@@YourBoyWang Alone on a ship. With 7 humans. Dallas: we’re gonna search every inch until that thing is dead! In space, no one can hear you scream! Ash: I admire its purity. Brent: This should sting the little bastard! Alien: graaaaasahhhhh insert actions scenes Parker: I’m for killing that Damm thing right now! Alien: Yippie Ky Yah Explosions A L I E N
I heard a review that said a big theme of this movie is sexual violations and everything is designed around it, the chest bursting, the face hugger putting the tube down your rthroat, ash putting the magazine in ripleys mouth, the alien having a phallic mini mouth to penetrate skulls with, the grabbing of Disposable woman #2s pants from underneath with the tentacle thing. When I was told that the director INTENTIONALLY did all this I got creeped out about the director. Not the movie.
Reading your comment put the movie in my head but with all roles reversed: Xenomorphs sat at the table eating , lots of banter is in the air, suddenly Big Chap begins choking, his crew try to help and restrain him * Ripleys head bursts from the chest of Big Chap *
One of the few games that sent shivers through my body. The first time you see it in VR holy shite! Probably the most memorable video game memory I have. That and when my care package drop landed on 3 people.
I never thought of the Xeno as being good or evil. I always thought of the situation along the lines of it was him or the crew that was going to survive. The Alien was doing what it was instinctually born to do. The crew had no idea what this creature was or what it was capable of and so they felt threatened. The REAL bad guy was the company who set the crew up and put everyone including the Alien in a bad situation. The crew was expendable and the company put Ash on board to prove it.
Couldn't have said it better. Especially at the very end when it hides in the escape shuttle it looks like a spider who crawls inside a very tiny space to hide or simply to be left alone (I think in the script it was dying). Maybe the atmosphere of the space ship wasn't meant for it and it only could survive for a certain period. I want this aspect its motives to remain a mystery though...
@@xenomorphloverthe Xeno knew about the self destruct..and it would be it's best chance of survival let Ripley jettison the escape ship and have a tasty snack for the trip .
The Alien just…IS with no guilt or innocence. It’s an amoral predator. Ash was a preprogrammed android. Kane on the other hand was guilty as f*ck for being an overly inquisitive dumbass.
True. We're the scariest animal we know of in the real world, so much so that we make movies fantasizing about what it would be like if we weren't for entertainment because we're so dominant.
That's exactly it. If you're the cockroach, the emerald wasp is nothing short of a hideous mosnster. For what is worth, in my opinion xenomorphs are as moral as great white sharks or earthquakes.
@X The movie was always pretty ambigious about the nature of the Xenomorph though. LIke if it was really just a very dangerous predator of some kind. Or if it really had an actual kind of intelligence, on the level of a human maybe even greater in some sense. Like it wasn't just killing the crew, but actually toying with them. Maybe it attempted even to rape Lambert. We will probably never know for sure ... The book, based on the script, even left the question open what ever if Ash tried to communicate with the creature and if he was even ... succesfull in his attempt. In the book, I believe, he was asked by Ripley or Parker and Ash said he wants to take that with him in to his grave.
Parker: "We gotta talk about this direction situation. Left or right man?" Brett: "Right, right, right." Parker: "(blast steam) But that's just a left goddammit!" Brett: "Right."
Plot twist: The chest burster ran into Jonesy, after escaping being confined inside Kane, and befriended him immediately. Seeing Ripley, Parker, and Brett chase and trap Jonesy and Jonesy desperately fight his way away from them, the alien decides to intervene and save Jonesy when Brett has him cornered.
Ignoring the explanation that a cat is an unsuitable host, this theory is backed up by the scene where the alien examines Jonesy curiously and leaves him alone. The only difference in the extended scene is the alien shoving the cage out of the way.
The problem with just leaving the alien alone is it's a ticking time bomb due to the acidic blood. If it dies or even just gets injured on something, acid could leak out, breach the hull, and destroy the whole ship. This is why it's such a potentially valuable bio weapon in space.
Ah, but we know from Bishop's studies that the blood neutralises completely upon the creature's death. Granted, the crew of the Nostromo didn't know that.
Going into cryo would be an immense gamble. They know very little about it, what little they've learned is that it can dissolve metal even if only through injury, and there's no way to assess what incidental damage can be caused to the Nostromo by leaving an unchecked ET organism running around. Not to mention a flagrant disregard for quarantine procedure and the ethics of possibly door dashing alien pathogens to Earth. 0/10 do NOT recommend😂
Except that in the original film, the alien didn't have acid blood. Only the 'facehugger' had it. I am not counting the deleted scene that does give the adult acidic blood. When Ripley shoots the alien with the harpoon gun, it is shown as having white blood, like Ash's. This is meant to get the audience thinking if it was an animal or a machine like Ash, or something in between, of which is a common theme of H.R. Giger's work. Additionally, the blood did not melt through the harpoon cable, causing it to be pulled towards the shuttle.
There's hints that the Alien had absorbed memories from Kane (perhaps other victims) and used this knowledge to outsmart the crew. When it heard the klaxon from the self-destruct, it knew to go there for refuge, but perhaps didn't know enough to operate the ship, especially being so near the end of its life and energy.
The Xeno takes traits from its host via horizontal gene transfer, which allows it to be perfectly adapted to the hosts’ environment at birth. While that gene transfer can include instincts (automatic neural responses to environmental stimuli) complex memories would be a stretch. At best, I think the instinct to run from loud noises (thus in the direction of where the other humans are going) might transfer over.
@@chuckhoyle1211I could never understand why it was called perfect. People seem to have a low benchmark for what constitutes perfection. What even makes it perfect?
The only person Big Chap really attacked unprovoked is Lambert. It seems to stalk her before it attacked, but everyone else invaded its space, or acted aggressively towards it. It also left the cat alone. And even initially ignored Ripley in the escape ship, until again, it was provoked.
He'd be the exception in this model due to it needing to reproduce, right? Just a critter doing what critters do. An interesting theory that I'm gonna have to chew on.
It’s been a while since I’ve watched the first but the argument could also be made that the Alien was watching him and if memory serves correctly, Brett had a pipe or rod. It’s only after he lowers his defense that the Alien ambushed him, the Alien also never attacks Jonesy who showed the Alien no aggression other than defensive posturing which the Alien clearly understood.
@@MalevolenceIncarnate I'm interested in your line of thinking. Please develop it a little more. If Brett has a pipe (or whatever long object) and is holding it defensively why would the alien then attack after Brett lowers Brett's defense? Brett goes from a defensive position to a neutral position. Isn't a neutral position less threatening? Animals such as dogs get aggressive around defensive posturing but relax when other animals relax. Seeings as the xenomorph doesn't attack the cat who is in a defensive posture... what gives? I'm interested in you flushing out this scene.
@@the_golden_bough8541if you gona take out a possible dangeroes criter you dont do it when it is in a defencive position, you go for the atack when it most vulnereble ( when you gona kill a fly you do it when shes about to land). If you atack a dog/ wolf/ boar/lion when hes showing his theeth/claws you gona get mauled but if you atack while his defence is down he is gona die before he can maw you
There's often something deeper in these stories: Frankenstein's Monster wasn't the real monster, Frankenstein was. He tampered in God's domain by creating life. King Kong was innocent. He was brought to N.Y. in chains for the folly of man, all in their pursuit of fame and fortune. But it escaped, destroying the city and killing innocent lives. The mayor in Jaws was the true villain. He knew of the rouge shark, but the "summer dollars" were just too important to close the beaches. The company on Earth wanted the alien for it's weapons division. They even added an android to the crew to protect the alien (without their knowledge). The crew was "expendable." Kane acted irresponsible, but he did pay a big price for it. The alien was acting on it's survival instincts, but was the crew.
By the same logic the nazis were not evil. They saw the extinction of other races as the only way for the german race to survive. Lucifer fought a war against Yaweh as he saw him as an oppressor. Practically every one in history, from Vlad Tepez to the Kmer Rouge, IS or Mussolini can be viewed as only trying to survive or not be oppressed. But it will not be how most people will agree on the evil nature of men or beasts. As for King Kong, he was far from innocent. The locals sacrificed a woman to him every full moon. Our heroine only survived because she charmed Kong in a way the previous women had not. I say good riddance to him, and I cheer for the humans in those movies.
Dr. Alan Grant (Jurassic Park): "They are no monsters, just animals fighting to survive." This may be one reason the Xenomorph is so loved an popular...
I wouldn't call the alien innocent, but I've never thought of it as strictly a villain either. It's like if a tiger was loose on a ship; it's just an animal doing what it does to survive. It's still scary as heck and you'd want to stop it, but it's not really evil.
17:30 The Queen isn't even that hostile. Ripley showed her the flamethrower and she actually decided to let Ripley and Newt go, she even called back the warriors. The only reason the Queen attacked is because Ripley decided to start burning the eggs.
In Kane's defence: He couldn't have known that these were eggs. They had the same biomechanical look as everything else on that ship. The eggs could have been food containers, energy cells, computer servers, all sorts of stuff....
Kane is stupid and greedy but in his defense the other films characters covenant and prometheus they where isolated away from help while Kane had 2 team members with him and Kane had old seen one fossilised alien corpse from 1000 of years ago who could have died from anything where as both prometheus and covenant character had seen piles of bodies clearly killed in violent ways and yet still they both threw caution to the wind on the scale of stupid choices Kane was the least stupid of the three
@@redpillnibbler4423kanes actions where incredibly reckless regardless of him recognising them as eggs or not. That right there is a biological contamination and (as far as we are aware) first contact. the last thing you do is mess with it. Even just walking into the egg chamber after clearly stating they seem like eggs of some kind. What if the mother was still present and very defensive of her nest? He doesn't need to know what a xenomorph is, to draw similarities to bears or birds. he knows its biological so you dont even remotely go near it just because of a contamination risk. thats literally the first thing you do if you see any of this. you get the hell out of there immediately just for that alone. they shouldn't even have been near the suspected alien ship the second it was recognised as non-human. the amount of biological and non biological compounds that could potentially harm the crew, or anyone back home when they come back, is endless. the only person who ever acted even remotely smart was Ripley. everyone else was moronic. The only way you could spin this to be logical is if you see them all as lower economic class work grunts and treat their personal mentak horizon accordingly. i know some beer chugging contract workers in some fields ive worked with would absolutely fuck with it, not for an intelligent decisions sake though
Kane was one of the main reasons they all died, however so was Dallas. A proper captain wouldn't ket his XO set the pace the way he lets Kane. In the novelisation Dallas was a competent enough captain but a bit of a dead ender, always looking at getting by with the minimal amount of effort. We certainly see that here.
"Alien" did for sci-fi/horror in 1979 what "Pulp Fiction"did for crime drama in the 90s. Even if you don't like either of those movies, their actors, their directors - they definitely forced a change in film making and consumption.
@@SmartCookie2022 sure, the godfather redefined crime movies. I'm not suggesting that the movies I mentioned are the only examples, or that sea-changes in film only occur singularly.
I really like this theory. The allure of the initial film, for me, is in great part, that the xenomorph is not a monster. It's alien biology, well thought out, that interacts with the human (and human nature). The following films did not use this aspect very much. They used the xenomorph as a monster. Closest to using the alien biology as the main theme were the Ridley Scott prequels, but they also, sadly, concentrated on (creating) alien mythology, which was problematic.
EGGZAKTLY! And Lambert was actually a man before the sex change operation. There's an earlier AlIEN THEORY video about this. I guess l can't blame Big Chap for being ..... curious? L0L And the scene with the "'erect tail"'. If that ain't suggestive, I don't know what is .
It probably sensed that "she" was somehow different which makes the whole sexuality aspect of the Alien and Gigers art even more fascinating than it already is....
One of my all time favorite flicks and this theory never occurred to me. Probably watched Alien at least 100 times including seeing it with my Mom opening weekend in 79. She was a champ for all the horror movies I dragged her to. Will watch it this weekend and take the innocuous Star Beast's side and enjoy it from a whole different perspective. Thanks for a great vid.
There's an outtake (from the three-hour DVD documentary) that clearly shows the Alien to be the aggressor, during its encounter with Lambert & Parker. The Alien (from Lambert's POV) is about to punch a hole in her face BEFORE Parker charges at it from behind.
@mistermatix8241 No, because people are exceptionally dumb. You know if there was a species that literally murdered humans to reproduce, there'd be a loud group of people demanding the species be allowed to live.
Milburn was a scientist. He knows better. The covenant XO had a visible example of David’s perfidy. He is expected to know better. Cane is a space trucker, a curious blue collar guy. He has no reason to know better.
Exactly, these characters are not even in the same ballpark when it comes to "he should know better!". Milburn was a damn biologist, allegedly top of his field if he got recruited for the mission. Oram was one of the people who were supposed to lead a new colony on an alien planet, i assume he had received proper training for all kinds of scenarios and situations plus, like you said, he had already seen that David was not on his side to say the least. Cane was just a dude driving a huge space truck, maybe he was too curious for his own good, maybe it was greed but you can't say he had been trained in any way for something like the scenario he was in. The only one on the Nostromo one could argue should have known better is Ash and we all know why he did nothing to prevent the disaster.
@watonemillion what does seeing Alien have to do with it? Do you really think the first thing an experienced biologist would do when encountering an alien life form would be to make a sex joke and try to stick his finger in its mouth? Especially when it looks like a snake, has teeth and the first thing that should run though his mind should be that it might be poisonous?
That was a really interesting perspective to pursue. After all these years, I had never looked at the "alien" as having any innocence or non-violent instincts, until provoked. Great stuff, and another reminder why I love this channel so much. Cheers!
I've always been intrigued by one of the original ending ideas of how the Alien kills Ripley and takes on the voice of Capt. Dallas as it sends out an s.o.s. in hopes it will be picked up by more prey.
That's actually a brilliant ending. But not exactly realistic for such creature. I mean... It would be too damn lethal in that way and moreover if it can send out a message, then why it can't just man and fly the ship towards Earth or some colonies? 😑
I've always liked the idea of that ending, it would have been chilling to watch, making the Xeno a significantly greater threat to humanity, and fooling both the crew and the audience alike. It's not just a dangerous 'animal' now, but a highly sentient/sapient being that could knock humanity down the food chain, like I said, it would have been quite a chilling ending, but sadly it would also mean the death of Ripley and never seeing her epic, if utterly tragic, story.
One problem that goes against the big chap being innocent theory is the derelict ship. Why would another species have a cargo hold full of friendly tree hugging type creatures?
Exactly. Especially when we learn in Prometheus that the Xenomorphs were actually made by the Engineers specifically to be used as a bio-weapon. And even before Prometheus, Ridley Scott said he always envisioned that ship as being a bomber of sorts, ready to drop those eggs on whoever they were at war with.
Perhaps they were fleeing a warzone, think the school busses in Godzilla 2014. They're thrown off-course somehow and stranded on LV-426, leaving the pilot to die and the eggs dormant.
The point isn't that the xenomorph is a "tree hugger", it is a killing machine, but its an animal and animals are just like that. The true assholes are The company that tried to poke it with a stick.
I have been following your channel a while. I had a really sh*tty job few years ago, and when i was working alone, in a cold unconvenient environment as someone who had to EVERYTHYNG in a biiig building (they said i was custodian, film editor, mechanic, carpenter, event organizer, translator, postman, ect ) that was supposed to be a "house of culture" , or "club" for the town ,whatever you wanna call it, my ONLY joy was listening to your videos in my ear plugs, and if i had the chance sit down and watch them, well then i could also watch not just listen to them. (I was mostly just listening to them in cold dark places alone in corridors like Fury 161..i mean really they looked very similar. Unxerground, dark, dirty, cold, wet wind breezing...brr) Anyways in those long months, i have watched/listened to all of your videos , and kept following you since. I will never forget to You that even You didnt knew, YOU WERE THERE WITH ME in those horrible conditions, and to be fair the theme )Alien's dark unforgiven theme and world) felt really fitting to the conditions i were in. Iam awfully thankful to you ever since, and every single one of your new videos are kinda celebratory for me. Thank you for your work and amazing content, please never change, You are a breath of fresh air for us Alien fans especially now. Thank you, and thank you thousand times. Keep up the good work
To me, the question at 9:49 goes to the heart of the matter. Either way, it's not good or evil. But is it aggressive without provocation? It's awesome that you addressed that. Great video.
Same here, seemed like when this movie was made it was in anticipation of sequels an perhaps even prequels that would CLEARLY have the Xenomorph species... or at least vast majority of the species as parasitic, literally alien, monster killing machine predators
No , it has no choice on how its born . In some case ,in human reproductive cycles , mothers die giving birth to babys . Would you say those babys are evil ? . Dont forget no one choose why ,where ,who to and how they are born . I love big chap
@saifullahhabid1133 At least human women have a chance at survival, a xenomorph birth is a guaranteed fatality. THe Xenomorph are vile and destructive creatures.
@@saifullahhabid1133it can be assumed that the Queen knows something has to die to give birth to a xenomorph. Do parents anticipate the death of the mother when trying to conceive? Probably not. If a father could magically see into the future, and knew that his spouse would die giving birth, and decided to carry through with the process anyway, would we not call him a murderer?
The only thing two things Big Chap was "innocent" of is being the child of a facehugger that had no choice but be implanted down Kane's throat by its parent, and the way it evolved forced it to be born in a painful and fatal manner to his father. Otherwise, the second his exoskeleton hardened after his molting, he was a sadistic little (censored) who enjoyed every second of the pain and terror that he caused, and got off easy with a mere plasma-shower that probably did not even kill him. Also, when you think about it, since its actually the Facehuggers who carry out the act of impregnation, the each new Alien are *grand* children of the Alien that created their egg, not their *actual* children.
I thought Egg to Chest Burster to Xenomorph "soldier ant" weren't generative iterations but a life cycle akin to larva, pupae, moth though? ooo, this really is a hatching ground for us nerd fans to discuss ideas and theories!
To be fair. That can be just territorial fights. Even same species males fight each other over territory and females. I am sure it also noticed that it is alone and that is a problem for a drone. Perhaps it thought that its hive was destroyed by you. They always have a hive. They are not loners like tigers.
From when he "hatched" from Kane, he was threatened. Parker pulled a knife on him, then he had Ripley, Lambert, Parker, Brett, Dallas and Ash following him as a baby in unfamiliar surroundings with detection devices and electrified cattle prods. Then he grows up, then Dallas goes after him with a flamethrower. The remaining crew then debate on blowing him out of an airlock. He comes to say hello to Lambert, and Parker bashes him with a flamethrower. Big Chap decides "ooh that place looks cosy" and hides in the Narcissus, and snuggles in for a nap or to die. Ripley comes in with Jones, Mr Xeno has a big stretch while sleeping, Ripley blasts him with gas to wake him up, shoots him with an harpoon gun, locks him out, then fries him with a plasma engine. Alien had a rough time. The only characters who never gave him a bad time were Jones and Ash. I think he knocked Jones about in his cat carrier was because Xeno was upset that his new human friends weren't exactly welcoming You got to ask yourself though, would you be willing to go face to face unarmed with the Alien in an attempt to communicate? He is an intelligent creature though, and some of his behaviour shows that he's actually curious. The way he looks at Lambert shows that. She's unarmed, fearful, and he doesn't threaten her immediately. As you say it's only when the overtly aggressive Parker attacks him, the Alien's mindset changes. If he'd met Lambert alone, as she was in the scene, would he have attacked? He might have thought "non hostile, no threat" and simply walked off, or even tried to communicate via sign language or something similar. He raised his tail like a finger towards her and simply sat on the floor and watched her working. I think he's just curious, and despite his birth being violent, unless he's provoked with violence, I just think he'd be happy to hide away and do his own thing. I think he just happened to bump into Parker and Lambert. I always think that when he points his tail towards Lambert, he's not displaying aggressive behavior, it's curiosity. It's as though he's saying "keep going, just do that thing, it's interesting. I'll sit here and watch" as soon as he's blindsided by Parker, he changes. It's actually an amazing scene, as the Alien even looks up at Lambert, like a kid watching his dad fixing the car. If Lambert had struggled with the oxygen cylinders, would the Alien have helped her? It'd be interesting to hear an actual psychologist discussing the Alien mindset in depth. The Alien might have been frightened, alone, away from his hive, strange surroundings, these biological beings holding things that hurt him, his fight or flight responses might have been off the chart. He never forced Kane to look into the egg, he never asked to be born in such surroundings with people being angry and violent towards him as a baby. Jones wasn't a threat so he could go into the claw room unchallenged. It wasn't that he was too small for cocooning, Jones just wasn't a threat. The Alien looks as he does because that is just how he is. Yes he's scary, but it's just how he's designed. A spider is creepy, with long legs and eight eyes, but he'll keep flies and other bugs off your food, no toxic chemicals used in bug spray, just his instincts. It's a symbiotic relationship. A spider only asks for a warm place to rest, he'll stay out of your way, and he'll keep your food and home bug free. Could the Alien follow that rule too?
@@mistermatix8241 The alien has some insect/spider-like attributes but it’s entirely different.As an individual it has an intelligence way beyond individual insects and it actively hunts any other creature in its vicinity. Leaving it alone or not will result in you being hunted,but it’s not mindless there’s purpose behind it. Looking at the expanded alien universe it also has a collective intelligence.
@@redpillnibbler4423 Yeah you're right. I certainly would not go face to face with the Xenomorph, but I was looking at the threat/no threat angle, but as you say the creature is a born hunter and is instinctive. It's cool how this channel is a melting (by acid?) pot of ideas and theories about our favourite acid blooded, banana headed friends and their universe.
I like this theory, and I do find it immensely disappointing that all subsequent alien movies make the xenomorph just ruthlessly bloodthirsty for no given reason. It doesn't eat them, it's not impregnating them like the chestburster. It's just hunting them for the sake of making things die, even when it is inconvenient or dangerous to it's own survival. Like they mixed up the Xenomorph with the Predator.
4:20 at the very beginning of Alien, the whole crew proclaims that they want more money and that they don't get paid for detours. Looking in a hole to see if there's anything valuable in it to make everyone, including himself, happier is thus not an absurd decision.
p.s. the Aliens would have gotten them anyway, regardless of the egg scene. The capitalistic (money is good for you, so you know your Caste) Cooperation, Mother, Synth et al would have made that certain.
And Aliens was all Ripley's fault. She could of kept quiet and just say it was a malfunction that caused the ship to blow up. Never mentioning the alien. No order to check out the crash site from Burke :)
It's just a couple hundred kilometers away from the colony. As they spread out - they would inevitably stumble upon it without Carter Burke asking them to check out the coordinates. But then again, the ship was totaled by an earthquake in the interim between movies that knocked out the power(unless you count Alien: Isolation as canon, where the beacon was disabled), so it's possible that the eggs would be dead by the time they actually found it on their own in a few more decades.
@Jr2728 Reports that were purposefully stuffed where light don't shine and buried underneath a mountain of red-tape, never to be found again, the moment the Nostromo went MIA. All so the people who signed off on the orders could weasel out of legal trouble of being responsible for loss of cargo, hardware and life. It's no coincidence that despite an outpost sprouting on the planet due to it's proximity to the shipping lane, no one ever decided to investigate until Ripley popped out the woodwork and started screaming from the rooftops about "ALIENS"
I don’t believe that tactic would have worked. I’ve always believed that the crew of the Nostromo was picked distinctly for the mission of acquiring a viable specimen of this creature. The company even went so far as to place a synthetic onboard to ensure that the specimen was acquired. The company at the time knew the alien ship was on LV-426. Now what I think happened was that time passed and the situation was forgotten/buried and the company people who initiated the Nostromo mission died off. When Ripley was found almost 60 years later and testified about what happened Burke sent the message that led to LV-426 being infected and overrun. And Burke was ultimately responsible for what happened because he didn’t tell the colonists about the dangers. He could have sent a professional team to handle the situation, but he was concerned about exclusive rights to what was found. And I believe the colonists would have found that ship eventually anyway. A colony of families should never have been put on that planet in the first place, which bolsters my idea that the secret Nostromo plot was forgotten or buried. I know corporations are cold, but I don’t think they would have done that if they had known what was on that planet. It’s either that the situation was forgotten/buried or its a huge plot hole….
I have always looked at the Alien, Xenomorph, Big Chap as running on instinct... If we take the original movies as a base, including Aliens... The Xenomorph is a creature of unknown origin ... It wasn't native to LV-426... And what happens when you take a species from its natural environment and place it somewhere it doe snot belong? CHAOS! I do believe that this theory has more merit than many may accept... Even in Aliens, The xenomorphs are doing what they woudl normally do, Build a Hive Breed, Feed... If as was suggested by the Dark Horse Comics both seriously and not so seriously... (There was a great strip where an Alien Species sought out Face hugger Eggs deliberately, One gets attacked by a Face hugger and HE EATS IT! The strip ended with them selling Facehugger eggs like Candy!) Then they probably had some kind of "environment" they thrived in or Natural Predators that stopped them becoming an issue... A Lion can be a very dangerous creature ... We know that! But its NOT inherently evil, It is just doing what it has to to survive!
That’s if the Xenomorph is natural. With all of the movies and such. There’s more evidence to that they are a bio weapon. Bio weapons don’t have natural predators. Considering that everything the Xeno does in movies facilitates its purpose to eliminate all potential life of a certain mass. Not to mention that these things have the durability of the strongest of extremophiles. In that it can live in the void of space for at least twenty years. What I am saying is natural evolved lifeforms have key exploitable flaws because they didn’t have to adapt for that particular situation. The xenomorph has abilities that allow it live if not thrive in any and every hostile environment including the desolate dangerous barren environment of space. You are right though in the respects that the alien is following its instincts. The thing is, it’s always in its natural environment as it adapts better to the environment than even the native life forms of that environment by taking the traits of its host. As well as being adapted to environments beyond even the host species capabilities. The alien is a biological WMD. The engineer ship was a bomber. With a very nasty payload.
@@DaddyHensei In the movies - Yes... That is what Ridley Scott has ran with, and they are the primary canon. In the comics however which are now Non-Canon, They were shown to have Natural Predators and some "Unnatural" - One Alien Species in a "What if... " Scenario were seen exploring a planet and one gets attacked by a Facehugger, Which he promptly eats... He then starts a stall selling Xenomorph Eggs. Also, the comics have depicted the Xeno's actually having their own Home world, and even evolving into warring factions - Like Black and Red ants... But the movies are the primary canon... Much as I woudl like to ignore many of them! (The AVP Movies were a bloody mess, And its annoying the comics are no longer canon given Aline Vs Predator stole most of its story from the comics!!! The Scene where they Predator marks the Survivor with the Alien Blood... YEAH, RIPPED DIRECTLY FROM THE COMICS! EVEN THE BLOODY SYMBOL WAS AN EXACT COPY FROM THE DARK HORSE COMIC!!! Which gets even more annoying when you find out the comic WAS FAR BETTER THAN THE MOVIE THAT RIPPED IT OFF! They should have just made a copy of the comic... It had a better story, better flow, and they pinched all its best ideas anyway! I am not a fan of the Bio-Weapon arc... I think cause its a bit "Played out" - But it is canon... I prefer the idea they are Natural as its a warning to US that we need to stop messing with shit... ... Much like THE THING, Fan Theories say that's a Bio-Weapon... And that to me is BORING! We have seen Alien Invaders over and over again... Why couldn't it be what it appears to be... A Being not of our planet, stranded their by mistake... And wanting to get out of Dodge!! In The case of THE THING, It makes the story way more compelling as then its not just the "Heroes" who are afraid and paranoid but the creature itself... With the Alien Franchise, The idea we might come across something that is purely instinctual... Thats FRIGHTENING! Far more frightening than a Bio Weapon...
I think Brett had a weapon; also, it DIDN'T kill him! It simply 'punched' him with its secondary jaw and dragged him into the vents. He was still very alive as he was being dragged too, as if the Alien was trying to say 'see? I don't want to kill anyone. Just let me by, please.' As for Lambert's death, Chap may have thought she betrayed him, luring him out with curiosity so Parker could kill him.
There are a couple of arguments In defence of Kane. First of all, I think he and the others really weren't expecting to find anything alive on the ship. It looked dead and the only crew member they found was long dead. Kane was expecting to find stuff rather than anything alive. What he did find look as much like plant pods as they did animal. For all he knew, this could be the aliens version of a hydroponics bay. For the egg itself, most creatures new born, hatched or whatever this was are normally helpless and require assistance and feeding from a parent. He wasn't expecting it to go off like a jack-in-a-box. Finally Kane was wearing an environment suit. This was designed for very harsh conditions and LV426 was deep cold with CO2 crystals in the air and high winds with abrading dust fragments. It was a suit designed to take some punishment and still protect its wearer. The face-hugger should have just bounced off, but it was equipped with something that could burn through even his heavily shielded face plate. Kane was taking a risk, but it was a calculated risk that he was fairly confident about. Of course, this is all just stuff that has bounced around in my head for years. Take as nonsense if you like.
I never considered the Big Chap to be "innocent", unless you consider it to be just an animal following it's nature. I always thought the notion of it having a very limited lifespan as something that was completely unexplored in the film. It just didn't comport with the theme of the final cut of the film, and as you said, every other movie in the series kind of blew that idea apart. The creature is CLEARLY hostile from it's very first phase of the ovamorph. Like many predatory species, it capitalizes on it's prey's curiosity. I think the question is interesting in the context of the first film, though. Especially when intelligence is a consideration. I seem to recall a potential ending that nearly had the Big Chap killing Ripley on the life boat, and mimicking her voice for the final log entry. If the creature is intelligent, then the idea of it being an innocent is void. If, however, it is just an animal, then it is only doing as it's natural instinct presupposes... Or there is option "C"; the Big Chap IS the biological weapon it was suggested to be, and is nothing more than a crued, and bloody slow firing bomb blowing up in the faces of it's creators victims.
Also interesting that the shuttle is where Dallas chooses to chill at the end of the day. I remember a meme with that scene of the ALIEN inspecting Jones in the cat box. The ALIEN is asking "Where can I find some peace?" Jones responds "I know a nice spot in the shuttle."
I honestly hadn’t thought about this theory much, but it really does make a lot of sense. Kind of sad he was waiting to die at the end basically and had to deal with Ripley lol. I think there are some parallels to the cat in the film in the aliens nature. It is curious, but can also be deadly if need be. It felt like the film was kind of pointing to that with the way they showed the cat wasn’t too bothered about the alien also that the alien didn’t bother it either.
Agreed, it really felt like they kept showing the cat at crucial moments to emphasise that the alien is like a cat - it's an animal, it has instincts, it gets scared, it lashes out when it feels threatened. Put a cat in a scary place and corner it, it will scratch you. But the humans tolerate it because they know a cat cannot kill them. The alien is viewed differently because even if its behaviour is the same, it CAN kill.
This theory has one huge problem. It's hard to imagine a creature whose life cycle depends on a death of another species, to be peaceful by nature. Parasitoid wasp that lays its eggs in caterpillars won't evolve to ask a caterpillar politely for a favor.
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The situation with Brett is too ambiguous to be considered a point for the xenomorphs "innocence". Brett was simply looking Jones, and the xenomorph took its sweet time pursuing and relishing in Brett's fear before killing him. Animals who act in self-defense mainly stand their ground or only pursue until it scares off the predator. If it perceived Brett was a threat to be dealt with the way it did, then its putting itself on the same level as the Nostromo crew who are trying to get rid of it for the same reason. But what I think throws a wrench into the theory is the aftermath with Lambert and Parker. When the xenomorph appeared, Lambert was fully clothed. But when Ripley returns to find them dead, Lambert's feet and legs are bare, implying the xenomorph stripped her and did a big no-no to her. Given the monster's clearly sexual design and Ridley Scott's commentary of using sex for horror, if this is true then this can't be considered self-defense due to how disproportionate it is, suggesting that there's a more malicious nature to the creature.
Interesting point of view but for sure " It can't be bargained with...it can't be reasoned with. It doesn't feel pity, remorse or fear. And it absolutely WILL NOT STOP...EVER!!! Until you are dead."
Always thought that from its perspective its born into a strange world where every other thing you encounter is either running from you or trying to kill you. Like imagine how a human would be in its situation. Very dangerous and intelligent, resilient, resourceful, scared into a kill or be killed reality.
Before the theory even starts, I'm listening to your opening statements and I'm thinking to myself: "you know, Xenomorphs rarely need to eat, and they usually hunt for the sole purpose of obtaining hosts for the Facehugger eggs. Big Chap is a lone Xenomorph with no queen and no eggs nearby. It has no real reason to go around killing everyone unless it's retaliating in self defense" then I remembered that Xenomorphs are incredibly intelligent, and like with humans, intelligence breeds cruelty. a Xenomorph would 100% go around killing people just for laughs.
@@GDeNofaThat's not being realistic, though. It's a series. Especially if you're speculating on a potential future story, which would, by necessity, have to take other events into account, too.
I read a similar idea put forth from the creature in 'The Thing'. As to the Alien getting sustenance, there was a passage in the novelization when the crew first try and use flamethrowers on it, they almost corner it in a storage room, containing food for the crew. It escapes through an air vent just before Dallas incinerates the room. I laughed at the name 'Big Chap', as I bought a large figure with that same name.
I think it improves the message of corporate abuse. Forcing employees to endanger themselves by fucking around with a critter that just wants to be left alone, having control over society and especially their employee's perception of the world, keeping people cruel and selfish and easy to control. Their job, the ship they're vulnerable to, is the real horror, Big Chap is a convenient scapegoat. Hell, maybe that was all intentional, and later movies retconned that. There's certainly less focus on how fucked up corporations are, so I'd believe it.
Both things have been true for ships here as well. Even today, ships have to answer distress signals, as long as it doesn't put themself in danger. And some ships had the ability to be destroyed or sunk by the crew - mostly military vessels though.
The self-destruct mechanism isn't such a stretch for a space ship. Most sub-orbital and orbital class craft in our history of space flight have self-destruct mechanisms in case they go out of control. It's logical that a craft capable of faster-than-light travel and would possibly have a failure mode leaving it at a significant fraction of the speed of light would need a flight termination system that assures its complete destruction if it's going to run into something critical. A few million tons of mass running into the Earth even at 30% would be an extinction level event.
@CrniWuk Yes but checking something on a completely different planet, or a moon, whatever is a completely different story : ) Different planet = completely different ecosystem, differnt bacterias and viruses, unknown flora and fauna just to name a few. Imagine landing on such a planet having all the bio-atmospheric analysis fine and then being attacked by a 10m tall gorilla out of nowhere. : ) I find "go and check the distress signal" idea a bit ridicilous...to say the least.
I found the self destruct thing kind of silly too. I mean, that thing was huge! how much you think it cost? Especially with a full load, Im guessing many billions of dollars. Im surprised the company would just allow Ripley to blow it up, and only a 10 minute countdown? Im actually surprised she didnt get in more shit in Aliens.
I think the final film does give excellent visual cues as to the alien being near death in the escape pod, not only because of its sluggish movements but in the way its "drool" has changed from running like a faucet when attacking Brett to thick and sticky. I love the idea that it lives days or even hours. Still, its hard to feel sympathy for a parasitic creature whose life cycle relies on the death of another animal, especially in such a horrific way. Whilst I love both films it is sometimes preferable to think of them as entirely separate. Cameron made them less "alien" by turning them into ants with a queen and drones which is simply less interesting.
I think that simply having the parasite aspect makes it threatening at least. You can argue that it’s just an animal doing its thing, but that doesn’t make it any less menacing.
I once tackled this idea by writing a small fan fic from the point of view of the face hugger. That it was scared but ultimately concerned for kane. As it could tell he couldn't breath in the initial atmosphere after it woke up. It then saw how kane had fainted due to lack of oxygen and assumed he had fallen into some kind of coma and didn't want to leave him alone hence why it didn't let them remove it from lanes face. It proceded to try and comfort kane with all these different chemicals to help kane relax and recover. Growing ever closer to this creature it couldn't understand until it eventually wanted to leave a bit of itself with kane to remember it by before it left and finally died itself. Horrifying from our experience. An act of love and compassion from the face hugger.
To me the crux of the film is Ash’s speech. Possibly the best ever speech on any suspense movie: It’s like you know there are bad news coming from the gurgly mouth of the only being that could know anything about the nemesis we are facing and each word it utters feels like a slow death sentence confirming our worst fears to the point even of surpassing them to a degree never heard before or after in cinema: “You can’t….Perfect organism… Its structural perfection is only matched by its hostility”. Mouths agape, from the innards of the screen to the last row of the theater. It feels like someone died. Then comes the “you admire it” line and Ash proceeds to explain in a way that brings us back from reptile mode to reboot our central nervous systems back to a somewhat thinking mind. It isn’t innocent, it isn’t guilty, it is a force of a nature we didn’t dream of but existed in our darkly pulsating fears. Nature isn’t nature anymore. This thing, vaguely and twistedly humanoid has wiped out that concept. What we know is that it’s either it or us. Because it won’t stop killing or worse and we won’t stop running.
I once read an essay entitled "The Xenomorph and The Biological Imperative" which brought up precisely these points. In fact, it expanded on them to include and biologically reconcile the behavior of the xenomorphs throughout the entire franchise. Now, making allowances for narrative needs and the like, through all of its iterations, the xenomorphs and their queen behaved in a manner consistent with the principles of survival, not through malice or evil acts, but survival through sheer hostility, aggression, and even anger. The queen's pursuit of Ripley and Newt (for instance) up through the elevator at Hadley's Hope was not driven by a thirst for vengeance (or at least not entirely) but recognizing that the environment was becoming untenable, she (the queen) needed to try and escape. The essay went point-by-point through all of the movies through "Alien: Prometheus", and I felt definitely made its argument well.
It's an interesting theory but... Somehow it reminds me of the words said by Carter Burke. "It's a new species and we have no rights to wipe them out"... 😅 After these creatures have wiped out an entire colony and a group of Colonial Marines.
Interesting take but ultimately it reduces the creature to mere animal status as some in the comments say, I have to agree I'm afraid. That happened with James Cameron's take on the theme with Aliens but I suppose you could argue that could possibly be a genetic tampering offshoot or similar and that admittedly is certainly compelling. As for Giger's original Beast, I think it should stay in the pages of the transhumanist Necronomicon iconography as the Master himself portrayed it. Massively erotic, sadistic, corrupted human aspects emeshed with industrial design (which H.R.G. excelled in) qualities and adult spiritual angst. Not being snobbish just acknowledging the original thematic values, which imo are much more scary and alluring. I'm hoping Noah Hawley's series will somehow incorporate Giger's imagery and mindscape aspect together with the corporate evil of the acquisition of the Alien. This is a fantastic channel, sincere thanks for all you do for the fans.
I think, the Alien just imprinted itself onto Ripley as its mother. It didn’t try to chase her down through the ship. It picked up on the tension the crew had for Ripley. Didn’t hurt the cat. Tucked itself into the shuttle’s bulkhead and tried to ask for a bed time story. Ripley just a bad mom. Blowing Big Chap out into space. I mean she left Amanda on earth. See Chap just a misunderstood and a neglected child of a space trucker. If Parker tried to head pat the lil fella instead of skewer it with a fork. Things may have turned out better. I mean who really liked Kane anyway? He wanted to press onto the spooky alien space ship and just decided to shove his face into a sleeping egg that was minding its own business. They should have gave Chap a chance.
I'm kind of sick of this trend of seeing the villain as "misunderstood" or somehow in the right. It feels tailor made to literally undermine all values that exist and really seems anti human at its core. You do you though 🙄
“The face hugger only hurts you if you try to hurt it!” Says the guy as a face hugger is implanting an alien to painfully and fatally burst out of someone’s chest. Seriously did a xenomorph write this?
This is up there with the Darth Jar Jar theory. It sounds ridiculous when you first hear it, but when you look at the evidence, it doesn't sound all that far fetched.
I think it's an interesting premise. The problem is that it egg morphs Bret but the egg is useless without a host. So it has to go and find someone to cocoon next to the egg. That is in this case Dallas. You can argue that Dallas went looking for it but It's out looking too. It just ambushed Dallas first as he had gone out alone. I believe it would have hunted and taken anyone who was alone. It is interesting that it didn't take Lambet or Parker to it's hive. Perhaps this does show a limit to it's ability to reproduce solo. Perhaps it sealthly hunts it's first two victims. One to be the egg and the other to be the host, and then stands guard over the nest/hive until it is replaced. This cycle and short life makes a lot of sense if the creature is the biomechanical weapon Giger intended it to be.
Dallas was undergoing the same process. Hence, why he begged Ripley to kill him and why he can't even talk correctly. He is in agony from the facehugger's development. The Alien had no knoweledge of what eggs are or what comes out of them. It just had urges. It knew capturing some alive 'felt good' and had the drive to do whatever it did to them. Once Brett's egg had fully matured, it would probably feel a shift to capture victims alive, but place them in front of the pods, instead. Ripley, being the last alive, would have probably been caught around that time. Alien wouldn't have known what it was doing, just that it felt right to do so. in the sequel, every single colonist was abducted.
@@Xenomorphine I completly disagree. To my eyes Dallas has been cocooned to be the host for the egg. But either way we have to remember, this isn't a real animal, it does whatever the writer wants it to do. What I was talking about here is what was the intended cycle from the creator/writers/director. Given how hectic the production was they may not of ever really worked that out in any detail. As we know when Cameron came in for Aliens he pretty much threw out Giger's work did his own thing, which was going down the Starship Troopers, bug hoard approach, as he stated himself. He didn't think about the aliens in any depth other than what worked for what he wanted them to be, to serve his picture.
@@FalloutPBCEven the concept art were laballed as Dallass transforming and the prop made it clear he was physically mutating into a living egg, not just being cocooned. Plus, as I wrote, if he was merely cocooned, he would have been in normal health and been glad for Ripley to help him get free, just like with Newt. Heck, he probably could have got himself free without her help. As it was, he clearly couldn't even speak normally; even his vocal chords were too far gone. Ripley even asked him what the Alien "did" and it was obviously too traumatic for him to clarify. He was literally sobbing with pained trauma. If he was just cocooned, he wouldn't have begged her, not just to kill him, but to burn him alive, which is an unbelievably painful way to go. She offers to get him looked at by the atuo-doc and he's too pained. He knows it's irreversible, because it's happening inside.
@@Xenomorphine Dude "Normal health" "got himself free" really? Ok whatever. The less said about how stupid it is for Newt to be abducted and cocooned without a scratch on her the better too, but as I said, it is what the writer wants it to be. That's the point, it is what the future writer wants. What I said in my original post was PERHAPS it makes more sense if Dallas is the host for the egg. Perhaps we can explain the short life of the alien and why it just straight-up brutally killed Lambet and Parker. That's the whole point of this video, exploring alternative ideas and playing a fun game of what if.
@@FalloutPBC "Dude "Normal health" "got himself free" really? Ok whatever." No, not "whatever". He was clearly in a lot of pain and sickness from being mutated. If he'd been at normal strength and not getting turned into yolk, do you seriously think he was typically weaker than Ripley? Of course not. Even Newt, a child, was able to tear away some chunked of resin. Ripley tore her free of all of it. If Dallas was jstu held there by the cocoon material, he could have just broken himself out in the same way. "The less said about how stupid it is for Newt to be abducted and cocooned without a scratch on her the better too" Why? That's the same for all abducted characters, including the woman the soldiers find. It's especially plausible, given how she was rushed through water, too, along with being a child, which, for obvious reasons, would make her easier to forcefully render unconscious. "PERHAPS it makes more sense if Dallas is the host for the egg" But my point is that it doesn't. Even the concept art makes it clear what's happening, as well as the actual prop of Dallas, along with him sobbing and being unable to even speak, due to the trauma and being horridly mutated. Brett acted as foreshadowing: It was his fate in a few hours. If he was cocooned, he would have simply agreed with Ripley to help break him out. "Perhaps we can explain the short life of the alien" Thanks to 'Aliens', that ambiguity on screen was rendered null and void. They don't have short life spans. Instead, it has to be interpreted as the creature simply knowing it can take its time and not seeing any point in rushing. It was always just a misunderstanding of how bee stinging functions. As for Lambert, it's deliebrately ambiguous. She could be unconscious, for all we know. Scott, in one commentry, interpreted it that way and even claimed she was impregnated, although he frequently changes his mind about lots of stuff..
Honestly, I've looked at it through this lens before. In the context of the first Alien it's no more evil than "Bruce" in Jaws or, arguably the Grim Reaper in Greek myth. Each only does as it is inclined to do or compelled so by outside influence. It's only when people place themselves directly in harms way that things go sideways. Seek death, you'll find it. Go into the ocean after a Great White Shark, you'll be turned into chum. Chase an unknown organism all around a claustrophobic environment and you'll provoke it into attacking.
Given the sexual undertones of the movie, I have had the thought that the alien had a sexual attraction to the females. It reacted more slowly to the females as opposed to the males. It attacked/killed the males instantly; whereas, it was more intrigued by Ripley and Lambert. I often wondered if it viewed the females as potential mates.
If Lambert and Kane were intimate (I think It's mentioned in a deleted scene or I read it somewhere) you could argue that the Alien 'remembers' Lambert and tries to 'reenact' that intimacy. Makes the scene more dark and disturbing. 👍✌️
There is no such thing as one species. Well. Humans now I guess could make their own oxygen. But before the industrial revolution we required plants to make it for us. And still do need them in the fourth industrial revolution. It is a symbiotic relationship. So funny thing is: No plants means no humans or anything else that needs oxygen. And plants even need our exhaled CO2. Though there may be other CO2 sources. We need them. They do not need us. The Xenomorph using us as an encubation chamber and food source also actually can even adobt non sexually a DNA trait like seen with a Predalian. So any superior genetic trait of any species the Xenomorph can adopt. Funny thing is though that they only morph within the animal kingdom and never into a sapiens. The Goauld of the Stargate universe had genetic memory. I guess humans are just crap then. Because we do not have a genetic memory. Hence Aliens 3 scientists forcing a merger with that human female.
