Nobody believed Ripley’s account of the alien killing her crew mates and therefore it did not make sense to them that she ordered the destruction of a very costly piece of company equipment (i.e. the ship). She was being held somewhat culpable as she lost her pilot’s license/rating/whatever it was that let her be a crew member aboard a ship. The whole reason she was good at using the exo-skeleton was because she had a lot of practice working on a loading dock because her career was effectively dead.
The colony had been there for years. It wasn’t until Burke sent some of the colonist to specifically look for the Ripley’s aliens that the colonist knew of their existence. We find this out in the theater release of the movie when Ripley is going through some computer records and comes across a communique from Burke to someone on the colony.
Some people in the company did know, you’re right. I don’t think Ash from the first movie knew the nature of the xenomorph when he left Earth but he did have a directive to bring it home. All crew members expendable. Ripley had been drifting in space for nearly 50 years prior to the 2nd movie. How many people who knew that there was a xenomorph on LV-426 and how many of them are even alive after 50 years?
The only aliens I recall seeing in their lab were facehuggers. Obviously those little bastards were everywhere and I don’t doubt they’d be the easiest to catch when facing a full blown alien outbreak. However, it’s never really explained why contact with LV-426 is cut off so abruptly. Why couldn’t the colonist have gotten the message that they were under attack? Maybe it was explained in the movie and I just don’t remember.
So it looks like my hypothesis was incorrect, and we are left with the huge coincidence that the company simply colonized that moon accidentally (not a planet after all, I see), and didn’t know about the aliens until Ripley told them about them, somehow managing to never explore or scan the surface. Of course, once Ripley mentions them, it takes them a very short time to find it. Seems pretty dumb to me.
Your other points are taken and well considered. I also agree with this one and see it as a problem. They WOULD have gotten some sort of a message out about what was happening (unless of course they knew it was a top secret thing and the company knew about the aliens the entire time the colony was there). I assumed that the company KNEW the aliens had taken over the colony, and sent in a small team of marines as a sort of test, with the inside company guy there to get one out surreptitiously. Hence why they never explain “how come no signals of distress??” Evidently, that’s not what was going on at all, the colony was only there by coincidence. So, yet another plot hole emerges.
In Alien Dallas mentions that at the last minute his normal science officer was replaced by Ash for reasons unknown. Ash was specifically ordered to bring an alien specimen back even at the expense of the crew’s lives. I don’t think anyone in the company knew the specifics of the alien’s biology though. They only knew there was a beacon and put Nostromo in the position of picking it up. I do recall that there were standing orders to investigate any alien transmission though.
The only good parts of these movies is when Ripley strips down to her underwear.
Yes, the movies work the same theme-evil businessmen want to make money by bringing deadly, mucous-dripping aliens to earth. Its the same meme used in Avatar.
The thing I don’t get-when an alien is killed (in a ship), how come that “molecular acid”-which eats through everything-doesn’t destroy the ship?
Did you even watch it?
Yes, the acid can eat through almost anything, but it gets “used up” - just like any acid would. They race down several decks, and watch as it finally stops burning through the floor.
Yes, this is true. Just because the acid is very powerful doesn’t mean it wouldn’t get used up as it reacted with stuff. The truly humorous part about the acid is that it is called “molecular acid.” Aren’t all acids molecular?
I don’t recall if there was an official explanation but I assumed it was a combination of the speed at which the infestation/attack occurred and the effects of the constant electric storms surrounding the planet on getting signals out. The Company’s first thought about lost communication was a downed transmitter so I’m guessing temporary gaps in communication weren’t unusual. It wasn’t so much abrupt as it was sustained past the usual gaps.
They had the Nostromo’s flight recorder data in the shuttle Ripley escaped in; that would tell Burke where the Nostromo originally landed on LV426. If you look carefully at the derelict in Aliens, it’s partially covered by rock that wasn’t there in Alien, and is damaged as well, so either a meteorite impact or seismic activity has damaged the derelict. Seismic activity would be a logical suspect, as a geologically active planetoid/moon would be more valuable mining colony than a dead rock in space.
You keep saying “the company knew,” as if The Company was monolithic and everyone knew everything about every other department’s goings-ons; that isn’t true for the company I work for, and we’re world-wide and pretty benign.
You’re reading a lot more into stuff that isn’t there, and ignoring stuff that is.
Exactly. I was just looking this up. From the first draft of the script:
Burke was Ripley’s Company liaison and the one who knew Ripley’s full story before anyone else (he prepped her for the court martial). Presumably, he doctored the recorder and used the data to send the survey team to explore the area. The Company itself didn’t act on it because, to them, the recorder data didn’t collaborate Ripley’s story and there was nothing to see there. I guess the left the lines about doctored data out of the final script because it cast too much suspicion around too early.
I don’t keep saying the company knew. In fact, in the quote you have from me, I accept that my hypothesis is wrong. Still a huge coincidence that seems dumb to me, that they ended up colonizing the planet by accident that had Aliens on it. And also, even if the broadcaster had been disabled, the message still would have been floating through space and picked up by ships nearby, or on their way to that moon. So, plot holes, and silly ones at that.
But if you’ll go back and read my original post, it’s way more than just the plot holes that made Aliens so difficult for me to like, anyway.
I appreciate you all pointing things out to me to help fill in some of the gaps, though.
Burke acting as an independent agent on his own, doctoring the flight recorder so he could profit/get promoted/etc from discovering the aliens.
The movie is making more sense to me now as you guys bring these details to light.
But I still can’t get over how convenient it was that they just happened to have a colony there and never got the messages that the nostromo got even after the beacon was destroyed the messages would still be flying through space to be picked up, etc. And also, the fact that the company knew in Alien that there were aliens on it (hence replacing the science officer with Ash at the last minute to make sure they got some back), but didn’t know this in Aliens is also annoying.
Was the derelict’s distress beacon omnidirectional? What was it wattage? How far is LV-246 from shipping lanes with ships that might detect the signal? Or human colony worlds with potential receivers?
Since LV-426 is a moon orbiting what appears to be a Saturnian gas giant, is the signal occasionally occluded in the direction of settled space, or human shipping lanes?
How long after the Nostromo’s departure was the derelict damaged?
Any or all of these factors (some of which are basic science) might make the derelict’s signal a tad difficult to pick out against the background stellar “noise.”
In the words of Douglas Adams: “Space is big. You just won’t believe how vastly, hugely, mind- bogglingly big it is. I mean, you may think it’s a long way down the road to the chemist’s, but that’s just peanuts to space.”
We’re not talking about someone tooting a kazoo in a dark room a few feet away from you, we’re talking about distances best expressed mathematically, or shortened to convenient units like parsecs.
Space IS big, vastly big. So which is more likely? That they colonized the moon coincidentally, or were led there by the previous discovery/signal etc? Evidently, according to Cameron, it was coincidence. And that is a huge, vastly mind bogglingly huge coincidence.
Without resorting to fanwanking or anything, I’d simply suggest that Alien and Aliens were two different films in two different genres made by two different directors years apart and in an age where home viewing was just starting to exist (and didn’t exist when Alien was filmed).
In short, they weren’t made to be watched back to back and compared for inconsistencies between the two.
Hadley’s Hope is a mining colony. Why wouldn’t they colonize a seismically active planetoid? Ash said it was dense, in Alien, before the Nostromo set down on it, suggesting useful metals. And it’s not too far off of a shipping lane, since it was in range enough foo the Nostromo to divert off of its course without running out of fuel, etc, to get back on course and return to Earth.
Give 60 years for humanity to expand further into space (the time Ripley spent drifting in the shuttle), and that moon might be a “good find.”
If they had of found and colonised a different planetoid, would have been a very boring movie I’d say.
If you are willing to accept that (admittedly massive) coincidence I think the rest of the movie flows just fine. There are so many movies where you have to accept bigger coincidences than that to get the plot rolling, I’m happy to accept it.
When I read your OP, (wrt to Aliens) my immediate thought was, Tell him he’s dreaming and there’s probably no point getting in this thread because we are polar opposites on this one. I recognise that nothing I say will change your opinion on the movie. Different strokes and all that. But in terms of two of your stated reasons for disliking it, I see minimal plotholes, (and believe me I’ve looked), I’ve watched Aliens easily 100+ times. I think your comments about the sterotypes have been amply covered by other posters, in that this movie established some of those cliches you rolled your eyes at. I think it’s just unfortunate for you that you’ve come to the movie so late.
I was actually one of those that originally hated Alien 3. If you want to talk gaping plotholes, explain how there were eggs on board the Sulaco? I also hated that they killed Hicks. I loved his character and having him killed ‘offscreen’ as it were just got me off on the wrong foot. (Newt dying - meh whatever )
A few years on, and having watched the directors cut of it, that plothole and Hicks death still rankles, but getting past that, as a movie in and of itself, I agree with you that Alien 3 is pretty good. To me, it makes a good bookend to the series. They started with a horror movie with sci fi trappings, went into full blown action movie for the sequel, before returning to the franchise’s foundation of a horror movie.
The less said about Resurrection the better IMO. Terrible terrible movie.
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