripley. Eager to get the film off the ground ASAP, they take several of their past scripts and smash them together into this movie and they do the one artistic thing of making the whole film about sacrifice and death (hence all the religious and Christian imagery intercut with horrific gut-punch deaths of literally everyone). Script's not great, but they hire David Fincher and he "gets" the film thematically and leans as hard as he can into the concept that this movie is all allegory about dying, sacrifice, death, loss and grief.
And the film goes into production. And a whole lot of shit goes wrong and the studio doesn't like the death motif coz its too grim, but too much of the film is already shot and there's politics and firings and rehirings and studio meddling and the script is still not as polished as it could be....but basically after a LOT of production problems, the film is finished and released.
Long story short: Ripley was always meant to die and the film was always meant to be a horrific dark gut punch. It just probably wasn't what audiences ever wanted to see. Audiences still wanted "real" movies and thought comic book films and sci-fi was for children and dumb people. but they still CARED about the characters in a way that was different and maybe a little unexpected. Basically the filmmakers tried to lean hard into the 'arthouse' way of making a "Ripley must die" movie and the public didn't care for it, despite how well the movie is made and how beautiful it actually is.
Also it is worth noting that tastes in the 80's and 90's which made general audiences sneer at sequels is also why they thought killing her would be interesting. Getting invested in the multi-movie arcs of characters, again, was the realm of children's content; comic books and bad detective novels and shitty soap operas on TV. People were generally thought to be uninterested in following characters lives, but rather how a character dealt with a singular situation and what an audience member could take away from that. The "one and done" approach to storytelling was thought to be superior writing as a whole: you get 90 minutes and you say what you want to say about the world through your movie. And adult audiences knew that's what movies were; experiencing an event filtered through on-screen characters.
Being invested in fictional characters in movies and wanting to see more of them was childish and that's why it was reserved for movies for children (i.e. STAR WARS). It's why there's no character continuity in the original INDY trilogy. It's why slasher movies play fast and loose with their continuity. And its why the very rare genre films made in the 80s and early 90s that focussed on character's stories over themes and finely crafted one-off stories were all made by filmmakers who cited comic books and movie-serias as a lifelong inspiration. Fast, easy, junkfood for the masses as these mediums were considered back then.
ALIEN movies having a 'continuity' was a novelty and one that the studio and its filmmakers and its cast - including the lead actress - didn't really understand or think was 'good art'.
Whether you agree with them or not, that's what filmmaking and storytelling was back in the day. 80's adult audiences would likely look at cinema and television of today and consider it to be 'infantile' because it prioritizes being over-invested in the fictional lives of fictional characters OVER using characters to explore a real-world idea or theme in the tightest and most finely tuned writing possible.
This film went through many rewrites & directors like Renny Harlin b4 David Fincher signed on. im glad you watched the assembly cut as it way better than the theatrical which omits the first capture of the Alien altogether, the alien bursts out of a dog not a ox & the alien bursts out ripleys chest in theatrical which she holds as she falls into the fire. This at the time was supposed to be the final alien film so killing Ripley gave the series closure. Hicks & Newt were meant to appear & Michael Biehn was gutted when he found out Hicks was killed. Killing Newt i have mixed feelings part of me thinks its ballsy part me thinks a copout after how her & ripleys surrogate mother daughter relationship was wondefully explored in Aliens.
Brilliant discussion, you pair always give vaild points on the good & bad on every movie you react to & you are one of my favourite reactors.
oh man as a writer learning the lesson that "Am I killing this character for story value, because it serves the story or shock value?" the very very hard way. The same can be said with memory loss/ amnesia if its not temporary. I really appreciate your point of view as a writer yourself and both of your views as story tellers. Very insightful.
As a teen I wasn't as comfortable with the general feel of the movie, as it is a lot "darker" than "Aliens". But I always liked it and like it even more today. I never understood why people wouldn't like it. One of the most interesting things about the Alien trilogy is, that every movie is completely different, from the making, the story, to even the genre and all three feel very authentic and consistend. This one definitely deserves more than it usually gets.
I thought Alien e was a logical next step in the Alien franchise and not just a rehash of 1 and 2. Too bad Hicks and Newt didn't survive, but it probably was to take away Ripley's every hope and reason for living.