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I often consider myself a geek.  I have a bustling 2000AD collection and the first three volumes of the Megazine (minus 10 issues).  I like to play video games. I love reading Terry Pratchett and Isaac Asimov.  I watch countless sci-fi/fantasy films and tv programmes.  I have been a fan of anime since the days when Manga Entertainment were pretty much the only distributor and we all went around calling it Manga because of that.

Nevertheless, there is so much of geekdom that really doesn't interest me.  Looking at some discussions on the boards here that becomes even more apparent to me.  I could consider myself a connoisseur of geekyness (if I'm being especially egotistical) or I could be more of a casual geek.  It might be because I've never had much in the way of finances to fund and fully explore my inner geek.

What makes a geek, then?  Do you consider yourself a geek?  Do you think being a geek has been ruined by geek chic?   

£100?!? 

I find it hard justifying £20 for an art book.

I got my trade copy way back when I was 18 and it was an instafave.  Best female comic book character ever and a contender for best comic book character full stop.  Love the story, love the artwork and love all the ideas.

The biggest heartbreak is we never got to see more of her adventures.

Alan Moore could easily be my favourite comic book writer and some of his best work was with 2000AD.

Sorry Eric, I think we are of two completely different minds on this.

On a different note somewhat unrelated to my above statements I am truly surprised that the choice to kill off Hicks and Newt is so despised.

I'm pretty sure it wasn't much of a choice — I think Biehn was unavailable and Carrie Hen was too old by the time Alien3 was green-lit.

Cheers

Jim

Well, no, I suppose not.  Being the broken record that I am, though, they had the option to recast. 

Yet the facehugger came from an (shown) egg that, somehow, found its way aboard the Sulaco.

It makes my head hurt trying to make sense of the opening sequence to Alien3...

Did it?  OK, my bad, forget what I said

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YcFnvULy8zA

I think both Newt and Hicks should have survived and all three should have made it back to where they started. The plot could start with them being held accountable for the destruction of LV-426.
While this is going on an egg could be found somewhere in the rescued ship, thereby kicking things off again.

Cheers

Not a bad idea.  One problem is the Queen ditched her egg laying butt at the end of Aliens.  This is easily resolved by doing what they did in Alien3 and have a facehugger stowaway.

Thing is, would you have been happy to see Newt recast?  Carrie Henn was 16 when Alien3 was released.  Judging by her imdb page I don't think she would have done another Alien film anyway.

I don't agree with this.  I found that Alien 3 was all about Ripley and she was more essential to the story than the previous films.  It became a film about Ripley and her relationship with the Aliens.  So much of the film is dedicated to exploring the character that I can't see her as being anything but the core of the film.  Alien 3, for me, does need Ripley because it is about Ripley.

That relationship, while interesting, is only there to justify Ripley's inclusion. A bit of gloss to help seal the deal for Weaver. The set-up's too contrived for me to care, however. Yes, it fits in perfectly with film's overall tone (one of the things about ALIEN 3 I do actually like) but, in doing so, it negates my investment in ALIENS.

Well I found it to be the heart of the film and a good theme and never really found it took anything away from Aliens.  We may differ in the personal investment we individually have for Aliens, which is fair enough.

I don't really see how having a new prisoner arrival carrying an Alien with them would work.  How did they get impregnated?  What happened to the Alien planet?  Would that just be ignored or would the film have to contrive exposition to explain it?  I think they went in the right direction.

Yet, that's exactly what ALIEN 3 did. Badly. Exactly how was Ripley impregnated? And why should LV-426 need even be mentioned?

I found it more feasible that two face huggers stowed away and one impregnated Ripley than I might if it had been a random prisoner.  LV-426 becomes a point of interest because it was the only known location of the aliens and after it's destruction there are only three people left alive who have come in contact with them. 

I think for the random prisoner scenario far more exposition would be required to explain these points and it could easily run the risk of being more contrived.  You could leave out the exposition.

In fact, thinking on it - it would be better to have another relic found on Fury 161 with another batch of alien eggs.  Unfortunately I think would end up just retelling the story in Alien.

Whatever change you make to exclude Ripley and get the alien on the planet I still think will an irrevocably change to the story that it would not resemble Alien3 beyond the setting and the basic premise that an alien kills a lot of people.  With that in mind I just can't agree with the initial statement that Alien3 doesn't need Ripley at all, whatsoever.  Alien3 relies heavily on Ripley.  Nevertheless I can concede that an Alien sequel to Aliens did not necessarily have to include Ripley, Hicks, Newt or Bishop.  There are many conceivable alternatives, but these alternatives are not Alien3 - the one we have.

On a different note somewhat unrelated to my above statements I am truly surprised that the choice to kill off Hicks and Newt is so despised.  So perhaps we can open the discussion out a bit more.  Who is your favourite character from the Alien film franchise?

For me, it's Ripley.  Ripley from Alien to be specific.  Obviously she is the heroin of the piece and clearly she is a strong female character.  Nevertheless, she is strong not through being a hard-arse gung-ho battle-babe, but for being sensible, strong willed and level headed under pressure.

ALIEN 3 doesn't need Ripley. At all. A new prisoner recently arrived could have acted as a surrogate and without pissing over the previous film.

I don't agree with this.  I found that Alien 3 was all about Ripley and she was more essential to the story than the previous films.  It became a film about Ripley and her relationship with the Aliens.  So much of the film is dedicated to exploring the character that I can't see her as being anything but the core of the film.  Alien 3, for me, does need Ripley because it is about Ripley.  I don't really see how having a new prisoner arrival carrying an Alien with them would work.  How did they get impregnated?  What happened to the Alien planet?  Would that just be ignored or would the film have to contrive exposition to explain it?  I think they went in the right direction. 

Referring back to my previous post and the topic title, there are few strips there that I do lament the loss of.  Finn, Witchworld and the Friday version of Rogue Trooper.  From what I understand, Finn was dropped because it was too similar to Slaine.  The other two I reckon were dropped because of unpopularity.

In regards to the other discussion that appeared, I do think there are instances when having different writers on the same strip can be ok.  There have been good non-Wagner Dredd strips.  I liked Peter Hogan's stint on Durham Red.  I'm not a big fan of Dan Abnett's Durham Red for many reasons but it wasn't awful.  John Smith wrote what I think is the best Rogue Trooper story, Cinnabar.

Sometimes having varied writers works, sometimes it doesn't.

[ABC Warriors]

I started collecting 2000AD in July '94.  Here is a list of some of the stories from that point to the end of '99 that I find to be good:

ABC Warriors - Hellbringer

Button Man II

Time House

Finn

Strontium Dog

Rogue Trooper - Ascent to Rogue Alone

The Journal of Luke Kirby

Judge Dredd - Bad Frendz - The Cal Files - The Pit - Beyond the Call of Duty - The Scorpion Dance - Banzai Battalion - Return of the Assassin

Durham Red - Deals to Night of the Hunters

Canon Fodder II

Sinister Dexter (not so much a fan these days, but I still think it started off well)

Venus Blue Genes - Stealth

Slaine - The Treasures of Britain (Dermot Power's artwork on this is my favourite of all Slaine artwork) - The Swan Children

Mazeworld

Mercy Heights

Nikolai Dante

Witch World

Sancho Panza

Devlin Waugh - Red Tide saga

Nemesis - Book 10

Glimmer Rats (ok, the prologue only made publication in the 90's, but still...)

...that dared to go against the grain, be genuinely dark, violent, weird and relentlessly grim and downbeat from the first frame to the last - and I remember it definitely was a big, expensive, heavily-marketed film when it came out. I also love the ending - which is incredibly bleak but somehow fitting as an ending. Blew my mind when I saw it as a kid. Weaver with the skinhead is such an iconic image, and the design of the elegant, quadruped alien creature is excellent, even if as mentioned above some of the effects haven't aged well. And Brian Glover, of course. There's a lot to like in the film.

I agree. 

The killing off of wossisface and the child from the second instalment didn't really bother me a great deal.  I just figured they couldn't get the actors back.  They would have had to recast Newt anyway.  Ripley is all alone in a hostile environment, grieving and terrified.  Her character shines for me in this movie.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iEpjgFZpAt0

Eeessh.

I've seen both AvP films and neither are particularly good.  The second one is definitely the better of the two, however.  I just never really liked how they tried to gel the two franchises together.  I always felt it should be more in keeping with the Alien universes rather than the Predator universe.

Speaking of Predator, I didn't mind the Predators film.  Was a different angle to the previous two, refreshing in its own way.

I always really liked Alien 3.  The look and scenario were fresh and the threat was more present (not necessarily just from the Alien either).  It also has an excellent cast list.  It does have a couple of shaky special effects.

Terminator over Terminator 2.  I'd vote Terminator.  Am I alone in finding Edward Furlong's breaking voice highly irritating throughout?  Also the dialogue is even more cheesy than the first.  I prefer Sarah Connor in T2 though - possibly because she was far less damsel in distress and ended up being one of those strong female role model things for me.  I'm probably going to commit heresy now and exclaim my preference for Salvation over T2.  For all it's faults I found Salvation a thoroughly entertaining film the hit the action visuals perfectly on the nose.

Mad Max 2 is definitely the best Mad Max film.  I really loved Thunderdome as a kid as well, but I haven't seen it in a very long time.

I liked Robocop 2 as much as I liked Robocop, but the original is probably better.

Of the Hellraiser series I'd have to say that 5 is the best of the bunch.  I loved the first one (again, as a kid) but watched it a few years ago and found it didn't live up to my memories.  I did watch quite a few of the others out of curiosity but it just gets worse and worse... with the exception of 5 which is a good horror flick by itself.  I tend to prefer the subtle shock, messing with what's real and what's not and interesting visuals.  That's probably why I'm a fan of David Cronenberg.

I have often heard it said that Aliens is one of the rare cases that a sequel is better than the original.  I have thought about it for years as to which was my favourite Alien flick (Alien 3 held the post the longest time).  These days I feel more inclined to say the original is the best and that Aliens is way down the list now.  This has probably been done to death already but I'll throw it back out there.

Which is your favourite, Alien or Aliens?

I was more angry about the new Star Trek than the new Star Wars.  I think that was mostly because I thought it was such a stupid film, but when I talk to others about it becomes clear I'm in a minority.

The original Star Wars films are as good as they've ever been.  Anything else made after that isn't going to change that.