Tuesday, 30 May 2017

39 Years of the Alien Franchise




by Movie knights

1979 became a year to fear as the one quote rang out across space "No one can hear you scream in space" which sounded terrifying in it self, from the design artist / designer H.R.Giger came the first creature that would terrify the audience for years across the world.

Alot of the film franchise's we're inspired by H.R.Giger work include poltergeist 2, all 4 alien movie, 1995 species film, which went on to create an expanded universe. H.R.Giger achieved international fame with Ridleys Scott Alien film, I'n 1990 he received the academy Award for the "Best Achievement for Visual Effect" for his design of the film's title creature and its otherworldly environment that came with this xenomorph design.

 Alien game Franchise although its been a rocky road from the start with over 23 games altogether
    • Alien (1984 video game)
    • Alien (video game)
    • Alien 3 (video game)
    • Alien 3: The Gun
    • List of Alien, Predator and Alien vs. Predator games
    • Alien Trilogy
    • Alien vs. Predator (mobile game)
    • Alien vs. Predator 3D
    • Alien War
    • Alien: Isolation
    • Alien: Resurrection (video game)
    • Aliens (video game)
    • Aliens Adventure Game
    • Aliens Infestation
    • Aliens Online
    • Aliens Versus Predator: Extinction
    • Aliens: A Comic Book Adventure
    • Aliens: Colonial Marines
    • Aliens: Extermination
    • Aliens: Thanatos Encounter
    • Aliens: The Computer Game (Activision)
    • Aliens: The Computer Game (Software Studios)
    • Aliens: Unleashed
     start from 1984 with it first game Alien on the Amstrad cpc, commodore 64. ZX spectrum, the game was a suspense heavy game using a black and green graphics with some add colour for the text revolving around the nostromo. I remember the game being very difficult to play special as you moved around the air ducts, as you never knew where the alien was for its time this game was great, but out dated by now.

    Over the years the the game when from computer to arcade with Alien 3 the gun which after a lot of coins i actually did complete the levels of this arcade game, which was actually brilliant going from outside of the complex seen 1000 of xenomorphs run cross the screen to walking down the corridors gun down face huggers and xenomorphs left ,right and center.

    1992 in London movie magic attraction created by John Gorman and Gary Gillies on the movie The marines originally carried blank firing pistols. For Alien War London, an innovative electronic system called Sound fire was developed to allow the weapons to sound like those used in the film Aliens.

    The system consisted of M41A pulse rifles with infrared transmitters and small strobe lights (to simulate muzzle flash). When the trigger is pulled a signal is transmitted to receivers hidden in the set. A central computer then plays gunfire sound effects to speakers in the correct area of the set. The method of producing the effect was entirely different from how it would be imagined the weapons would discharge.

     The strobe lights also resembled blue camera flashes, and did not resemble a muzzle flash. The system also played other sound effects such as the Alien sounds and suffered teething troubles in the first months after opening meaning that the blank firing pistols had to be used for most early shows.

    The show was seen in various guises and briefly featured an actor dressed as the Predator for a spell prior to it closing in Glasgow.

    This was one of the best Alien franchise arcade games ive actually played at it time, there has been a few alien franchise games out but over the years this game seem to slacking haven't been great with gamers over the years. This main is because they've tried to give the gamers a cross over which is in the the dark horse comic alien v predator war, yes some of these game have been ok but just like the films this cross over has been shorted lived.

    Sadly the gaming side of the franchise has been slowly going down hill special when Sega got a massive law suit against them from the gaming commission for false advertisement of Alien colonel marines, from what i found out is that time gate studios that this game was past over for the graphics while Sega works on the rest of the game.

    Time gate which is no longer in business after the law suit screwed up the by past back a poorly made game which left no time for Sega to fix it, which unfortunately instead of Sega delaying the game release Sega got sued for the false advertisement.

    Which sadly almost destroyed the  Alien game franchise, but thankful Sega redeemed themselves with the best Alien game they've brought out Alien Isolation, which follow the story after alien with Ripley's daughter Ellen Ripley as just like her mother she is forced to face the same nightmare situation.

    Unlike the nostromo incident the station Ellen on was a fully operation living station full of malfunctioning Cyborgs which is one thing to fight against but also one extremely dangerous xenomorph that is stalking your every move. This game gave the gamers experience in fear as you have no weapons no way of defending yourself, which give a whole new meaning of survival horror which hopefully we will get another game of this soon.

    Film side of the franchise has actually done better than the game industry with 3 successful films, i know what your thinking how can i say alien 3 was a success, well that because im not talking about alien 3. The problem alien 3 had was with the script writer which had 10 scripts written and rejected one you were kind of glad they didnt make, with a power ranger feel with xenomorphs forming to be one big giant xenomorph.

    Ya this would have completely killed the franchise, which is why you got the version we have now although you have the director cut and theatrical version, but i do prefer the director cut make things make sense more although the cinema C.G.I didnt match  the colour of it surroundings which made the alien look fake in apart.

    Also a few Tv adverts didnt match up with what the audience was seeing as in the original trailer for Alien 3 it said it was set on earth but this was false because the alien 3 story was set on a prison planet, which might of also been its being a failure.

    Alien (Ridley Scot Director cut) "No on can hear you scream in space" was the best version of the franchise as we got the full version, in 1979 this was the firsts film we were introduced to the terrifying xenomorph which is like no other creature anyone has brought to the screen. With it vicious way it's born from an egg which wait for a victim to come by, it creepy form hugs the face like a brace of death, paralyses the victim into a coma where it lays an egg or parasite inside it's host then burst through the chest which is where the term chest buster came to light.

    As the plot of "Alien" as we all know on its return to Earth, the U.S. commercial star-ship Nostromo is diverted to a desolate planetoid after receiving a cryptic signal from a derelict alien spacecraft. While exploring the alien ship, one of the Nostromo's crewmen discovers the remains of the ship's pilot and also a large chamber that contains thousands of egg-like objects. One of the eggs releases a creature that attaches itself to his face and renders him unconscious.

    The others break quarantine to bring him back aboard the ship. The parasite dies and the crewman wakes up, seemingly fine. Soon afterwards, an alien organism bursts from his chest and grows extremely rapidly into a terrifying eight-foot (equivalent 2.5 meters) tall creature that starts killing off the crew.

    This is where we get the a great performance from "John Hurt" who plays Kane which is one of the most talked about and memorable moments in the first alien film, this is where the film take on it nightmare fueled intense roller coaster ride as the crew are force to defend them-self against this unknown creature. Alien made a whooping $104,931,801 on a budget of only £11 million.

    In 1986 "James Cameron directed" Aliens which up the action and fear, unlike alien with no one can hear you scream in space having to deal with one xeno, this time is war Ripley is once again thrown in to the lion den with a team of harden colonial marines who are up against the odds.
    One thing this film gave the audience from the first film as well was alot of theory's and question that needed answering, for me personal looking at the direction of where these film was going its like the weyland company know about the exists of this creature set the 80 family's up as an experiment to see what this things can do.

    If you remember in aliens before they landed the complex still had power so ever video monitor was recording and being sent back to the company, hense why they knew they lost contact on lv-426 Halley hope population 101 so there was more family there.

    With the plot : After 57 years in hyper-sleep, the sole survivor of the Nostromo, LT Ellen Ripley, awakens aboard a medical space station orbiting Earth. Her story of the Alien terror she encountered is disbelieved and she learns that the planetoid from the first film (now designated as LV-426) is now home to a terraforming colony.

    When contact with the colony is lost, Ripley, against her better judgement and to regain her pilot's license, hesitantly accompanies a squad of high-tech Elite Colonial Marines aboard the spaceship Sulaco to investigate. Once there, they discover the colonists have been wiped out after they had found the derelict alien ship (and its deadly cargo) from the first film.

    Aliens budget £18.5 million and made worldwide £131, 060, 248

    Probable the most hated film in the franchise Alien 3 came out in 1992 like ive said before alien 3 had 10 scripts written and rejected for being bad, which result in the film being a pretty average movie, although there are a few fans out there that like this film. This may of added to the reason why the film on a budget on $50 million only made $55,473,545 domestic and $159, 814,498 worldwide.

    The bring the fear to a prison colonel on fury 161 where once again Ripley is force to not just face the xenomorph queen, but also the prison inmates that havent seen a woman in years. Due to a fire aboard the Sulaco, an escape pod carrying the survivors of the second film is automatically jettisoned. It crash-lands on the refinery/prison planet Fiorina "Fury" 161, but Ripley is the only one to survive the crash. Unbeknownst to her, some alien facehuggers were also aboard the ship. Before long, a full-sized Alien is then loose in the prison, killing the inmates and staff. Ripley also discovers there is an Alien queen growing inside her, and must not only kill the rampaging Alien but also herself in order to save humanity.

    This one i would call the abomination of the franchise which it never existed in 1997 Alien Resurrection. set two hundred years from alien 3 where the companies have managed to get their hands on a xenomorph queen, which as before breed more of them which was their mistake in thinking they could control them.

    The very through of this film script just kills any film going further with Ripley being cloned she become half xenomorph half human, which resulted in a reserve change of the queen instead of eggs giving birth to a human xenomorph which was not only one of the most stupid scripted writing ive seen for a film, but just killed the franchise.

    Two hundred years after the events of the previous film, Ellen Ripley (and the Alien queen she was carrying) are cloned. The Alien queen is surgically removed from her body as the United Systems Military hopes to breed Aliens to study on the spaceship USM Auriga, using human hosts kidnapped and delivered to them by a group of mercenaries.

    The Aliens escape their enclosures, while Ripley 8 (a clone who contains some Alien DNA herself) and the mercenaries attempt to escape and destroy the Auriga before it reaches its destination, Earth.

    What made this worst was the two alien v predator films spin off's that just almost crippled the franchise for good, Alien V Predator and alien v predator 2 requiem which we'rent bad just we're done right.

    Few years on there was talk of an alien 5 being done by director Neill Blomkamp in 2015 which sounded like a pretty good script for the story, but was put on hold for Prometheus direction which now with the latest news from Ridley Scott director another 3 films from the Prometheus films could be on hold preminently.

    Since Ridley Scott Released Prometheus in 2012 we got the first look at the space jockeys we saw in the 1979 Alien fossilized in the pilot chair on the diralict ship on lv-426, which gave us the answer to what it was we were looking at.

    Which also gave us the first look at how this xenomorphs where first created with some kind of black jelly liquid, that is teeming with some sort of genetic transformation genesis, which we saw from the film can create life by transforming something in some esle. Here's the kicker Ridley Scott announced that the space jockeys didn't create the xenomorph, so it begs the question on who or what created such a devastating force of death and destruction as the xenomorphs?

    With Alien Covenant hitting cinema's may 12th 2017 there is alot of rumors and theory's flying around as to what happened to Elizabeth Shaw two theory which one mention that David could've of killed her as she tried to stop him doing something or the other one is that David trying to save here life used the black liquid and transformed her in to a queen.

    But these are theory's but it would be a shock that the neomorph is in fact Shaw transformed but again these are just theory's, so we wont know until the film come out, according to Ridley Scott there is gonna be another 3 films inlcuing Alien Covenant which is set 10 years after Prometheus, the next will be Alien Awakening and he third film "untitled" at the moment i assume will be linking the story to how the ship landed on lv-426 to the events of alien.


    This is part of the alien franchise so far spanning from film media, to comic books, action figures and games, the franchise has been running for 39 years. As the audience and fans of the franchise where do you think this franchise could go and do you like the direction Ridley Scott is taking or do you think they should've of just let Neill Blomkamp make alien 5?











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