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draculaura21's review
adventurous
dark
tense
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Loveable characters? No
4.0
doowopapocalypse's review
3.0
Artwork is the dog's proverbials. The story could have been better if they had trimmed down. I liked some aspects of it and they hit a lot of alien-universe nostalgia notes, but it could have been streamlined. The epilogue/one-off was fun.
tmaluck's review
3.0
Deserves a fourth star for the stellar presentation - deluxe oversized paper with black trim, plus extra art and letters from the original team.
nooker's review
5.0
Just as awesome as when I collected it originally. The preface and afterword were really cool and added to the history nicely.
booitsnathalie's review
dark
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
The art is still immaculate and looks phenomenal on the heavy stock paper (can't imagine how expensive this was to print). The writing is...fine? Characters are painted in broad strokes and heavy emotions without actually getting to do anything significant. There's a reliance on "humans are the real monsters" mic drops that I find tiring (especially in relationship to the films which are both more specific in their targets and empathetic towards their characters).
Fun if you are as obsessed with Alien/s as me but not much to chew on as a book itself.
Fun if you are as obsessed with Alien/s as me but not much to chew on as a book itself.
readingrainbill's review
dark
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? N/A
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
1.0
Easily one of the worst comics i have ever read. It's so boring and the story tried to do too much with too little time. I don't mind the Ripley wasn't in it but it never explains where she is and how much time has passed.
chocklad's review
4.0
I hardly ever watch horror movies, but I'm enjoying reading it. there are lots of information and confusing scenes but they're explained during the story, thus you don't get confused but, at the same time, you get surprised a lot. I'd like it was kinda longer than that, there are so much to be explored on that but overall I really liked it.
kukushka's review
3.0
Rendered non-canonical by Aliens3, Aliens takes up the story of Newt and Hicks, several years after their return to earth (due to legal issues, Ripley is inexplicably absent).
Aliens, the movie, struck a chord for people because it wasn't just about the action - it was about the characters. When shit hit the fan, viewers cared because we had come to know and like the people it was happening to (except for Paul Reiser's Burke - he was terrible). And in the end, we loved the little family Ripley had made for herself.
That's what Aliens3 got so very wrong. Ripley's whole arc, the whole process of building a new community while surrounded by the cold, machine-like xenomorphs, all got tossed out of the airlock when they killed Newt and Hicks in the opening credits. The movie failed on many other levels, too, of course, but destroying the bonds formed in Aliens right off the bat would have doomed it regardless.
Aliens makes the same mistake. Newt and Hicks are alive, of course, but the opening finds Newt in a mental institution and Hicks back in the army, and they don't talk. They've come back to earth and gone their separate ways and that was that. There's some bit further in where Hicks decides to save Newt because he did it before so why not, but that's really about it.
These are two traumatised people with experiences that are literally out of this world, and no one can possibly understand what they've been through except each other. Why wouldn't they have stuck close to each other?
Apart from what they've done with existing characters, the story itself is fine. It hops around too much, and there's this whole weird bit where the xenomorphs suddenly have psychic powers for some reason. The bit about the religious cult forming around the aliens was interesting, but the story keeps jumping around too much and I never really got a grasp on who the preacher was or where he got his information from (except for the psychic communication stuff, which just came off as silly).
As much as I loved getting to see Newt again (and her arc was a decent one once it actually got started), I think the comic would have been better served by narrowing its focus. It could have focused on the preacher, or focused on Newt, or focused on Hicks, and any one of those would have made for a much better story. But, instead, the strategy seemed to be to throw as much at the reader as possible and hope that something sticks.
Which is another lesson the comic didn't learn from Alien and Aliens. Both of those are very simple stories - xenomorph appears, Ripley survives. There are vague bits and bobs about shadowy corporations, but all the other content comes from just spending time with the individual characters - getting to like them, getting a feel for their motivations. Whatever is happening off-location is not part of the story.
The artwork is fine. I found that some of the key characters lack definition, so I had some trouble telling them apart. This wasn't helped by all the plot-jumping. It's in a realist style that isn't really my bag of cats, but it does the job. I did appreciate all the detail put into each panel, which gave it some of that crowded, dark, mechanical atmosphere that the movies do well.
Aliens, the movie, struck a chord for people because it wasn't just about the action - it was about the characters. When shit hit the fan, viewers cared because we had come to know and like the people it was happening to (except for Paul Reiser's Burke - he was terrible). And in the end, we loved the little family Ripley had made for herself.
That's what Aliens3 got so very wrong. Ripley's whole arc, the whole process of building a new community while surrounded by the cold, machine-like xenomorphs, all got tossed out of the airlock when they killed Newt and Hicks in the opening credits. The movie failed on many other levels, too, of course, but destroying the bonds formed in Aliens right off the bat would have doomed it regardless.
Aliens makes the same mistake. Newt and Hicks are alive, of course, but the opening finds Newt in a mental institution and Hicks back in the army, and they don't talk. They've come back to earth and gone their separate ways and that was that. There's some bit further in where Hicks decides to save Newt because he did it before so why not, but that's really about it.
These are two traumatised people with experiences that are literally out of this world, and no one can possibly understand what they've been through except each other. Why wouldn't they have stuck close to each other?
Apart from what they've done with existing characters, the story itself is fine. It hops around too much, and there's this whole weird bit where the xenomorphs suddenly have psychic powers for some reason. The bit about the religious cult forming around the aliens was interesting, but the story keeps jumping around too much and I never really got a grasp on who the preacher was or where he got his information from (except for the psychic communication stuff, which just came off as silly).
As much as I loved getting to see Newt again (and her arc was a decent one once it actually got started), I think the comic would have been better served by narrowing its focus. It could have focused on the preacher, or focused on Newt, or focused on Hicks, and any one of those would have made for a much better story. But, instead, the strategy seemed to be to throw as much at the reader as possible and hope that something sticks.
Which is another lesson the comic didn't learn from Alien and Aliens. Both of those are very simple stories - xenomorph appears, Ripley survives. There are vague bits and bobs about shadowy corporations, but all the other content comes from just spending time with the individual characters - getting to like them, getting a feel for their motivations. Whatever is happening off-location is not part of the story.
The artwork is fine. I found that some of the key characters lack definition, so I had some trouble telling them apart. This wasn't helped by all the plot-jumping. It's in a realist style that isn't really my bag of cats, but it does the job. I did appreciate all the detail put into each panel, which gave it some of that crowded, dark, mechanical atmosphere that the movies do well.
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