Like many things in life, we owe the movie Alien to a curious chance already something you don’t expect. In 1977, Ridley Scott was in Los Angeles to present his first film, The duelists.
By this time, Scott was already thinking about his next film, Tristan and Isolde. However, a friend of his and producer, David Putnam, invited him to the premier of a new movie. Scott went to the appointment, saw the movie and was so impressed that he was depressed for 3 months and dropped the project at hand.
That movie was Star wars.
Yes really. We have Alien because Ridley Scott, by pure chance, went to see Star wars, as he himself related to The Hollywood Reporter. Basically, he was so fascinated that he wondered why he was thinking of movies like Tristan when there were others doing something like Star Wars.
The Duelists it won the Best First Film award at Cannes, but failed to get initial theatrical distribution.
And then, also out of nowhere, Ridley Scott fell into the script of another movie, Alien Someone in Cannes saw The duelists And, who knows why, he thought he would be the right fit to direct a science fiction film, with which Fox wanted to repeat the success of Star wars.
The rest is history and these are its pieces.
All the films and their synopses
We could say that there is 8 official films within the saga Alien, but in reality there should be only 2. However, since my wishes are never fulfilled, these are all the films of the franchise.
Alien the Eighth Passenger (1979)
The mother of the lamb, the first and best of all. They wanted to make a “Shark in Space” and they came up with a movie for the story, a a masterpiece of science fiction and horror at the same time.
The ship Nostromo captures a sign of life on an unknown planet that is supposed to be uninhabited. When they try to find out what it is, they will have to face a terrible alien life form and a secret hidden in the belly of the MADER computer.
The amazing HR Giger designs would create nightmares for multiple generations, Sigourney Weaver would consecrate himself and Alien It would be one of the most honored (copied) films in history.
Aliens: The Return (1986)
James Cameron directs the continuation and achieves something unheard of. The film goes from pure horror to fast-paced action and it doesn’t matter, they mark another masterpiece. Two out of two and the fans are still debating whether the first or the second part is better.
In this case, Ripley (Sigourney Weaver), accompanies an unforgettable group of Marines who come to investigate the loss of communications with a colony.
Things, of course, are not going to turn out well.
Alien 3 (1992)
I’m a big fan of David Fincher (Fight club, Seven…), But his directorial debut in Alien 3 is not good, although he is not to blame either, because several directors and screenwriters went through there on a set full of problems.
The movie is not that bad, but pales before two masterpieces and is an omen for what is to come. There will be no more good movies in the series.
Ripley accidentally ends up on a kind of prison planet and is not going alone, because a facehugger had slipped into the ship when escaping from the planet of Aliens.
Yet another return to the old argument of being locked in with a monster, but with mediocre execution.
Alien: Resurrection (1997)
French director Jean-Pierre Jeunet (Amelie), tries a third change, but does not get it. Sigourney repeats the role, but this time 200 years after the action of the previous films and in the form of a clone.
Wynona Rider gives you the replica and the Jeunet aesthetic saves nothing. Delusional and forgettable.
Alien vs Predator (2004)
Exhausted the premise, nothing better than trying to make money mixing with another successful alien, Predator. Those things never go well.
Pyramids buried in Antarctica without much sense and, above all, with enough boredom. What could have been an epic showdown remains a mediocre attempt to get the money, breaking the myth of both monsters.
Alien vs Predator 2 – Requiem (2007)
More of the same, but this time with less means is imagination.
There is a kind of mixed spawn of Alien Y Predator, but instead of fear causes yawning.
Prometheus (2012)
Ridley Scott returns to the legendary saga with a prequel that tries to explain the origins from Alien and its mythology.
The start is promising, Scott proves he’s the best at creating alien-looking worlds (sorry, Nolan), but the film deflates at full speed and ends in disappointment.
It is not as bad as the films which I just named, but it is not good either.
Alien: Covenant (2017)
Scott tries to repeat and forgets about the cliffhanger where he left Prometheus (or rather, he solves it in a bad way) to go the other way and focus on the adventures of the most useless scientists in history. They just have to make stupid decisions so the movie can keep running.
To top it off, destroy the mythology Alien with absurd and confusing explanations that take away its aura of mystery and threat.
I left the cinema pissed off, did not succeed and meant a stop in the plans to continue.
The future of the saga
Ridley Scott insists that a Alien He still has a lot of sane left in the movies, but no. There don’t seem to be any more movies in the works, at least not yet. Scott’s ideas also insist on plot lines that, precisely, were the worst received in the prequels.
In the same way, the Alien 5 by Neill Blomkamp was canceled, so for the moment, we’ll have to settle for the future tv series.
Its director, Noah Hawley, says that one of the basic themes will be something that resonates now: “Eating the rich.”
Noah Hawley’s new Alien series will play on a popular theme: Eat the rich. https://t.co/qqouIAUkMQ
– VANITY FAIR (@VanityFair) July 1, 2021
Anyway, it hasn’t even started shooting, something that will happen in the spring of 2022 if everything continues on schedule.
In what order to watch the Alien movies?
To be honest, the order does not matter much.
The ideal is to see Alien Y Aliens, the return, and stop there. However, there are those who want to see himthe saga in chronological order according to the events in the movies.
I’m not going to be the one to criticize the fetishes of others, but if you haven’t seen anything, doing it in that order doesn’t make sense and you’re going to get fed up before you get to the good movies.
But, just in case, this would be the correct temporal arrangement:
- Alien vs Predator.
- Aliens vs Predator – Requiem.
- Prometheus (located chronologically 90 years after Requiem).
- Alien: Covenant.
- Alien
- Aliens, the return.
- Alien 3.
- Alien: Resurrection.
As you can see, the saga Alien It has more history than it seems and, if you are a fan or want to enter the saga, now you know everything you need.
