Franchise Rants

Are the novelisations canon though? I doubt it.

I don't think you understand the concept of RANTING @S.M

No, actually, when I think back to all the other comments you've posted I think you're actually quite the expert at it.

Not wanting to stop anyone from ranting.  Just putting info out there. Whether people are interested are not, is up to them.

Oh my, how highly you must think of yourself.

You're putting info on here? A place where the members know ALOT about that particular franchise?

Most of the members on here know everything about that particular CANON.

You get all your information from the comics. They're not canon dude.

Someone was angry about some specific story points in Aliens, that had been addressed. Not trying to change opinions - just letting people know who might be interested. Or not.

Which comic was I referencing?

Look, in almost every post you make you reference a comic or book; fire and stone, out of the shadows, the film novelizations. 

They're not canon.

Forget about the comics, watch the films and the documentaries dude, you may learn something.

I've been watching the films for 30 years.

And the things you mentioned are currently regarded as canon.  No one is asking you to like them or accept them and they shouldn't be a barrier for ideas, or indeed ranting, but that doesn't change anything.

"the things you mentioned are currently regarded as canon."

Didn't they say that Aliens colonial marines was canon?

They also said that Avp and Avp 2 were canon to the ALIEN franchise. They do that to promote and sell more of the product, it doesn't mean that they are canon though.

A:CM was touted as canon, but that is no longer the case.

AvP and AvP:R - I don't know if they were ever outright stated to be canon, though they were created to fit with the existing films. Currently their status is uncertain.

The Weyland-Yutani Report (upon which I consulted) was created to be as tight as possible canonically, and that includes references to Fire & Stone, Out Of The Shadows, River of Pain and the Isolation video game.  A version of the WYR itself was then referenced in the Sea of Sorrows novel.

Obviously Alien is the masterpiece.  As much as I loved Aliens, it doesn't really fit does it.  Its a complete departure from the horror of the original and made the Xeno's vulnerable.  At least A3 tried to bring back the unkillable stalker that was in the original.  A4 was unspeakably bad with almost no redeeming qualities. 

AVP- lets all just agree to forget those.

Prometheus was just a mess.  Visually it looked great, but man the story and script was just awful and completely ruined the mystery of the only masterpiece in the bunch, the original.   Makes me cringe to see what Blade Runner 2 is going to become.

Hey now. This is my thread, and if anyone is going to dispense unpleasantness it's going to be me!

That said, as some of you already know I find the idea of personal canon to be valid and that is definitely one of the concepts we're exploring here. Even though I personally reject 99% of the media  most others embrace as canon, even the goofy concepts of Fire and Stone will sadly have to be considered here.  

Play nice, or I'll tie your tails  together, hang you over a branch, and then we'll see who wins!

The thread is for ranting and Necronom 4 is ranting about comics.  Seems appropriate.

S.M.-

Agreed. We all express our different passions differently. It's a big beautiful world and we are all special snowflakes. Personally, I only recognize Alien and Prometheus, and if anyone contradicts me I am going to go fucking apeshit.

So, Prometheus. I love the movie. I found the Alien franchise in, like, 2010 and by then the Alien prequel talk and news was starting to get going, so I was swept up into it. It really led to my obsession with this franchise and my imagination runs all day with this stuff. 

It is just too bad that the final product was such a bad movie. I think that on a 10 point scale, I would give it a 5. I used to say 8 or something, but the characters are paper thin and the story is slightly muddled. 

Shaw is close to being good, but I don't think she quite makes it. When she quotes her father in response to Milburn I see what they wanted to go for pretty much, but it came across flat. He asked a legitimate question that was extremely important actually (to any rational person let alone a scientist, which is funny considering how much an idiot he was. Damn I don't know I just don't think it worked. I think Charlie was actually a pretty good character. A real asshole mostly, but he seemed to be layered. But Janek was wasted. Fifield was an unstable asshole. Vickers could have been worse. Theron acted it well I would say, but the writing wasn't super strong. Most anyone else was just a background weirdo. IN fact, a whole tank/truck of characters disappeared (most likely died.) Just, gone. 

The engineers weren't designed terribly to me, but I would be a liar if I said I didn't prefer to see the 30 foot space jockeys haha. I know that isn't practical, but I WANT IT. 

The cinematography was amazing, but the writing left this movie hollow. I might always pop the dvd or bluray in every month or so, but the writing (of the characters mostly) makes me want to throw up. 

Yeah the editing really mucked around with those background mercenary characters. As the film stands, Janek tells Vickers to evacuate, but there was two more guys either on Prometheus or on the planet driving the RT who got forgotten about.

Each movie has its flaws.... Alien and Aliens being lesser and it seemed each new movie the flaws got worse... Alien 3 had no real flaws that prior did not have, all Alien 3 left us with was maybe a few Plot Holes such as the Eggs on the Sulaco but these are not massive holes.

Alien R had a problem with how they obtained the Organism, to me thats my biggest gripe in the whole Franchise.....

How from DNA you can re-create a clone who was exactly the same as the Ripley who died....

I cant see how this would be..... i can buy the Ripley 8 idea, but not the Pregnant with a Queen one... i would rather them had shown us a Ripley Clone that was more Xeno like the failed Clones, or that they got one Ripley who then evolved into something that then could have led to a Queen or Egg Morph to produce a Queen.

I felt the oh we can clone from DNA a Ripley and when she grows, then magically a Queen would appear in her just as when the Ripley had before she Sacrificed herself.

Apart from that the movie had good ideas that where not executed well, like Prometheus too, good ideas, just not executed well.

Genetic material is shared during embryo implantation. When the embryo samples the host DNA to develop the final creature, some Alien genetic material is passed to the host.  Possibly to protect it (Ripley healed rather quick on Fiorina, and Purvis seemed to be a pretty decent swimmer with an embryo in his chest restricting the capacity of one lung).

Yes i can buy that some material is passed on, which is why i felt Ripley 8 made sense.... maybe to a degree that DNA is tainted with Xeno Strain that any clone would be a hybrid which Ripley 8 seems to be.

Just the whole Queen part.... i cant see how that would work.... it would be like if we try and be as scientific as we can..

If i was to have my Legs removed and then someone gets my DNA after this happens and clones me, then i would expect my clone to be a fully restored me and not a Legless Clone...

Which is why i cant buy the Clone having a Queen inside.  The Failed Clones i liked... just not how we have a complete Clone that carries a Queen.

But we overthink things and it was necessary to carry the Plot Device and obtain a Queen. for the same reasons that Alien 3 had to fit in that a Egg (Eggs) were on board the Sulaco so that they can carry on with a Xeno and Queen Embryo in Alien 3

"How is it that none of the surveys ever turned up any indication of this very large and strange object?"

Maybe the Derelict is hard to detect, and cant be picked up like a Normal Ship can, this would explain Plot Holes.. in the Franchise...

Prometheus they never detected a single ship, it was only due to the Pup Probes when mapping the Temple/Cave Mound that Janek noticed something.

In Covenant it seems the crew are surprised to only find David or that they even find him... could the ships scanners not detect the Juggernaught?

Would the Covenant not send a probe or do a scan before setting down?

The big problem is the Space Jockey SOS,  and did this stop broadcasting after Alien?

The build up to Prometheus’ release was the most excited I have ever been about any film! Our man Ridley finally returning to Science Fiction, and more importantly, the Alien Universe he set in motion, what could possibly go wrong?

I went to the cinema 4 times, including two 3D showings. I kept going back because there was so much to digest. Without the awesomeness of the 3D, there was less distraction and I noticed much more. Ridley is pretty damn unique, he can create the spectacular, with an economy of style. Unlike Jim Cameron, Ridley can economise in both visual and monetary terms.

I couldn’t empathise with any of the characters. I honestly could not stand Shaw, and although she is a very capable actress, I felt Noomi Rapace was totally wrong for the part. Holloway was an absolute a-hole, Vickers came across as a complete bitch with daddy issues. Much of Vickers key scenes ended up as out-takes on the extras compilation. Janek, Chance and Ravel were the good guys, but never really got the chance to make much of an impact, until the collision with the Juggernaut! Old man Weyland was an over-reaching ego-maniac, anyone who thinks they can just rock up to the nearest planet with a pale giant baldie and ask him for immortality probably deserves to die! Millburn acts like a blubbering overgrown baby, and Fifield has outright serial killer potential!

That leaves David, the creepy, manipulative AP who dyes his hair in admiration of a movie character, and who just happens to be the most interesting of the lot. Certainly not your atypical characters, and a million miles from the world-weary space truckers who inhabited the Nostromo. Who in their right mind would hire any of them? Their crazy/odd/weird/stupid behaviour surely has to be part of a grander design, otherwise it points to terrible writing!

The Engineers were very intriguing, and not what I was expecting. I really love the depth of symbolism hinted at through the design of their technology. Though they still don’t stop me from hoping that the ancient Space Jockey is a separate entity!

The more time has passed the more I love Prometheus. Visually it blows you away and probably contains Ridley’s best work to date, but it’s the bigger picture which I have come to appreciate most. It didn’t sit well with a lot of people, and being totally honest, it took me some time to decide exactly how I felt about it! No film has ever had that effect on me before.

Prometheus equates to a strange, trippy experience. Ridley steered us through a bold, brave and innovative journey. That’s why I admire him more than any other living director. Very few, if any, would take that risk. I believe the Alien Franchise began and should end in his capable hands. Hopefully, Prometheus will sit more comfortably once Covenant and its sequels fall into place.

Ridley’s investment in the Franchise holds more importance than any other director, producer and even Fox. He is part of the origin, the only director to have worked with Dan O’Bannon, H.R Giger, Moebius, Ron Cobb etc. Together they created that wonderful Alien Universe. It’s because of them that I have become transfixed by it, to the point of obsession, and why I will never give up the hopes and dreams I have for its future!

Thanks a bunch NOOB.....instead of trying to sleep the last two days, I've been here!

Hahaha...seriously, have loved every minute of it! :)

Lone-

Anything for you, darlin.

Thanks to Ridley I was aware at a very young age of what an influence a director has over the movie experience, his look and feel alone having sometimes an almost hallucinogenic mystery to it. This is obviously due to Alien and Bladerunner, but I looked for his name everywhere thereafter.

When I saw the trailer for Prometheus I just about died. I knew Ridley was back to science fiction but that was all I knew, time and lack of interest in the diminished Alien universe having shifted my attention elsewhere. It's remarkable how quickly it all came back.

I'm a creative professional, a visual person, and so it's no surprise I guess that I'm aligned with Ridley. I'm also a voracious reader, don't get me wrong. I read A.D. Foster's Alien novelisation when it came out, and while it expanded things, I didn't feel enriched by details about Ripley and Lambert sleeping with Dallas, or the MORB eating batteries, or eating anything, for that matter. Movie novelisations, even by accomplished authors, can often confuse things.

Cameron, Fincher,and Jeunet are all capable directors, Fincher being notable among them for his visual style, but none managed to hit the mark set by Ridley, and each diluted the franchise with their stylistic choices, Cameron with his flash and machismo, Fincher with his (then) inexperience and lack of stature (I'd like to see what he would do now) and Jeunet just being wrong for the material in general (although I can see how he seemed good on paper).

We talk a lot about story, characters, dialog being critical, and they are, but filmaking was first and foremost a visual medium, and I feel that Ridley's mastery of this aspect elevates Prometheus well above the disappointment most find it to be. To tell its expanded story, he relied on visual cues to be deciphered later, which is also very much an homage to what has kept Alien relevant for 35 years, the audience questioning what they saw as much as what was explained. 

Much of it seemed to make no sense for this very reason, but it also heightened the feeling of being trapped in a deadly and surreally incomprehensible situation.

I don't feel for a minute that Prometheus is flawless, but I've never seen any point in adding my little disappointments to the cacophony of fashionable hatred, and I'm not gonna do it here. But it's hardly the black sheep of the family.

I've got some potentially shocking news regarding Waterstones character.

I wanted to start a topic about it but for some reason it's not letting me start a one and I keep getting an error message. I'm also having a lot of difficulty typing out a comment. This has probably took me about 30 minutes to type out.( It's been like this for a few weeks now) I've tried refreshing the page and putting it on a different compatibility setting but still having problems. Very frustrating!!!

Anyway, my apologise for raiding your thread Aorta, I just didn't know how else to post it!

I will post the link Here 

If there is any truth to this then it's very disappointing!

"The big problem is the Space Jockey SOS,  and did this stop broadcasting after Alien?"

This as been addressed in a number of ways.

1) Originally Dallas turned it off. I believe this was shot, but cut. It was however depicted in the comic adaptation.

2) The lava flow that damaged the Derelict between Alien and Aliens shut it off.

3) Captain Marlow of the Anesidora shuts it off in the Alien : Isolation video game.

So which method do you think was used?

I prefer the lava flow, but as things stand, Marlow turned it off.

The actual problem is how come Prometheus didn't pick it up (from memory there's some info on the blu-ray that's a bit hand wavy).

Marlow?

Are you referencing things that they say are canon now but will probably wind up being swept into the cupboard along with all the other once regarded as canon but ultimately abandoned promotional, selling material?

What is and isn't canon has been changed before and will probably be changed again at some point - despite this being the most concerted effort Fox has ever made at tying things together more coherently.

Hence my use of the term "as it stands".

Only the films have ever held up and remained canon, from Prometheus all the way to ALIEN 4 (unfortunately.)

And the fact that you suggest Fox is making a concerted effort to make the whole thing more coherent by publishing geek porn is laughable. Not that I think you're laughable but rather FOX for attempting to create more cohesion but instead creating more CONFUSSION.

It makes me wonder if they really have got a brain between them!

Oh, wait a minute, no they're actually REALLY clever because they have the power to manipulate people into BUYING their products.

If they invested as much time and effort in their films as they do with their geek porn, they would be churning out hit after hit.  

If you like.

I find baseless cynicism a bit lazy though.