alien: Resurrection Review
It’s a pop culture in-joke that anytime a film series runs out of ideas, you set the next installment in space. But what if the whole fuss started in space, as with Alien? Send in the clones. You would be hard-pressed to make a case that Alien: Resurrection is not an entertaining experience for anyone willing to accept the bizarre tonal shift relative to Alien, Aliens and Alien 3. It’s visually dynamic, updates the Alien mythology in some creative if questionable respects, and gives us the last (hopefully not final) appearance of Sigourney Weaver as the iconic and previously academy award nominated Ellen Ripley. This version of Ripley behaves quite differently and has more of a predatory instinct than the one we know…because clones. Clones are imperfect, right? The film is bonkers in comparison to anything Alien that precedes it, a result of its neon color palette, less serious casting choices, and a semi-humorous script by Joss Whedon of Avengers and Justice League (pre-Snyder Cut) fame that Whedon himself claims was “executed in such a ghastly fashion as to render it almost unwatchable.” We might need to note the source and table the salt in this case as Whedon has developed quite the toxic reputation in Hollywood. Speaking of the script, I always found the choice to dive deeper into “aliens as a bioweapon” and the specifics of how we would harvest said weapons to be the logical canvas for the next iteration of the franchise. The execution is far from perfect but after watching the trailer we all knew this was to be a different kind of Aliens movie. In the pantheon of the franchise, it might always be known as the sequel that feels like Aliens on acid. That doesn’t sound terrible to me.
Aliens: Resurrection receives a score of 6.5/10 for general audiences and a 7.5/10 for die-hard fans of the franchise. It is no great secret that Winona Ryder was terribly miscast. She seems to be acting in a different film.