# A Few questions About The "Aliens" Movies **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [June 8, 2012, 9:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-questions-about-the-aliens-movies/624553 "2012-06-08T21:13:45Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![billfish678](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7bcc69/32.png) [@billfish678](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/billfish678)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2012, 3:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-questions-about-the-aliens-movies/624553/21 "2012-06-09T03:00:51Z")
> [@The\_Tooth](#): > > Hudson talks about the mission being “another” bug hunt, so I’m guessing not. Thats true. But I also got the impression that most other bug hunts were either outright busts or a big deal made about nothing worth writing home about. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Tooth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c67d28/32.png) [@The\_Tooth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Tooth)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2012, 3:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-questions-about-the-aliens-movies/624553/22 "2012-06-09T03:05:01Z")
Yeah, maybe, but it implies the existence of bugs to hunt. As opposed to the stand-up fight he’s hoping for, if I remember the line correctly. ---
**Author:** ![AncientHumanoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ancienthumanoid/32/278_2.png) [@AncientHumanoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AncientHumanoid)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2012, 3:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-questions-about-the-aliens-movies/624553/23 "2012-06-09T03:15:43Z")
Some years had passed between the events of Alien and Aliens, tho. Maybe a rash of attacks by swarms of semisentient bugs had come up in the in between time. ---
**Author:** ![Ethilrist](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ethilrist/32/4604_2.png) [@Ethilrist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ethilrist)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2012, 3:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-questions-about-the-aliens-movies/624553/24 "2012-06-09T03:24:39Z")
> [@billfish678](#): > > Thats true. But I also got the impression that most other bug hunts were either outright busts or a big deal made about nothing worth writing home about. “Who’s Snow White?” “Some big shot. Says she saw an alien.” ---
**Author:** ![Sister\_Vigilante](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9de0a6/32.png) [@Sister\_Vigilante](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sister_Vigilante)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2012, 4:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-questions-about-the-aliens-movies/624553/25 "2012-06-09T04:08:42Z")
> [@Ruffian](#): > > I’ve been watching the marathon here and there too. I’ve previously never seen anything after _Aliens_ as I was instantly turned off when I learned they killed off Newt and Hicks first thing in the third movie. > > So, catching a bit of _Alien: Resurrection_ (not having seen the third one), my question is: Um… **WHAT the FUCK**?! Precisely why you should not watch Alien 3 and skip directly to Resurrection. Just don’t worry about 3. It didn’t exist. I promise. ---
**Author:** ![Sleeper\_Service](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/848f3c/32.png) [@Sleeper\_Service](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sleeper_Service)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2012, 4:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-questions-about-the-aliens-movies/624553/26 "2012-06-09T04:32:57Z")
> [@Sister\_Vigilante](#): > > Precisely why you should not watch Alien 3 and skip directly to Resurrection. Just don’t worry about 3. It didn’t exist. I promise. Whoa. I’ve never before witnessed the recommendation of _Resurrection_, even over the flawed but infinitely more thoughtful _Alien 3_. If anything, _Resurrection_ proves Joss Whedon is much better at killing his characters than he is at, well.. resurrecting them. ---
**Author:** ![grude](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e47774/32.png) [@grude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/grude)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2012, 5:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-questions-about-the-aliens-movies/624553/27 "2012-06-09T05:14:18Z")
> [@billfish678](#): > > Thats true. But I also got the impression that most other bug hunts were either outright busts or a big deal made about nothing worth writing home about. I’m not sure if it was revealed in “official” sources like the script or screenplay, or extended universe stuff, but someone said genetic engineering is common place in the Alien universe. Weyland-Yutani between the first and second movie moved into the terraforming business, and the settlers and colonists are kept mostly under their thumb much like company towns in the USA. There is apparently a lot of independence movements among colonies and terraformed worlds, some of which have turned violent and one of the weapons used are genetically engineered beasts called bugs in slang. And the bug hunts are when the military is called in to kill the bugs used in conflicts between WY and colonists or other colonies. ---
**Author:** ![Gatopescado](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gatopescado/32/5711_2.png) [@Gatopescado](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gatopescado)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2012, 5:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-questions-about-the-aliens-movies/624553/28 "2012-06-09T05:21:08Z")
> [@A Monkey With a Gun](#): > > **Gatopescado** , your conclusions about a movie made in 1979 ripping off movies made before 1955 are demonstrably untrue. I somehow doubt you mean to discuss that, though. Do you have anything useful to add or was your blindingly original “movie producers like cocaine, hur, hur” the height of your insight? No. Nothing “useful”, just like your post. Just my opinion, as stated. “Hur, hur” indeed. ---
**Author:** ![Atomic\_Alex](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/atomic_alex/32/175_2.png) [@Atomic\_Alex](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atomic_Alex)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2012, 8:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-questions-about-the-aliens-movies/624553/29 "2012-06-09T08:51:36Z")
> [@billfish678](#): > > Interesting Sci-Fi concept. I thought it was interesting as well, although it wasn’t made explicit I imagined that there was an inverse relationship between objective and subjective speed as well. For example a journey to another star could take ten years at just below lightspeed but using the Aliens FTL drive the journey could be made in a single day for an outside observer but that trip would seem to last centuries for the crew, basically the faster you want to make the trip the longer it seems to the crew of the starship, so there would be a trade-off between achievable maximum speed and the feasibility of doing so. Of course there’s nothing stopping them using ships crewed entirely by AI’s _(or no crew at all)_ except for the effects of long duration trips on the ship structure itself. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2012, 1:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-questions-about-the-aliens-movies/624553/30 "2012-06-09T13:22:28Z")
> [@Disposable Hero](#): > > using the Aliens FTL drive the journey could be made in a single day for an outside observer but that trip would seem to last centuries for the crew, Isn’t it the other way around? ---
**Author:** ![Atomic\_Alex](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/atomic_alex/32/175_2.png) [@Atomic\_Alex](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atomic_Alex)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2012, 2:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-questions-about-the-aliens-movies/624553/31 "2012-06-09T14:24:30Z")
> [@carnivorousplant](#): > > Isn’t it the other way around? I’m fairly sure it was as I described, I remembered it because it was the opposite of what you would expect but still sort of makes sense. The trip would seem to take a short time for someone waiting for the ship to arrive but a long time for the crew, but still faster than making the same journey below lightspeed. I haven’t been able to come up with anything definitive in a google search but it is mentioned in the first post in this thread: [http://www.trekbbs.com/showthread.php?p=2038394](http://www.trekbbs.com/showthread.php?p=2038394) So its not something I just made up, I was wondering myself for a while there! ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2012, 3:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-questions-about-the-aliens-movies/624553/32 "2012-06-09T15:07:32Z")
Check out[this link.](http://www.orionsarm.com/fm_store/RTTCalc.htm) At v=.9C, ships time is .42 years, external time is 3 years. In the seconod film, I believe it was pointed out that much more time had passed on Earth than Ripley experienced traveling. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2012, 5:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-questions-about-the-aliens-movies/624553/33 "2012-06-09T17:01:11Z")
> [@carnivorousplant](#): > > Check out[this link.](http://www.orionsarm.com/fm_store/RTTCalc.htm) > > At v=.9C, ships time is .42 years, external time is 3 years. He’s not talking about real-world relativistic effects, he’s talking about the imagined effects of a fictional “warp drive.” As to whether there are other aliens in the the Alien-verse, in the second film, the lieutenant casually mentions that they’re hunting a “xenomorph.” So they’ve got jargon to specifically describe aliens, and nobody is particularly surprised to hear it used in a mission briefing. I suspect that there are a fair amount of non-intelligent, hostile fauna in the galaxy. Stuff that’s too dangerous for colonists to handle, but relatively easy for trained marines, hence Hudson’s derogatory “bughunt” question. I suspect the space jockey was the first sign of intelligent extraterrestrial life, though. Or at least, the first that the people on that ship had ever heard of. ---
**Author:** ![Astral\_Rejection](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/258eb7/32.png) [@Astral\_Rejection](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Astral_Rejection)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2012, 5:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-questions-about-the-aliens-movies/624553/34 "2012-06-09T17:19:59Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > As to whether there are other aliens in the the Alien-verse, in the second film, the lieutenant casually mentions that they’re hunting a “xenomorph.” So they’ve got jargon to specifically describe aliens, and nobody is particularly surprised to hear it used in a mission briefing. I suspect that there are a fair amount of non-intelligent, hostile fauna in the galaxy. Stuff that’s too dangerous for colonists to handle, but relatively easy for trained marines, hence Hudson’s derogatory “bughunt” question. > > I suspect the space jockey was the first sign of intelligent extraterrestrial life, though. Or at least, the first that the people on that ship had ever heard of. “Excuse me, sir… a Xeno-WHAT?” I don’t agree that the jargon was as well-known as you’re suggesting. I always got the impression “another bug-hunt” meant “another hunt for nothing.” He says it with some serious contempt. Couple that with the quote Ethilrist provided, and I think it’s obvious they have never seen an alien before. Also, the blu-ray quadrilogy version of Alien 3 is much improved, and a far stronger film than the old versions. My only regret is that they made it more obvious Bishop isn’t a robot at the end, when I liked the ambiguity of him in the original. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2012, 5:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-questions-about-the-aliens-movies/624553/35 "2012-06-09T17:40:53Z")
On the other hand, when they find the facehuggers in the tanks, no one seems surprised that there really are aliens in the colony. ---
**Author:** ![TBG](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c89c15/32.png) [@TBG](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TBG)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2012, 2:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-questions-about-the-aliens-movies/624553/36 "2012-06-10T02:29:53Z")
> [@River\_Hippie](#): > > As I worked through the first two movies I kept watching for the answer to this question but didn’t see it addressed. > Was the space jockey/xenomorphs the first extraterrestrial life forms encountered by earth dwellers? Depends on whether you consider the Alien vs Predator movies (and presumably Prometheus) canon or not. ---
**Author:** ![Number](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/number/32/242_2.png) [@Number](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Number)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2012, 3:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-questions-about-the-aliens-movies/624553/37 "2012-06-10T15:35:43Z")
> [@ralph124c](#): > > SciFi has been running an “Aliens” marathon-man Is it safe? ---
**Author:** ![ExTank](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/35a633/32.png) [@ExTank](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ExTank)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2012, 3:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-questions-about-the-aliens-movies/624553/38 "2012-06-10T15:52:09Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > On the other hand, when they find the facehuggers in the tanks, no one seems surprised that there really are aliens in the colony. I assume you’re speaking of _Aliens_, Cameron’s sequel to Scott’s original _Alien_. By the time the Marine search teams get to Medical where the facehuggers are in stasis containers, it’s pretty obvious _something_ has happened at Hadley’s Hope/LV426. Melted floors (Hick’s grudging acknowledgement, “Acid for blood.”), scenes of devastation and evidence suggesting a balls-out hopeless fight, yet no bodies, or signs of bodies, all of this points to Ripley being right all along, or at least not entirely as full-of-shit as they clearly thought she was when she was attempting to brief them, back up on the Sulaco. ---
**Author:** ![gravitycrash](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/977dab/32.png) [@gravitycrash](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gravitycrash)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2012, 5:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-questions-about-the-aliens-movies/624553/39 "2012-06-10T17:21:25Z")
[quote=“Astral\_Rejection, post:34, topic:624553”] “Excuse me, sir… a Xeno-WHAT?” I don’t agree that the jargon was as well-known as you’re suggesting. I always got the impression “another bug-hunt” meant “another hunt for nothing.” He says it with some serious contempt. Couple that with the quote Ethilrist provided, and I think it’s obvious they have never seen an alien before. When the got out of stasis and sitting around the table Hudson ( I think it was Hudson) was joking with the black guy Pross? " Remember that Arcturian poontang?" “yeah but yours was male.” “Don’t matter when it’s Arcturian” ---
**Author:** ![Astral\_Rejection](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/258eb7/32.png) [@Astral\_Rejection](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Astral_Rejection)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2012, 5:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-questions-about-the-aliens-movies/624553/40 "2012-06-10T17:24:21Z")
I always took that the same way soldiers would joke about Vietnan girls. Given all the other Vietnam references, that made sense to me. I didn’t interpret the Arcturians as aliens, just humans who live on Arcturus. Sex with an alien never crossed my mind. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-questions-about-the-aliens-movies/624553.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-few-questions-about-the-aliens-movies/624553.md?page=3)