Alien3 takes place directly after Aliens, where Ripley, Newt Hicks & Bishop are in hypersleep, that is until their ship gets damaged and crash lands, killing everyone but Ripley. The local inhabitants revive Ripley and inform her that she has crashed in a prison made up entirely of men, meaning she's the only woman amongst a bunch of rapists, murderers and psychopaths. Of course a Xenomorph is born when a Facehugger from Ripley's ship attaches itself to a dog and begins killing prisoners. Eventually Ripley discovers that she has a Queen Alien growing inside of her and the Alien won't kill her because of it. Eventually the remaining prisoners realise that their only option is to trap and kill the creature before Weyland company show up and turn it into a weapon. In the end, Ripley & team kill the creature, but at the cost of their lives, killing the Xenomorphs once and for all and ending Ripley's story...that is until Alien Resurrection would be released and fuck everything up.
So let's start with what is clearly the biggest problem with this movie, killing of Newt & Hicks. Not only killing them off, but killing them off screen, before the movie even begins. One of the reasons why Aliens works so well is because there being multiple survivors makes it feel more unique, especially when they were characters that we loved, it was a happy ending to a story that seemed impossible to have a happy ending, and this movie fucks it up in the first 5 minutes. That is the worst sin a sequel or an adaptation can commit, harm the previous source material. Now, the ending in Aliens doesn't seem as good because we know it isn't going to last, a movie that everyone loves is now going to seem just that little bit more bitter because of this film. And what is the main reason for killing off Hicks & Newt? Just so Ripley has to go in alone again, because god forbid she has a character she can relate to on a personal level, no she always has to work from scratch and rebuild relationships that we've seen twice already. Aliens was able to get away with this because it didn't have a choice but to start from scratch and the marines that she was partnered up with were diverse and likeable character, here, most of the inmates blend in together with maybe 2 or 3 exceptions, and even then, they're not as good as the characters from the previous film. So yes, i think this was a bad move on all parts, it was a slap in the face to the characters, to the fans and the previous films.
But that's not to say the rest of the story doesn't work, it does...ish. The biggest problem with this film is how much feels rehashed, we're back to one alien again who goes around killing people one by one, this feels like something we've seen before, not just in the Alien franchise, but in so many monster flicks. I will say they put an interesting twist on the Xenomorph by making it behave more like an animal than in the previous films and that does allow for some neat cinematography and a sense of something new, but in reality the Xenomorph doesn't act much differently than the previous Aliens except it walks differently. And the fact that Ripley is pretty much immune from the alien sounds good on paper, but in execution it also creates a big problem. I've already said that i didn't find the characters that well written in this film, that is except for Ripley. Ripley is one of the greatest action stars of all time, and she is still amazing in this film. She has an interesting arc to go through for her closing chapter and has some very poignant moments "I don't even remember my life before you" can pretty much some up all the pain she's gone through having to face these things. But the fact that the creature isn't going to attack her makes the film a lot less intense because the only character we care about isn't in danger and because of the Queen Alien inside of her (How the hell did that happen by the way!?) we know she's gonna die by the end of the film. There's no tension whatsoever to be found, and that's always a big problem with action heroes; people like Ripley or John McClane who are supposed to be the vulnerable hero and end up becoming practically immortal almost ruins the connection the audience has to the character.
But there are still plenty of good things about this film, for one thing the cinematography is very good, especially the POV shots of the Xenomorph were great, except weirdly enough the death scenes were very poorly shot. We're 3 films into this series and are fully aware of what the Aliens are capable of, why film the death scenes in quick cuts and close ups? In the first film it makes sense because it has this sense of mystery, but here, it's just badly filmed death scenes. Though i will give them points for having a few surprising death scenes in the film of characters i did not expect to die so early, and also the build up to the deaths was well done, just the scenes themselves which were let downs.
Also the practical effects are amazing as expected, in fact this is the best that they've ever been and i'm glad that they used practical effects wherever possible because the CGI in this film is truly god awful. Not once, not for one single shot are the effects convincing, not even remotely, seriously, awful, awful CGI.
But being completely honest, even with all the problems i've talked about so far, i don't really consider this to be a bad film. Hear me out. As an instalment in the Alien franchise, hell, as what was thought to be the final instalment to the Alien franchise, it sucks, it's such a bad note to go out on. But if you were to look at this as a stand alone movie, so if you watched it without watching the previous two films, it's not half bad. It works as a typical monster flick that you can watch just to kill time, i mean it doesn't hold a candle to the first two, but i also think it's a million times better than Alien Resurrection. But with that being said, there's also a third level that you need to look at this as: A David Fincher film. Fincher has come out multiple times and says that he completely disowns the film and blames a lot of the problems on studio interference. And frankly i'm inclined to believe him, because even though it was his first feature length film, he still could have done a lot better, especially seeing as his second film Seven remains one of his best films to date. So there are three ways to look at this, as a Fincher film: It sucks, as an Alien film: it's disappointing, as a stand alone monster movie: it's not half bad.
And it's because of that, that i'm giving this film a 6/10.
-Danny
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