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#alien #alien1979 #xenomorph
Published: 2019-10-31 22:59:40 +0000 UTC; Views: 7987; Favourites: 187; Downloads: 22
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If I can give my 50 cents on this, I would stress to NOT make the alien too powerful. If it's so strong and implacable and it can break through every barrier and no weapon can stop it, it can become boring to watch: "Oh yeah, doesn't matter what they do, that thing is still gonna win... Oh look, it did it again. And again... and again... *yaaaaawn*... Oh look, the monster kills them all. Okay I guess."
I enjoyed 2017's Life for what it was, but the criticism that Calvin was too OP is legit. Making a villain too powerful and contriving the plot to help them is the same as making overpowered and lucky good guys: it's just lazy writing with plot armor abuse and is not engaging.
Sure, Lovecraft's monsters are technically these cosmic demigods that are way above us, but he was smart enough to not make the story some kind of hunt or fight against these things no human can stop, it's mostly about pondering the implications of the little info we have about them, and when they show up, they have small scenes like Cthulhu getting rammed or the Shoggoth showing up giving chase, just the little it needs to drive the point home.
Films like Alien, The Thing and The Mist did a pretty good job finding that sweet spot between making the monsters an intimidating threat, but not making them invincible either. It helps the stakes when there's a 40% or so chance to win against the monsters, you COULD make it out, but you're more likely gonna risk your life. That ups the suspense, it keeps you at the edge of your seat wondering if they'll make it or no, when you write a story so well to the point both the villain and the protagonist have a fair chance of coming on top of the other, THAT is engaging.
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You also have to consider something else:
The crew of the Nostromo DIDN'T have any proper weapons to defend themselves with.
They were also confined to a single space station with numerous ducts and ventilation chambers making the Xenomorph more capable of ambush.
It also doesn't "See" with light, like us, but detects our bio-electric energy. It can see and snatch a human in the dark.
But the Xenomorph was also hunting a group of unprepared and unarmed humans.
In "Aliens", the humans were at least armed.
They were still caught with their pants down, but maybe that's the point of it all.
Humans adapt. We overcome. We use what we have intelligently.
The Xenomorphs' greatest strength was remaining an unknown threat. No warning, no preparation, thus easy to hunt unsuspecting humans.
But Ripley survived.
She warned others.
And people prepared for it.
Using overwhelming force of advanced weapons.
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Sigh... Once again, I like Aliens, it's a good movie.
I just hate how it made the xenomorph weaker, it got worse and worse in the following movies, until a SINGLE headshot is enough to kill an Alien.
If the xenomorphs in Aliens were as strong as Kane's Son, then Vasquez could have done jack shit and the xenomorph would've hold her down and killed her like how it did with Parker. If the xenomorphs in Aliens had an acid blood as powerful as that of Kane's Son and its facehugger, Gorman and Hicks would've been INSTANTLY killed by a drop of acid going through their bodies instead of "Aaaw, it burns!"
If people have the freedom of refusing what Alien vs Predator: Requiem establishes (untrained idiots in 2007 with modern day guns can kill xenomorphs better than futuristic soldiers with "advanced weapons" in Aliens could), then I have the freedom to call bullshit on Aliens RETROACTIVELY making the Alien's strenght and acid blood weaker.
Again, it's still a good movie with great direction, effects, characters and dialogues, but I will forever call bullshit on how they began to ruin the Alien.
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Maybe that was the point of the sequel: Geiger's Alien was an unstoppable monster, but only BECAUSE no one had the means to fight it. The ability to fight back dispelled the illusion of its myth and power.
Now granted I'm in full agreement concerning the Xenomorph's acidic blood NOT being as canonly potent, or being a bit too "easy" to kill with small-arms munitions. Pulse-rifle, acceptable. 9 mm pistol, not so much.
Also didn't help there not being enough human "cannon-fodder" for the Xenomorph to sufficiently kill to show off its power, what with it being dependent on human hosts to reproduce.
Also, you're right. The more into the "sequels", the more the Xenomorph's lethality and danger was diminished. But I suppose the directors and writers of those movies just wanted to see how many different ways they could play around with the mythos of Geiger's Alien.
Final note; AvP Requiem was an all-around disappointment, and I refuse to accept it as canon.
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I'd be less sour if the stuff Aliens established didn't inspire people to get worse and worse. It proved that you need to make the monster weak once, and it'll get weaker. And weaker. And weaker. Until a pizza delivery boy can just kill one with a couple of headshots like it's a fucking zombie.
Colonial marines: WHAT THE HELL!!! We're soldiers from the future, you're telling me a bunch of untrained rednecks with 2007 guns could do a better job than us and our advanced weaponry?!
Alien: See how it feels like?
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Wait, when did they have rednecks?
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If they weren't rednecks (don't remember, don't care, just like the people behind that garbage) the point is that the Colonial Marines are upset and call the Alien vs Predator: Requiem characters that.
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Oh you’re talking about the aliens vs predators stuff, that explains a lot
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The movies at least, the AVP comics seem more competent and I heard good things about them. Ain't gonna bash them or praise then until I've watched one of those in their entirety. But the two movies, especially the second one, are crap.
I believe the first AVP movie could've been good if it had execution and mastery on par with Alien and Aliens, after I got into Lovecraft I appreciated how the plot of the first AVP movie was vaguely similar to At the Mountains of Madness: science expedition in an ancient alien temple in the Arctic goes wrong and the Predators and Xenomorphs kinda fill the roles of the Elder Things the Shoggoth respectively.
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this would be an interesting premise to explore.;the alien drifting in space until it happens upon another unfortunate crew.
as for the alien's vulnerability, i'm kinda in the middle ground. the Xenomorphs in the sequel are fragile, or at least appear so, because the marines use explosive ammo. plus it's possible the alien in the original is a more singular, eldritch strain than the hive variant we see in alien's.
but at the same time the alien is very much a cosmic horror being, an unstoppable herald of entropy and death. even if you can destroy a singular instance of the creature or isolate it, the knowledge that such a thing can exist and will continue to exist can be it's own source of dread. after all,who knows how many civilizations the xenomorph has outlived?
a middle option for me would be to make the alien not indestructible, but make it very difficult to kill due to it's healing factor, meaning that'd you'd probably have to spend an entire clip of pulse rifle rounds to kill even a single xeno by pushing their healing factor to it's limit, all while avoiding getting to close to it or being in the splash zone of the acidic blood.
and your'e dealing with a swarm of em.
awesome piece of artwork.
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To be fair the aliens in Aliens were grunts, not Giger's beast.
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I definitely agree with your sentiments about the other sequels. They really took away a lot of the Alien's potential for mystery and fright by making them more grounded creatures. The only thing I've seen besides the original movie that really captures what they're all about is the game Alien: Isolation where they were bulletproof, extremely fast, and phenomenally cunning (especially for a video game enemy). Would definitely recommend that game.
I don't think they should've necessarily have been made indestructible and super-strong though, because that really just doesn't make a lot of sense. I think that in Aliens they should've made them invulnerable to ordinary weaponry, so that only the largest, most powerful of the marines' weapons would've been able to harm them, and even then they would mostly be just injured and slowed down, not killed. Because as it is, Aliens makes them seem not only like fragile easy-to-pop acid-balloons, but also completely stupid. Like, why would they keep attacking the humans if they were just getting killed? They should've gone for more surprise, geurilla tactics, snatching people out of the ceiling and floors. Never a direct assault. Never needlessly throw away their lives.
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Oh yeah, Alien: Isolation is such a breath of fresh air, and someday I want to read the Alien: Dead Orbit comic miniseries, I've been told it's really good and aims to be more like the original movie than another action fare. I wanna check it either way because the artstyle is beautiful, it vaguely looks like Ron Cobb's concept arts which is fitting.
I agree, I wouldn't make the Xenos in my story unstoppable, turning something to the other extreme can be just as bad; if the Alien always wins no matter what they do, it'd get repetitive and predictable. Besides, if I make the protagonist finally triumph over one of the Aliens, it's be extremely satisfying "YES, FINALLY!! ONE SOAB IS DOWN!!!", John Carpenter's Thing was a tough guy too, but even he allowed the humans to win from time to time, the dread and sense of hopelessness weren't ruined.
I really loved how Aliens at first made the situation at Hadley's Hope feel hopeless, they still treated it like "Holy crap, ONE Alien was a bitch to deal with, a whole colony invaded by multiple Aliens must look like a taste of Armageddon", but after what you said, seeing them just being things that run at you like mindless beasts and are even physically weaker (Kane's Son could hold Parker down effortlessly, while Vasquez just keeps a Warrior down with her foot before she shoots it in the head), just makes you wonder if the colonists just sat down in fetal position and allowed the first Alien to spread. Unlike the Nostromo crew they didn't have to worry about the (now only scorching) acid blood making holes.
Still a great movie recommendable to any film enthusiast, but I hate how it began to nerf the Xeno.
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Oh, also your drawing is really good too. Forgot to mention that. I like that the only light source is the shuttle's engines.
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Damn straight, Aliens/Xenomorphs are my favorite alien species by far (3rd favorite behind others)
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I do remember the more memorable quotes in Aliens.
"Game over man, game over!"
"Get away from her you bitch!"
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Out of curiosity, are you familiar with the Alien parody in Conker's Bad Fur Day? What did you think of that?
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Don't have much to say, it was just a little spoof/homage to the power loader fight in Aliens.
If you mean the whole thing about the game fucking up allowing Conker to win, that was very clever, but I don't think the Xenomorph is to thank for it, if you replace it with some other monster the joke would be the same.
When it comes to Alien spoofs, Leo Ortolani in 2012 made "ALLEN" which was a parody of both Prometheus and the first Alien, starring his characters from his Rat-Man in a non canonical piece of silliness, as he sometimes does. It's more cleverly written than most if not even all spoof films, better than any "Movie" movies. On that regard, Ortolani also made a solid spoof of 300 with Rat-Man that is SO MUCH better than Meet the Spartans.
His method of parodying reminds me more of Mel Brooks' stuff like Young Frankenstein, in which he obviously pokes fun at what he's parodying, but you can sense a deep respect for the source.
It's not just slapping outdated pop culture references that will age in a year and nonstop toilet humor.
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I guess you're right about that.
This guy's method of parodying sounds interesting, though. I tend to like those older parody movies like Airplane! and Blazing Saddles, (I need to re-watch Young Frankenstein, though, maybe I'll appreciate it more the second time around,) so anything along those lines is bound to be enjoyable. And what I've checked out of his artwork is neat as well, kinda makes me think of cartoons from the 90s.
And yes, that "Movie" movie crap is awful.
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