Alien Anthology Blu-ray Oct 26th

[bandit29]

US release date Oct 26th. Fox says they have been "reinvigorated for an intense Blu-ray high-definition viewing experience." I hope they don't turn out like the new release of Predator...

IGN has the scoop on the release date and details for the Alien Anthology, which will come out in the US on October 26. This six-disc set contains about 60 hours of special features and over 12,000 images, including material from the legendary early 1990s LaserDisc release, the "Legacy" release and the Quadrilogy DVDs. 20th Century Fox claims that the four Alien films have been "reinvigorated for an intense Blu-ray high-definition viewing experience."

http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=4881

[Keith]

I'll be waiting for indivdual releases of Alien & Aliens as per usual.

[Agent ONE]

I'll be waiting for indivdual releases of Alien & Aliens as per usual.

Right.. There are only two alien movies. Look at that, we agree on something.

[derex3592]

US release date Oct 26th. Fox says they have been "reinvigorated for an intense Blu-ray high-definition viewing experience." I hope they don't turn out like the new release of Predator...

what's wrong with the new release of Predator?? I was about to pull the trigger on it......

And yes, they're are ONLY 2 Alien movies...I will wait for individual releases as well. Can't wait to see and hear them on Blu-Ray though!

[bandit29]

The new release of Predator has been heavily DNRed. Some of the movie looks good and other shots the characters look like they are made of wax.. There's been plenty of complaints about it..

http://www.blu-ray.com/movies/Predator-Blu-ray/11375/#Review

I used the movie cash that came with it for Predators

Aliens.. I think I'm going to wait for the individual releases unless Amazon has a great sale on the box set or something..

[EXO]

Lol... and filmakers PAY to put filmgrain in their digitally shot movies...

Is it an anthology when there's only 2 movies in the series?

[VT 1010]

Hmm...Looks like I wasn't too far off. http://www.macrossworld.com/mwf/index.php?showtopic=25762&view=findpost&p=861217

It has the Burke Cocoon scene!

I'm also astonished that it seems to have all of the extra features from the Quad, the Legacy set, the Saga doc, and the Laserdiscs--plus new stuff. They better not screw up the transfers. I thought I heard Lowry was working on it, so who knows...

[Duke Togo]

I'll be waiting for indivdual releases of Alien & Aliens as per usual.

QFT. I'm a big fan of David Fincher and Jean-Pierre Jeunet, but the 3rd and 4th movies were flat out not good. At all.

[electric indigo]

I re-watched Aliens recently (from my VHS tapes set). Camerons front- and back projection technique may have saved them a lot of money in the production, but the shots haven't aged too well. I hope they can fix some of that in the new transfer to BD.

[Gaijin]

I re-watched Aliens recently (from my VHS tapes set). Camerons front- and back projection technique may have saved them a lot of money in the production, but the shots haven't aged too well. I hope they can fix some of that in the new transfer to BD.

If it's like the recent re-release of Predator, we'll get ultra sharp house of wax with lost details.

[kaiotheforsaken]

I actually really enjoy 3, and 4...well 4 is at least alright until the newborn shows up. I have the full set on standard def DVD so I'll definitely pick this set up when it hits.

[Warmaker]

I'll be waiting for indivdual releases of Alien & Aliens as per usual.

That's all that needs to be said. 1 and 2, the rest are trash.

[Graham]

Ditto, there is only Alien and Aliens. Some poor deluded (insane?) souls seem to be suffering from some form of mass-halucination about additional sequels, but they are obviously derranged and should be locked up so they are not a danger to themselves and society

I will pass on this set. Still not sold on Bul-Ray and I almost never watch extras (I buy DVDs to watch movies, not a bunch of other mostly boring crap), so an easy pass.

Graham

[eugimon]

Well, the Aliens DVD release is complete crap so as long as it looks better than that...

[Keith]

Well, the Aliens DVD release is complete crap so as long as it looks better than that...

The first release was, the later collector's edition was improved.

[VT 1010]

Yeah, the last Aliens DVD--while not eye-candy--was fairly accurate to the source. It's a dull and grainy film. In fact, James Cameron even mentioned it in the commentary. Don't get your hopes up too high about Aliens by expecting the picture quality to knock your socks off. I just hope they don't DNR and EE the crap out of it.

Alien, on the other hand, was not only a dramatic improvement over the first DVD; it was one of the best looking DVDs I've seen. It had a stunning transfer with exceptional detail. Having seen the Director's Cut last year on film, I can attest to the transfer's fidelity as well. I can't wait to see what it looks like on Blu-ray.

Edited July 16, 2010 by VT 1010

[sketchley]

Ditto, there is only Alien and Aliens. Some poor deluded (insane?) souls seem to be suffering from some form of mass-halucination about additional sequels,

Com'mon, the best part of "Alien Reserrection" is the combination of Ripley and the Alien. If anything, her character was the scariest thing in that whole movie. For a couple of years, I looked forward to a continuation of that character exploring Earth, etc.. Alas... the turd called AvP, and the WTF were you smoking AvP2 pretty much precluded a Ripley alien sequel.

As for the rest of "AliRes"... it... well... uhm... it was cool seeing a pre-CSI Gary "Warrick Brown" Dourdan in a completely different role. Reaffirmed my believe that he fits the CSI role.

Alien 3? What alien got cubed?

Edited July 16, 2010 by sketchley

[shiroikaze]

Just out of curiosity, are you guys hating the last two movies because they took a poo (twice) on Ripley's Good End?

[taksraven]

Just out of curiosity, are you guys hating the last two movies because they took a poo (twice) on Ripley's Good End?

I think that has to be a major factor and I think that there would be few that deny it. I think to many fans it was too big a "fuck you" to wipe out Newt and Hicks, especially in such a way.

There were other problems with both 3 and 4, but for me it was the biggest insult.

Taksraven

Edited July 17, 2010 by taksraven

[Keith]

Just out of curiosity, are you guys hating the last two movies because they took a poo (twice) on Ripley's Good End?

I actually went to see Alien 3 in theatres, and from the first scene where Kyle Reese & Newt were spontaniously dead, I was already lost on the movie, so yeah, that does have something to do with it. But more over, the franchise got turned into too much of a "yeah, you killed all the aliens in the last one, but not really, also, you're in a significantly worse situation than you thought, sucka!" A little bit is ok, but it became too huge of a crutch. Kinda like Terminator 3.

[Warmaker]

Just out of curiosity, are you guys hating the last two movies because they took a poo (twice) on Ripley's Good End?

The 4th one? I really disliked the idea of resurrecting the dead main character. From there on, it felt like too much a departure from either of the first 2 movies.

But of the first 4 movies, Alien 3 is where I reserve most of my "dislike." I was a kid and didn't get to see it in theaters. But in the mid-early 80s, when I saw Alien, I loved it for the suspense. Aliens? Loved it for its action and great characters. In hindsight, it helps I guess when you have R.Scott and J.Cameron in charge of those respective movies. But anyways, I really loved Aliens, the favorite of the franchise for me. Cpl.Hicks was a great character and they went through alot of effort in rescuing Newt. So, when my Dad rented the tape for Alien 3, I was very excited. But to my horror, in the first few minutes of the film, they kill Hicks and Newt.

They're dead. Ripley crys a minute. Movie moves on as if nothing happened.

Excuse me? They took an awesome, surviving character, the last of the Colonial Marines sent in, took the little girl that everyone took great pains to save, and killed them both off in the lamest possible way in a movie?

"Yeah, a beam fell on him and she drowned. Oops."

The moment that happened in the movie, the rest of it was cast in a hugely negative light for me. I stuck around with my Dad to watch the rest of it, but left it with a great dislike.

Edited July 17, 2010 by Warmaker

[sketchley]

I think James Cameron comments on Alien³ succinctly sums up everyone's feelings toward Alien³.

Edited July 17, 2010 by sketchley

[taksraven]

I think James Cameron comments on Alien³ succinctly sums up everyone's feelings toward Alien³.

What were his comments?

Taksraven

[eugimon]

What were his comments?

Taksraven

back in 2003:

"Hated it. Simple as that. I hated what they did.... I couldn't stand Alien 3 - how they could just go in there and kill off all these great characters we introduced in aliens, and the correlation between mother and daughter. It stunk, but hopefully I'll get a chance to rectify all that". You mean the talk about him being tied to "Alien 5" is true? "To an extent. yes. We're looking at doing another one. Something similiar to what we did with Aliens. A bunch of great characters, and of course Sigourney. I've even discussed the possibility of putting him [Arnold Schwarzenegger] into the Alien movie".

Edited July 18, 2010 by eugimon

[taksraven]

back in 2003:

"Hated it. Simple as that. I hated what they did.... I couldn't stand Alien 3 - how they could just go in there and kill off all these great characters we introduced in aliens, and the correlation between mother and daughter. It stunk, but hopefully I'll get a chance to rectify all that". You mean the talk about him being tied to "Alien 5" is true? "To an extent. yes. We're looking at doing another one. Something similiar to what we did with Aliens. A bunch of great characters, and of course Sigourney. I've even discussed the possibility of putting him [Arnold Schwarzenegger] into the Alien movie".

Thanks for that.

Arnie saying "kill da haliens"? Would have been interesting. "Its naht a facehuggaaa"!!

Taksraven

[EXO]

I watched an interview where he says that it was a slap in the face of the people that worked on and enjoyed Aliens. Which is pretty much how I felt. All that trouble to get Newt and she just ends up dead in her sleep.

[taksraven]

I've seen and read interviews, but I can't remember hearing any reason why the production team thought it was a good idea to kill of these characters from the previous film. Anybody ever heard a justification for it??

[EXO]

I'm not sure if I'm remembering right but they asked Michael Biehn if he would return but I think they couldnt agree on the salary and Newt was a teenager by then and couldn't reprise the role. But basically they wrote a story that wasn't anywhere near the Aliens lore. The original story was even more ridiculous than the prison in space script. It was about this world of monks and every structure was made of wood, plus the atmosphere was only about 10 ft. high... the only thing that carried over was the fact that everyone was bald.

IMO, the biggest problem with everything after Aliens was Sigourney Weaver was handed the franchise. She had the power of approval over almost everything because Ripley was so popular. I think they could have used her character further but she didn't need to be in control of it beyond acting and characerization, after all, the real star of that franchise should have been the Alien species itself.

I always thought that the next stage after the second film should have been on Gateway, the facility that Ripley was taken to in the beginning of the second film... so close to earth but not quite there yet. Forget all that fancy auteur bullshit.

[anime52k8]

I'm not sure if I'm remembering right but they asked Michael Biehn if he would return but I think they couldnt agree on the salary and Newt was a teenager by then and couldn't reprise the role. But basically they wrote a story that wasn't anywhere near the Aliens lore. The original story was even more ridiculous than the prison in space script. It was about this world of monks and every structure was made of wood, plus the atmosphere was only about 10 ft. high... the only thing that carried over was the fact that everyone was bald.

The space monk script was actually the last script turned in before the Walter Hill and David Giler (the producers) took over and wrote their own script. The idea was that Ripply's escape pod lands on a mile wide satellite constructed mostly of wood that's being used as a monastery by monks.

as stupid as the idea sounds, and despite retaining some of the worst aspects of the final film (i.e. killing of everyone from the last movie but ripply) I still think it would have made a better movie than what we got. I think that visually it would have been really interesting, having these very medieval looking sets punctuated by the kind of cold, industrial look of the first two films and the serial alien environments. definitely more interesting than "more pipes and corridors"

IMO, the biggest problem with everything after Aliens was Sigourney Weaver was handed the franchise. She had the power of approval over almost everything because Ripley was so popular. I think they could have used her character further but she didn't need to be in control of it beyond acting and characerization, after all, the real star of that franchise should have been the Alien species itself.

I'd say that what's really killed the alien franchise is too much meddling on the part of the producers and the studio executives. Sigourney Weaver being allowed to dictate so much of the franchise isn't helping, but even that is a direct result of Joe Roth's insistence that if an Alien movie gets made, Ripply HAS to be in it.

I always thought that the next stage after the second film should have been on Gateway, the facility that Ripley was taken to in the beginning of the second film... so close to earth but not quite there yet. Forget all that fancy auteur bullshit.

That's pretty much where the earliest draft of the script for the third movie was going. The first script by William Gibson involved the Sulaco arriving on a Weyland-Yutani run space station and introduces a group of space communists who have developed alien bio-weapons using a face hugger and what was left of bishop which they stole off the Sulaco while it was in transit.

Ripply would have been completely absent form the film and it would have instead focused on hicks and bishop fighting Space commies, the company, and super aliens that now have the ability to infect people with a virus THAT TURNS THEM INTO ALIENS.

This version of the film fell through because the producers kept wanting Gibson to make revisions to the script and finally he got sick of it and quit.

from there Eric Red was brought on and turned in a really interesting but totally not aliens script which caused the the director to quit. Red was then fired and replaced by David Twohy (of Pitch Black fame) finally produced a finished screenplay (that was eerily similar to Aliens 4), but was dumped because Joe Roth thought there wasn't enough ripply in the film and then director Vincent Ward wanted to do his own story anyways (Vincent wards script was the one about the space monks).

Edited July 18, 2010 by anime52k8

[EXO]

ah... thanks anime52k8!

A satellite made of wood... lol... don't they know how much it would cost to get that much wood into space? And have they never heard of space termites?

[VT 1010]

I read the Gibson script and it was so over the top, it just didn't feel like an Alien movie. I believe Alien 3 (the Special Edition version anyway) would've been the better choice. The biggest problem was that Alien 3 was a clusterf*ck in both pre-production and production. Hell, I think they may have still been writing the script as they shot it--and I don't mean some last minute touch-ups either. Then, it make matters worse, they tried to make a sequel to a bad movie. Like anime52k8 said, they had to have Sigourney back in some way and this unnecessarily complicated the story. Plus, Jean-Pierre Jeunet was not a good fit for directing an Alien movie.

Luckily more of the controversial stuff about Alien 3 will be on the Anthology. They edited a lot out of the documentary on the Quad and it'll be uncut here.

I didn't think the Special Edition version of A3 was that bad though. It did fix a number of the films minor flaws. If only it did the same for the major ones...

[Warmaker]

If something is not that bad, it's still bad, man

[anime52k8]

I read the Gibson script and it was so over the top, it just didn't feel like an Alien movie.

As over the top as Gibson's script was (and there are some pretty crazy elements in there no doubt) I personally still feel like it would have made a better sequel and would have been more true to the franchise.

I think it really comes down to what one thinks constitutes an Alien movie. I can see how Alien3 can feel more in the same vain as the original film, but personally I think that any sequel to Aliens should match the kind of escalation between the first and second movies.

from the Alien to Aliens you go from a small group of unprepared people fighting a single creature, to a group of well armed and prepared soldiers fighting a hoard of creatures; so logically (to me anyways) the next step should be guys with bigger guns fighting hoards of bigger, scarier creatures.

[Graham]

The next logical step I always thought after Aliens, was to have Newt, Hicks and Ripley make it back to Earth, but also have the Aliens get back to Earth, get loose and start taking over the planet.

Graham

[sketchley]

The next logical step I always thought after Aliens, was to have Newt, Hicks and Ripley make it back to Earth, but also have the Aliens get back to Earth, get loose and start taking over the planet.

Graham

Which was why I thought the initial two Dark Horse Comics follow-up series were much more relevant than the 3rd movie. You pretty much summed up the plot, but I think Hicks might have been replaced, Newt is grown up, and Riply doesn't appear until the very end of the second series.