We are on the precipice of a new entry in the Alien franchise, with Noah Hawley’s Alien: Earth coming to streaming very, very soon. I couldn’t be more excited to step back into the world Ridley Scott created back in 1979, introducing us to the perfect apex predator, the Xenomorph. It also gave us one of the best action heroes of all time, a woman who should need no introduction, Sigourney Weaver’s Ellen Ripley. And Jonesy the cat, but Ripley did all the heavy lifting, I guess.
The impending series has my nostalgia cranked up to eleven, so I decided that I needed to look back at the franchise so far and rank them, because why not? But first, we need to specify what we’re actually ranking. There’s a whole lot of Alien media out there…
Have you stopped crying yet? WAHHHHHHHHHHHH, he’s not including a movie that has “Alien” in the title and has Xenomorphs in it. WAHHHHHHHHHH. Quit it. Xenomorphs exist in Rick and Morty, and they aren’t part of this list. Suck it up. I actually love AVP as a rewatchable action film, but it doesn’t belong on this list.
However, the following installments DO belong on this list, so let’s get to ranking!
It sucks. Moving on…
Ok, fine. I’ll give you more explanation. Alien: Covenant is a travesty of a film within the Alien franchise. Not only does it make no sense from a lore perspective (no, David (Michael Fassbender) did not create Xenomorphs. That’s absolutely absurd), but it’s just painfully bad from a story perspective.
Everyone makes decisions that are way out of character. Billy Crudup begins the film as a conservative protocol-abiding leader and ends his arc being the risk taker willing to roll the dice on a whole community because “we don’t want to go back to sleep.” Grow up. Danny McBride’s best pilot in the world risked thousands of souls to save but a few, which is realllll dumb. Everyone is coupled up for no reason, and it affects their objectivity. And, worst of all, it abandons the hero of the last film, Dr. Elizabeth Shaw, for absolutely no reason.
So, in summary: the story sucked, its place in Alien lore sucked, the characters sucked; IT ALL sucked. Except maybe Fassbender’s performance. That was good. BUT EVERYTHING ELSE SUCKED!
*sigh*
There are few good things about Alien: Resurrection. Winona Ryder is always extremely watchable in films, and this is no different. Sigourney Weaver is back as Ellen Ripley in her swansong for the franchise. The setting is pretty cool, that of a futuristic cloning facility with hi-tech prison cells and stuff. And… I dunno, I’ve got nothing.
Alien: Resurrection is sort of a mess. Yes, Ripley is back, but only sort of because she’s a clone mixed with the DNA of a Xenomorph Queen. The tone feels very weird for an Alien movie, perhaps because it was partially written by the overtly quippy Joss Whedon. If you put to one side his IRL sketchiness, I mostly like all of his stuff, but it doesn’t fit into this movie or the tone of the established universe.
And then there’s the first step into the breach of “what if we could do a scarier Xenomorph?” Stop it. If Alien wasn’t evidence enough that they can be scary enough on their own, then what more do you want? Enough of this alien-human hybrid sh*t!
From this point on, I thoroughly enjoyed each film on this list.
Alien 3, however, is the film I have rewatched the least. There are a few issues with the film and its overall narrative. Throwing out the end of Aliens was its first mistake, basically hitting a hard reboot after so much love and care was put into its survivors. Taking place in a prison colony made most of Ripley’s team inherently unlikeable, and the ones that you do like don’t last very long. Also, the setting was kinda dull and same-y, except for the final scenes in the film.
They do nail the scariness of the Xenomorph, though. Because it’s a prison colony, weapons are hard to come by, and it’s like watching John Cena wrestling one of the Mean Street Posse (now when they’re old, retired, and even worse than they were in the 90s). Basically, it’s a massacre. The added Weyland-Yutani evil corporation lore was also very welcome, although the lack of series staple androids was disappointing.
But, like, Sigourney Weaver kills it, as always.
I struggled with ranking Prometheus because of how closely tied to Alien: Covenant it is. My first instinct was to put it at the bottom, just above that unholy demon, but that would be unfair to this film. Without hindsight, Prometheus is a very entertaining film with a good protagonist in Dr. Elizabeth Shaw (Noomi Rapace), a great crew (although they were a little misused in the film), including Idris Elba and Charlize Theron, and an interesting supposed origin story for the Space Jockeys (or Engineers).
Man, this film is also so, so, so pretty. The cinematography can be held up there with the best in any film, never mind the franchise. Although there isn’t actually an honest-to-God Xenomorph in this movie, there is enough tension and threat to the crew that it reminds me of the original Alien. The Engineers are an imposing force that were pretty cool (again, in a vacuum, without the knowledge of Alien: Covenant).
Altogether, Prometheus is a great movie tarnished by subsequent entries in the franchise.
The most recent film on the list takes third spot! Directed by Fede Alvarez, Alien: Romulus oozes style and is shot really well. The crew were likable (mostly) and were just normies with a scavenging itch hoping to get out from underneath the thumb of the company: Weyland-Yutani. Yeah, those evil b*tches are back and scheming as always. Rain (Cailee Spaeny) and her refurbished android, Andy (David Jonsson), are perfect poster protagonists for the new age of Alien.
Most of all, though, this film brought back the fear of the Face-hugger. Those creepy little b*stards were the main threat behind the ever-menacing Xenomorph, which in itself was extremely imposing for the most part, until its friends all joined the party. I dunno, I always find one stealthy alien scarier than ten that are in your face.
Only let down by a few goofy moments, some cringeworthy nostalgia callbacks, a silly hallway of acid scene and THAT ending, Alien: Romulus was the return to form the series needed. I loved this movie.
The OG! Make no mistake, Alien is a straight-up horror film, bordering on a slasher. A stealthy, murderous alien scythes through the crew of a mining ship one by one until only the final girl remains, the wonderful Ellen Ripley. At this stage, Ripley is no more than a savvy engineer with little to no combat experience and an unhealthy attachment to the ship’s cat, Jonesy, so she’s very much the underdog. There’s a reason that Ripley is such an iconic character in cinematic history, and it started right here.
Alien is a freaking classic. Directed by Ridley Scott in 1979, the tight corridors of the Nostromo were the perfect backdrop to the Xenomorph’s debut. The futuristic industrialism aesthetic is something that has inspired countless science fiction properties over the years, and I’m sure it will for many years in the future.
There’s that legendary John Hurt cafeteria scene where the chest-burster finally arrives after a “he’s okay, don’t worry” fake-out. *chef’s kiss*. Ian Holm’s cold performance as Ash is the best of his career (yes, over Bilbo in The Lord of the Rings). Then, the finale sequence was so tense I was on the edge of my seat.
This film is sooooooooooooooo good.
It had to be, right?
Aliens is in my top five movies of all time. In what was a big genre shift, Aliens was more of a pure action film rather than a horror. Man, did it do a great job of it. Introducing the Colonial Marines, the ultimate badasses of space that barely needed guns to destroy the enemy, these guys get ripped to shreds by the Xenomorph swarm at Hadley’s Hope colony. Introducing enemy variety with the alien Queen and seemingly insurmountable odds, Ripley, Hicks the Marine, Bishop the android and the lone survivor of the colony, Newt, manage to face down and escape the overwhelming threat.
Apart from the cinematography being great, the stunning visual effects and the awesome story, this film is the source of so many amazing quotes and pop culture moments. “Get away from her, you B*TCH,” accompanied by Ripley wearing the massive yellow exosuit, will be forever etched in my mind. Hudson screaming “Game over, man. It’s game over!” will never not be what my friends and I yell at game nights. And Newt whispering “They mostly come at night…mostly” will never not be funny, yet oddly chilling.
Add to all of that the deepening lore about the Weyland-Yutani company, fronted by the ultimate douchebag, Burke, and Aliens didn’t just build upon what was before, it made itself stand out in the best way possible, out of the shadows of the original. Of course, there is a genre preference thing here, but, personally, I’m here for the last stand at Hadley’s Hope. It ruled, and it’s the best film in the franchise.
What do you think of this list? Do you agree? What did I get wrong? Let me know in the comments where we can all agree to forget Alien: Covenant even exists.
