Alien Cubed

In light of our recent fascination with genre, I’m going to do my best to avoid all reference to genre in this post. I was unfortunately born far too late to enter into the Alien franchise at a respectable point. Alien (1979) and Aliens (1986) had been on laserdisc for years by the time I was allowed to watch them, but Alien³ (1992) was in theaters at a time when I could spend my allowance and drag my dad to the theater for my occasional terrible choice in movies (this list includes The Faculty and From Dusk ‘til Dawn).

This period also marks the time when I would spend my allowance on various sets of cards purchased at the Trader’s World flea market. Because I identified this as an “adult” film, and part of my entrance into adulthood, I bought the entire set of Alien³ movie cards to only ensure that everyone would be aware of my maturation.

For a long period of time the third film in the franchise occupied the much-coveted third spot in the hier

archy of alien films. I don’t think many would argue that the Ridley Scot

t Alien isn’t the best film in the franchise, with Cameron’s taking second place. It seems the central argument to the Alien movies is where do three and four end up after one and two. After years of carrying this film close to my heart, it’s time to let the chest-burster go and move this film down a peg.

Part of this film suffers from wanting to be a Terry Gilliam movie, but a weirdly sentimental and serious Terry Gilliam movie. Most of the characters are British, and the set design is less futuristic and more industrial in a Brazil sort of way. Just look at Jonathan Pryce on the set of Alie...I mean Brazil.

The film also failed to develop any really sense of character, or at least if it did I failed to realize which relatively unknown, bald, British actor was which relatively underdeveloped psychopath. Poor Pete Postlethwaite. At one point I was certain they had just killed the same guy 17 times. And I only recently found out that William Gibson was the original choice for screenplay writer. I’ll allow him to add his two cents: “It became the first of some thirty drafts, by a great many screenwriters, and none of mine was used (except for the idea, perhaps, of a bar-code tattoo).”

Ultimately, what this film did not do that makes Alien great and Aliens meh is point out that it’s the metaphor that’s scary. We should be afraid of a world where people are treated as itemized inventory, and we should be afraid of the dark. In Alien³ it seems we should be afraid of the alien itself, but in its new dog form.

By the way, I think you could identify which films are the best according to taglines.

Alien: Resurrection: It's been more than 200 years ... The beginning has just started.

Alien: In space no one can hear you scream

Alien³: In 1979, we discovered in space no one can hear you scream. In 1992, we will discover, on Earth, EVERYONE can hear you scream. (The film did not take place on Earth, in case you were wondering)

Aliens: This time there's more