r/movies • u/Urbanpsyche • 15h ago
Discussion Aliens
I just caught Aliens, I’ve watched this film 20 times but I was still on the edge of my seat- the medical room scene, the movement detection scene where the warning pulse keeps getting quicker, the air shaft scene with Gorman and Vasquez taking one for the team so they can escape, which transitions beautifully into the Queen’s lair scene. We’re all going to come through this conversation with the same old it’s the best sequel ever but I think it’s a standout and standalone story.
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u/Obi_1_Kenobee 15h ago
it’s my favorite movie of all time. and probably always will be.
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u/BRtIK 10h ago
How do you feel about the alien content that has released since the original run and how do you feel about the aliens origin?
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u/TorsoPanties 9h ago
I enjoyed Romulus. Good tension, felt like it borrowed ideas from all the previous movies and made it work pretty well.
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u/fungobat 8h ago
I enjoyed Romulus. Are you watching Alien: Earth on Hulu?
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u/SimplyBlarg 5h ago
Romulus made me able to enjoy Prometheus and Covenant as Alien films. Still not happy with the xeno basically being an ez bake recipe, but it made it work.
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u/Grimdotdotdot 9h ago
But your avatar!
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u/Obi_1_Kenobee 9h ago
I couldn’t think of any cool Aliens names. 😅
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u/HumpieDouglas 11h ago
That scene where Hicks looks in the ceiling and you see them all crawling towards them like giant roaches. I love that scene.
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u/crabcancer 11h ago
This has forever scarred me that I cannot do aircon ducts when I heard scampering or go into roof spaces.
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u/TorsoPanties 9h ago
The wardrobe in my room had a shelf and if you climbed up there you could see into the space between the old ceiling and new ceiling about a foot gap. Fucken nightmare fuel when my brother trapped up there one time. I was like 9-10
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u/Orwells_Roses 15h ago
I’ve always thought this is far and away the best movie in the “Aliens” universe. It holds up perfectly well as a stand alone story, and was genre-defining as a sci-fi thriller.
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u/ExcellentPassenger49 15h ago
This is my favorite of all Alien and Alien related movies. If you like the motion detection, the movie Death of a Unicorn has an eerily similar device.
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u/introvert_tea 12h ago
It's one of my favorite movies ever, and it's definitely one of the best (if not THE best) sequel out there.
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u/mandosauro 14h ago
As they say, 1 is more space horror and 2 is more action, likewise the aliens one is my favorite too.
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u/Lahk74 12h ago
A sadistic part of me wishes they would have just went nuts with the genre switching after Aliens in the 90's and 00's.
You're watching a new 90's Kevin Costner Western. Surprise! Facehugger!
Sandra Bullock churns out yet another will-they-wont-they rom com. Surprise! Chestburster just as they kiss.
Matt Damon continues to shit on the Bourne novels when he discovers that his memories and perceptions are fake and he's really a xenomorph drone capturing victims for a queen.
Why the fuck not? Better than any AVP effort.
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u/sanjuro_kurosawa 12h ago
It's really great films made by our finest directors.
There are so many Ridley Scott and James Cameron touches in both movies that make them amazing.
Scott was able to incorporate neo-futurism, a bleak view on corporate life, and many revolutionary cinematic stylings into Alien. Cameron was becoming the master sci-fi/action director with Terminator, and he turned his company of Los Angeles actors into a Space Marines unit, along with his mastery of film miniatures and epic gunfights.
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u/Bennett1984 8h ago
Revisited it not long ago for the first time in a few years and echo what you say. It's incredible. Holds up amazingly well.
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u/Expensive-Sentence66 7h ago
Saw both films in the theater.
Aliens was a total ride and a fantastic amount of fun.
Alien was an intense emotional experience I don't ever want go through again. Both films were the top of the food chain.
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u/udat42 11h ago
I love Aliens. Alien is a superb film, but Aliens is more to my personal taste. All the characters are great.
This might be a minority opinion, but I also much prefer the theatrical cut. The directors cut is overly long, and showing the facehugger attached to a colonist right at the start really diminishes the tension that builds up to the first time you see one in the theatrical cut. Also, although I might be mis-remembering this, I think it's Newt's dad, which just feels like an unlikely coincidence.
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u/dvb70 11h ago
I would like a cut that keeps the sentry guns in. I am not fussed about much else in the extended cut but I love the sentry gun scene.
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u/udat42 11h ago
I like that scene too, but it does show a shitload of Aliens being wasted. I always wondered if the sentry guns, plus all the other Aliens we see die in the rest of the movie, adds up to more Aliens than there were colonists (140 or something?) which should be impossible with what we know of Alien reproduction.
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u/festoon_the_dragoon 10h ago
I always wondered the same. Counting the kills from the initial marine engagement, then the sentry guns seems like a decent amount of xenos were killed.
Posted this above, but the theatrical cut has a lot less tension than the director's cut. The aliens vanish for the entire second act and the stress on the survivors doesn't seem to make as much sense. In the director's cut the xenos are a constant threat and the sentry guns barely stop them.
While I agree the first facehugger scene is unnecessary I do like being shown the families and children on the colony.
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u/Riskrunner7365 9h ago
I prefer the extended cut as it also gives you the bit about Ellen losing her daughter, so it gives extra gravitas to the heroics when she's rescuing Newt
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u/TrueLegateDamar 14h ago
As a kid, I kept trying to watch this movie that almost was never on TV for whatever reason, and when it was on I was young enough to be ordered to bed around the part the marines escape the hive. Didn't see the full movie until I was like 14 and holy shit what an intense expierence.
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u/Reyson_Fox 7h ago
Its fascinating how movies like Predator, Alien, Aliens, Terminator, The Thing or even Jurassic Park have you tense or gripped by scenes even when the monsters aren't even on screen or ever around them - but you still feel the sense of the urgency, worry or stress of that threat still being there for them in the story.
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u/scrubbedx123 15h ago
aliens is a masterclass in tension it never gets old those scenes are so intense and yeah that queen's lair bit is just iconic even if you know what's coming it's still such a thrill every time
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u/MadeByTango 13h ago
There is a game in early access called Xenopurge. If you like the pulse sensor tension it’s essentially that, where you are commanding blips on a screen as you try maneuver them around an alien ship accomplishing tasks.
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u/festoon_the_dragoon 10h ago
They recently played the theatrical release on cable. I realized how different it is from the director's cut and how spoiled I'd been after watching that fuller version for so many years.
A ton of the best lines and conversations are absent in the theatrical release. And the xenomorphs essentially disappear until the final act. Without the sentry guns and the xenos probing the defenses, a lot of the tension goes away.
Funny this popped up today. I'm going to see the original Alien in the theater today. Really stoked to see it on the big screen.
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u/Carbuncle2024 7h ago
I agree with all of this ..will watch #2 over #1 on tv bc #2 had more action ..but.. I did see Alien in a theatre in 1979 and it was truly a horrifying movie.. I also like that #2 kept Ripley as the Heroine and that she wasn't shuttled aside for a replacement hero (or heroine). 👹
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u/Cosmicdusterian 3h ago
Love them both for different reasons. The superb pacing of Aliens. The cast and claustrophobic feel of Alien.
Single scariest scene for me isn't even on the screen. It's when Ripley and the audience are listening to what's happening to Lambert (Veronica Cartwright). We see how it starts, but not how it ends. When she's hyperventilating over the speaker, and her scream is cut off. Her absolute terror is captured only in sound. Gives me chills every time.
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u/fitnessexpress 15h ago
Aliens is magnificent, even though I personally think I prefer the atmospheric horror of Alien a tiny bit more. Both are almost perfect movies.
It's depressing how utterly disappointing Alien: Earth is.
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u/labria86 14h ago
Funny. For me alone earth is already better than anything except the first movie. But it does feel noticeably of lower quality than Fargo. The editing and production is weird.
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u/HiImBrianFellow 12h ago
I'll take every single movie in the alien franchise over alien earth. It certainly has decent production value but everything else feels lacking. The story so far seems very silly and I don't particularly care for any of the characters yet.
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u/AidilAfham42 6m ago
I actually like that they’re starting to show hints of the kids having existential crisis. Maybe it’ll get better from there. I also like the cyborg character. I was expecting Noah Hawley’s weird editing but didn’t expect the overuse of dual exposure shots. I’m still liking the show but I do recognize all the flaws.
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u/labria86 11h ago
Yeah I feel ya. To me all the other films aside from alien, aliens and Prometheus are just not really watchable. I get it though. I'm disappointed as well. But maybe it'll be better as a whole.
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u/Gaemon_Palehair 4h ago
The first time the Alien just ...statically moves into frame like it's a bust on wheels is so laughably bad.
The show as a whole is great but yeah some budget issues maybe?
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u/labria86 14h ago
I wish I could figure out how to like this movie. The first one is one of my favorites. And everything after that is just such lower tier for me. I actually liked Prometheus though.
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u/PauIAIlensCard 15h ago
I know the first is the “better” film, but I still prefer Aliens if I’m only going to pick one. It’s just so enjoyable. In the exact same vein as Terminator vs T2.