Here's the blurp that Ellen Ripley might return to her favourite franchise.
https://www.giantfreakinrobot.com/ent/exclusive-sigourney-weaver.html?fbclid=IwAR0xlVNPYSz2DQLz4OVPMnRtW-efbDl5smlBOVNsC7OVKiT2ru4xjvpWWKw
Well, I'm just throwing this concept into the ether to see who bites: An alien spaceship crash-lands in a Disney theme park. Cue absolute mayhem, with chest-bursting dwarves etc. Ripley - currently employed as a tour guide in the park - has to save the day.
(I shall now sit back and relax, as I wait for the inevitable multi-million dollar option rights to come my way.) :D
"Sigourney Weaver is currently 72 years old, which is definitely older than she was when she first starred in Alien."
That's some quality insight right there! :)
Alien: Geriatrica.
At least she is not older than Harrison Ford. Will Hollywood move for once onto a new franchise instead of milking older and juiceless ones?
They need to stop making Alien, Predator and Terminator films. It's done.
I can't quite put a finger on why this is but it is impossible to make a good film in any of those franchises now.
For me, it's because they remain slavishly tied to the original continuity, in a manner that too often erodes the mystery in the original films, overcomplicates matters, and also stops new writers from doing anything interesting.
Quote from: repoman on 08 November, 2021, 12:47:03 PM
They need to stop making Alien, Predator and Terminator films. It's done.
I can't quite put a finger on why this is but it is impossible to make a good film in any of those franchises now.
Dark Fate worked for me. As far as I'm concerned it's the third film in the Terminator trilogy. But still, I agree, no more.
Quote from: IndigoPrime on 08 November, 2021, 01:00:59 PM
For me, it's because they remain slavishly tied to the original continuity, in a manner that too often erodes the mystery in the original films, overcomplicates matters, and also stops new writers from doing anything interesting.
I used to quite enjoy the Dark Horse Aliens comics, they often did interesting things with the material. Maybe its the format?
The Marvel Aliens comics I've read have been very poor.
Perhaps it's a combination of format, flexibility and creative teams. Certainly, movies lack the space to do a great deal with a concept. TV shows provide more breathing room and comics even more so, given that your 'budget' is effectively unlimited. That said, comics are no guarantee either. Firefly should have been an obvious comics hit: fill in the gaps from the end of S01 to Serenity and then forge ahead. But almost every comic I've read in that universe has been utter shit.
Budget is a good point. There's more willingness to take a creative risk on a comic when, at most, you'll lose thousands of dollars, not tens or hundreds of millions if you fail. The dead hand of committees and executives will stifle creativity.
Quote from: CalHab on 16 November, 2021, 03:08:43 PM
Budget is a good point. There's more willingness to take a creative risk on a comic when, at most, you'll lose thousands of dollars, not tens or hundreds of millions if you fail. The dead hand of committees and executives will stifle creativity.
This probably hits closer to the truth. They are viewed as Intellectual Property... emphasis on Property. It's an asset to make money from. It's viewed in terms of risk and reward. Creativity is hardly a consideration or a necessity because a name can get bums on seats. Let's face it, plenty of cinematic masterpieces have been flops and plenty of creatively-devoid piles of garbage have been blockbuster hits. So why would it matter if they keep pumping out piles of garbage if it's still making them money?
Quote from: CalHab on 16 November, 2021, 03:08:43 PM
Budget is a good point. There's more willingness to take a creative risk on a comic when, at most, you'll lose thousands of dollars, not tens or hundreds of millions if you fail. The dead hand of committees and executives will stifle creativity.
Some of the great comics runs have been from comic being on its knees, about to fold and a creator - often young - being pulled in and told to do what they want as no one is particularly paying attention to that dead horse. Claremont (joined by Byrne) on X-Men, Frank Miller on Daredevil; Walt Simonson on Thor (I think) all fall in as classic examples of that.
The same just can't happen with movies as the cost of a pitch hit is too much these days.
Quote from: pictsy on 16 November, 2021, 03:24:26 PM
Quote from: CalHab on 16 November, 2021, 03:08:43 PM
Budget is a good point. There's more willingness to take a creative risk on a comic when, at most, you'll lose thousands of dollars, not tens or hundreds of millions if you fail. The dead hand of committees and executives will stifle creativity.
This probably hits closer to the truth. They are viewed as Intellectual Property... emphasis on Property. It's an asset to make money from. It's viewed in terms of risk and reward. Creativity is hardly a consideration or a necessity because a name can get bums on seats. Let's face it, plenty of cinematic masterpieces have been flops and plenty of creatively-devoid piles of garbage have been blockbuster hits. So why would it matter if they keep pumping out piles of garbage if it's still making them money?
Definitely this. There's more bad than good films in all three francises nowdays, but with such marketable IPs they'll keep churning out the cinematic equivalent of McDonalds burgers.
Agree re. the old Dark Horse comics, I've still got a bunch of these somewhere plus a reprint where all the film characters names have been changed because at that time these weren't huge franchises.
Quote from: IndigoPrime on 16 November, 2021, 03:00:41 PM
Firefly should have been an obvious comics hit: fill in the gaps from the end of S01 to Serenity and then forge ahead. But almost every comic I've read in that universe has been utter shit.
Agreed. They're too reverent, and end up being terribly bland. The show's dated quite a bit, as well - having Reynolds call Inara out for her profession every two minutes because he "loves her" is icky poo nasty.
Quote from: IndigoPrime on 16 November, 2021, 03:00:41 PM
Firefly should have been an obvious comics hit: fill in the gaps from the end of S01 to Serenity and then forge ahead. But almost every comic I've read in that universe has been utter shit.
The BOOM ones? They do exactly that. I know I'm biased, but as a Firefly
fan I've really been enjoying what Greg Pak has done with the property.
Sorry, Jim, but I couldn't stand the Boom stuff. It didn't feel like Firefly at all to me. After reading a load of it, I later read that Pak wasn't familiar with the show prior to starting.
Funt: I've not watched the show in a while. I'm a bit scared to revisit any Whedon stuff, TBH. I suspect I won't like it as much as I did at the time. (It's not like some of the dodgier elements weren't evident at the time, but I'm not sure I could stomach them today. Although I do wonder whether Firefly would hold its own better than, say, Buffy.)
Of the Whedon projects I've seen I'd say Buffy holds up best. But I am going to say that's despite his involvement and because of other peoples contributions. I should probably contextualise my opinion by also stating I don't get the high praise of Firefly. That show really failed to leave a lasting impression on me.
Quote from: pictsy on 16 November, 2021, 02:14:01 PM
Dark Fate worked for me. As far as I'm concerned it's the third film in the Terminator trilogy. But still, I agree, no more.
I hated it quite a lot. Apart from Grace. She was good. Everything else though was either rubbish or boring.
T3 was a perfectly good Terminator movie. Although none of them come close to the greatness of the first one.
Quote from: repoman on 16 November, 2021, 05:13:47 PM
I hated it quite a lot. Apart from Grace. She was good. Everything else though was either rubbish or boring.
T3 was a perfectly good Terminator movie. Although none of them come close to the greatness of the first one.
I hated it too. T3 wasn't good as T2 but I liked how well it round up the whole arc. Before they killed off John Connor. I hated Genesys as well.
Firefly still holds up amazingly well, even in this age of budget-smashing TV mega-sci-fi. It's wonderfully written and performed.
Quote from: wedgeski on 16 November, 2021, 06:10:12 PM
Firefly still holds up amazingly well, even in this age of budget-smashing TV mega-sci-fi. It's wonderfully written and performed.
It is. It's a testament to how quickly and how well the characters 'take' that after only six episodes they can do a story like Jaynestown, which is hilarious for much of the episode but almost
entirely because of Jayne's utter embarrassment, and then execute a precision turn for a surprisingly affecting finale.
(And I'm a sucker for a western. As my clothing choices might suggest...)
I do wonder what Whedon had planned for some of the characters, if anything. I'd hope something more interesting than the dreadful reveals in the Dark Horse comics. If not, perhaps it's best we only got that half season and the movie—which was, what, the two-part finale to season 2?
Quote from: IndigoPrime on 16 November, 2021, 07:30:37 PM
If not, perhaps it's best we only got that half season and the movie—which was, what, the two-part finale to season 2?
Yeah. I've come to the conclusion that I'm (sort of) happier to have had the brief but wonderful stuff we got, rather than have ended up sitting around bitching about the lacklustre fourth season.
QuoteFunt: I've not watched the show in a while. I'm a bit scared to revisit any Whedon stuff, TBH. I suspect I won't like it as much as I did at the time. (It's not like some of the dodgier elements weren't evident at the time, but I'm not sure I could stomach them today. Although I do wonder whether Firefly would hold its own better than, say, Buffy.)
I'm approaching the end of an Angel rewatch. Hadn't seen it since it was first broadcast, and I don't think I even watched the final season at the time. Now, maybe it's just with hindsight goggles and the knowledge of what a real shit Whedon really was, but some of the sexual politics are questionable. Pretty much every female character is ditzy, needing saved or just plain stupid. And the way Cordelia was effectively [spoiler]fridged [/spoiler]is nothing short of disgraceful.
Yeah. In hindsight, a lot of what happens in Angel is nasty—and I mean that from a production standpoint. And we now know the Cordelia arc was in part 'punishment' because of the wrecked relationship between Charisma Carpenter and Joss Whedon, seemingly entirely due to Whedon being an arsehole.
You can see this threading through Buffy as well. For all its attempts to be progressive and promote feminism, in the cold light of day too much of it is very 'white bloke feminism', with female characters being treated in a manner that feels skeevy. It's not at the level of a Skyfall, where the entire production itself had to have been blind/misogynist to end up where it did; but Whedon clearly had a lot of issues with women that ended up coming out on the screen.
I never liked what happens with Cordelia in Angel. I've watched the series twice and that's the total amount of times I probably will ever watch it and it's largely due to that particular season. It always felt icky to me.
I think Buffy did benefit from having a number of women involved in production and writing, but it still manages to fall into the misogyny tropes a number of times. Thankfully, Whedon's involvement did diminish as he went off to focus on Angel.
Whedon also killed off Tara because he had a thing for having an actor get an opening credit just to kill off the character in the same episode. Also a friding, also a bury your gays.
I don't play computer games so can't comment, but I feel like I've heard there's a very good and scary Alien-based game out there from recent years, written by one Daniel Abnett.
Also I don't hate Prometheus or Covenant (and have a big soft spot for Predators).
(runs for cover)
Which is all to say that I don't care if the big studios haven't the wit to try anything but franchise extensions, as long as they occasionally forget what they're doing and accidentially let someone try something weird with it.
Quote from: AlexF on 26 November, 2021, 02:14:46 PM
I don't play computer games so can't comment, but I feel like I've heard there's a very good and scary Alien-based game out there from recent years, written by one Daniel Abnett.
Also I don't hate Prometheus or Covenant
Despite their obvious flaws, I love both those films. There's definitely an element of, having wished for thirty years for Ridley Scott to make another Alien film, he then goes and makes two, and they're so close to being amazing, that in my mind, they're amazing.
Quote from: AlexF on 26 November, 2021, 02:14:46 PM
I don't play computer games so can't comment, but I feel like I've heard there's a very good and scary Alien-based game out there from recent years, written by one Daniel Abnett.
I don't have any particular insight, but I believe a British software company released an Aliens Vs Predator game in 1994 which really helped them make their mark. Whatever happened to that company? ;)
Quote from: sheridan on 26 November, 2021, 05:58:12 PM
Quote from: AlexF on 26 November, 2021, 02:14:46 PM
I don't play computer games so can't comment, but I feel like I've heard there's a very good and scary Alien-based game out there from recent years, written by one Daniel Abnett.
I don't have any particular insight, but I believe a British software company released an Aliens Vs Predator game in 1994 which really helped them make their mark. Whatever happened to that company? ;)
(which is to say I think the entire reason we're here on this forum dedicated to one of the longest-running British comics is because that game made enough money to make that company).
Quote from: AlexF on 26 November, 2021, 02:14:46 PM
I don't play computer games so can't comment, but I feel like I've heard there's a very good and scary Alien-based game out there from recent years, written by one Daniel Abnett.
Alien: Isolation. Very atmospheric.
I am not keen on continuing Alien lore, after dreadful Prometheus and even more dreadful Covenant. The former film explained nothing succintly about Alien origins and i didn't buy the idea it being a wmd.
I also tried to get in a few AvP comics, but quickly lost interest when they gave name to the Predator species, among other things.
Quote from: sheridan on 26 November, 2021, 05:58:12 PM
I don't have any particular insight, but I believe a British software company released an Aliens Vs Predator game in 1994 which really helped them make their mark. Whatever happened to that company? ;)
They made disappointing 2010 reboot.
Quote from: CalHab on 30 November, 2021, 09:03:28 AM
Quote from: AlexF on 26 November, 2021, 02:14:46 PM
I don't play computer games so can't comment, but I feel like I've heard there's a very good and scary Alien-based game out there from recent years, written by one Daniel Abnett.
Alien: Isolation. Very atmospheric.
Best game I've played in the last ten years. An absolute corker.