R Rating Ep13 - Aliens (1986)

[00:00:00] Speaker A: Mongoolie's movie madness. It's a sight to behold. Mongoolie's passion for films never close up. From classics to new releases. He's in the no Mongoolies movies. Let's start the show foreign. [00:00:35] Speaker B: And welcome back to our rating the show where I get together with a couple of my friends, we take a movie franchise, break it down by movie, give it an overall score, throw it on the board, and see where it's gonna land. This week, we're talking about 1986's Aliens, the sequel to Alien with probably one of the best titles for a sequel I've ever heard. And I'm joined, as always, by Brian and Will Ryan. How are you doing today? [00:00:55] Speaker A: I'm fantastic. How are you doing, Dan? [00:00:57] Speaker B: I'm doing very well. It's been a stressful day, but we're. I'm happy to be here now and talking with you guys. How about you, Will? You said you've been having a cold you just cannot quite get rid of. [00:01:06] Speaker C: That's right. [00:01:09] Speaker B: Good talk. All right, you have a synopsis ready for us for this one. [00:01:17] Speaker C: I mean, ready or not, here it comes. Aliens. 1986. After a 57 year catnap, Ripley is refreshed and ready for action. She agrees to travel back to the source of her alien nightmares to investigate a colonization crew gone mia but this time, Ripley does not plan on walking on eggshells. Instead, she plans on burning them to the ground. [00:01:46] Speaker B: That's significantly better than last week's, like, half a sentence. I'll take it. [00:01:49] Speaker C: Okay. Okay. Leave the judgment for the movie. [00:01:53] Speaker B: Okay. You've been attacking me on stream. I feel like I can get a little bit here and there. [00:01:58] Speaker A: All right, this one. Did you guys get to watch the extended footage? Because I. I think that that adds to the film but does not change the film. And I love every little cut scene that you can find. Did you just happen to see any of the extra footage? [00:02:14] Speaker B: So that's something I definitely wanted to talk on. I watched the one that was on Disney plus with a friend of mine and was not getting into the movie for some reason and realized after it ended, oh, it didn't have, like, the scene that stuck out to me was the scene where they have the turret set up in the hallway and the numbers are just draining and not have that scene. And I was like, that scene doesn't necessarily add a ton to the movie, but, like, if it missed that, what else did it miss? And like, six months ago, I picked up the Abyss, Aliens and True lies, all on 4k because they were released 4k for the very first time. But I never really opened it because it's on Disney plus. I'll just watch it there. But I was like, okay, well, let's see if there is a director's cut for. The director's cut for Abyss was drastically different. I ended up watching this movie twice in the last week, once on Disney plus and once on 4K. And the 4K version does add some extra scenes. Nothing super drastic, not movie changing like the Abyss does, but it adds enough to the movie to not only give you more context, but also more intrigue into why the characters are doing what they're doing. It really doesn't change the movie, but it definitely changes how you interact with the movie, if that makes any sense whatsoever. I really enjoyed the director's cut far more than the Disney plus one. What about you, Will? Which one did you watch? [00:03:29] Speaker C: I watched the OG I've seen the director's cut. I actually prefer the OG that being said, there are two scenes, one you mentioned that I would have liked to see in the OG cut, and that's the turret scene and the mother scene. Ripley's mother. Why. [00:03:49] Speaker A: Why didn't you like the scene where she learns about Amanda? [00:03:55] Speaker B: I just. [00:03:56] Speaker C: I just didn't think it was necessary. I didn't think it was necessary to see the whole colonization thing going on. That's like a retread of the first movie to me. [00:04:08] Speaker A: Right? [00:04:08] Speaker C: Like them colonizing and setting up is like the first movie where they're just learning about everything and it just slows the pace of the movie unnecessarily. For an action movie, I feel. [00:04:19] Speaker A: See, I. I completely disagree. I felt that the scene where she learns about Amanda having passed and she just misses her by a couple of years really added the depth of the whole mother daughter theme that runs throughout this. It. It added more of that in there and I, I thought it was important. Not necessary, but important to just add more color to it. And then the scenes when you see like the little kids, you know, riding the big wheels down the hallway and stuff, I thought that that showcased the horrific act that Burke did in sending them out to find this thing and, and nude, of course, screaming when she sees her father with a face hugger on, that adds this level of terror that those colonists went through. And I, I thought, I thought those scenes were really good. I liked them being in there. [00:05:13] Speaker B: So I feel like this is actually my first time ever seeing the colony on any of my watch of this movie. There were scenes that I had seen, like the. The hallway scene, like the finding out that Amanda had passed away. Like, those. I remembered. I have no recollection of seeing the colony as a living space, and I really liked that. I liked seeing that aspect of it because you see all these, like, derelict hallways and bullet holes and whatnot. But to see what it actually looked like in its prime for what it was supposed to be, I thought was really cool. Seeing Newt as a happy girl with her family surrounding her, I thought was really cool. Like, that was. That added elements to the movie that, like, maybe not necessary, but definitely helped overall. [00:05:57] Speaker A: The turret scene, I. I don't know this, but I think they cut the turret scene because they plowed through too many aliens in that hallway. And. And they had 157. Calling it 50. 158, technically, if you look in the script. But. [00:06:13] Speaker C: But Newt survived, so. 157 alien. [00:06:16] Speaker A: 157. Right. If. If every one of them was harvested and turned into an alien, it would have been 157 aliens. And they tore through them in the hallway. And so I think they needed more aliens to be alive. And that might been why they cut that scene. But, man, what a badass scene. And they include those turrets in, like, all the video games now. [00:06:37] Speaker B: I actually completely disagree. I'm gonna go the exact 180 on you on that one. [00:06:40] Speaker C: Me as well. [00:06:41] Speaker B: I think you need that. I think you need that scene to. Why there's not more aliens running around. Because at the end when Ripley is like, okay, I'm gonna go back. We're spoiling the hell out of this movie. I'm gonna go back and I'm gonna get her. And she goes directly into the alien nest. And there's like, the queen and two aliens. Yeah, like, it doesn't make sense. You don't have that scene of, like, oh, no, we're murdering aliens by the dozens. Why does she not just get ripped to shreds? We saw one alien take it. The entire crew of the Nostromo. And in this movie, they're like cannon fodder. I thought that was actually because, like, when you don't have that scene, it's like, okay, how did she survive the rest of this movie? Why do you only ever see the queen after this sense? If they've all gotten torn to pieces? What do you think, Will? [00:07:20] Speaker C: Yeah, I. I agree with your take on that. [00:07:22] Speaker B: That the. [00:07:23] Speaker C: I would have enjoyed the turret scene in the OG cut because of that reason. There's. There's, like, 100 plus aliens, they would just massacre these 12 marines that are here. And so by the turrets taking a big portion of him, it is more believable that RIPLEY can get to the queen's nest without just being bombarded. [00:07:43] Speaker A: I guess every time they're walking around using this, the scanners, the scanners have like 40 dots on them. [00:07:50] Speaker C: Always. [00:07:51] Speaker A: It's like always a full scanner full of dots. And it just always felt like it, it felt like there were a lot. But you know what, as you guys talk about it, I guess it's just a matter perspective. You know those games where like guess how many jelly beans are in the jar. You know, I'm always the guy that guesses like it's 37. And they're like, dude, that's 1468. Like, I just don't, I don't comprehend the numbers very well. [00:08:14] Speaker B: So counting this one. [00:08:16] Speaker A: So if you guys think that it evens the score, I'll go with it. Either way, that scene belongs in the movie. And, and, and I, I want it in the movie because it's a badass scene. [00:08:25] Speaker B: Yeah. The other scene that you don't get as much of or maybe none of is at the very beginning when Burke is telling her, telling Ellen about Amanda and like, you know, she passed away at the age of like 68 or something. Because you meant. It mentions that Ellen, that Ellen left her when she was 10. She was supposed to be there for her 11th birthday. She never did make it. And then when she meets Newt, it matters so much more because nude is right in that like 9 to 11 range. So like my friend at the end of the movie, having not seen that first scene, was like, why does she care so much? This is just some random kid. And it's like, no, this is the daughter she never got to see grow up. Like this daughter matters to her because she already lost the kid that was her own. [00:09:07] Speaker A: And even at the end, this is one of the things I hated about the movie. At the very end, Newt hugs her and says mommy that they dub in because it didn't really have. They dubbed it in. She goes, mommy. And I'm like, that doesn't fit. [00:09:18] Speaker C: Right? [00:09:19] Speaker A: I just, I feel that was the forced line they put in there. I didn't like it. But yeah, that's the theme that they were going for. [00:09:26] Speaker C: I don't disagree that the Amanda reveal at the beginning of the movie makes for a stronger connection with Ripley and Newt, but I don't feel it's a necessity. Necessity. I, I agree it should be in the movie. But I, I think it was cut because you can still connect Ripley and Newt through their shared trauma of surviving alien. An alien attack. [00:09:52] Speaker A: Right? [00:09:52] Speaker C: So like she can, she knows exactly what Newt went through and survived even better than she did. So I think like that, that motherly bond comes into the movie just fine as is. It would be stronger with that other scene though. But yeah, those two scenes are all I really want in the OG Cut. I don't want any of the colonization stuff. I really don't. [00:10:17] Speaker B: But you see Ellen, when the marines are taken by the aliens, she's like, no, no, they're dead. Like they're, you can't go back for them. They're already cocooned. And that was like two, three minutes apart. And then when Nuke gets taken, it's like 10, 15 minutes and she's like, nope, going back for like there is a connection between the two of those characters. And like, obviously you could just say like, oh, she's a kid. Of course you motherly instincts would kick in. But actually showing exactly why I do think just helps strengthen it a little bit. Speaking of the Marines, what was your take on them? How did you feel about them? Were they fun and comedic or like, wow, just freaking annoying. You just want them to die, Will. [00:10:55] Speaker C: I think overall they were pretty well thought out. I think, you know, they look like a band of rough and toughs that get on each other's nerve and, you know, play off each other's aggressions. And I think it was fine. I mean, yeah, overall I had no problem with them. [00:11:12] Speaker B: Brian. [00:11:13] Speaker A: I think the Marines were incredibly well thought out. You had these bunch of somewhat misfit, inappropriate, probably rule breaking platoon of Marines that's kind of shorthanded. They've got their, their new lieutenant who is, does not know what he's doing at all. He's obviously just there to, to get his hours in so he can cash out. And then you've got a pone. Their sergeant, I believe, and then you have Private Hicks who is next in command. And I, I'm not super up to date on military lingo. I apologize, but that's it. Everybody else is a private. They're shorthanded. Like, this is not a proper platoon to be going in. And I feel like maybe this is the best that Burke could get to go on this expedition. And you're meant to think that one, they're badass, or at least they think they're badass. But two, that this is not enough. Even though they look badass, they're not really the best that Wayland Yutani, Marine Corps, has to, you know, send out there. And so I just. I felt like it was really well thought out and. And created, you know, this. This first time. Look at it. They look great. And then when you stop to think about it, you're like, these guys are kind of a bunch of clowns that think they're badass and they learn their lesson. [00:12:44] Speaker B: So I was looking online and I saw a bunch of different theories from raging from either this is one of the worst Marine Corps, and that's why Burke chose them specifically because he wanted hosts as opposed to. To kill the aliens. Or this is like a. I can't remember what the term is, but like. Like a penal system where, like, these people were either, like, okay, it's either jail or the Marine Corps. And if you do X amount of time in the Marine Corps, then you can get released. And both of those made way more sense to me than thinking these are badass Marines. Because at no point do I think any of these are badass Marines, with the possible exception of Michael Bean. [00:13:22] Speaker A: Well, in fact, in. In the script, Drake and what's the female's name that goes with Drake, they both got the big smart guns, Vasquez. Vasquez and Drake in the script actually went to juvie together and were given the option to get out of juvie by joining the Marine Corps. Did so together. And that's why they have that bond that was written into their script. [00:13:48] Speaker B: But that's not in the movie, correct? [00:13:50] Speaker A: That's not in the movie. No. [00:13:51] Speaker B: I feel like something like that would have made way more sense for this movie because watching this the second time didn't bother me as much. And I can't really put my finger on why, because there's no extra scenes with them that I could. I noticed or picked up on. But the first time, about halfway through, I was so annoyed with every single one of these Marines where I was just like, just shut up. Like, they're talking through. Other people talk like there's no discipline to their unit whatsoever. They're just annoying each other. Bill Paxton is whining constantly. [00:14:22] Speaker A: Anybody who talks back to their CEO, even regardless if he's new or not, that's. That was, like, so out of line. [00:14:28] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:14:28] Speaker A: When he's like, how do I get out of this chicken outfit? Like, that was just so out of line. [00:14:33] Speaker B: Oh, it really was starting to bother me quite a bit. Now there's definitely. Don't get me wrong, Bill Paxton has some great lines in this movie. And I really do enjoy them. But sometimes in between those great lines, we're just like, okay, like when, when do you meet your demise? When can we move on with the rest of this film? For whatever reason, the second time through the extended cut, I don't know why, didn't bother me whatsoever. I, I still didn't like that they were interrupting and that they definitely seems to have no cohesion as a unit. They didn't seem to be particularly well trained. They didn't seem to be well disciplined. But like the whining didn't bother me at all. I mean, I can't really put my finger on that one, unfortunately. But it was an interesting walking into this one because I remember really liking the Marines the last time that I saw this. And then this time it was just like something about them just really got under my skin. [00:15:19] Speaker A: Will, do you have a Wayland Yutani cup or is that a W for Will? [00:15:23] Speaker C: Yeah, both. Both are correct. [00:15:26] Speaker A: Okay. It always looks like the Whaley Utah. [00:15:31] Speaker C: If nothing, I'm a corporate man, you. [00:15:33] Speaker B: Know, that. [00:15:37] Speaker C: I, I didn't ever really have a problem with the Marines. I felt that the company purposely obviously sent too few people to get the job done because they have ulterior motives. I feel like this is kind of. [00:15:55] Speaker B: A. [00:15:57] Speaker C: Parallel to like the Vietnam War where overconfident, you know, over tech guys go in and get their asses handed to them by the more nature esque group. And so they come in so hot and so confident, overconfident, that when hits the fan they, they lose it pretty hard. And that's pretty much Hudson's role is just to be the one because there's only 12 and half of them die right away. You know, he's the one squawking guy who's like, I'm losing my, we got to get the hell out of here. How do you get me out of here? Right? So, yeah, I felt like, you know, it's all compacted within like very few characters, but I just really enjoyed the contrast of these characters compared to what we had in the first Alien movie where most people were very level headed aside from maybe the guys underneath the, the mechanic crew. But, but even compared to the mechanic crew, like the mechanic crew was cool, calm and collected compared to these kind of crazy Marines that are just like, they don't know what they got themselves into. And so I think yeah, they were just used to doing, you know, mundane jobs of like cleanup of whatever trash orders and now they actually have something they, they can't compete with. And they don't know how to handle it. [00:17:22] Speaker B: Yeah. Now one of the things I was debating or I was talking to my friend with Brian, you're, you're more versed in this universe. You're a bigger fan of it than I am. Are obviously not xenomorphs, but aliens in general. Are there aliens in this universe that humanity knows about 100 because they make a comment in this where you talk about the Marines and I, forgive me, I don't have the alien name in front of me, but like, oh, it's like when you met these people, like, like this race or something. I have no idea if that was supposed to be a joke, if that was like a different race of humans, if that was a different race of aliens entirely. Are there other aliens in the Alien universe that we know of? [00:17:58] Speaker A: So as far as the, the movies go, I'm unaware of anything. I think that when they talk about that, it's like, you know, the one you had was a man and I was like, whatever it was, you wouldn't care or whatever. I think they were talking about a culture of humans that lived in a far off planet or something like that is what I was expecting. I do know that there are other creatures throughout the universe and that they do go hunt bugs, as they say. And there are some colonial marine stories in this universe that you can read in those novels and stuff where they go out and hunt bugs that are not xenomorphs. They're just other creatures. And. But there are no sentient life forms outside of humans in the, in the galaxy so far as the. As humans have explored. As for do. Does Wayland Yutani know about the xenomorphs? You know, we in, in the movie Alien, the company sent their ship off course to go explore this signal, right. So they, they got a signal. They had a reason to go explore and find something out there. And in Aliens they are. Sigourney Weaver tells them of this xenomorph thing and Burke sends them off to go explore the, the colonists to go explore. And, and, and it gets collected. And so the origins of the aliens, we get to learn more and more about as they do the prequels. And a lot of that is also left to interpretation. And there's some, some questions in the plots of those prequels too, that causes a bit of skepticism. You can go way off on the deep end of those fan theories about origins of aliens and stuff like that. [00:19:56] Speaker B: Fair enough. Yeah. Somebody was mentioning they were created by the Prometheans or, or the, the Engineers, I think. Engineers. Thank you. I could not get the name that I was looking for, which is definitely something we'll get to later on in the franchise. But I'm not entirely sure that humanity knows about them either. Right, yeah. [00:20:12] Speaker A: In, in this. Well, in this movie, in the chronological release of these films, the engineers haven't really been explained to the people, but later will be introduced to the Engineers. However, in later films, we're going to spoil a little bit. The alien virus is showcased in the prequels and later the actual alien xenomorph that we see, which is engineered by David. And so there's this full circle of we built a robot, the robot found the people that made us, and he engineers their virus to be the most. It's kind of complicated, so we'll have to get to that in the future. But yeah, the, the origins of the alien as we see it, as in this movie, the xenomorph form of it is a little bit complicated. [00:21:04] Speaker B: Fair enough. Now, Will, in the first movie, obviously we have one alien who is dealing with a, a crew who is not really well prepared for anything. They're miners, I believe they are. None of them really have any weaponry to speak of. And they are trying to take on this one alien entity. And it's a very dark cat and mouse game. As they are being hunted for the sequel, they obviously went the opposite route. You've got like 12 military guys going up against a hundred aliens. Is this a case where more equals better? Or would it be better if this is a more contained story like the first one was? [00:21:38] Speaker C: I don't think it's a question of if more equals better. I think it's different equals better. The first movie is a, a haunted house where people are trapped inside and the boogeyman has acid blood so you can't shoot it. How do you get rid of this thing? How do you stop it without destroying everything around you? Whereas this, they went instead of a, you know, haunted house horror movie, it's a bold action movie with some thrills. And I think that was to its benefit because it's hard to do a sequel without just making it a remake if you, if you follow that same small haunted house premise. Whereas this allowed James Cameron, writer, director, to take the story forward and make it a world building story, more so. And yeah, you can blast aliens away because they don't care if they're melting this rundown colony. Yeah, I think, I think it's different equals better. And I think that's a. You'll find that in a lot of cases where sequels hold up to originals. [00:22:50] Speaker B: Now Brian, I'm sure you have thoughts on that as well. But in this one we see that the aliens seem actually pretty fragile. They're taken out very, very, very easily. Does that make it harder? I mean you've obviously you're more familiar with the movies going forward, but does that make it harder to make the aliens scary again in say three or four or Romulus going forward? Or do they still have a way to make them scary without having to evolve them or bring them in in the dozens or hundreds or whatever it is? How does that. [00:23:18] Speaker A: Well, I mean they tried to recapture what happened in Alien. Moving into Alien 3. We'll get there. But they do a little bit of morphing in that movie too. In Aliens, they just put a lot of them in there and they showcase their bug like appeal. The sequence when they're all in the room, they've got all the doors sealed and they're like on the motion scanners and they're like 15 meters, 10 meters. It can't be. That's inside the room. And they look up above and they're crawling in the ceiling. It looks like a crawl space full of spiders, full of scorpions, full of insects. It's creepy. And there's a lot of them and that's how it's scary. Do they, are they more fragile? They don't seem fragile. They're shooting, you know, what do they call them? Exploding caseless tip hollow point. Like they've got a bunch of really powerful weapons with their pulse rifles. By the way. They. I've heard it explained how the pulse rifle works. It's not actually a pulse of energy or anything. It's a, it's a bullet. They've got the smart gun, which is just a heavy caliber, ultra fast firing weapon. They've got some big toys. They've got the turrets that we didn't get to see in the OG film, but these things still have a tough carapace and they explode in a bath of acid. If you're nearby them, we see a lot of, of the, the, the colonial marines getting melted by that acid time and again throughout the movie. They're still tough, they're still scary, but there's so many more of them that even though we've got a bunch of rough, tough hombres, they're still getting the crap kicked out of them. And it's still pretty scary. And I've actually heard people call this a pivot to a war drama, which is A stretch, but it kind of rings true. Like almost a comical war drama really. Like you've got a bunch of Marines going in there and getting taught a lesson, you know, a really bad life lesson. [00:25:25] Speaker B: Yeah. Because Will, you touched on something about this being kind of reminiscent of like a Vietnam kind of a movie, which I think I'd heard of before. I kind of forgot about it, but as soon as you mentioned, I was like, oh, that is right. I have heard Jim Cameron speak on that or other people speak on that on, on his behalf. Do you think that, that. Yeah. How well do you think that holds up that, that analogy of the Viet Cong versus the Marines? [00:25:50] Speaker C: I think it's fine. Yeah, I think, I think it works. And the beauty of it though is like, well, look at movies. They've done that story over and over and over again. Right. Like you've seen plenty of Vietnam inspired movies where elites go in but can't take out the, the natural contenders. Avatar. I guess if you want to put a point on it, Avatar. [00:26:16] Speaker A: To one of my favorite movies, it's. [00:26:18] Speaker C: Like James Cameron's best to James Cameron's worst. Like it's weird that. [00:26:22] Speaker B: Thank you. [00:26:23] Speaker C: Start of his career was his best work and at the end of his. [00:26:25] Speaker B: Career is his worst work. [00:26:27] Speaker C: But I would, I would like to take a moment now to say, proud Canadian, James Cameron is a Canadian director, so kudos to that. [00:26:36] Speaker A: Never missed an opportunity. Do you guys. [00:26:39] Speaker B: Hey, I didn't legitimately. I just learned that. I really didn't know that. [00:26:43] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah, no, he's a, he's a Canadian writer director. And I also want to say f you to James Cameron who is, after teaching us all the risks and the troubles of AI in Terminator, he goes ahead and goes onto the board of directors of an AI company. So f that guy. But at least he's Canadian, so that's something. [00:27:10] Speaker B: F Canadians. You heard it here first, folks. [00:27:12] Speaker A: I, I really like how they rolled the dice changing the formula for this movie so drastically. Going from like, I think it was a great analogy that Will used the haunted house, you've got a boogeyman chasing him around to this war drama, Viet Cong style movie. And it works. It was new and different and you took the fear from the first one. You expanded it into a new setting, a new idea and it was great. It was a super fun ride and it was well produced, well directed. They pulled it off. You know, we've seen other people take a risk by changing it up big time. We didn't like. Well, we sort of liked but sort of didn't like the Evil Dead Rise. They changed a lot of stuff. Went a completely different way with the cast of the family and stuff. And two real mixed reviews there. And the box office results kind of show that with Aliens. Smashing success, you know, just a huge success. And you still have that pivotal character, which is Ellen Ripley in the center of it all. And you're diving deeper into her character. It showcases exactly what we saw in the first one and expands upon it in the second one showcasing her as a mother. And we have this mother theme running deep through this movie with a queen and her eggs and her babies. Right. Yeah, sorry. That was a lot. I know. I just did like eight things in one rant. Sorry. [00:28:41] Speaker C: That's all good. I, I, I do want to, I do want to disagree a little bit with you on the Evil Dead Rise. I feel Evil Dead Rise was still Cabin in the woods scenario, right? [00:28:54] Speaker A: Well, it was a cabin in the city. [00:28:56] Speaker C: Exactly. But it was very, very contained. [00:28:59] Speaker A: Right. I think more so changing this family setting, this family dynamic going on. We have this mother daughter theme going on in Aliens and it works. Whereas you have the mother and her children in, in Evil Dead Rise. And it just made me uncomfortable. [00:29:14] Speaker C: Yeah, but I, I still feel like the, the bones of the movie are the same, whereas the bones of these movies are different. [00:29:20] Speaker A: Okay, a bad analogy then. [00:29:21] Speaker C: Yeah, but, but I, I see where you're going. I see where you're going with it. [00:29:25] Speaker B: I'll agree with Will on that one. And also just to, to prove run wrong a little bit. Rise didn't necessarily work for us that well, but it was a box office hit. [00:29:35] Speaker C: I like Rise. I like Rise. [00:29:37] Speaker A: Oh, I didn't, I think, I thought it only like doubled what it cost or something like that. [00:29:41] Speaker B: I must think with horror movies is you can make. [00:29:43] Speaker A: Dan, I was trying to give you an opportunity to plug previous episodes. You guys just blew that out of the water. Come on. It's supposed to be like, like, and subscribe. Push that. Come on. [00:29:52] Speaker C: Okay. Seeks how. We're already on a tangent. Can I just say that I really. What I really appreciated from Aliens is that they gave us the blue Highlander electricity. Okay. Anytime 80s movies puts in the Highlander electricity, I, I just smile. [00:30:07] Speaker B: 80S movies love that effect. I don't. [00:30:09] Speaker A: I was thinking that same thing. When they're flying in, into the, into the processor, the electricity's going up. I'm like, oh, somebody's gonna bring this up. The red, the red hot pipe work was really cool, though. I don't know how they did that effect, but it was really cool and I liked it. I think anything that's that red hot would probably be melting, but whatever. I don't know. It's future. But it was cool. I liked it. [00:30:33] Speaker B: Yeah. Now, out of curiosity, you mentioned the whole mother daughter dynamic, and of course, you do have the ending with, like, the queen and her eggs and Ellen and. And Newt going against each other. But I have to ask you, Brian, because you have brought this up so many times in so many different episodes. You have said that child actors can kill a movie for you. This is one of your favorite movies. How does Newt's performance not damage that in any way, shape, or form? I'm not saying. [00:30:59] Speaker A: She's got like, five lines, man. She's got like five lines. One of her best ones is interacting with Bill Paxton, with Hudson, you know, and she's like, affirmative. You know, she's kind of cute or whatever. Granted, when. When her and Ripley are having their moment, Ripley's like, cleaning her face and she's like, newt, My name's Newt. Nobody calls me Rebecca except for my brother. Like, that was a terrible delivery lines. I know, I know it was terrible. But, like, the rest of it was fine because she didn't say or do much. They dubbed in that one line at the end where she says mommy, and it was terrible. They shouldn't have put that in there. That wasn't her fault, though. But yeah, child actors can kill. Kill a movie. Fortunately, like, one of her best scenes was cut out of the film. And that's just her screaming for like an hour and a half when she see dad with the face hugger. [00:31:50] Speaker B: Yeah. And turns into the wind. I like that effect. That was actually really cool. I. I just had to bring it up. Not. I don't even think that Newt or Jennifer Hen. I'm gonna get that wrong. I don't think she even did that bad of a job. But there was definitely a couple of lines where it was just like. And you have, I'm gonna say, crapped on much better child actors than this. I was like, I had to bring it up and I had to ask. [00:32:13] Speaker A: I think it's because they kept her lines real short and they focused on Ripley as a mother rather than nude as the daughter. [00:32:19] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah. Less was more with the lines and things like that. And I think that was probably a choice with the script writing, for sure. [00:32:26] Speaker B: I was looking up some trivia with this movie, and one of the things I saw that I thought was kind of fun is the Scene where Newt has to like slide down the slide. Like the two or three. Oh, yeah. She purposefully blew that scene like eight times in a row just because she wanted to keep going down the slide. And like James Cameron's finally like, look, you can play with the slide as much as you want. Let's just get the scene done and go home. He's like, okay, got the scene in one take. And he's like, fine, go play on the slide. She played the slide for like 20, 30 minutes after that. Just like having a great time. He's like, cool, we don't need to be recording this. I just like, that's pretty smart for what, eight year old, nine year old? [00:32:59] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. [00:32:59] Speaker C: Beauty of working with kids. That's the beauty of working with kids. [00:33:02] Speaker B: Yep. Okay, as far as the practical effects, we talked about the in previous movies, whatnot. This one has a bit more may not cgi, but they're trying for more stuff with the ships flying in and stuff like that. But I think for the most part there's one scene where the ship flying looks pretty rough. Other than that, I think a lot of the scenes held up pretty nicely. I think the aliens held up nicely. The Queen looked really cool. The loader looked good. Like the, the thing that Ripley's driving around on. Like, overall, generally speaking, this movie looked decent. The tank looked a little cardboardy, but other than that, this looks really, really good. Do you guys agree? Do you have a. [00:33:38] Speaker A: A thought, Dan? You're absolutely wrong about the tank. That tank was bad ass. [00:33:43] Speaker B: Oh, it was like Batmobile 1.0. It's like, no, no, no A that. [00:33:48] Speaker A: I thought it was fantastic. That tank was £75,000 or something ridiculous. And in order for them to be able to drive it where they needed to, they had to strip out like 2/3 of its weight to make it work. Like, it was a. It was a major issue. I forget what they got to use. It was like some sort of a fire truck or something. I don't remember the story, but it was incredibly heavy. And so they had to like strip it way down just to use it in the scenes and everything. But I think that thing looks amazing. The gun doesn't really make any sense. How it disconnects and slides over the back. Like how do you load shells into it if you like, unattaches, but whatever. [00:34:28] Speaker C: It's super cool. [00:34:29] Speaker B: Ever to the. It was literally just to show that they could. Right. Like if they just didn't have that, the movie would not have changed whatsoever. They're like, look what we can do. And like me and my friend, like, that's cool. That's a cool design. Yeah, totally. You could have also made the door bigger. Right? Like there's so many have to do that. But it was cool, so who cares? Rule of cool. [00:34:52] Speaker A: Yeah. And you know what? I believe that they minimized the sounds in space where there's no air. I always appreciate when it's silent in space. [00:35:02] Speaker B: I think Alien was definitely screaming at the end as it was flying away. [00:35:05] Speaker A: Right. But there was a gust of air coming out of the ship. Let's roll with it. [00:35:09] Speaker B: That's not how sound waves work, but sure. [00:35:14] Speaker A: But you know what? They minimized it greatly. So for some reason, I don know why, but directors always want to have this sound in space. The rockets as the ship passes by or whatever. If you've ever watched the movie Gravity, you know that that silence is freaking intense. I love how they don't use sound in gravity. And. And you're just on the edge of your seat, like, turn around, the ship's destroyed around you, you know, and. And they don't know because they don't hear it. And I mean, they even have the slogan, in space, no one can hear you scream. So they should really kind of focus on that. I think that science is amazing. They didn't perfectly silence it, but they did bring it way down. And I'll give them thanks for trying. [00:35:57] Speaker C: Partial. [00:35:57] Speaker B: I will give you props on that one for sure, because I agree. I like it better when they do use silence. I think it works better in Gravity because the whole point is to show how alone she is. And so having these silence surrounding her really does showcase that quite nicely. Whereas something like Star wars or Aliens, like if you didn't have the TIE Fighter, like that screeching noise as they flew by or the explosion from the Death Star, I think that would hamper the movie, even though it doesn't make any sense. I think it would. [00:36:24] Speaker A: You can work around it. Fans of Battlestar Galactica know that's one of those minimalist sounds in space. It works real well. Still some sound, but they kind of like minimize it as much as they possibly can. And they focus on the sounds of the cockpit and the people on the radios and stuff like that. There's workarounds for it. I. When it comes to sci fi, I like it to be hard sci fi. I like it to be as accurate to real life as possible because I like to think of myself in at least this one area, somewhat intelligent. And I know that there's no sound in space. And so I. I want it to be accurate. [00:36:57] Speaker C: You know, that's funny. [00:37:01] Speaker A: No. [00:37:01] Speaker B: One person mentioned in chat. Sorry, Will, I cut you off? [00:37:03] Speaker C: No, no, no, no, go ahead. [00:37:05] Speaker B: Okay. One person mentioned Bishop in chat. And that reminded me, I. I really liked how in this one, the. The synthetic, if you will, artificial person. [00:37:15] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:37:16] Speaker B: Thank you. [00:37:16] Speaker A: Right. Dan. [00:37:17] Speaker B: No, I can call him whatever I want. That's what he likes to have. [00:37:20] Speaker C: Wow. [00:37:22] Speaker B: I really, like. They didn't go the exact same route and they didn't have him also be like a company man, like he says at the very beginning. Like, no, I couldn't hurt a human being from my actions or my inactions if I wanted to. And they proved that to be true throughout the movie. Like, he actually does help Ripley quite a bit. As opposed to Ash in the first one, who's clearly doing his own. His own thing, or he's following the company's orders. I thought that was a really nice. Almost like a twist by not having a twist, if that makes sense. Yeah, that worked really well for me. Now, obviously, I'm less familiar with this than you are, but how did you feel about that, Will? [00:37:55] Speaker C: I felt that James Cameron just, like, beat us over the head with it, being like, we're gonna make Bishop look like this shady character. He's doing, like, the knife tricks. He's dangerous. He's even got a dangerous kind of look compared to even Ash. Ash looked quite, I don't know, lovable, whereas Bishop looks just a little harder edged. And so I felt like Cameron went out of his way to be like, oh, let's make the audience question this the whole way through until the very end. And that's what he does. [00:38:26] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:38:27] Speaker B: I didn't watch the knife scene and. And think that he was dangerous. I don't know. I guess I was focusing more on Paxton than on. On Bishop at that point. But I didn't walk away from that being like, oh, he's a killer. Yeah. [00:38:38] Speaker C: No, not that he's a killer, but, like, obviously he's got skill. [00:38:41] Speaker B: Oh. [00:38:42] Speaker C: And he. He could dicey exactly where he wants to. [00:38:46] Speaker A: Yeah. And they do. They never did it with Ash. But in all the other movies where there is a Synthetic, they will showcase how that Synthetic is somewhat superior to a human being. They have the knife scene in two. In the David. Well, it's a two movie series. Yeah. [00:39:07] Speaker C: The David Show. [00:39:08] Speaker A: It's the David Show. Let's call it the David show because it's gonna be a trilogy. Me, I don't know. They show him like riding a bicycle, spinning a ball in his hand, tossing into the hoop, like just perfect everywhere. Right. So they, they do that in, in throughout this entire franchise. And there is a whole theme about origins. Your maker making humans and, and humans making androids. And then later there's androids and all kinds of stuff with this, with these themes that they explore in this franchise. And it's a fun theme to explore. They do it better and worse in different movies. But by the way, that little hand trick thing, he actually cut Bill Paxton's finger doing that. And they weren't originally going to use Bill Paxton's hand underneath his own. He was just going to do it himself. But they kept doing it and they would speed up the film and it didn't look good. And then they ended up trying it with Bill Paxton and it looked great. But in the process he did nick Bill Paxton's finger doing it. [00:40:12] Speaker C: Can I, can I jump in here with the androids and the people and company? I think my biggest confusion in, in just solely looking at alien aliens is that it's hard to tell and maybe purposely where the company is. Is the company looking for these alien life forms to bring back still in aliens after 57 years? Did the person who was looking for this, you know, disappear after the, after the ship was lost? And now the company is just, just doing their thing? Paul. Colonizing places like it. It's very questionable. And obviously Burke is a company man and he has ill intent throughout from the start. So is it a full company thing? Is it these one off people? It's just not very. [00:41:14] Speaker B: I don't know. [00:41:15] Speaker C: It'S, it's not very pointed. It's very convoluted, I found throughout. And it raised more questions than answers, which isn't always bad. But it felt awkward in this movie. [00:41:29] Speaker A: I guess I always felt like the company was bad. I just felt like this is an evil company and not necessarily like, like. [00:41:37] Speaker C: Like all companies, right? [00:41:39] Speaker A: Yeah. In our, in recent times we have this kind of idea that if you're a big corporation, you're evil by necessity. If you're rich, you're evil. Like, let's not go there. But in this movie it is simply the Wayland Corporation to me has always appeared a brutal company, cutthroat in every way, shape or form, and they only care about money. We see that in the opening sequence when Ripley is in front of the board and they whittle it down to numbers. And they care not for human life or her story or believe her or anything. None of this interests them. It is simply about how they can cover their asses and profit the most from the situation. It just seemed pretty pointed to me. That combined with Bishop's terrible haircut and sharp features makes me think that he is probably going to be an evil robot. And they pushed it pretty hard. And so I was kind of questioning it until the end the first time I watched it. But it didn't really surprise me that he really was a good robot and it turned out okay. [00:42:43] Speaker B: Yeah, I know. That's totally fair. I feel like with the company, they definitely are putting money first in every situation, but in a lot of ways, like, other than Ripley, most of the people are too. Like, a lot of the times we mentioned in the first Alien movie, all they're talking about is like, oh, am I gonna get paid for this? I'm gonna get money for this. It's gonna be worth time in this one. Maybe less so about money. More about like putting their time in to get. To get out of the core. Stuff like that. But then you've also got like Burke when they're talking about nuking the site from orbit, Burke's like, oh, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. This facility has a substantial dollar value attached to it. In the opening scene, you've got all the people on the board being like, you destroyed a. I don't remember the. [00:43:18] Speaker A: Number, but like a 65 million dollar starship. And I'm like, yeah, you guys got that number wrong. That doesn't hold up. [00:43:26] Speaker B: And that doesn't even include the load that they were carrying because they were finding something worthwhile to be that far out. Right? So, like, yeah, the company is all about the finances. And I think they definitely see these aliens as a way to bolster either their weapons division, their bio division, something. This is definitely all about the money for them. And the entire colony is completely expendable. [00:43:49] Speaker C: I also found it was maybe one of Ripley's like, I don't know, underwritten aspects. Ripley, amazing character. Like, awesome. One of the best heroes of any movie, right? Like, hands down. But she just came from knowing this company sent Ash out to get an alien specimen at all costs. And she didn't even, like, lay into the company about that. Really. She should have been like you all. We were expendable to you for you wanted this alien. Like, it just seems so at the forefront that, that she would never let that go in her character. [00:44:33] Speaker A: Like, I agree. [00:44:34] Speaker C: She would try to take this company down before she ever agreed to go check out that freaking planet again. Unless she was going solely there to just nuke the place. Right? [00:44:44] Speaker A: Yeah, that whole bit. [00:44:48] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:44:49] Speaker A: That was a flaw in the way with me. [00:44:51] Speaker B: Yeah, well, and even, like, she says to Burke, like, you're going to destroy them. Right? And he's like, yep. And she's like, okay. Like, she. She accepts that at face value. Like, what? Why. Why on earth would you trust this person? [00:45:02] Speaker C: And, I mean, I. I get that. You know, that opening sequence of her, like, coming back and she's having nightmares. She's got post traumatic out the wazoo, and it's like, I think it's over, like, a few months before she actually gets contracted to go with them. And she's got to get a different job. She can't fly. That's what she wants to do. [00:45:23] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:45:23] Speaker C: There's, like, some reasons for her to be like, oh, you'll give me my flying back. Okay, I'll do this. There's reasons for her I just didn't feel was strong enough for her to ever trust this company for a second. [00:45:36] Speaker B: Yeah. TLC brings up a point. It's been, he says, seven years. It's actually been 57 years, but whatever. Everyone that made the decisions at Whalen Yutani is dead now, which is true. But for her, it's been three, four, five days. She would still be holding a grudge, even if the logical part of her brain would be like, well, you know, they. They all died. Who knows? [00:45:56] Speaker C: Yeah. And just because the people who were running the show then are dead does not mean in any way that the company is good. [00:46:03] Speaker A: Yeah. And I. I wish they would have had some sort of a sequence where maybe she, you know, bumped into Hicks or something and. And she confided in him. Like, no, I don't trust these guys for a second. I'm going along to make sure y' all exterminate these things that. So much more real and legit. Because her believing Burke was absolutely asinine. It didn't make sense. And like you said, her in the boardroom completely just. They just ignore the fact that it was crew expendable and that they put a killer robot on board. They just left that out. And you don't even remember that until she slaps the cornbread away and then, oh, yeah, that's right. There's a robot that tried to kill her. And they glossed over that whole thing and just now bring it up when it's convenient. [00:46:52] Speaker B: Yeah. The other shoot. [00:46:56] Speaker A: Did I rant too long and you lost your thread. [00:46:59] Speaker C: I'll rant more. I'm gonna rant more then so this colonization crew's been there for two decades. That's what they say, right? [00:47:08] Speaker A: Like 20 years. [00:47:09] Speaker C: And they never found this distress beacon, which, sure, maybe a storm knocked it out or whatever. [00:47:15] Speaker A: This huge ship. [00:47:16] Speaker C: Like, when they found this ship and these alien specimens which they brought into the colony, they never told the company about this. Like, something's wrong here, right? Like, what is actually going on? Because they have two live specimens in tanks and the company doesn't know and isn't aware of these alien life forms which they want to know so much about. [00:47:39] Speaker A: I'd love to find out the backstory of how that happens. Did they have a company man on the ground that was trying to keep it a secret? Because they said they killed them. Removing the two live ones. They killed the human beings trying to get the live ones off their face. [00:47:53] Speaker C: Right. [00:47:53] Speaker A: And I mean, that's pretty horrific. If it's just this tight knit colony, you don't. You don't kill Charles because you want to collect the spider, Right? You just don't do that. So what's the backstory there? What's going on? Yeah, there's. I mean, it's not an insurmountable leap to make, but I. I would like an explanation at least. [00:48:15] Speaker C: Yeah, I think it's. [00:48:17] Speaker B: It's Wayland Yutani is not necessarily the kind of corporation that's going to tell everybody everything. So Burke might not have. Might have known a lot more than, say, the judge in that case would have known, right? Oh, sure. It's actually higher up or maybe part of the biological division or whatever. [00:48:33] Speaker C: Different departments. Yeah. They are not exactly 100, if anything. Burke's like, like, just let her go. I'll take care of her. [00:48:40] Speaker A: It's all like, universe. They are very cutthroat at the corporation and they do backstab, hide things. Power struggles constantly. [00:48:51] Speaker B: So that does kind of lead into. What I was going to ask is why is Ripley there at all? Is it because she's a loose end and Burke just wants to get rid of her in some way? Because all the knowledge she has about these aliens, she tells to the crew in like, eight seconds. Seconds. Like, oh, there's a face hugger. They bleed acid, they burst out of your chest, and they're deadly. Okay. That's all I got. Have fun. Like, she doesn't know. [00:49:16] Speaker A: How else do you get our star to make a sequel? How else do you get around? Like, I don't know. [00:49:20] Speaker C: No, no, no. [00:49:21] Speaker B: But I think. [00:49:22] Speaker C: I think what he's asking is, like, logistically, why Would the company agree to send her on this trip? And my, I guess my like, first thought is Burke is going on this trip and knows she can survive. So maybe, okay, that, that plays well. [00:49:40] Speaker B: Into him surviving, covering his own ass in that way. I think maybe covering his ass in like a. If all the marines disappear and you disappear, then nobody knows where these aliens came from and I get all of the money because at the end of. [00:49:52] Speaker C: The day that's also. He straight up says that, right? Like at the end of the day, he, he won. He's in it for the money and he planned on offing all these Marines, right. So like, there's no way he was going to keep Ripley alive either. [00:50:05] Speaker A: Yeah, ultimate chaos makes a good point that Ripley is there as a visual confirmation of the first encounter as they want the xenos. She could say, yeah, that's the thing I saw. [00:50:15] Speaker B: I don't. [00:50:16] Speaker A: I think when you come across insectoid hard shell carapace with acid for blood, you probably got the right one. But yeah, sure, we'll. Whatever else. [00:50:25] Speaker B: Mine was in red. That's the black version. [00:50:28] Speaker A: No, wrong guy, wrong xenomorph. [00:50:31] Speaker C: Anyway. [00:50:35] Speaker B: It was totally different. You go invisible. I don't know what this thing is. [00:50:37] Speaker C: Yeah, I'm harping on a lot of like little scriptural notes and I felt like that's. This is an action movie, right? So obviously a lot of these things just get glossed over. But because it's such an interesting world that they've built in the first one and like the alien species is so interesting and cool, I just want to know more about it. And even the corrupt company, I want to know how much they know. I want to know how, what, what ends they'll go to, to get this specimen. So like all these things are so well done and fleshed out that it, it saddened me that they just glossed over a lot of those big chunks and it just kind of left me wanting more. And like, as far as like the sequel, I, I love that they went the action direction. I love that they just kind of forced it into its own movie because I think it, it let it stand up on its own. And obviously it has over time because it's still one of the, one of the best action movies out there. But yeah, those little things just, you. [00:51:42] Speaker A: Know, I would say to play devil's advocate, the movie is 2 hours and 17 minutes long. They already cut some really cool stuff out of it. [00:51:52] Speaker C: I. [00:51:53] Speaker A: Maybe they just didn't have enough time to really fit these nitpicky Things in. [00:51:58] Speaker C: Oh, for sure. [00:51:59] Speaker A: I. I agree. 100 will I. I want to know. And, and that's why I read so many of this, so many of the novels to this story and, and love the backstories. They have books on just the colonial Marines. No xenomorphs at all, just stories about colonial Marines. I find it very interesting. And they talk about this stuff and it's, it's, there's. It's because they did a great job building this world, and so it makes you want to know more. I love when they have back stories like Vasquez and Drake written into the script. Maybe it's never going to make it on the screen, but the actors can go, oh, this is where I'm going to get my, you know, my ideas from. And then how I'm going to approach this character and bring this character to life, knowing this backstory that we're never going to see as viewers, but they're going to put into their character and it works. Yeah. [00:52:49] Speaker C: I'll argue that you see it because you believe the characters. [00:52:52] Speaker A: Right? Right. Yeah, yeah. [00:52:53] Speaker B: You don't. You don't. [00:52:54] Speaker C: They don't tell it, but you see it in their, in their acting, in the, the characters, portrayals. That's what good acting is all about. [00:53:02] Speaker B: We can sit here and nitpick this movie because it is so incredibly well made that, like, the tiny little things do bother you more because everything else is so good when everything is polished to such a perfect shine or a near perfect shine, you do notice those tiny little things a little bit. Whereas other franchises we've taken a look at, like Highlander, we're just looking at the gigantic cracks in the armor that you don't even care about anything else else. Whereas this one. [00:53:27] Speaker A: Yeah, they're running into battle in a kilt on that one. [00:53:30] Speaker C: Sorry. [00:53:31] Speaker B: But yeah, so I think. I think the tiny, tiny, tiny little nitpicks that we have are really just speaking to how good this movie is overall. And speaking of which, do we want to roll that into our final thoughts? And we'll start with. You Will, if you don't mind. [00:53:48] Speaker C: Okay, let's see. What have I not talked about that I want to add into my final thoughts? I think James Cameron made Aliens a franchise. Alien, the movie was not a franchise, but it had the bones. And James Cameron put the old flesh and blood into it to make it a franchise. And he did that by changing this from a haunted house to an action so that he could expand the story and not just remake the same thing. We Just saw. I appreciate that this movie took, what was it, six or seven years to come out later. I think that helped that breathing space and yeah, I. I don't know. There's a lot of great things about this movie. Sigourney Weaver Shout out best actress nomination for a sci fi picture well earned nomination. She was incredible in this movie. She was incredible in the first one. Very good. I like the action. I like the change of pace. All good things. Overall, I'm gonna rate this movie a slightly lower score than the original. And I've heard that either there's two kinds of people in the world. People who prefer Alien and people who prefer Aliens. I'm an alien. Prefer, but not by much. Overall, this scores 87 out of 100 compared to my 90 out of 100 for alien. And the major reason for it is the scriptural parts that I just couldn't wrap my head around as to why this did or did not happen in the movie, coming from the first movie. But all in all, it's a standalone, wicked, wicked movie. You don't even have to see the first Alien to enjoy this movie. But I would recommend watching the first Alien first. [00:55:41] Speaker B: I'm gonna go next. I think, Brian, we'll leave you for last because I feel like there's a very good chance you're gonna be the high score here. [00:55:48] Speaker C: You've been wrong about that before. [00:55:50] Speaker B: Yes, I have. But I know that when we talked about Brian's like top 20, I want to say this was like number two or three or something like this was way up there. Spoilers. So I'd be shocked if it dropped hard. But he has changed his opinion on some things as we've been doing already. He says, why? Watching things with a critical eye. [00:56:06] Speaker A: It'll push you in a point or two opinion. [00:56:08] Speaker B: So super curious and. [00:56:11] Speaker A: And, you know, just like going back to army of Darkness. I hadn't seen it in a long time and I went back and watched it recently and I was like, you know what? I remember it is better still great. Just, just. I. Maybe not as great as I remembered it. So these things do change. Of course. I'm pretty sure I probably watch Aliens about twice a year every year. [00:56:29] Speaker B: So I'd be surprised if it's been decades since you said, seen this one. But, you know, wrong. Maybe I'm wrong. All right. As far as my thoughts on this movie go, it was really interesting to score because I hadn't seen this in a little while. And in my brain, I always enjoyed Alien, but I liked Aliens. A little bit more. Watch this with a buddy. Watch the. The version that's on Disney plus. And I just found myself not really getting into it. Now, whether that was because we were kind of talking a little bit during the movie or whether because it was missing some scenes that give you a little bit more heart and insight into the. The characters, I'm not entirely sure. But I took the chance to watch the director's cut on 4K within, like, two or three days of watching that original cut. And I'm really, really glad that I did because it drastically changed my impression of this movie and I really did end up enjoying it again. And I'm really glad that I did because I felt like I loved this movie, watched it and wasn't entirely sure and then watched it again, was like, no, no, I. I do love this movie. They do so many things right in this one that it's. It's hard to even pick apart, really. This isn't necessarily one that I'm going to watch over and over again multiple times a year, but when I do watch this one, I think I'm going to be really reminded of why I love it so much, why this is such an iconic franchise for what it is. Will brought up a point that I'd never thought of before, but I agree with him entirely. James Cameron took Alien, made it a franchise with aliens, and gave them so many different directions they could go in this universe. They. They very well could have gone somewhere with Alien, but it might have been just another, like, oh, look, here's another ship with one alien doing a thing. James Cameron took that and changed it entirely into something completely else, and he absolutely nailed it in almost every category. I think the characters are, for the most part, pretty fun. Some of the Marines are a little bit annoying, and I wish you'd seen either more respect for them for why they are a Marine and why they're doing what they're doing, or giving me a reason for why they don't have any respect for where they are. Maybe they're, you know, supposed to be in jail or prisoners or something. Maybe they are the worst of the worst. Maybe they are the Suicide squad of the Marines. Either way, I could have enjoyed that more than just being presented like, these are supposed to be badasses and they're just not quite. That was a little bit of a fault for me. But as far as, like, Newt goes, I thought she was really interesting. I really like Ripley's character in both these movies. I actually quite liked Bishop in this one. I liked that not quite knowing which side he's going to be on. Burke, as much as you hate him, I think casting Paul Reiser in that position is actually really good because he comes with a lot of love from his stand up career, from Mad about you stuff like that. I realized Mad about you actually came after this show, but I saw it first, so doing away with that, I. Or that aside, I think having that character, somebody that you instinctively want to hate, but you do like for some reason, like he just is a likable person. I think it works really, really well for something in that condition because you do want to give them the benefit of the doubt. Even though everything in you is saying like, no, like this is a bad person through and through, period. As far as the cinematography goes in this movie, I think that it looks incredible. I think a lot of the effects are improved from the first one. The aliens look really, really, really, really good. The alien queen looks phenomenal until she loses her. Was her thorax or her, her back half. Then she looks a little bit weird to me. I kind of wish they'd gone a little bit a different direction. Maybe give her a bit more of a back end somehow there. But overall it works really well. This is one of those movies where I'm not entirely sure that more equals better. For me, it's cool seeing so many aliens, but then I'm nervous where the rest of this franchise is going to go because are they going to have to just keep upping the ante or how are you going to get back to that feeling of like, these are terrifying creatures? Features in the Predator franchise, which we did recently, you're only ever seeing one Predator a time and they're always terrifying. Now we've seen an entire colony of aliens and we can survive that. I'm not entirely sure how that's going to work going forward, but I gotta say we're at the end of the Alien movie. These are the last ones that I've seen. After this, most of these movies are going to be brand new to me and I am extremely excited to see where this franchise goes. I gave this movie an 85 out of 100, which puts it 1 higher than alien. So I'm going the opposite direction. Will did on this one. [01:00:34] Speaker A: One. [01:00:37] Speaker C: Two, two kinds of people in the world. Those who like junk in the trunk and those who don't. [01:00:41] Speaker B: I mean, in fairness, we're very similar. You went down one point or two points? I went up one point. Like we're both. These Alien movies are hitting right around the Same spot for us? [01:00:50] Speaker C: Yeah, for now. [01:00:51] Speaker B: For now, yeah. Fair, Fair. All right, Brian, let us hear it. [01:00:57] Speaker A: Okay, so Dan, you are mostly right, but Will is more right. I do like the character Burke. I don't like any character Paul Reiser has ever played. I like Paul Reiser as a person. I don't like the characters he portrays and that's a testament to his acting ability. I think most of the characters you're supposed to feel awkward at best about. And I think it was a great casting for this role. I think every character in this movie was well cast. We did talk about Newt. They did a great job cutting her lines. I appreciate that. I think that James Cameron didn't change a thing. I think James Cameron did an amazing job at World Building. He took everything we love about the alien and he expanded it. He took everything we loved about Ellen Ripley and he expanded it. He took everything about that universe with the Corporation and he expanded it into something so vast and so amazing and so well thought out that we are grasping at the smallest of threads to try and pick it apart and we're still cool with it. I just found this movie to be absolutely phenomenal. I can watch it and re watch it and find new things to enjoy. I think everything in it looked amazing. They were able to capture the look of the alien they used. They expanded on Geiger's feel, showing the nest, right. And those tunnels and the aliens coming off of the walls and they don't even show up in. In infrared. Such cool sequences. The claws, the ripples on the skull. Like everything about the look of the aliens was amazing. The sequence when they're crawling on the ceiling is one. It's one of my favorites in cinema. I think it's so cool when Hicks falls backwards firing at the ceiling because they're up there and then they just start falling from the ceiling and aliens are jumping everywhere and explosions and the sound effects of all those guns and fire and screeching aliens is crazy. Throw on top of that an excellent scoring that really pushes the envelope with the drums and the Dunn and all that stuff that really gets your heart pumping and takes this. This, you know, haunted house story, as Will told us, and blows it up into this epic, fast paced, action packed war drama that's really intense with such lovable characters like Hudson losing it. I can't believe none of us have laid out any of his quotes. I won't bore you to death with them, but I love everything he says in this movie, even when it annoys you and seems out of place. I think everything in this movie is just so well thought out, so well done. It's fantastic. This is one of my favorite movies of all time. I'm looking through the way I scored this and I think the only, like the lowest point, and it's not even a low point in movies, but probably the overall plot was probably the. The worst thing I can think about this. There are a few holes. We talked about that. She's in front of the board. She doesn't even bother accusing them of trying to murder her whole crew with a sight psychotic robot that they sent along. You know, she goes back with the team, just accepting Burke's word. There are some plot holes there. The. The idea of how this all kind of comes together is a little bit thin, but honestly, I'm just so glad they made it happen. I'm willing to overlook those little bits because I want to see how this plays out. This idea of going head to head with some of our best. Maybe not our best, but, you know, some of the expendable best that we've got to go up against nature's worst beast that it could possibly create. Super epic, super fun and super scary. Like you're being chased through claustrophobic tunnels. You're being pushed and cornered. You're in the dark. You've got that beeping scanner and all these dots closing in on you all the time. You've got them swimming in through the water. You've got this mother daughter scenario where you're trying to protect your child. You've got two facehuggers loose in the same room with you skittering across the ground. You can't, you know, get anybody's attention, get help, because you're defenseless without your gun. They go through so many different scenarios. Not to mention you go mother versus mother. The queen alien against Ripley in that awesome mech suit with the hydraulics spinning around. And you know, the great foreshadowing, you think it's just a joke, her using that thing in the cheesy line of where do you want it, boys? Or whatever. And then later she comes out, the door, opens up, and she says that iconic line, get away from her, you. And you just want to jump out of your seat and just say, yeah. And they go head to head in that battle, and it was just incredible. You keep thinking this movie is peaked. And then there's just another sequence that takes it another notch. This is by far for me, the best movie in the series. I love Alien. I can critique it in a little bit because the Alien movie is a bit dated and doesn't hold up as well as this one does. I mean, I just watched it and I'm just so in love with it still. Like there's nothing takes me away from this movie except maybe the electricity where they fly into, into the atmospheric processor. But that's, that's more of a, that's more of an R rating kind of joke there. But for me, this movie's fantastic. I gave it a 97 and everything you guys said didn't change my score one bit. I am solid on that score. I think this is a phenomenal movie. And, and, and I'm. What can I say? I was happy to watch it yet again. [01:06:50] Speaker B: That is an epic score. That is, I think, the highest we've given anybody has given any movie so far on this channel. And I gotta say I'm not terribly surprised by that for this one. [01:07:00] Speaker A: I gotta say, in some of my, my little departments, the direction of this movie, how it holds up, and how much fun it is to watch had perfect 100 scores. For me, those, those three areas, I, I have no room for improvement and so rarely do I give anything a perfect score. If I can find something wrong with it, I will, I will ding it a little bit. But in those three areas I was like, I just don't see how they could improve in any way, shape or form. And so those scores plus the other areas got really high marks for me. And that's why this thing came in so high. [01:07:36] Speaker B: Anyways, the overall score for the Alien franchise so far I'm giving it an 84. Brian, that shot you all the way up to a 90, putting you in the highest place. Again, not terribly surprising. And Will is just behind you at 89, which brings our overall score for the alien franchise to 88, which is Leap and bounds above the other franchises we've been talking about so far. Now, I know it's incredibly early in the Alien franchise and obviously we've talked about the two best ones or debatably we've talked about the two best ones. Does this score surprise you at all? Do you think it should be a little higher, a little lower? Is it kind of right where you think it should be? What are your thoughts so far? Is this scare you for where we're going forward if all the ones get worse from here? [01:08:16] Speaker C: I'm sitting pretty on this. I think these are two very well made movies. I think think they have stood the test of time and are still talked about and have changed. I think they've impacted cinema so I'm very happy with these scores and I know it's just gonna go downhill from here. [01:08:34] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, we're in, we're in for some bumpy territory. [01:08:39] Speaker B: I don't, I don't. [01:08:40] Speaker C: That's how franchises go though. [01:08:42] Speaker A: Dan, you haven't seen Alien 3 yet, right? [01:08:44] Speaker B: I have seen Alien 3327 years ago. Okay. So like I don't remember it, but I know that I've seen it. I don't think I've ever seen Resurrection. I've definitely not seen what is. It's Prometheus and then Covenants. I've seen Prometheus once. I've never seen Covenant and I've not seen Romulus. So as I said, like there is like I'm, I'm going into uncharted territory. Like I've seen like with we did Predators, there was like one movie I hadn't seen. This is like a lot of un told territory for me. So I'm actually really excited to see where this franchise goes. I know people says it gets worse, say it gets worse, but I didn't hate Prometheus. I actually enjoyed it to some extent. So I'm, I'm curious to see where I land on the rest of this franchise as a whole. [01:09:28] Speaker A: I think I'm happy to talk about Aliens, but we all know it was no secret that Aliens is one of my favorite movies of all time. So we knew I was going to give this a high score and brag about and get excited about it and everything. Everything. So this was fun, fun chat and I love going over all the little behind the scenes stuff. As always, I'm most excited to talk about Alien 3, however, which I'll tell you guys right now, it's not going to get as high a score from me. It's not. It's not. But I think there's so much to that movie when you pick it apart, you pull it apart and you try and see what they were doing. So I'm really excited for next week to Talk about Alien 3. Dan, I'm really excited to get your fresh take on it. Going into it, thinking about things that we've been talking about these previous two movies. And of course, Will, I love your insight in these movies. We tend to agree very much on like 98 and then strongly disagree on 2%. So I'm really curious to see where. Because I don't know you, you've been very good about keeping your, your opinions of the upcoming movies and then I appreciate that. So I'm really looking forward to hear what's going on next week. [01:10:36] Speaker B: All right. And that has been our rating of Alien. What do you think? Was the score a little too high? A little too low? Exactly where you think it should be. Next week we're gonna be talking about Alien 3. It's gonna be a new one for me, returning to old ground for Brian. And we have no idea how Will feels about it. So come back, check that out, and we'll be going over it in the very near future. Until then, I hope you're safe. I hope you're well. Good night. [01:11:04] Speaker A: Sam.