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sati_84 (441)
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Shields are useless!
My assessment of the 2023 specials
Irritating stupidity at the end... (SPOILERS, obviously)
It's disappointing how they handled Rocket's captivity friends in the story
The S3 finale was extremely disappointing
Pepsi had a chance to play this smart / cool, but they botched it with their disgusting reaction
Jake's plan made no sense!
A simple reason why i don't believe the "Bishop did it" theory
This series is completely unnecessary and did not have an actual story to tell
Had potential, but goes downhill in the second half
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1. You did not miss anything, this was not explained.
2. Well, this seems to be a contradiction, created by the adaptation. In the book, there was no future tech. What the aliens sent was only the software, the game itself, but the hardware was an existing widespread "VR suit" which explains the hot, cold, kinetic effects, etc. This was handled differently in the series, and it was not explained how they did it. Did they only transmit the blueprints for the VR devices? That seems most likely, but Team Wade did not make any effort to trace these back to where they were manufactured or something... which makes this point confusing. It was better handled in the book.
3. This also was not properly explained, but the implication is that the alien fleet is already on the way. They are on the ships, most likely in suspended animation, which prevents them to do research, update their science, etc. So it is a real and threatening scenario for them that humanity will catch up by the time they get here, and they will be wiped out. So even if the sophons spy on everything and would be able to transmit the theoretical background of tech advances, they would not be able to manufacture updated weapons en masse, since they only have limited resources in the fleet, and those resources sever only the purpose of getting them to Earth.
You watched The Curse, right? That has horror elements, kind of, with the usual level of Nathan brilliance (supported by a magnificent performance from Emma Stone!)
Yes, in horror movies there is this irritating trend of the characters doing something stupid, just to move the plot forward, get the alien on the ship, etc. But Alien is not that kind of movie.
See, they are not scientists, and the science officer has a hidden agenda. That's the setup, and everything follows from there. They don't want to investigate the signal, but the company forces them to, threatening them with withholding their full salary.
Kane volunteers first to go out and explore the planetoid, meaning he is an adventurous spirit, not afraid of taking risks. So when he sees the egg open, and he sticks his face in it, his curiosity is backed up by his characterization. Also, what is equally as important is that the audience is curious as well. The derelict exploration scene is brilliantly crafted with Giger's biomechanical design, and the excellent Space Jockey set piece. After that, the audience wants them to push and go even deeper into this mystery, we, the viewers want to see more and more and more... and Kane gives us just that - he also wants to see more -and at a point it is of course too much, and too horrible - but justified.
My point is: the "stupid" decisions are built up, and backed up threefold: characterization, world building and by crafting the atmosphere around them. You might still think their decisions are stupid at some points, but - again - Alien takes the effort to make these decisions understandable, in character and - dare I say - logical.
Also, your criticism is too vague. If you could list all the "incompetent leadership decisions", that would give me a chance to react, but as it stands, I really don't know what you mean here.
You mention "precautions" regarding handling the alien. Well, just remember, they are not scientists. Ash is in charge of all things science, so for example when he is wearing a plastic mask as protection, when they are handling the facehugger, that's exactly what Dallas is going with. Logical, isn't it?
Indeed, this is the reason.
The scene gose like this: Parker spots the alien, when after the death of Dallas he goes to refill the flamethrower. The alien is standing on a random corridor, looking at the strobing light of the airlock. This light is situated between the two doors, and the alien is apparently mesmerized by it, wanting to "get it" or something. Parker quickly reads the situation, and gets to a communication device that is on a nearby wall. He calls the bridge, where Ripley and Lambert receive the call. Parker tells Ripley to open the inside door of the airlock, which promptly happens. The alien steps closer to the light, and the right moment comes - Parker instructs Ripley to close the inner door and open the outer door, but as soon as he does that, before Ripley has a chance to press the button, the Nostromo's emergency siren kicks in.
Startled by the sound, the alien jumps out of the airlock, the outer door is opened, the inner door is closing, and the alien's tail is caught in the inner door, severing it. The creature runs free, but the acid of the wound starts eating through both doors (somehow), which causes air to leave the area, rendering Parker unconscious. Rip and Lambert are picking up portable oxygen bottles, helping themselves and Parker. When they get there, their nose starts bleeding from lack of air. Parker is saved, and the door is sealed quickly to prevent more air rushing out.
A bit later, when Ripley is conversing with the ship's computer, she asks who initiated the emergency siren, and the answer is - to the surprise of no one - Ash.
This scene is in full described in the novelization, so you can find some more details there. Shame it was cut out because of budgetary reasons (the special effects for the limb severing were too expensive), so it was only partially filmed, and later, when we see Ripley, the nosebleed was applied to preserve intended continuity.
Thanks, and thanks for the laugh as well - I didn't know this about the blocks in Mario, and I never thought someone can bring up Mario games as a comparison to the Derelict in Alien... Brilliant :-)
A word of warning: character actions are nonsensical in Ahsoka, and you will notice this more and more as you go forward in Rebels.
<i>If Ahsoka knew that the whales could get them there then wouldn't she of known all along that's where Thrawn and Ezra was?</i>
You raised an excellent point here. Hyperspace tracking aside, Sabine should have tried to use the whales to find Ezra, it was out of character for her to just mope and do nothing. Also, Ahsoka should have thought of this immediately as well. It's ridiculous that it never occurs to them prior to her trying to find the map - and this is never addressed.
Also, even watching Rebels doesn't explain how Thrawn got resources / manpower for his star destroyer, unless you consider him very lucky to end up on just the planet that is home to Force sensitive witches who happily assisted him in his plans... ridiculous.
Rebels is a good show... until a point where it introduces space magic. I know that was already present in the Clone Wars series, but introducing magic to Star Wars is like saying "anything goes". It's always an easy out for bad writers to just pull a miraculous escape for the heroes from any given situation... Of course good writers can use magic, but Star Wars has not been burdened with good writers lately, except for the Andor series.
In 1979, the original lifecycle was a lot different than what we got later. There was no queen, the new eggs were to be produced by a process called "egg-morphing". There is a deleted scene which shows this exactly: Brett and Dallas are captured and cocooned in a specific area of the ship. The cocooning looks very similar to the cocooning in Aliens. I think Cameron got that idea from watching that scene. So Giger designed a whole room around this.
Ripley happens upon this horrible tableau just after he discovers that Parker and Lambert are dead. She starts the countdown to the self-destruction, goes to the Narcissus, sees the alien being there, runs away in panic, disoriented, not watching where she is going, and just runs into the alien's lair, where Brett and Dallas are glued to the wall, and Brett is already almost completely morphed into an egg, whereas Dallas is at the beginning of the process, as in he is still conscious, and "greets" Ripley with horrifying moans. Ripley is completely devastated by the sight, and tries to argue for a rescue, as in she wants to peel Dallas off the wall, and get him to board the Narcissus, but Dallas is having none of it, as he can - presumably - feel the process has already begun, and he is beyond saving. He begs Ripley to kill him, and that's how the scene ends, Ripley torching Dallas, Brett and the lair completely.
Now this was what originally was the lifecycle and the creation of new eggs in '79. And let me tell you - this has even more horrific implications for the Derelict - considering how many eggs there were in the cargo hold - each of them could have been a poor Space Jockey or a creature that was indigenous to the planetoid and they are now all dead and converted into eggs...
Here is the egg morphing scene on YouTube - it was shot, and it's brilliant, but unfortunately was cut from the movie.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y6dSIMFo7iU
<i>the device was shown to detect movement in front of it by emitting a sound based on distance/speed of the movement. That's a far cry from showing two dots and their locations on a display, 2D or otherwise</i>
Got it now, there is a discrepancy between the capability that was shown in the scene where they are hunting for the chestburster and what was shown in the Dallas vent shaft scene. A valid observation, however I remember taking it at face value, even upon first viewing. But I can see how it kind of does not make sense on a plot level, and here comes your personal tolerance for dramatic licence. The function of showing the grid layer, the dots, the beeping does not really make sense. Case in point: when Dallas is stationary, his dot still shows up, so by that logic, Lamber's screen should be full of the dots of the others present around her and at the other exit. But those dots are not visible, and Scott needed a dramatic shot of a moving dot closing in on a stationary dot. So that's what we got.
A certain amount of dramatic licence is expected of any movie - especially science fiction ones. It's up to the personal tolerance level of the viewer what amount of slack they can cut for the filmmakers- I'll forever let this slide for Alien, since the dramatic tension, the characters, the set design, the buildup and the focused structure of the plot all counterbalance this - and the scene is effective in the way it was executed. So for me it's ok, but I can understand if this is a problem for you - and I can't really give you an in universe explanation.
Here is my view on this:
Ash hastily threw the tracker together. The "micro changes in air density" explanation might have been misleading, or maybe it was correct - either way, using this tracker in an air vent was a recipe for disaster.
<i>How did it go from that to showing the location of Dallas and the Alien through a complex network of vent shafts?</i>
Here, you seem to imply that Lambert had the full schematics view of the shaft network. But she didn't. The tracker only had a general grid of squares, and the positions overlaid. And no, there was no way to tell which one is Dallas and which one is the alien. And there was no way to tell if there was a wall between them, etc. Also, when either of them was not moving, the signal should have disappeared, but maybe Ash built in a "last known location" function to not make it too confusing to operate. Anyways, the beeps are I think part of the dramatic licence of the scene, not something Ash included as a feature.
But even upfront, the viewer can tell this plan has a really low percentage of succeeding. The fact that Lambert is trying to navigate Dallas using a 2D screen, while Dallas is in a 3D environment, with vent shafts going not only left and right relative to him, but over and under him as well... The fact that air density changes are constantly happening, even when Dallas is breathing for example... The fact that the alien chose to hide in the vents, meaning it is moving around in them with ease and familiarity... This paints a picture of desperation and a last ditch attempt. Dallas tries to be tough and present the plan in a way that it seems calculated, meticulous and detailed, but in reality it's anything but. And that's the point of the scene. They tried their best as "space truckers" to formulate a plan and execute it, but in the end their failure is predictable and twofold: one is the alien, who cannot be beaten on home turf, the other is Ash, who might have sabotaged the tracker.
Absolutely fair!
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