Aliens - 1986 movie (was Dog Soldiers)
 

Aliens is my favourite film of all time. It was sad that the Colonial Marine squad in that film was led by a green new Lt. He was a total loser and they should have fragged him at the earliest opportunity. If they hadn't lost Sgt Apone so early on they might have done better, he was very crusty. You have to admit, the machine gunner Vasquez and Cpl Hicks were very effective. The other machine gunner, Drake, was also hard as nails but didn't do so well once he was covered in acid then set on fire.

Drake certainly kicked arse up until that point with both machinegun and then flamer.

Speaking of game mechanics, T2K tends to punish those who don't follow common sense. Aliens takes that idea and runs another mile or two with it.

My favorite piece of trivia about Aliens is that the actress who played Vasquez really did show up for the movie audition expecting it to be about illegal aliens. The joke from the film (regarding illegal aliens) was added because of that.

Hah! I didn't know that, thanks. Very funny!

I love this quote from Al Matthews who played Sgt Apone - "I spent six years in the United States Marine Corps; I hold thirteen combat awards and decorations, including two purple hearts. I was the first black Marine in the 1st Marine Division in Viet Nam, to be meritoriously promoted to the rank of sergeant; I served with Kilo Battery, Fourth Battalion, 11th Marines, 1st Marine Division, of that I am very proud."

Yes, IIRC, she's actually a freckle-faced redhead. I remember reading in People that the makeup artists had fits covering up her freckles.

The 1987 film Near Dark has several of the actors from Aliens in it including Jenette Goldstein, Lance Henriksen and Bill Paxton. Not a bad film IMO.

The Wikipedia article on Aliens shows the full names of the Colonial Marines (many of which I didn't know) and its interesting that the writers used the actors' real first names for the characters they played.

Probably made it easier on the actors. If they made a slip and used their real name, there would be no need to edit it out or reshoot the scene.

That's what I thought too. In the original script, before filming started, the characters were probably only referred to by their surnames. There would be no downside to writing in their first names as the actors' first names.

Bishop's full name was Lance Bishop 341-B; sort of makes you think how many androids were based on the original Lance Bishop's template. And it has to be an ego trip -- having a series of Androids, with far better abilities than you, but wearing your face and body.

I also remember the scene where he's about to go down through the tunnels with Bishop and Newt; he's handed a handgun, which he refuses. Makes you wonder after experience with earlier androids, they programmed Asimov's Three Robotic Laws into the androids.

I have thought many times about that scene. I don't think his decision was directly related to Asimov's laws of robotics as Bishop wasn't anticipating combat with humans, but possibly indirectly related in that perhaps androids, even androids assigned to military missions, were deliberately not programmed with any direct combat skills.

Then again perhaps Asimov's laws of robotics were precisely the reason he didn't take the pistol - perhaps he thought that by taking it he would be denying the use of one of the few available weapons to the remaining humans, thereby placing them at greater risk. Through reading Ripley's reports on her original alien encounter, his own research in the colony science lab, his own observations and through processes of logic Bishop may have (probably correctly) come to the conclusion that the aliens would be unlikely to attack a non-living object such as himself if it presented no direct threat to them. The queen alien was much smarter than her drones however and obviously did consider Bishop to be a threat or potential threat when she ripped him in half aboard the Sulaco.

The book actually describes an encounter Bishop has with aliens while crawling through the pipe. A hole had been torn through the bottom and underneath he sees a horde of the beasts, close enough that they could easily reach him. They notice him, but do nothing - he has no signs of life (beyond movement) and therefore is judged not viable as either a host or food source.

An hour or so later and that decision to let him go comes back to bite them...

I attributed that attack to sheer malice more than anything else.

Drake and Vasquez struck me as quite undisciplined. They had no intention of obeying the order to not have gunfire under the reactor and Drake opened fire on Newt when she first appeared.

On the other hand, they did have a complete novice for an officer and they themselves had probably been involved in dozens of combat missions. Trust, or more accurately lack of, was definately an issue. Ensuring the machineguns were operable when going under the reactor was obviously a good thing in the short term (it allowed at least a few to escape), but long term was another matter.

Gorman should have explained WHY firing was not allowed and immediately withdrew the marines, re-equipped them with shotguns, flamers and whatever else non-penetrating they had. Sending them onwards with little more than four flamers was just plain criminal.

Can any of us say they wouldn't have done the same as Vasquez and Drake if in a similar situation?

I agree. As it turned out though it was the drop ship crashing into the side of the atmosphere processor that caused it to go critical, not the firing of weapons inside.

Agreed. Gorman should have thought about the location before sending in the section though. Once they were inside the structure their comms were very patchy. A detailed explanation of why weapons should not be fired inside probably would have been half buried in static once they were in.

No. I think Drake and Vasquez did exactly the right thing. Even if they had disrupted the cooling system the facility wouldn't have gone up right away. They all would have had time to get back to the Sulaco and watch the whole facility turn into a glowing glass bowl. Problem solved. Carter Burke was the only one who was insisting that the facility be saved because of the "significant dollar value attached to it". They should have strung him up by the balls at the earliest opportunity.

Hmm, must be a different movie you're been watching...
The APC was moving away from the processor and from what I can remember the dropship crashed from the rear of the APC (taking it out in the process) and ended up spread across a very wide area of broken, but open ground.

Yes the dropship hit the APC, then the bulk of it tumbled into the processing plant. I have the extended edition on my hard drive, you can see it quite clearly. Also the write up of the film in Wikipedia suggests that it was the dropship crash rather than firing inside the facility that caused it to go critical. That makes sense when you consider the difference between the energy released by the relatively small amount of firing inside compared to many tonnes of dropship travelling at high speed, plus ordnance, hitting the side of the facility.

Of course a ten millimetre minigrenade (which is effectively what the guns were firing) at a rate of say ten per second is likely to chew through cooling systems and control circuits pretty damn fast....

The Colonial Marines Technical Manual lists the pulse rifle as firing 900 10x24mm rpm and the smart gun as firing 1,200 10x28mm rpm.

So roughly twice as fast as an M60 (650 rpm) and equivilant to the MG-42 the movie weapon used as a base.

I'm rather inpressed Jenette Goldstein was able to throw what must have been a rather heavy rig about so effortlessly. The steadicam mount probably helped, but the total weight must have played hell on her knees.

That's part of why they they chose her over the Latina actresses available -- she had the muscle, but didn't look like a steroid monster.

That's pretty good for a small projectile! In the book they say part of why it's called a Smart Gun is that the rounds are IR-guided, and could be programmed to ignore specific heat signatures (in the book, they were programmed to avoid humans). That projectile has to have a guidance package, small thrust squibs, and still have enough energy to kill its target!

...and I just thought, that might explain the different sound the Smart Gun makes -- it's the guidance thrusters firing. They'd just be tiny little shots of gas.

I'd always thought the guidance was contained within the weapon itself. If there's a risk of hitting an invalid target, the weapon simply doesn't fire until the barrel is pointing elsewhere. Likewise, the weapon doesn't fire until the targeting software believes there's a good chance of hitting a valid target. The device Hicks gave Ripley (and subsequently handed to Newt) as well as the implanted transmitters the colonists had could act as IFF transmitters and the weapon programed not to fire at them.
Would save a LOT of ammo!

The system could be overridden by the operator though and manually fired even at the risk of hitting unintended targets - this allows for covering fire over areas or at concealed targets.

The CMTM lists the complete weight of the M56 Smart Gun (including harness and ammo) as just under 18kg.

(perhaps we should split this into an Aliens tread now ;)

The movie prop may have weighed even more which makes her feat even more impressive.

I'd always assumed that too. I don't own a copy of the Colonial Marines Technical Manual but I do have a copy of the Aliens RPG packed away somewhere.

I have a PDF version somewhere, but I've never read it. Maybe I should take it with me when I take my mom to her doctor's appointment tomorrow (it'll be a long one; she's getting some sort of special EEG done), but I have to find it first...

Wow. Nice.

I'm reminded of a line from The Golden Child, "Ahh, those wonderful Americans. So much power, and so little idea of what to do with it."

another great quote
 

"He is like Germany ,ambitious but misunderstood"

Maybe I should have used the sarcmark to convey my meaning.

Wow. And I thought I liked the movie. My uncle gave be a bootlegged VHS copy when I was like 13 and I must have watched it 50 times before going off to college. I've seen it a couple times since. I don't know why, but it just doesn't get old.

Anyone notice the similarities between the Colonial Marines in Aliens and the PMCs in Avatar?

They share attitude/cockiness, powered exoskeleton things, dropships- even the spunky Latina character. There's also the heartless corporation angle. Burke and the Giovanni Ribisi character could be working for the same company (or taken the same business ethics class).

Heh, sarcasm. :D

ARGH! Spoilers!!!!

:eek:

If you watch the official trailer, I don't think any of that is really a spoiler.

I always liked to think of 'Mad About You' as the home life of Carter Burke. I know the dating of the series obviously wouldn't match up but the back story it adds gives a certain poignancy to his role

"Aliens" remains my favorite movie of all time because there is just so much going on in it told in a quality way. I've seen the extended versions, and I have to say I'm glad the theatrical release was released as it was.

Gorman couldn't have done any better than he did because he is a statement about butterbars in Vietnam specifically and the commissioning process of the United States military (the Army in particular) as a whole. He received plenty of training, what with several dozen simulated drops. Training only goes so far, though. Gorman is a classic "gentlemen officer" of the sort epitomized by West Point: a great attitude about getting in there and fighting the good fight but too little experience to make good decisions under pressure. His personal gear, his weapon, and his role as observer and coordinator make plain the idea that he is not one of the Marines. (Also, his little work station in the APC makes a nice reference to the hive command structure of the enemy.) Had Gorman done things the right way, he could not have served as such a powerful indictment fo the commissioning system we "enjoy" in the US.

The indiscipline of Drake and Vasquez serves to illustrate the effects of a breakdown in trust and effective command resulting from having a buttterbar in charge of a mission that clearly requires field experience. Also, while I appreciate that there might be some extended footage showing the drop ship causing the problem with the reactor, without that footage we are forced to conclude that Drake and Vasquez cause the problem. Again, the problem goes back to the mission leadership. Gorman failed to make good decisions, thereby creating the window of opportunity for the catamity that befalls his command and the mission.

Note that as a private, Gorman's not so bad. He plays well with the team when he's no longer in charge. He fights bravely. Had he been obliged to enlist and go on a few missions first, he might have made an effective lieutenant.

No officer should ever be commissioned without being a private first! Neither West Point nor ROTC nor OCS should take anyone with less than two years of enlisted time--preferably as a rifleman with one combat tour under his belt. Anyone who makes it through that and still wants to lead has a much better chance of being effective than a ring-bearer or a 90-day wonder.

Have I beaten this horse into hamburger?

There are other very powerful Vietnam-esque images woven througout "Aliens". The enemy is an archetype of the NLF/NVA. He has inferior technology but superior morale. He uses the terrain to his advantage, striking when the conditions are right for him. He prefers close combat that reduces the effectiveness of American firepower. His internal cohesion is superb. His commitment is superb. His willingness to absorb casualties for the sake of the mission is superb. The attack in which the enemy is crawling through the ceiling is a very nice turnabout of the underground infiltration techniques employed by the NLF/NVA.

Not surpirsingly, some of the same Vietnam-esque imagery appears in "Avatar". I'm sick of Cameron's Vietnam references at this point, so I'm probably not as appreciative of all that in "Avatar" as I might otherwise be.

Gorman, ah Gorman! He serves his literary purpose, as does poor Apone. All prospective West Pointers should be obliged to watch "Aliens" to see if they get the message.

Webstral

P.S. Of course, there is far more going on in "Aliens" than the military commentary. I find the nuclear family and competing reproductive themes even more fascinating.

If the alien drone hadn't wiped out the dropship crew in-flight the damage the smart gunners' fire may or may not have done to the reactor's cooling systems would have been irrelevent anyway because immediately after most of the Colonial Marines are wiped out in the fight in the nest, Cpl Hicks (the ranking Marine still conscious) agreed with Ripley to head back to the Sulaco and nuke the site from orbit. So the same end result would have occurred anyway. Its like Schrodinger's cat. If the dropship hadn't crashed there would have been a nuclear explosion either from the cooling system damage (if indeed the cooling system had been damaged by the Marines' fire) or from a nuclear warhead.

The dropship crashing meant that the mission suddenly became sharply time-critical, also for a variety of reasons. The survivors were almost certain to have been overrun some time that night even if the reactor didn't go critical.

Don't insult Helen Hunt like that! I wouldn't kick her out of my bed -- I'd tie her to it!

Did Camerone serve or some such ? Or was he just another protester ?
 

Aliens as curriculum at military academies..hehe..why not ?

Our system here in Norway ( not that it is anything to break out the champagne for all in all ) revolves around our institutions of military advancement ,and two types of ranks .

1 Commissions : you can get one after schooling .You start out as what we call a cadet or "aspirant" at the NCO school with the typical selection process hardships .
After that is completed -usually 2 months - there is an additional 6 -12 month schooling process.

You are then an NCO of corporal or sgt rank and a mandatory 6-12 month practition /"experience " period ensues at your unit based in country/domestic.

After that ( 12 months -2 years as an NCO) you are given a commission as either a sgt or a 2nd lt.

You can then serve in that capacity formally -but to get platoon command or company command , a furter 2 years of schooling at the national military academy for your branch is needed .You will then end up with a commission as a LT.You are then set for a career at low to mid level -but additional schooling is required to get ranks above captain.

Field commissions : meritious advancement as some call it - able minded and bodied personell might be promoted temporarily to ranks that come with the job that the unit needs filled. Example : a platoon leader might be down , and if the situation dictates ,a replacement is made form say the 2nd LT nr 2 in the platoon -even though he has not gone through military academy until a formal replacement can be deployed .
Or say a private makes squad leader the same way .

As a rule no officer or NCO without "operational experience" ( tours abroad or the whole military academy thing ) are allowed command in combat operations .

Exceptions happen all the time though - including one of my PLT leaders back in 97-98 in my second tour .

He was a cronie of the COY cmdr -and landed his job that way .I would have had no problem with that if he hadnt been a ..well incompetent .

( After all - he was a welcome change from the previous LT who had to be removed from his position -highly competent but just crazy / no judgement).

Personally I agree with you, I'm a little tired of Cameron wishing he could relive Vietnam. He wasn't there so he should just get over it. I will likely wait until Avatar is in the weekly rental bin at my local video store.

Apparently, Australian Army officers from both the Royal Military College and the Officer Cadet School were obliged to watch the 1960s movie 'Zulu' for the same type of reason. I don't know when the practice stopped but since the advent of the Australian Defence Force Academy, it's likely the movie is no longer used to illustrate officers in command.