Alien Resurrection has received mixed reviews, but it’s much better than Alien 3. In fact, I’d say the box office numbers tell the whole story. Alien 3 had a strong opening weekend, making $23,141,188 at the box office, but the revenue plateaued shortly afterward, whereas Alien Resurrection had a much weaker opening than the previous film, bringing in $16,474,092 but as time went on, it continued to pull people in, and while it was unable to beat Alien 3 domestically, it surpassed the third movie internationally. I suspect there was a lot of hype for Alien 3, but it disappointed movie goers, and the revenue slowed. However, Alien Resurrection had to deal with a jaded audience, but it won some of the fans back with time. See the box office numbers here.

I won’t say Alien Resurrection is a good movie, but the reason for its limited success has more to do with the damage done by Alien 3 rather than the quality of the writing. Structurally speaking, the story isn’t perfect; it’s barely coherent, but it’s fast-paced and kind of enjoyable if the viewer is into lame slasher films. The trouble is that it suffers from one major flaw, which comes as the result of the previous writers’ poor decision to kill off the protagonist of the franchise.

Nobody Cares About the Clone

Cloning Ripley was never going to work. Nobody was ever going to care about a clone, not to mention bringing her back in such a way creates a variety of plot holes, which I’ll get to, but before I do, I want to stress that the writers of Alien Resurrection were backed into a corner by the previous film. With both Ripley and the Alien Queen dead, there was no place for the story to go. They had to come up with something, and Alien 3 didn’t just kill Ripley and the Alien Queen; it incinerated them. They couldn’t revive Ripley through some magic sci-fi tech, and if they tried to bring back the aliens somehow, Ripley’s final sacrifice would’ve been for nothing. That would’ve infuriated an already angry fanbase. Their options were either time travel, a multiverse, or cloning. Honestly, as much as I hate time travel, it would’ve been better to bring her back by going into the past because, at least then the audience would have had the original Ripley to root for. Nonetheless, the movie was bound to have problems no matter what.

Some Other Problems

So, I’m a little sympathetic to the writers of this film. Cloning Ripley was the best they could come up with. But the movie has other problems, and those are completely the writers’ fault. They kept some of the third film’s worst aspects. For one thing, the majority of the cast acts cartoonish and mean-spirited for no reason. It’s bad enough that Ripley is a clone, but the only characters who are noble in any way aren’t even human. There’s one exception, but the poor man gets very little screen time. This makes the stakes issue even worse. Not only is it impossible for most people to root for this new Ripley, but even the supporting cast is annoying. The audience might just find themselves rooting for the aliens.  

The movie starts by showing Ripley’s “resurrection” as a clone. Through a voiceover, Ripley quotes Newt as she grows inside a tank, and the implication is that her memories are muddled. It’s clear that this character isn’t really Ripley. From a philosophical point of view, I agree with this choice, but narratively speaking, it’s handled in a lazy way. The writers’ challenge is to get the audience to root for this Ripley. The best way to do that is to play the sympathy angle. It would’ve been better to see her remembering her host’s death, coming to terms with it, and deciding who she’s going to be . . . if she can be anything. Is she going to try to act like the old Ripley, or is she going to try to be someone else? Where is the line between her host’s original traits and her own self? This all would’ve been interesting to explore and might’ve helped the audience transition from the old Ripley to the new one. Perhaps, this new Ripley is a coward, and her arc would be to find the courage of her host. This would give the viewer something to hope for, and it would’ve paid homage to the original character, which might help the audience get over the travesty that was Alien 3. I’m not saying this was sure to work, but it would’ve been better than what we got.

Instead, the writers chose to make Ripley confused so they could explain her odd behavior throughout the film. But I believe this odd behavior has less to do with Ripley 2.0 as a character and more to do with the bizarre precedent set by Alien 3. Most of the supporting cast in that movie acted like goofy and hateful cartoons. Now, Ripley has to join the funhouse, and this cloning process is how the writers of Alien Resurrection justified the change.

The scientists who clone Ripley have to reteach her a number of things, which makes sense, but after a certain point, Ripley’s ignorance is completely forgotten. She goes from no longer remembering what a fork is to operating a rifle in the blink of an eye. Basically, Ripley’s newborn-like nature serves no purpose beyond altering her behavior.

As to why Ripley was cloned in the first place, well, the bad guys have to resurrect the aliens somehow. The Company — who later went out of business, hopefully, thanks to Ripley’s sacrifice — grabbed Ripley’s blood from the prison planet, and two-hundred years later, military scientists inferred that if they could bring Ripley back, the Alien Queen would still be in her chest. I have no idea what possessed them to come to that conclusion. It makes no sense whatsoever, but things become even more confusing. Because Ripley and the Queen were cloned together, their DNAs have somehow merged. Now Ripley has acidic blood and can hear the aliens telepathically. The Queen receives a little gift from Ripley as well, but I’ll talk about that later.

So, the Queen is removed from Ripley’s chest, and while the scientists are rehabilitating our new hero, the alien clone is being kept in another part of the ship. What could go wrong? It’s not like the aliens are going to escape or anything.

Ripley remembers enough about her old life to have misgivings about the military raising the Alien Queen, but of course, she’s ignored, and the army moves on to the second phase of their plan. They have an Alien Queen, who can lay eggs. Now, they need human bodies for the spider-like variants to latch onto. They hire a group of smugglers, and we’ll cover what happens then in the next review.

Here are all four parts of my extended review

Alien Resurrection, Part 1: This movie pays for the sins of the last one. It’s better than Aliens 3, but has a host of problems nonetheless. Ripley remembers enough about her old life to have misgivings about the military raising the Alien Queen, but of course, she’s ignored, and the army moves on to the second phase of their plan.

Alien Resurrection, Part 2: Trying to recover after a retcon The writers of the show never seemed to agree on how smart these aliens really are. A problem for the franchise as a whole is that there’s been no consistent measurement for these creatures’ intelligence.

Alien Resurrection, Part 3: Call up the reluctant robot Amid the harrowing crew escapes, Call survives being shot because she’s a robot. She somehow has sentience and hates being a robot. No one can pull ideals from a system of numbers. How could a robot decide what is objectively moral when all its decisions are based on a set of probabilities?

and

Alien Resurrection Part 4: The Good, the Bad, and the… Bizarre In a single moment, Purvis becomes one of the most heroic characters in the entire franchise. Alien Resurrection might help you forget Alien 3, and that alone makes it worth watching.