Alien

This article or section is about something oldschool - and awesome. Make sure your rose-tinted glasses are on nice and tight, and prepare for a lovely walk down nostalgia lane.

The Alien franchise is a series of films, video games, and comic books that range from absolutely awesome to absolute garbage. The premise is remarkably simple: a hostile alien lifeform is discovered, and slowly it kills everyone. The series is very influential, with some of the high notes being the Titular Alien (or Xenomorph, as our friends at Xenopedia would call it) to Sigourney Weaver's performance as Ellen Ripley, and the USCM.

Origins

Back in the 1970's, sci-fi was pretty much the same; a futuristic setting with bleached white tile and highly futuristic technology. This sat unwell with a few directors, one of which was George Lucas.

With the release of Star Wars, 20th Century Fox was desperate to follow up with another sci-fi movie. The only script they had on the table was titled "Space Beast" by Dan O'Bannon. O'Bannon, like his college roommate John Carpenter was a huge fan of science fiction and H.P. Lovecraft. The original script was heavily influenced by At the Mountains of Madness, with a whole sub-plot being the crew of the ship finding a dead alien pyramid complex behind the derelict covered in bas-reliefs showing the history of the alien civilization. Scott was actually not their first choice, but he eagerly took up the opportunity. The creature of the film would be influenced by the work of H.R. Giger, who was hired to work on the creature design for the film.

Alien

The first film was met with resounding acclaim. If you wonder why, go ahead and watch it. The special effects stand up even today, and the acting from the cast was fantastic. The film itself took sci-fi in a unique direction: rather than having everything be a traditional sci-fi setting with computer gizmos and flashy lights, the setting of the film was a commercial freighter, designed to be dingy, dark, and grungy. Also should be complimented is the amount of work that went into the design of the model of the Nostromo, the aforementioned ship, which was gorgeous.

But the best part is by far the creature violence and design. The Xenomorph was fascinating to audiences at the time, not because it looked super scary, but because of its nightmarish form and characteristics, and the fact you could barely see it allowed your imagination to do the work that not even a team of designers could ever recreate. As for the creature violence? It's...dated, but still iconic, such as the Headbite, and the Chestburster scene(which was filmed only once and with no warning to the rest of the cast, with the intent of getting a genuine reaction of fear and terror.)

Additional celebration goes to the cast, in particular Sigourney Weaver as Ellen Ripley, the hot and awesome main hero of the film who takes no crap and shoots the alien out of her escape pod with a Grapple gun.

Aliens

The second film was actually not directed by Scott, but by another familiar name: James Cameron. This film was going to keep the sense of terror from the first film, but also have more combat. The film essentially entered into production hell (this tends to a be a trend with anything Cameron does) but the final result was a gorgeous masterpiece that stands the test of time just as well as Alien, if not better. The Xenomorph's design was changed to a more militant creature with a ridged head, as the smooth domed variant from Alien was deemed too fragile for filming.

High points in general are Sergeant Apone, the direct inspiration for Sergeant Johnson from Halo, the Colonial Marines, which are also the inspiration for the UNSC Marines from Halo, Ellen Ripley being a complete badass again, and FUCKING BILL PAXTON. The Colonial Marines were a light reference to Americans going into Vietnam, and a lot of the props in the movie were functional weapons or machines. The Pulse Rifles were modified Thompson Submachine guns, and the Smartguns were MG 42 machine guns with motorcycle parts added to make them look more gothic. Also of note was the acting of the little girl named Newt, who was chosen because she DID NOT SMILE during auditions.

Alien 3

The third film is skubby for a variety of reasons, the biggest of these being that the director decided to kill off some of the better parts of Aliens, such as Corporal Hicks and Newt. Additionally something that grates on people is the lack of guns in the film, which was a choice to theoretically make the film more terrifying and capture the feel of unarmed humans versus alien of the first film (which also lacked guns), which would have made sense if it wasn't on a prison planet. Plus there was little suspense as everyone knew who the hero was and what an alien would do and so instead of horror it became a formulaic 'Xenomorph kills skinheads until hero kills it'. After expanding both the setting, scale and arsenal in the 2nd film this nothing new back to basics approach didn't cut it with most viewers.

A lot of the problems with the third film came from executive meddling. As Fox choose a release date long before selecting a director, writers and even the concept itself.. This was also David Fincher's first time in the directors chair. As both David Cameron and Ridley Scott were working on other projects at the time. With the two producers changing shit they didn't like for no reason.

Today, the Assembly Cut is considered superior to the theatrical release. Along with the shittyness of the films released after Alien 3, the film is now seen in a better light.

Alien Resurrection

The premise of this one involves some brain donors deciding to clone Ellen Ripley and also happen to get a xenomorph embryo inside it as well, meaning that it will attain some xeno properties. The scientists, seemingly having no records of the sorts of terrible things the xenomorphs can do, decide to just extract the larva from the clone and then raise it for more science. Around the same time a group of mercenaries come in with a batch of humans in cryostasis all prepared to become xeno-food (and becoming very suspicious once they see the Ripley clone), the xenos decide to stage their breakout and it becomes a race to stop them from freeing the queen.

This is the film that basically killed the Alien franchise. Giger flat out calls the Aliens in the film "shit". No really. Ripley also isn't Ripley anymore, acting like some kinda weird edgy action hero. It's also written by the very controversial Joss Whedon, the same guy people blame for ruining Justice League. Which is fair when you watch this film and see him write in a part where a character looks at their own brains before they die. Something that will irk the propfags is that none of the guns made for the film actually could shoot, a stark contrast to Cameron's work in Aliens. This film contributes little, if anything to understanding the xenomorph biology beyond the fact they are smart, which we already could imply from the other three fucking films. It was all in all just a cash grab to suck the franchise dry.

Prometheus

The Ridley Scott directed ‘prequel’ to Alien, taking place roughly sixty years prior to the first film. Weirdly, this movie is OKAY as a sci-fi horror flick, with some awesomely grotesque scenes including a robot performing a c-section on someone to remove a rapidly growing parasite from them, while said person is still conscious. Sadly, as a tie in to an existing franchise the film has few memorable characters (with one major exception in David 8.) The plot consists of a convoluted journey to discover humanity’s “makers”, who are apparently the same species as the space Jockey in the original movie. They also want to destroy Earth for some reason. And the worst part is there is no Alien. Okay as a stand alone movie. Bad as an Alien film (better than 3 and Resurrection for sure though.) Has begun to receive something of a revival after fans got their hands on earlier scripts and discovered dialogue and deleted scenes that would've made the film 80 times better.

Alien: Covenant

Another film of varying degrees of skub, depending on who you ask. To some, it’s a return to form for Ridley Scott and the franchise. To others, it’s a poorly written mess and Ridley should have never have come back to the series. Wherever you fall, the movie’s a lot of fun. Violent deaths, crazy androids, and a good old fashioned shower kill.

The Covenant is a colony ship headed to a new world, but things take a left turn immediately when a solar flare kills James Franco. The crew decides “fuck all this space shit”, and instead head to a nearby habitable planet (that they found because of John Denver.) Of course it isn’t paradise and the landing crew is mostly killed pretty quickly. They also find David, the Android from Prometheus, who has been experimenting with genetically engineering life. His efforts yield the Facehugger, which does exactly what you’d expect it would. Eventually they return to the ship, square off against the alien one last time, and go to hyper sleep. Except it turns out David had infiltrated the crew by taking the place of the crew’s robot Walter, who just happens to look exactly like David. It’s implied David is going to spend some time experimenting on all the juicy colonists still laying in hyper sleep.

Vidya Gaems

A franchise as large as alien was bound to get video games about it, and just like Star Wars, some are either totally awesome or complete Fail.

Aliens Vs Predator(2010)

What many fans consider the best shooting game in the franchise. The game is very faithful to the lore of both universes, and the game most importantly captures the FEELING of the Alien franchise. The basic backdrop is that Peter Weyland, the apparent CEO of Weyland-Yutani, is on an alien planet, and opens a temple doors, which activates an electromagnetic pulse that shuts down his nearby colonies' systems. This causes a predictable Xenomorph outbreak, which leads to a slaughter of civilians and a Predator hunting party on the planet that draws in an actual reason for all three factions to be on the planet

In the marine campaign, it envelops you in a sense of hopelessness as allies die around you, and all you can do is survive. The Marine Campaign is also awesome because you get to shoot your way through hordes of aliens, androids, and even a predator with the infamous Pulse Rifle, and you are guided through the levels by marine waifu Tequila, who adds dramatic tension in the end by getting impregnated, and you have to get her to a stasis pod as soon as possible to halt the xenomorph growth and save her life.

The Alien Campaign has you follow an alien know as Specimen 6, and are a somewhat sympathetic character despite you being a murderous homocidal killing machine. The gameplay for the Alien is also fantastic including stabbing things with your tail, the infamous headbite to add some swag to your kills, and the ability to crawl and climb on walls which culminates in an epic duel between you and a predator, where you impregnate the thing with a chestburster.

The Predator campaign is also highly unique, in that while with the Marine campaign you simply shoot things to death, and the Alien campaign you have to be somewhat clever in getting around the AI and overwhelming guards and the like, the Predator Campaign is what one would consider the "advanced" mode. You start out with very little in terms of weaponry: a mask , a Plasma gun, stealth field, and claws. You can also leap absurd distances and hide in trees, waiting to plan each attack and strike you make. Of particular note is that you get to rip people's skulls and spines out of their bodies in glory kills. Later in the game, you get the death Boomerang, enhanced vision, and a javelin that will kill even the toughest non boss enemies in the game in one shot. The predator campaign ends in an epic battle between you and a Predator-Xenomorph hybrid in a lava cave shortly before you detonate the temple on the planet, destroying the technology and preventing humanity from getting access to it's technology.

It was praised by fans and gamers alike for it's faithfulness to the lore and more importantly to many, the absolute goriness of it that nearly got it banned in Australia. The environments were beautiful, the AI was fantastic, and the game was al around just a fantastic lover letter to both franchises.

Alien: Isolation

Remember how we said that the best shooter was Aliens Vs Predator? Well for many fans, Alien Isolation the magnum opus of the alien franchise. The AI was developed by the Creative Assembly, and the plot was written by none other than Dan Abnett himself.

The tl;dr of it is you play as Amanda Ripley, the daughter of Ellen Ripley, and are coming to this small station in the middle of nowhere because you heard there was news about your mother's disappearance. After arriving and nearly dying, you discover that the place is completely screwed and there is an alien infesting this place, so you have to go to work.

The appeal of this game is the horror, accuracy of the environments and their faithfulness to the original works, the survival aspect, the oppressive atmosphere, and the AI of the game being Absurdly intelligent to the point where it learned from it's mistakes. But what was even more awesome is that though there are weapons that you can use to kill weaker enemies, like rogue humans and “working Joes”, you can never use them to kill the alien, as it is impervious to death and can only be temporarily scared off by the weapons you possess.

The sad thing about this game is that it will never get a proper sequel because the White Collars at Sega didn't feel like the sales justified greenlighting a new project. Which while fair when compared to the sales numbers, is sad for all fans of the franchise.

Even today, people are finding small subtle things that make the game stand out, like the prescence of a Xenomorph outside the station while you hike to the airlock at the begining of the game, and the roars of a Queen in certain parts of the station can be heard.

Aliens: Colonial Marines (sigh)

This article is about something that is considered by the overpowering majority of /tg/ to be fail. Expect huge amounts of derp and rage, punctuated by /tg/ extracting humor from it.

Where as the above two games are considered masterpieces, Aliens: Colonial Marines is at best considered a massive disappointment. After all fans were hyped, the Colonial Marines are always awesome, and the trailer was amazing.

Colonial Marines problem lies in part due to bad programming, and that unlike the 2010 Aliens Vs Predator, it acted more like Call of Duty: Alien Warfare than it did an Alien game. People die, but not enough to really zero in on that oppressive terrifying feel the franchise is notorious for, and you rarely even connect with some of the characters in the game meaningfully. The worst part is that the developers had at least a rudimentary understanding of what made AVP work so well, as it made it into an entire level where you have to run unarmed from a darned mutated ugly super-xenomorph.

You have like 3 or 4 characters who survive throughout, which isn't a problem for Tequila in AVP, but is for literal combatants as it lowers the stakes of whether or not they will live. The ending reveals that Hicks, who allegedly died in Aliens, actually didn't die, and in DLC it's revealed it was some other guy who died in the pod who was misidentified, which was somewhat skubby. The plot was overall ok, but the sheer awfulness of the graphics and the boring repetitiveness of gameplay made the game controversial.

It wasn't the worst game, but it was far from what it was supposed to be. Unlike No Man's Sky(See the internet historian video), this game never got better. It's bugs and issues remained for players to fix.

In 2018 the folks at ModDB discovered that the Alien AI wasn't falsely advertised but rather broken because Gearbox can't fucking spell the word tether and instead spelled it as teather. This ability for the Aliens to tether onto walls and ceilings seen in the trailer was suddenly made possible. Except it was never patched.

Aliens: Fireteam Elite

An upocoming new release for the alien franchise that appears to be a coop squad based survival shooter set in the alien universe. Gameplay could be sketchy, but the lore will at least be faithful and Focus Home Interactive (the same blokes who made both battlefleet gothic games) will attempt to make the game fun. While they are not great at coop strategy, they are conciously aware of how to make a fun multiplayer at least, so they have that going for them

Species

Xenomorph: The titular "Alien" largely regarded as one of the scariest creatures in all of cinematic history. Xenomorphs have a Gigeresque influence to their design, with large heads and tongues with mouths on them, as well as bladed tails and large claws. They possess acidic blood that makes them a danger to kill at close quarters, with bladed weapons, or in ships. Our friends at Xenopedia speculate that the Xenomorph is a silicon based lifeform with tightly compressed blood vessels to allow for the acidic blood to gush out, and clearly do not need Oxygen to survive suggesting that cellular respiration may not require Oxygen. Xenomorphs also seem to have no need for food. Xenomorphs mature incredibly fast, going from Egg to Warrior in less than a few days. The Xenomorph physiology and reproductive cycle is extremely convoluted at the best of times, but roughly follows the pattern below.

• Egg: The Alien egg is itself an organism, that itself spawns another organism. The Egg's singular purpose is to keep the facehugger inside them alive until a host has been detected, in which case the Egg will open and release a facehugger. Eggs are produced by a Queen Alien, though deleted scenes in the original film indicate that in specific situations killed hosts can be turned into an Egg. How the fuck this is supposed to work remains to be explained. That being said, the Egg is immobile, and is vulnerable to being sho from a distance by ranged weaponry.

• Facehugger: The second stage of Xenomorph development. Facehuggers can be of two breeds: Royal Facehuggers and normal Facehuggers. The difference is pretty obvious: Royal Facehuggers create Queens, normal ones create normal Aliens. Facehuggers have strong finger like appendages to provide mobility and keep a firm grip on the host, as well as a long probiscous to insert the Embryo into an unfortunate host through the mouth. Some observers state that this oral injection feature of the creature was influenced by a deep seated fear among audiences of being forced to suck a dick without their consent.

• Chestburster: The third stage of Xenomorph development, not counting the Embryo, but the Embryonic development is pretty uniteresting and boring, so for this list we'll consider it number three. Chestbursters are small snakelike creatures with fully developed mouths and arms. They almost always result in the death of the host creature, killing them due to blood loss, trauma, and shock. Chestbursters are also the second most vulnerable stage of Xenomorph development, having no way to defend itself in any meaningful way beyond its acidic blood. The Chestburster will hide until it matures to the next stage of development.

• Drone: The fourth stage of Alien development. Drones are fully combat capable creatures, with all the monstrous features of the warriors. A few key differences between the two is that the Drone has a smooth head with smaller claws, while the Warrior has a more ridged head with larger claws. Drones are an intermediate form between Warrior and other developmental cycles, which are chosen by either plot conveience or pheremones. Drones seem to have an advanced amount of intelligence compared to Warriors, suggesting that the Alien lifecycle has evolved to create a cautious creature to increase the chances more hosts can be brought to Eggs for impregnation. Drones will also take up the features of their host, as evidenced by the "Dog Alien" in Alien 3.

• Warrior: The fifth and final stage for most Eggs. Warriors are tougher, stronger, and more deadly than Drones. They form the grunts of any Alien horde or nest. Warriors also seem to be adept swimmers. The Warrior class only exists because James Cameron found the domed heads from the previous film too fragile for on set filming. Thus a distinct class was born, though this was probably not the intent of Cameron or anyone involved in the project. While no evidence has been seen on screen, it is largely believed that Warriors will take up the features of their hosts like Drones. While not nearly as intelligent as Drones, Warriors are incredibly intelligent nonetheless.

• Queen: The Queen is the penultimate stage of development for Xenomorphs. Queens are colossal creatures with Four arms and a massive bladed tail. When not killing people, the Queen takes up a static place somewhere warm to create a den to lay eggs. The Queen creates an Ovipositor that can be detached forcibly if it is threatened. Queens also have a crownlike crest to denote their status, and their jaw has a limited ability to withdraw into the craium for protection.

In addition, there are several other minor species that were introduced in comics or games, like the Raven from Colonial Marines, Kings, or Praetorians, which are functionally just the Queen's personal guards.

Arcturians: An entire culture of aliens created by a single line of dialogue between two minor characters. At first they were stated to be furry-apelike creatures, but later sources changed them to be Humanoids with large eyes, pale skin, small noses, and dark hair. Arcturians reside in cities stated to be like those of Mesoamerican civilization. Arcturians are friendly to humans, but refuse to leave their planet. In spite of this, they have taken to speaking Human language, working for Human companies, and adopting firearms. They have a warrior class which traditionally would use bladed weapons. They are also sexually compatible with humans.

Engineers: An advanced race of creatures that have been introduced and expanded upon since the release of Prometheus. These guys are the same Space Jockey from Alien. In the current canon, Engineers are a mysterious race of chalk white aliens with dark eyes that have advanced technologies and sciences. They created Humans and likely created Arcturians, and to reference the concept of a perfect creature, they appear immaculate and without flaw. The Engineer seen in Prometheus did not seem friendly to them, and tried to wipe out Humanity. Where the specices currently stands is unknown at this time. They are also very strong and durable, able to resist gunfire and take damage that would fell many lesser men.

• The canon stuff is very bland, but the early scripts for the Engineer race are incredbily interesting. In deleted dialogue that should have been in the final film of Prometheus, the Engineer states that his people were angry because they gave Humanity "Eden" (Earth), unique among all their creations. Instead, they chose to pillage and murder and steal. The Engineers kidnapped a child (implied to be Christ, though the writers prefer to be ambiguous about this) to educate them, and they killed this savior. This script also revealed that speaking reduces their lifespan.

• More information from other scripts suggests that the Engineers are a lot like Eldar, being able to see and feel in spectra that humans only know exist with sensors. The giant ships they fly in appear dismal and dark and scary to us, but this may be because we cannot see the full spectrum that went into making them. They also were implied in this script to have died out due to inability to reproduce or transcended into another dimension and becoming energy. Yeah, the Prometheus scripts were whack yo.

• Why hadn't the Engineers wiped humanity out earlier? There are implications that the Engineer in Prometheus killed his crewmates because he still believed in Humanity. When Shaw addresses him, he can tell that she is genuine in her search for knwoledge, unlike Weyland who is greedy. In extended scenes prior to him getting impregnated by the Trilobite, he enters a room where Shaw is hiding, and looks upon it with wonder. You can even see in his eyes that he is second guessing everything he did up to that point in the film and is probably considering sparing Shaw...until she tries to kill him with an Axe.

Deacon: An alien that spawned from the Engineer in Prometheus. The Deacon is much like the alien, eyt also very different. The Engineers seem to have a reverence for the creature, displaying iconography similar to religious imagery. The creature has a mouth influenced by a Goblin Shark and a fleshier head, and appears near fully developed when out of the hosts body.

• Scripts for Prometheus implied that the "Black Goo" was actually Deacon blood, a substance that would allow the Engineers to reproduce and seed life on other planets by sacrificing their lives.

Trilobite: An unholy abomination of God that was yanked out of Shaw's body by a surgery robot. Created when Shaw's lover, infected with Deacon Blood, had sex with her. Advanced into advanced stages of development in less than a day. Originally squidlike upon extraction, the creature grew into a massive starfish-like monster. It is a little stronger than a mature Engineer, and in addition to it's primary tentacles, it has smaller arms used to stabalize a host before inserting a massive proboscis into their mouth.

Hammerpedes: Snakelike creatures and complete assholes that are highly aggressive. When two members of the Prometheus crew get lost, they encounter them. One kills a crewmember, and when the other intervenes trying to cut its head off, the creatures blood melts his helmet onto his face.