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I got some stuff recently and I’m not sure I posted it here.  I had repaints of Hicks and Drake from late in the 90s toyline’s run, but I’d never had the original toys themselves. Now that I have more money than sense, I rectified that. What’s extra entertaining are the character cards on the backs of the packaging:   Hicks’ card reads like a mad-libs of incorrect information, Drake’s actually manages to include a reference to his character notes from Cameron somehow - Drake was in prison and got his sentence commuted by enlisting in the Marines. Same thing with Vasquez, in fact.
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Jan 8, 2024 19:04
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I always thought it was an rear end in a top hat move not to give Ripley the rockets so she could blast the queen with 'em.
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Jan 8, 2024 19:20
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Halloween Jack posted:I always thought it was an rear end in a top hat move not to give Ripley the rockets so she could blast the queen with 'em. To be fair she got the power loader, which had a big Alienator rocket launcher on it.  I’ve still got all my other 90s Kenner stuff, the Ripley figure had a flame thrower that had a little flame that would pop out when you twisted Ripley’s waist, it ruled. The NECA remake gave her a stupid Smart Gun instead of a custom-retooled flame thrower, which was lame. The NECA remakes of the old Kenner stuff were largely goddamn fantastic though. Stand outs include the Rhino and Mantis Aliens. The Kenner toys were good, but the NECA stuff is crazy.    
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Jan 8, 2024 19:30
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I kinda love how much theorycrafting there is within the "alien(s)" extended media universe there is. I've actually been enjoying SMG's posts here recently too, which is strange to me. I mostly agree that Burke really did seem to be a pretty stupid lone wolf trying to do an idiotic hail mary attempt at becoming fabulously rich and powerful. His plan clearly lacks resources and doesn't even make the most sense even if it was to work. But we don't really know all the details. I could absolutely believe he had some contact in some WY bioweapons division that agreed to essentially be his "fence" for the aliens or anything he could recover. That he must have had some actual reason for believing his plan would work out, even his later revised plans. But I don't think he was working on anyone's behalf, he was not a middle man or agent for some larger conspiracy. He was just a dude who thought he had the contacts and resources to pull it all off. I just always assumed Burke worked like this: -Hears Ripley's story and his initial plan/hope is that there is some alien derelict there, but its something the colonist there can totally deal with and secure because how dangerous can they really be and this lady seems kinda crazy. I don't know how their space legal system works, but I imagine he'd only be doing this if he was indeed entitled to some percentage of the find via his actions. He has contacts with WY's bioweapons/tech division and knows that even playing a part in the chain that gets them this potential tech/samples would result in some personal gain, even if its just a promotion or a cushy job over in that division. -Learns the colony has gone silent right after he sent the team out. He panics realizing these aliens might actually be as dangerous as the crazy lady was rambling about. This scares him, but also gets him excited because if they were able to wipe out a whole colony operation they gotta be valuable. He needs a plan B now to still gain from all this, and he wants to cover his tracks if needed at the colony. He pulls what strings he has and gets the lovely small marine team plus Ripley to go investigate. He's probably thinking that barely armed colonists were no match for the aliens, but surely trained marines will be ok, I mean he wouldn't be going with them otherwise. At this point he might not actually have a single solid plan, he just knows he needs to go along and be flexible and opportunistic and "figure something out" while he's there. -When poo poo really goes south for everyone down on the planet and he's exposed and threatened, he has to go with plan C. Get enough people killed or infected that he can take control of the situation and bring back at least one infected person on ice. After seeing the aliens and what they're capable of, he's really banking that his "friends" within WY will stick their necks out a bit to clean the whole situation up so long as they get their aliens. He thinks there's a chance he can still survive, and profit because he's dead or in prison otherwise. Also about Ripley in Alien 3: they show her mental state really collapsing in that movie along with full blown hallucinations. From her perspective there really is one single "them" in the form of "the company" that's been constantly ruining her life. She doesn't care about the actual specific details or nuance, it's just "the company" as a malevolent entity, a unified hive mind on par with the aliens with a similar destructive singular goal. So she'll remember past events purely through that lens. Mother, Burke, the prison colony, all just faces of the same personified beast that haunts her.
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Jan 8, 2024 19:51
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Baronjutter posted:I just always assumed Burke worked like this: We never even find out what his Plan A was supposed to be because it ends up DOA the moment the colony goes dark and it’s taken out of his hands by the Marine response. That’s assuming he had even thought that far ahead when he called the colony, of course. Xenomrph fucked around with this message at 20:01 on Jan 8, 2024 |
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Jan 8, 2024 19:59
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Xenomrph posted:As someone who was obsessed with JP as a kid (and is still an unapologetic fanboy as an adult) it took me an alarmingly long time to put that together and recognize that “spared no expense” was a profoundly incorrect catchphrase regarding the original park. I'm pretty sure he says that line after they mention they hired Richard Kiley; they spared no expense on him, leading the project to suffer in other areas
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Jan 8, 2024 21:58
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Baronjutter posted:-Hears Ripley's story and his initial plan/hope is that there is some alien derelict there, but its something the colonist there can totally deal with and secure because how dangerous can they really be and this lady seems kinda crazy. I don't know how their space legal system works, but I imagine he'd only be doing this if he was indeed entitled to some percentage of the find via his actions. He has contacts with WY's bioweapons/tech division and knows that even playing a part in the chain that gets them this potential tech/samples would result in some personal gain, even if its just a promotion or a cushy job over in that division. This sounds basically correct to me; what stands out is why things go wrong. In Alien, the uncontrolled element of the corporate plot that makes the whole thing go haywire is the crew; Ripley and the others put up a fierce enough resistance to the alien that Mother's attempts to maximize corporate profits ends up blowing up in her screen. Ash idealizes the alien and laments that he's (that everyone's, really) falling short of its example. In Aliens, the uncontrolled element of the corporate plot that makes the whole thing go haywire is the alien itself. Burke doesn't realize how dangerous it is and how fast it can spread, etc. Then Ripley criticizes Burke for falling short of the alien's example. There's a shift in perspective here where we're suddenly looking through Ash's eyes rather than Ripley's. The act of hubris that called down nemesis in the sequel film is that the alien wasn't treated with enough reverence.
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Jan 8, 2024 22:09
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Leave posted:I'm pretty sure he says that line after they mention they hired Richard Kiley; they spared no expense on him, leading the project to suffer in other areas I think he says it a couple other times throughout the movie as well. To this day I still have no idea who Richard Kiley is and why hiring him is supposed to be impressive.
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Jan 8, 2024 22:37
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Ferrinus posted:Mother following her programmed directives to seek wealth, Ash following mother's directives and overruling labor as necessary, etc. Ferrinus posted:In that case, even if we ignore the explicit test of the movie that the Nostromo was rerouted by Mother mid-flight and that the special order was written post-rerouting, I do think it's worth exploring these two statements in tandem- how much agency does Mother have? How much agency does Burke? (I don't think it really matters) essentially, Mother and Burke do mirror each other, in my view, as 'actors who due to corporate culture are allowed/encouraged to make bad decisions, but assume all the risk themselves and the greater company can cast them off as needed" (though Mother is a bit more literal, being a computer) So with Mother- she takes the Nostromo off course (delaying and potentially putting at risk the Nostromo and its big ore delivery) according to a pre-programmed directive, and once she found out what the Alien was, had the latitude to classify the crew as expendable (which further puts the ship/refinery/ore at risk). But where did that directive come from? Why did she have that ability to write herself new objectives? Well, seems unlikely to me that this is the result of some programmer gone rogue, and more like the programmers were acting in accordance with whatever instructions/guidelines/attitudes (official or unofficial) that the higher ups were instilling in them. That is- the attitude that it is permissible or desirable to gamble company assets and worker lives in pursuit of... profit(???) Like, I'm not sure that Mother wasn't also completely out of her depth and scrambling too- what levers does she actually have access to in order to actually capture the alien? She can consider the crew expendable all she wants but as the film demonstrates she has limited actual power over them. What was she going to do? Just drive back to WY-HQ while the alien roams around the ship, and then send an email like "hey come look around there's something neat"? Burke's actions follow this model, too. He's "programmed" to seek shiny, even when his tools are completely unsuited, and has to scramble when it goes pear-shaped. This whole discussion started with people wondering why it was that the Nostromo went off course- that can't possibly be an appropriate response, right? Why would space-truckers carrying a fatass refinery be the ones to go see? Shouldn't Mother just log the signal and relay it to someone better suited (whoever that might be) Logically, it's a terrible decision, which gives rise to the conspiracy theories. I don't think it's a conspiracy though, I think it's just the corporate greed filtering down so that 'seek an unknown shiny above all else- you'll get a percentage' even makes it into their AI programming. * Burke sending the colonists to investigate the derelict was a mistake- but it was one that was born of and festered in his corporate environment. The 'rules' he abides by (that he'll get a nebulous claim on future profits) are akin to Mother's programming. It's his mistake as a human being, yes for sure, but it's the mistake of the greater company that he was ever in that position- or even wanted to be in that position- to make that mistake. Mother taking the Nostromo off-course to investigate the signal was also a mistake- she gets a bit more of a pass as a literal machine, but yeah it's still the company's fault in the greater picture. (but of course, notice how in Ripley's debriefing/trial they focus soley on Ripley's actions, and there's no mention of the Nostromo being diverted at all) If she's a machine, then so is he, and they were programmed by the same hands. If he's an independent bad apple, so is she, and they both grew off the same tree and were picked by the same hands. * just a for fun thing, but now I'm picturing the guy who programmed the 'seek shiny' directive getting residuals from any shinies found by AI following that directive even waaaay down the line, akin to that one goon who would get a couple cents from EA every once in a while for having put code into the Madden games several decades ago or whatever it was Mazerunner fucked around with this message at 16:58 on Jan 9, 2024 |
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Jan 9, 2024 16:41
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Leave posted:I'm pretty sure he says that line after they mention they hired Richard Kiley; they spared no expense on him, leading the project to suffer in other areas https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DqM0yZK__gI heheh but it comes up several times- but only about superficial things. The park is 'spectacular', the food, the fancy electric cars, the voice overs, the dining room and guest accommodations. The things that wow guests and investors. Except yeah, the 'other areas' where the project suffered? All the important things, like... the programming and security systems, being able to keep the dinosaurs contained and healthy and accounted for and not breeding, the car locks not working, having enough staff, etc. (like while the big storm caused a lot of employees to leave, the design goal was to minimize staff and automate as much as they could- except the automation was done by one underpaid guy (in the movie- in the book Nedry had a company but he was the lowest bidder and they still stiffed him)) Hell, even the helicopter didn't have the right seatbelt
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Jan 9, 2024 16:54
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Baronjutter posted:I just always assumed Burke worked like this: While that's broadly correct, and likely the preferred reading of the film, there are some important details. First off, Burke absolutely knows, and knew at the time, that what he did was illegal. That's his primary and (possibly sole) motivation for attempting to kill Ripley. He was hoping that nobody would really look into the sequence of events - which is silly, because the rights things is certainly a legal clusterfuck and millions of dollars are at stake. Going off the extended version here, Newt's family were independent "wildcat" surveyors whose day-to-day work involved exploring unpromising areas around Hadleys Hope and using "seismic survey charges" to scan for subterranean mineral deposits. Upon finding anything, they could then stake a claim and, presumably, lease the mineral rights to Weyland-Yutani. Cameron's first draft of the script implies that the rights are simply evenly split between any discoverers: like, Newt's mom and dad each get a third of the claim, while Burke likely gets a third for sending the initial message. However, that doesn't really make sense because Burke was acting in an official capacity as a representative of Weyland-Yutani - with a signed directive, even! - so why would he be treated as an individual (or a partner of the Newts) when it comes to ownership? And why would Newt's fam be granted such a large fraction of the rights in this scenario? In the actual film, the dude in the extended cut doesn't know how following a company directive affects a wildcatter's rights to the claim - but we can make some basic assumptions. Like, the survey teams aren't going to go out and do free work just because some dude sent an e-mail. They would be compensated for their time in some way, even if they find nothing, because surveying takes work, and other resources. So, Newt's fam are implicitly working as independent contractors at the time of the incident - which changes the whole dynamic. And that sort of work is evidently common in Hadleys Hope, so there's going to be legal minutia already hashed out (even if these particular colonists are ignorant of it). A three-way-split is just implausible - and it's absurd that these independent surveyors wouldn't be extremely knowledgeable about these rights, when their entire business depends on it. Why would Weyland-Yutani agree to give independent contractors rights to the find at all, instead of a more conventional payment? Of course, the simplest explanation is the cynical one: as with the part where Ripley finds out about Burke's plan but tells nobody for hours, Cameron just didn't really plot this out too well. But that cynical take would be failing to read the existing film - so we have to go back to the conclusion that Burke was never going to get legal rights to anything, and was betting on a makeshift criminal conspiracy from the start. That's more consistent with his characterization anyways: his assumption that disgruntled Ripley will be 'smart' and instantly down to commit crimes (like smuggling invasive species through customs). Burke's entire MO is to just do crimes openly and hope that nobody will care, even as things get worse and worse. By the time Burke's at the point of doing two attempted murders, though, he's not even trying at all. He makes zero attempt to cover his tracks, and just leaves the alien storage tubes lying of the floor. Was he gonna come back and hide those later? So Ripley's assumption that Burke was going to stealthily kill everybody in their sleep, to avoid having to declare aliens at the border, isn't really supported by evidence. Killing Ripley was impulsive, having more to do with shutting her up or just expressing some kind of misogynist rage. SuperMechagodzilla fucked around with this message at 17:25 on Jan 9, 2024 |
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Jan 9, 2024 17:21
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Mazerunner posted:Except yeah, the 'other areas' where the project suffered? All the important things, like... the programming and security systems, being able to keep the dinosaurs contained and healthy and accounted for and not breeding, the car locks not working, having enough staff, etc. (like while the big storm caused a lot of employees to leave, the design goal was to minimize staff and automate as much as they could- except the automation was done by one underpaid guy (in the movie- in the book Nedry had a company but he was the lowest bidder and they still stiffed him)) It's portrayed as being even worse in the books. In the films at least the disaster unfolds as a result of deliberate sabotage by the underpaid programmer, but in the book there were already serious problems stemming from incompetence before that, such as dinosaurs escaping onto ships going back to the mainland, or the park not noticing that the animal populations were significantly larger than planned due to breeding in the wild, because their automated monitoring system was designed to only count dinosaurs until it reached the expected number of each species, rather than count every specimen it could detect.
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Jan 9, 2024 17:38
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SuperMechagodzilla posted:While that's broadly correct, and likely the preferred reading of the film, there are some important details. Oh yeah that's 100% what I'm operating under too. None of this is legal or would be a transparent and official matter of corporate policy or official contracts. This is Burke getting huge unofficial kickbacks or other advantages through his "fence" within some silo of WY. Some bioweapons bigwig he knows who will make sure Burke is rewarded for his actions in some way under the table, as well as helping him avoid any sort of criminal charges. Burke knows enough about the company's inner workings to feel confident that this plan will result in a big reward.
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Jan 9, 2024 20:12
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Baronjutter posted:Oh yeah that's 100% what I'm operating under too. None of this is legal or would be a transparent and official matter of corporate policy or official contracts. This is Burke getting huge unofficial kickbacks or other advantages through his "fence" within some silo of WY. Some bioweapons bigwig he knows who will make sure Burke is rewarded for his actions in some way under the table, as well as helping him avoid any sort of criminal charges. Burke knows enough about the company's inner workings to feel confident that this plan will result in a big reward. Yeah this is my take on it, too. Burke is complicit in at least the negligent manslaughter of the entire colony, and he clearly doesn’t care. Every step of the way he’s not thinking through the ramifications of his actions and what his next steps will be (assuming he even cares).
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Jan 9, 2024 21:06
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Mazerunner posted:So with Mother- she takes the Nostromo off course (delaying and potentially putting at risk the Nostromo and its big ore delivery) according to a pre-programmed directive, and once she found out what the Alien was, had the latitude to classify the crew as expendable (which further puts the ship/refinery/ore at risk). But where did that directive come from? Why did she have that ability to write herself new objectives? Well, seems unlikely to me that this is the result of some programmer gone rogue, and more like the programmers were acting in accordance with whatever instructions/guidelines/attitudes (official or unofficial) that the higher ups were instilling in them. That is- the attitude that it is permissible or desirable to gamble company assets and worker lives in pursuit of... profit(???) I'm more inclined to analogize Burke to Ash than to Mother, because Ash is the human face who's actually scrambling around to fulfill the blind hunger of Weyland-Yutani to grow its profits, while Mother actually is that urge. As you point out, Mother is fundamentally helpless; she can autonomously reroute the ship, but all Ripley has to do is sit down at the terminal and enter some commands manually for the evil computer to suddenly be completely at the workers' mercy. Mother herself doesn't personally benefit from the fulfillment of her directives except in the sense that additional profits might, down the line, be invested into upgrades for Mother or the construction of additional Mothers (and why would she even care about that?). I do think you're right that there's an as-above-so-below relationship here; there's an irrationality baked into Mother's heuristics that's an inescapable result of her caring about profits at all. If we plot the likely return-on-investment of her actions, I think we'll get a pretty wild roller coaster ride of a curve where in the immediate short term she's losing the value that the crew represents, but in the medium term she's gaining the value the alien represents, but then in the longer term she might also be sacrificing the Nostromo, but then if she doesn't make this gamble right now that makes the alien specimen is only retrieved by a science vessel X months down the line and therefore the exponential profit function loses that many months to slope upwards, etc. etc. - there's always going to be a timescale on which her actions are stupid and insane, even as there's another timescale in which she's being coldly rational. But I think the fact that Mother is looking out for Weyland-Yutani while Burke is looking out for himself still creates a fundamental divide between the two characters; they're both doing their best with what they've got, but Burke is betraying capital while Mother is merely intensifying the exploitation of labor.
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Jan 9, 2024 21:54
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Baronjutter posted:Oh yeah that's 100% what I'm operating under too. None of this is legal or would be a transparent and official matter of corporate policy or official contracts. This is Burke getting huge unofficial kickbacks or other advantages through his "fence" within some silo of WY. Some bioweapons bigwig he knows who will make sure Burke is rewarded for his actions in some way under the table, as well as helping him avoid any sort of criminal charges. Burke knows enough about the company's inner workings to feel confident that this plan will result in a big reward. The question is ask here is, if this "Michael" figure is such a key player, why isn't he in the film? It would be trivially easy to at least add a line of dialogue like "I know a guy in Science Division" or whatever. But there isn't such a thing. Certainly, there's no point where Burke implies that he has any sort of funding or backup. The only reference to anything remotely like a possible "Michael" figure is this: "Those two specimens are worth millions to the bio-weapons division, right?" Burke seems to have a pretty concrete idea how much a space-panther is worth to a specific organization. But, there, Burke is simply taking part of Ripley's testimony from the hearing and pointing it back at her - reminding Ripley of what she already believes to be true: "Right?" Burke has been following Ripley, all this time, because he believes she's is "smart": that she'll be down to restore her old reputation, look like a hero, etc. Moreover, she's pissed at the company, the government, the world. In Burke's view, the two of them could be allies against the company that 'threw her to the wolves': "Now, if you're smart, we can both come out of this heroes and we will be set up for life." But he was too cagey to approach her directly - only at the last minute. Burke has a bad habit of not telling anyone what he's planning, even when he desperately needs their help for the plan to work. He sent the colonists to the ship and didn't even warn them, when he could have easily gotten Newt's family onboard with the scheme before sending them there. But Burke's reason for not telling them is simple: if the ship wasn't actually there, he would have exposed himself as a criminal for nothing. He's too fearful to approach people outright. So there's no indication that Burke actually has preexisting contacts within the bio-weapons division. (He himself is, after all, in the separate 'mining/mineral extraction' division.) Burke is stating his belief that the alien is so overwhelmingly valuable that, once they get it through customs, they can simply 'figure something out'. Call the bioweapons division and be like "hey I got this illegal egg do u want it". It's stupid, but that's what he's doing. SuperMechagodzilla fucked around with this message at 22:15 on Jan 9, 2024 |
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Jan 9, 2024 22:10
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Okay, so I’m a little bit further into the Bishop book, I think something like 26%. im wondering if the book reconciles its own premise (Michael Bishop recovering Alien data from trashed-Bishop) with the Colonial Marines Technical Manual’s last chapter where WY had a full download of Bishop post-Alien3 and that’s where the bulk of their Alien knowledge came from. Like, does the book address how Michael Bishop came into possession of Bishop’s remains? Did he just… take them from Fury 161 when all the WY people he was with weren’t paying attention? What’s the chain of custody here? If WY did download Bishop per the CMTM, does Michael know that? If WY could do it, why can’t he? Not to mention I’m not sure why Michael cares about that knowledge when he’s got literal honest to god bona-fide facehuggers in his labs, which he got from…. who knows where. I don’t know how thrilled I am with the idea of Michael Bishop building Bishop a new body that looks different from his old body. Like, I mean, if it’s meant to be Lance Henriksen as he looked in his early 30s or something then I guess that’s okay, I dunno. But if it’s a totally different guy, I don’t like it. Like, on paper, a book about Michael Bishop and Bishop’s fate after Alien3 and the relationship between the two is a hell of a hook. It’s just the way it’s playing out has me raising my eyebrows. I talked with Andrew Gaska (the guy behind the Alien RPG, who also acted as a franchise consultant for a while) if he was consulted on this book. He said he wasn’t, and it shows. Fun fact about the Colonial Marines Technical Manual - the author very specifically only had the license to write about things from the second movie, and nothing else. That’s why the last chapter has no pictures of the Nostromo or the EEV from ‘Alien3’ - he was able to write about the Nostromo and Narcissus specifically because they get mentioned in ‘Aliens’, and he wrote about the EEV strictly as a hypothetical exercise that conveniently happens to line up with Alien3. He also includes some sly references to Alien3 in the last chapter (“Epsilon Eridani” is the Company’s trip to Fury 161). I talked with the author a few years back, I asked him if he were to change anything in a reprint, what would he change. He said that he’d likely rewrite the whole book from top to bottom, using his subsequent 30ish years of professional writing experience and a more modern grasp of military doctrine. the book has still been a cornerstone of USCM technical "lore" in the franchise since it was published - almost immediately after it came out, even toy packaging started referencing it. I've gotten my copy signed by Lance Henriksen and Michael Biehn (so far). Xenomrph fucked around with this message at 22:30 on Jan 9, 2024 |
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Jan 9, 2024 22:22
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Prey won an Emmy the other night for sound design
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Jan 9, 2024 22:41
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FastestGunAlive posted:Prey won an Emmy the other night for sound design Should’a won an Emmy for having the goodest doggo in a supporting role. 
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Jan 9, 2024 22:48
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I think by the time Burke is on the Sulaco his plan has already failed and he is in rear end-covering-mode. My take is that he initially believes Ripley's story that there is indeed some sort of derelict alien vessel, but downplays her 'giant alien' talk as that of a crazy woman. He is too much of a coward to really willingly want to walk himself into a super dangerous situation. As for legal profits: We don't have any idea, and I don't think the movie or Burke's motivation is any weaker because he doesn't give us a full explanation of how he is going to make money through the W-Y system on this. - Maybe there is a big special cash prize for anyone who makes a major contribution to finding some Cool Alien poo poo, and he's angling for a bonus? - Maybe he just wants a big pat on the head and a promotion and he's doing this for minor gains because he isn't risking anything by sending Newt's family out. -Maybe he wants to just confirm the location of the ship, and then cut a deal with some colonists to organize some smuggling of the salvage of the derelict? Newt's family can pry out some futuristic gizmo's and give them to Burke's contacts in a deep salvage team who can them sell them to whoever? I still figure that the giant ship full of junk is worth more than 'the alien' even if it didn't have eggs. There are a lot of ways to make money off of this, and I don't think the specific route to profit really matters. Burke saw his chance and went for it. By the time the Marines are involved Burke already knows he has hosed up big time and is going along to find some way to cover up his involvement or get away with some profit. As for trying to kill Ripley and Newt: I don't think he needs to cover his tracks with the empty jars. If all went well then Ripley and Newt would never wake up to tell the Marines. They are discovered with parasites on their face, and the Marines can assume that the things got out on their own or maybe the kid messed with them or something. Burke can chime in with some bullshit about the amazing medical care available Back In Civilized Space and convince the Marines to evacuate the facehug victims and toss them in a freezer. Burke programs his own freezer to wake up 'early' and he can launch the Marines into deep space and make up whatever story he wants. Presumably he has erased the records of his guilt in the colony's disaster from the Civilized-Space end of the chain, and the colony is just a smoking crater. Now Burke has control of a ship with two frozen aliens and can presumably profit from it or at least stop his own rear end from going to jail.
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Jan 10, 2024 02:28
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You guys can explain it however you want, but the fact is that at some point in May 2122 the crew of the Nostromo had a really difficult couple of days. And I think you guys should be a little more respectful of that.
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Jan 10, 2024 05:22
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MrMojok posted:You guys can explain it however you want, but the fact is that at some point in May 2122 the crew of the Nostromo had a really difficult couple of days. Circa June 3rd, to be precise. https://alientimeline.wordpress.com/2069-2123/ Also I like to think Jones had a great time as everything went down. He scared off an Alien! Twice!
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Jan 10, 2024 05:30
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Xenomrph posted:Circa June 3rd, to be precise. The Jurassic Bark style montage of him waiting on Gateway Station for Mom to come home is too sad to contemplate though.
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Jan 10, 2024 05:51
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Owlbear Camus posted:The Jurassic Bark style montage of him waiting on Gateway Station for Mom to come home is too sad to contemplate though. Yeah see that’s why this is canon https://youtu.be/20wsNqmTPxI?si=qF57jH6-E2-mqc9h
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Jan 10, 2024 06:11
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Xenomrph posted:Circa June 3rd, to be precise. Perhaps what I actually meant was that sometime in May 1979, *I* had a bad time. When I saw it in the theater. (Only now do I realize the significance of setting Aliens in 2179)
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Jan 10, 2024 06:34
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Xenomrph posted:Should’a won an Emmy for having the goodest doggo in a supporting role. That's a fact. It's Fury Road all over again, no category for Most Awesome.
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Jan 10, 2024 06:46
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Mr. Grapes! posted:There are a lot of ways to make money off of this, and I don't think the specific route to profit really matters. Burke saw his chance and went for it. By the time the Marines are involved Burke already knows he has hosed up big time and is going along to find some way to cover up his involvement or get away with some profit. It does matter though, as much as anything matters, because we’ve seen the consequences. By not going into basic stuff like 'who’s paying who’, and ‘how’, you have a big blank spaces where characterization for Weyland-Yutani, and the colonists - and the government - ought to be. And that affects our understanding of how every other character in the film relates back to those entities. Without sufficient detail, people just start imagining whatever they want to fill the gaps. The lack of detail also betrays a political focus (or lack thereof). The basic functioning of the corporation? That’s clearly not nearly as important as understanding the life cycle of the space panthers. (Not that I’m complaining about the panther detail, mind, because the massive gulf between how dangerous they actually are and how dangerous they’re perceived to be is the most interesting part of the film.) The scenario in Alien 1, as a contrast, is written and presented with absolute clarity. SuperMechagodzilla fucked around with this message at 07:58 on Jan 11, 2024 |
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Jan 10, 2024 23:57
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I guess we differ in that it seems pretty clear. The Derelict and the Alien would be immensely valuable for a corporation to possess, even discounting any sort of bio weapon. Some people think the colony scenes slow down the film already. I don't think Burke having a secret phone call with his fence where he tells him to meet him on Mars for the handoff or whatever is going to really improve the clarity of the film. It doesn't effect Ripkeys characterization at all. She has heard the arguments before and does not want any scenario in which the alien gets captured, she just wants it dead. She doesn't care if he's selling it on the black market or legally through the company or whatever, in her mind it all results in the thing killing more people. The stuff is worth money. Burke as a WY exec thought he found a way to profit by it through overstepping his boundaries. He hosed up and now we're at Ripley's apartment with Gorman.
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Jan 11, 2024 04:10
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Mr. Grapes! posted:I guess we differ in that it seems pretty clear. That's not exactly the point, although Burke does tell us the alien samples are worth less than a 60-year-old space tugboat. (Is the technology of Jokey's ship any more sophisticated than the Nostromo? We don't have much to go on.) What I'm referring to are the relationships between characters. So, for example, Newt's dad delays calling in the discovered spaceship until after they investigate the interior. Was he wrong to do so? Like, legally speaking: what procedures were in place that were violated, if any? According to Burke's later dialogue about the "security situation", it's possible that Newt Dad didn't need to call it in immediately because he wasn't aware of any immediate threat. But, then, 'calling it in' is likely distinct from the 'security situation' - a whole other procedure. If it is the same thing, though, then Burke is taking an enormous risk, hoping that Newt Dad will do a crime. But did Newt Dad even do a crime? Given that the character's only onscreen for a minute or so, every bit of info counts. In Alien 1, we are given a very clear breakdown of the quarantine procedure: in addition to normal cleaning, at least 24 hours of additional decontamination is required after contact with an unknown organism. Breaking the quarantine is both against the law and against company policy, yet Dallas breaks chain of command and 'orders' the door to be opened, to which Ash obliges. Dallas will later admit to a cynical belief that the whole chain of command is bullshit anyways; since nobody has any 'real' power - which certainly informs how we interpret his actions
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Jan 11, 2024 08:47
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You know I’m sure that in the 2 years I didn’t post in this thread someone already posted this but https://youtu.be/2agXKbgSprI?si=Xr73q5ssmd928eqL
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Jan 12, 2024 02:16
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Xenomrph posted:To be fair she got the power loader, which had a big Alienator rocket launcher on it. The old Aliens toys ruled. They were some of my favorite monster toys as a kid. They fought G.I. Joes, Power Rangers, and every super hero.
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Jan 13, 2024 06:42
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Open Marriage Night posted:The old Aliens toys ruled. They were some of my favorite monster toys as a kid. They fought G.I. Joes, Power Rangers, and every super hero.  “Don’t talk to me or my son ever again.”
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Jan 13, 2024 21:06
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https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/movies/movie-news/noah-hawley-prometheus-alien-prequel-fx-1235787276/ "For me, and for a lot of people, this 'perfect life form' — as it was described in the first film — is the product of millions of years of evolution that created this creature that may have existed for a million years out there in space," Hawley explained. "The idea that, on some level, it was a bioweapon created half an hour ago, that's just inherently less useful to me."
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Jan 15, 2024 17:53
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Gravitas Shortfall posted:https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/movies/movie-news/noah-hawley-prometheus-alien-prequel-fx-1235787276/ I endorse this product and/or service.
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Jan 15, 2024 17:57
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Noah Hawley excitedly approaching a canister of black goo, mask off.
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Jan 15, 2024 19:06
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josh04 posted:Noah Hawley excitedly approaching a canister of black goo, mask off. first episode post-credits scene, Hawley gives Ridley Scott a swirlie in a toilet and then shouts “David didn’t create poo poo” before walking away in disgust. He locks eyes with the camera and says “Canon.”
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Jan 15, 2024 19:25
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Xenomrph posted:first episode post-credits scene, Hawley gives Ridley Scott a swirlie in a toilet and then shouts “David didn’t create poo poo” before walking away in disgust. He locks eyes with the camera and says “Canon.” That'd be pretty  but at least it'd have more personality than we're actually gonna get
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Jan 15, 2024 23:39
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That’s a very silly misunderstanding of how evolution works. Like, I can think of a few things that are the product of millions of years of evolution and that have existed for a million years. Birds, for example. Evolution isn’t inherently progressive, like you’re levelling up over time. Also, as gone over earlier in the thread, the endlessly-swarming exponentially-reproducing aliens imagined by fans would quickly die out. They’re unfit. Hawley also seems to misunderstand that Ash is talking about the creature’s psychology - the mix of implicitly-humanlike intelligence and amorality - rather than its physicality. Like, Ash doesn’t really care too much about the polarized silicon on the crab.
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Jan 16, 2024 02:12
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That's a foolish assumption
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Jan 16, 2024 02:25
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Today I spent a little more than I probably should have (but I got a good deal, honest! No really!) on something I never thought I’d see in person: Vintage 1979 Alien action figure (Coke can for scale). https://youtu.be/iBhTpyJMnZY?si=ZRfVWgHa7ONw_KK9
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Jan 16, 2024 03:37
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