The original Xeno had a 4 Day Lifespan...

Which was to bite off Ripley's head, correct? Was there anything else Scott had in mind in addition to that? Anyway, I agree that would have been pretty horrifying.

Yes, then Bite her head off, sit down in her "Captain's Chair", and communicate in HER VOICE with Earth. I would imagine you can throw in rape her first as well, I am positive both Giger and he wanted that In for the ending.

So in essence the Xeno is a great big scary Mayfly. So if they invade Earth any time soon I'm going to pull a sicky from work, hide out for 4 days or so watching the films back to back until it's safe to go outside :)

Yep I'd heard that as well, and it would have been a horrific ending but in keeping with the original vision Giger and Scott had....... A true horror movie. Then we wouldn't have gotten Aliens, or Alien 3, or Alien: Desecration!

I'm not so sure (even at 19 yrs. old as I was at the time), that I would've bought into the whole "talking in her voice to earth" scene... seems kinda' weak (even for its time back then).

It would have been surprising at the very least..... No?

not to mention once the 4 day life span was figured out ,the scariness factor lessens considerably.

I'm so glad they didn't have it talk in her voice. That would have ruined the entire movie for me.

Good info. This seems to reinforce the concept of Xeno as having insect-like life cycle. James Cameron took that idea even further: warrior & worker types in a single hive. Some insects only have hours to find mate before they die. Interesting.

Of course it's tough to judge the way we would react back then, nowadays. We're so over-exposed to the rip-offs and played-out versions of what was once original creative thought. I teach video/film production and I'm always reminded through my teenage students of exactly how much they haven't been exposed to. In a way it's like this forum... someone new signs on and asks about something the rest of us have beaten to death. It's hard for us to see it through their eyes and their perspective as a newbie. Yet, to them, it may seem brilliant.

Yea wouldn't that have been a bitch to find out after everybody had been kacked by the Alien that all they woulda had to do was lock themselves in the kitchen for a couple days?

[quote]Yea wouldn't that have been a bitch to find out after everybody had been kacked by the Alien that all they woulda had to do was lock themselves in the kitchen for a couple days?[/quote] LMAO

@Engr101 yeah i was actually wondering about that, do we ever see a worker alien??? because everyone calls them the warrior aliens but i thought that other then the queen they were the only type. so do we see worker aliens? are they the ones that crawl out of the walls and then the warriors are the ones that attack them later? is there a difference? i am so confused :(

or are the ones with the domes the workers and we just don't see them in aliens? because i was always under the impression that the alien dome falls off or shrinks down to the skull as the aliens get older, after all the only aliens in the original series that don't have the domes are the ones from aliens and they were alive for a few months and the rest were only alive for a few days or less. anyone have an answer?????? and also, the 4 day thing was dropped obviously in aliens, they were alive for a long time.

another interesting post, thanks Spartacus Not convinced though that it hid in the Narcissus by fluke. I always saw the xeno as very intelligent - i thought it hide on the escape shuttle because it knew the self destruct had been activated. It's knowledge of the ship and the crew's movements has been supposed by some as it could "read minds" - see our brain waves? - as part of it's sensory perceptions. Another theory is that in "combining" with a human host while in it's facehugger phase it could capture the memories/knowledge of it's host - so it had Kane's knowledge. Ridley Scott certainly planned that it could operate the communication equipment, and knew to mislead Earth by disguising it's voice. And yes, RS's original ending was for the Xeno to "rape" Ripley before killing her (as like Lambert) - RS spoke that he wanted the xeno to be fascinated by the texture of her skin - hence the filmed undressing scene which showed off her legs, breasts, butt, and (pan down for it) crotch. Interesting re the 4 day lifespan - certainly it grew prodigiously fast from chestburster to adult in a day - I always thought that was just so it eliminated it's childhood vulnerability stage. But not sure that it would then die so quickly.... seems a waste from a species point of view. I am one of those who would keep Alien and be happy to ignore the following 3 movies, so look forward to RS giving his version of the xeno in it's origins.

Sparty, Sparty, you do get over excited. I have the wonderful alien vault also, and let's just get this straight, the four day lifespan was an idea of scotts but was not something that he set in stone, it was just a thought he passed on as been a possibility. Just as he did the ludicrous biting off head, speaking in ripleys voice crap. Lots of ideas pass through the synapses dude.

sorry, not to be confrontational at all "THP", but on the commentary included on the Quadrilogy DVD set he CLEARLY states it was a written ACT that FOX refused to let him shoot. They refer to that scene as "The Final Act" and it is in fact a FACT that it was written as I mentioned, but sadly IMO never shot.

Is the commentary on the Quadrilogy DVD different from the one on the Alien (Director's Cut) DVD? That one includes R Scott, S Weaver, V Cartwright, and other cast members as well as some producers and sfx guys. Great bonus features btw.

Not sure but I think it's way longer. Then there's the newer BlueRay version which is diff. too I think