Stacks posted:After watching it recently, it's amazing it made it to theaters. I know right, it looks like a crappy TV show. It's awesome. ruddiger posted:Huh, I never pieced together that the special edition of Aliens implies the queen hatched from Newt's dad. I'm not even sure it did; it''d be a bit of a coincidence that Mr & Mrs Newt stumble upon a queen egg first go. I always had the idea that a facehugger defaulted to implanting a 'regular' alien, and if that alien saw there was a big enought population of potential hosts around, they'd mess with another egg with pheromones and whatnot to produce a queen. Bit of a waste to hatch a queen if there's nothing for her to do. Clipperton fucked around with this message at 05:23 on Jul 12, 2016 |
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2016 05:01
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 22, 2024 08:56 |
|
|
You can go with AvP-R's idea where it suggests that if the alien is alone, it will molt into a queen, or a weird fan theory version I made up where a lone Alien will egg morph someone into a queen facehugger egg.
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2016 05:24
|
|
|
Tenzarin posted:If it was left to Ridley, I'm sure we would of had Alien 2:Crabwalker. People turning into eggs is 100% better and freakier than the canon lifecycle, as cool as the queen is.
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2016 05:29
|
|
|
IM_DA_DECIDER posted:People turning into eggs is 100% better and freakier than the canon lifecycle, as cool as the queen is. Especially when you extrapolate what that says about the "cargo hold" in the first movie. Those aren't just eggs, they're all victims...
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2016 05:37
|
|
|
Seems pretty inefficient to need 2 hosts per 1 alien.
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2016 07:48
|
|
|
SuperMechagodzilla posted:The issue is not that Ripley starts a family, but how 'family' is deployed as support for the liberal ideology of the film. The notion that Ripley is working in the interest of Weylend-Yutani is wrongheaded to me because the Aliens are in the interest of Weyland-Yutani. Both Alien and Aliens deal with the mechanization of people. In Alien, it is the workers, and in Aliens, it's the soldiers and even the colonists. The aliens do not represent some underclass rebellion. They represent the extreme of Weyland-Yutani's desire to mechanize their workers. They are organic machines; insectoid drones without any real sense of personhood. The Queen in this case, the leader of the drones, the things actively replacing people with machines, represents a grotesque mirror of Weyland-Yutani itself. When Ripley saves Newt, she is fighting both the Queen and Weyland-Yutani. And that actually strengthens the need for the daughter. The trauma that Ripley experiences can be just chalked up to living through a scary experience with the alien. The daughter is something that not just the alien took away from her, but Weyland-Yutani.
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2016 15:14
|
|
|
Timeless Appeal posted:An alternative read on that relationship is that the queen is not Newt's father/mother, but her sister. Which she literally is if we assume she hatched from her father. The Queen is not indoctrinating Newt; she is replacing her. This is a much more convincing read, if one absolutely has to look for symbolism outside of the usual body-horror stuff.
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2016 18:46
|
|
|
CelticPredator posted:a weird fan theory version I made up where a lone Alien will egg morph someone into a queen facehugger egg. Oooohh that's actually a pretty elegant reconciliation of the two depicted life cycles
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2016 19:18
|
|
|
Baronjutter posted:I don't understand why people think Alien 3 "ruined" the ending of Aliens. Movies don't all have happy endings, characters die, space is a cold uncaring horrible place and Ripley will have everything she ever loves killed or take away from her. Not every movie needs to have some comic book hero story arc where everything goes along exactly how the viewer expects. Bit late, but I only came to appreciate Alien 3 years later (and with the assembly cut). As a kid Aliens was one of my favourite films. I was 8-9 when I watched it and it was my Star Wars. Then I'm 12 and there's a sequel coming out. The shameful marketing campaign sold a different movie, the game sold another Aliens shooter and I'm a kid about to watch a follow up to my favourite movie. They're dead. Everything you loved about Aliens is gone. Please pay attention to a bunch of bald guys who look the same. Oh, and now Ripley wants to die so you don't even care about her anymore. I hated this film so much. It's the only time "raped my childhood" fits. I hadn't felt that cheated with a sequel since Highlander 2 (but drat if I don't appreciate both better now for different reasons)
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2016 19:22
|
|
|
lizardman posted:Oooohh that's actually a pretty elegant reconciliation of the two depicted life cycles It's a pretty popular theory, and it makes sense, although with the fast growth the aliens are capable of you'd think they could just molt into a queen. As far as "official canon" goes it seems to be dismissed as a possibility when Ripley acknowledges both reproductive methods in the novelization of Alien 3 and then theorizes that the queen embryo is valuable because they can't be made with the egg-morphing technique.
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2016 19:56
|
|
|
Biomute posted:This is a much more convincing read, if one absolutely has to look for symbolism outside of the usual body-horror stuff. I'l go a step further and say SMG's read is plain incorrect, which is the kind of judgment call I try really hard to avoid in the media interpretation game. But the alien infestation being working class revolution simply does not follow with what is presented to us on screen: corporate interests seek to possess the aliens, not quell or eradicate them. I suppose you can say liberalism seeks to exploit working class discontent to use against that class's own economic interests the way the Republican party exploited rural working class whites via the southern strategy and racism, and how Alien Resurrection documents Fox News seemingly harnessing this re-purposed angry rebellious spirit until it gets out of their control a la the Tea Party and culminates into the creation of the Newborn who is analagous to Donald Trump, but....
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2016 20:07
|
|
|
zVxTeflon posted:Seems pretty inefficient to need 2 hosts per 1 alien. It takes two to tango.  But inefficient compared to what? It goes from snake bursting out of someone's chest to eight foot tall adult in like one hour.
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2016 20:14
|
|
|
Dog_Meat posted:They're dead. Everything you loved about Aliens is gone. Please pay attention to a bunch of bald guys who look the same. Oh, and now Ripley wants to die so you don't even care about her anymore. I can totally understand this reaction when the movie was new, I felt the same. It's not just that Newt and Hicks die (and Bishop gets messed up and wants to be euthanized). It's that in the theatrical version Andrews/Brian Glover and Clements/Charles Dance's are the only potentially interesting characters, but then they both get killed in rapid succession early on and the rest of the movie is a bunch of indistinct bald guys running through dark hallways yelling gently caress a lot. Almost more importantly than Golic's subplot the work print adds a little bit of extra dialogue to almost every scene in the movie and is much more coherent and focused, so the nihilism and depressing stuff happening is earned.
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2016 20:20
|
|
|
Biomute posted:It's a pretty popular theory, and it makes sense, although with the fast growth the aliens are capable of you'd think they could just molt into a queen. As far as "official canon" goes it seems to be dismissed as a possibility when Ripley acknowledges both reproductive methods in the novelization of Alien 3 and then theorizes that the queen embryo is valuable because they can't be made with the egg-morphing technique. The egg morphing concept is being reintroduced into "the canon" in some upcoming comics - one of the writers and artists pushed for its reintroduction, and Fox approved it.
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2016 20:28
|
|
|
Timeless Appeal posted:An alternative read on that relationship is that the queen is not Newt's father/mother, but her sister. Which she literally is if we assume she hatched from her father. The Queen is not indoctrinating Newt; she is replacing her. For your reading to be supported by the text, you would have to identify even a single point in the film where Ripley acts against the interests of the corporation. She doesn't. The closest she comes to this is in arguing the corporation should take a loss on the colony, as it has been irreversibly corrupted by greedy Burke and the aliens. But again, that means she is not against the liberal-capitalist utopia at all. She is merely against the corruption of it from Outside - the threat to her 'way of life'. Now, we can understand that the 'totalitarian' aliens, that pure Outside, represent a distilled version of our own essence (as per Hegel). But Ripley absolutely does not understand this. She just kills all the drones, launches the queen out an airlock, and then goes back to sleep. She doesn't even have the gumption to execute Burke. Ripley remains unwaveringly humanist, like Joss Whedon. And you are frankly in agreement; the inhuman 'zombie-workers' aren't the real underclass; they're "organic machines," "insectoid drones without any real sense of personhood", etc. Did we already forget the first sentence of this paragraph? While you are right that the aliens realize the fantasy that sustains the corporation's desire (and the term for a fantasy that becomes real is 'nightmare'), Ripley is herself motivated by a fantasy of perfect fulfillment: of resurrecting her daughter, of a perfect family, of having a prestigious better-paying job.... Earlier in the thread, I noted how she jettisons the exo-suit along with the queen, as if declaring it all beneath her. She overcomes her nightmares in order to start 'dreaming again'. Newt: Can I dream? Ripley: Yes, honey. I think we both can. Zizek: The tragedy of our predicament (when we are within ideology) is that, when we think that we escape it, into our dreams, at that point we are within ideology. And here's where we really get into the point: Ripley's daughter was not taken away by anybody. She simply died of natural causes, in the same way that Shaw's dad in Prometheus simply contracted ebola - for no reason at all. So this is where we return to Prometheus, and its mockery of Big Questions about of "why do bad things happen to good people" and whatever. Aliens provides fake answers instead. What's foreclosed in all of this is the possibility of alliance with the drones. lizardman posted:I'l go a step further and say SMG's read is plain incorrect, which is the kind of judgment call I try really hard to avoid in the media interpretation game. But the alien infestation being working class revolution simply does not follow with what is presented to us on screen: corporate interests seek to possess the aliens, not quell or eradicate them. I did not write 'revolution'. I wrote 'labour uprising'. And it is absolutely in the interests of the corporation to destroy the site and foist blame onto 'one bad apple'. It's the exact same outcome as in the original Robocop, where the bad CEO who controls the entire legal system is fired and replaced with a good CEO who controls the entire legal system. The entire issue of a privatized police force is sidestepped entirely. That's a satire. The same thing happens, less satirically, in Iron Man 1.
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2016 20:30
|
|
|
lizardman posted:I'l go a step further and say SMG's read is plain incorrect, which is the kind of judgment call I try really hard to avoid in the media interpretation game. But the alien infestation being working class revolution simply does not follow with what is presented to us on screen: corporate interests seek to possess the aliens, not quell or eradicate them. I think it is quite clear that the alien infestation represents the Viet Cong, and how the technologically superior force of the US military never stood a chance at defeating an entrenched, indigenous force whose survival was at stake unless they had nuked the entire peninsula and destroyed everything they were supposedly fighting over in the first place. Everyone involved in making Aliens has said as much, and my dad (who got drafted for Vietnam and then, in the most ironic turn of events ever to befall a member of our family in its documented history, failed the physical examination due to a bug - literally a parasite - he'd caught in the Peace Corps) realized the same thing the instant the Marines appeared on screen when I watched Aliens with him at age 10. So a Communist/Socialist signification is readily assignable to the xenomorphs, and to be honest I don't think there is as clear a distinction between possessing the workers and eradicating them - after all, isn't one of the most fundamental principles of management's dominance over labor the eradication of the personhood of labor, enabling them to become a possession of management?
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2016 20:31
|
|
|
I think Blomkamp's bringing back eggmorphing in his fan film. So I guess that's a good thing that will come from a multi-million dollar masturbation.
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2016 20:34
|
|
|
CelticPredator posted:I think Blomkamp's bringing back eggmorphing in his fan film. So I guess that's a good thing that will come from a multi-million dollar masturbation.
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2016 20:40
|
|
|
SuperMechagodzilla posted:For your reading to be supported by the text, you would have to identify even a single point in the film where Ripley acts against the interests of the corporation. I guess if you entirely ignore Burke and the context of why Ripley is going there versus the context of why Ripley is sent there, as well as any number of other textual plot details that stand directly and obviously in the way of your fanfic.
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2016 20:49
|
|
|
Xenomrph posted:Apparently Creative Assembly were going to include it in Alien Isolation (as well as a Queen) but felt it detracted from the gameplay flow, so they decided to keep them "off screen". Ripley walks into a room. People are being egg morphed into a wall. That's all you needed....
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2016 20:56
|
|
|
OneThousandMonkeys posted:I guess if you entirely ignore Burke and the context of why Ripley is going there versus the context of why Ripley is sent there, as well as any number of other textual plot details that stand directly and obviously in the way of your fanfic. Forget it Jake, it's SMG. CelticPredator posted:Ripley walks into a room. People are being egg morphed into a wall. That's all you needed.... I think the logic was that it would be a distraction to the player (especially players who hadn't seen the egg morphing scene and didn't know it wasn't a new idea) and "standing around gawking at weird poo poo" would undermine the tension of trying to keep the player on the move (or get them killed). Like I'm with you, I wish they had included it and I think there are ways to make it work within the gameplay, I'm just reporting what I'd read. They said they didn't include a Queen because they predicted players would expect to fight it as some kind of "boss", and they weren't making that kind of game. Xenomrph fucked around with this message at 21:01 on Jul 12, 2016 |
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2016 20:56
|
|
|
SuperMechagodzilla posted:She doesn't. My reading is also strengthened by the fact that the bitch line ties the Queen and Mother from the first film together. Mother is inarguably the personification of the company and its mechanization of people as it and Ash have more agency than the crew The humans of Alien are closer to tools than the machines. Mother and the Queen are the exact same thing. They are both Weyland-Yutani in philosophy. You're applying the Robocop remake to this when as a pair of films, the Alien movies are closer to 2001 in their themes.
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2016 20:58
|
|
|
OneThousandMonkeys posted:I guess if you entirely ignore Burke and the context of why Ripley is going there versus the context of why Ripley is sent there, as well as any number of other textual plot details that stand directly and obviously in the way of your fanfic. Everything I've written is both true and accurate. In fact, I mentioned the Burke character three times in the post you've quoted. Could you list the textual plot details you are referring to? Timeless Appeal posted:Everything we know about the company tells us that they'll jump at the chance at trying to capitalize on the aliens. Where in the text of the film is this evident? But beyond this assumption, you are reducing the conflict to 'preventing them from getting aliens' - which is exactly the same as stopping Cyberdyne from getting Terminator parts in T2. That is not anticapitalism; that is merely fear of AI. SuperMechagodzilla fucked around with this message at 21:08 on Jul 12, 2016 |
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2016 21:01
|
|
|
SuperMechagodzilla posted:Everything I've written is both true and accurate. In fact, I mentioned the Burke character three times in the post you've quoted. Later, Burke tries to get them infected for the purposes of getting specimens back to the Company, a goal they had expressed in the first movie, and continued in the third movie. Ripley acts against this by escaping Burke's plot and getting the live facehuggers destroyed by the Marines. Burke may have been taking the initiative, but he was absolutely working in the Company's interest, and Ripley was working against the Company in trying to wipe them out. Like this isn't even subtext or a creative interpretation or revisionist history, it's literal text. I'm not entirely sure you actually watched any of the movies (but this also isn't the first time you've gotten basic textual details about a movie totally wrong, so we're pretty par for the course here). Xenomrph fucked around with this message at 21:09 on Jul 12, 2016 |
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2016 21:07
|
|
|
Xenomrph posted:Ripley specifically says she wants to go to the planet to wipe the Aliens out. Burke agrees and that gets her onboard. You yourself have just written that Ripley is willing to work with the corporation if they kill all the aliens. That is not anticapitalism. That is merely anti-alien.
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2016 21:12
|
|
|
Xenomrph posted:Apparently Creative Assembly were going to include it in Alien Isolation (as well as a Queen) but felt it detracted from the gameplay flow, so they decided to keep them "off screen". If they were worried about gameplay flow they should not have padded a 4-6 hour concept into a 20+ hour game. SuperMechagodzilla posted:You yourself have just written that Ripley is willing to work with the corporation if they kill all the aliens. Not when you consider the follow-up scene where things have gone to poo poo and everyone discuss what do to with the situation and Burke pretty much plays his (the corporations) hand by arguing against a nuclear option, with the grunts and Ripley voting him down. thotsky fucked around with this message at 21:19 on Jul 12, 2016 |
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2016 21:14
|
|
|
Biomute posted:If they were worried about gameplay flow they should not have padded a 4-6 hour concept into a 20+ hour game.
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2016 21:17
|
|
|
I never got round to playing the nostromo DLC for Isolation. Did they include the egg room in that?
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2016 21:20
|
|
|
SuperMechagodzilla posted:You yourself have just written that Ripley is willing to work with the corporation if they kill all the aliens. But the Company doesn't want to kill all the Aliens (the exact opposite, in fact), so I don't know what you're trying to say. Like yeah sure I can agree that Ripley isn't anticapitalist, but there are way easier ways to argue that point than claiming the Company wants to destroy the Aliens (a claim that's shown to be objectively false across 3 movies). Despite the Company nearly getting her killed in the first movie, she willingly goes back on their payroll operating power loaders at Gateway Station, and then accepts their offer (via Burke) to be a consultant when they investigate Hadley's Hope. You're right that Ripley doesn't appear to be anticapitalist, but it has nothing to do with Burke being a lone actor or whatever. hemale in pain posted:I never got round to playing the nostromo DLC for Isolation. Did they include the egg room in that? No they did not, which was unfortunate.
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2016 21:25
|
|
|
Apollodorus posted:I think it is quite clear that the alien infestation represents the Viet Cong, and how the technologically superior force of the US military never stood a chance at defeating an entrenched, indigenous force whose survival was at stake unless they had nuked the entire peninsula and destroyed everything they were supposedly fighting over in the first place. Everyone involved in making Aliens has said as much, and my dad (who got drafted for Vietnam and then, in the most ironic turn of events ever to befall a member of our family in its documented history, failed the physical examination due to a bug - literally a parasite - he'd caught in the Peace Corps) realized the same thing the instant the Marines appeared on screen when I watched Aliens with him at age 10. Oh, sure, but we're starting to mix our metaphors here: movies can mean multiple things at once, but the aliens being stand-ins for the communist Viet Cong (in the context of their specific, immediate military conflict with the marines) doesn't in itself lend credibility to the idea that the aliens are the colonists after having been transformed to conduct a 'labour revolt', which I find simply unworkable with the events depicted on screen: of what value would a disgruntled worker be for a corporatist over a complacent one? What is the embryo the facehugger implants in its victim that ultimately transforms him or her: An enlightened worldview? A spirit of discontent? Why would a corporatist want to protect such a thing? You might be able to come up with an answer or two that fits, but you'd do so much bending and stretching you might as well just go with something that fits more naturally. But even before we go here, how about : OneThousandMonkeys posted:I guess if you entirely ignore Burke and the context of why Ripley is going there versus the context of why Ripley is sent there, as well as any number of other textual plot details that stand directly and obviously in the way of your fanfic. This is actually the thing that irks me the most about SMG's read. It's painfully obvious that The Company and everything they stand for are a bunch of bullshit and that Ripley understands this. She doesn't do anything to obviously defy them because (1) she's just one person and probably just doesn't have it in her to organize a revolution and (2) this is just not that loving story - it's a personal one about a woman trying to get on with her life after a traumatic event - the sci-fi capitalist dystopia she lives in is, well, the world she lives in. You might as well just go into each and every thread about a Hollywood movie that takes place in the US and drone on about how it's a tacit endorsement of American imperialism, liberalism and the military-industrial complex because the characters don't try to subvert government and corporate interests, even if it's loving When Harry Met Sally.
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2016 21:28
|
|
|
quote:You might as well just go into each and every thread about a Hollywood movie that takes place in the US and drone on about how it's a tacit endorsement of American imperialism, liberalism and the military-industrial complex because the characters don't try to subvert government and corporate interests, even if it's loving When Harry Met Sally. Funny you should mention.
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2016 21:30
|
|
|
I was going to say, you must be new to CD
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2016 21:35
|
|
|
Biomute posted:Not when you consider the follow-up scene where things have gone to poo poo and everyone discuss what do to with the situation and Burke pretty much plays his (the corporations) hand by arguing against a nuclear option, with the grunts and Ripley voting him down. Yes: a 'good corporation' would nuke the facility like Ripley says, whereas Burke stands for bad corporate practices. My target is this very ideological notion of a 'good corporation.' As in Iron Man 1, you are merely against the existence of weapons. Tony Stark becomes a 'good capitalist' once he stops selling weapons and begins selling 'green energy' instead. Building better worlds.
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2016 21:38
|
|
|
Everyone should be Anti-Alien. Those things are like the roaches of outer space.
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2016 22:01
|
|
|
Like they say, a liberal is just a conservative who hasn't been attacked by aliens yet.
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2016 22:02
|
|
|
CelticPredator posted:Everyone should be Anti-Alien. I'm from Phoenix, and I say KILL 'EM ALL. Oh wait, wrong franchise.
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2016 22:13
|
|
|
SuperMechagodzilla posted:Yes: a 'good corporation' would nuke the facility like Ripley says, whereas Burke stands for bad corporate practices. Your target? I thought we were talking about a movie here? I don't buy it. The movie never establishes an example of a 'good corporation'. The phrase "Building better worlds" is outright mocked by Ripley when she first hears it (in the added scene from the Special Edition). Burke is never shown to be convincing in his attempts at selling the capitalist way, and Ripley only agrees to come with in order to confront the aliens and destroy them. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q4QY5Z8LBEo
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2016 22:19
|
|
|
Neo Rasa posted:But inefficient compared to what? It goes from snake bursting out of someone's chest to eight foot tall adult in like one hour. Inefficient compared to a queen just squirting out eggs.
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2016 22:20
|
|
|
SuperMechagodzilla posted:Yes: a 'good corporation' would nuke the facility like Ripley says, whereas Burke stands for bad corporate practices. At no point is Weyland-Yutani a "good corporation," ever, in the entire loving franchise. Ripley reluctantly tags along because they seemingly have the same goal, and she and the Marines are very quick to turn on Burke when it turns out they don't. Burke isn't "bad corporate practices," he's corporate PR: feed the people a line of poo poo and then do the polar opposite behind their back.
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2016 22:23
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 22, 2024 08:56 |
|
|
zVxTeflon posted:Inefficient compared to a queen just squirting out eggs. Well sure, but egg morphing predates the Queen concept. It only looks inefficient in hindsight. That's why the popular fan theory is that certain Aliens could egg-morph a host into a Queen-producing egg, as a way to jumpstart a hive in the absence of a Queen.
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2016 22:24
|
|