You’ve been in my life so long, I can’t remember anything else…But what Ripley (that is, Sigourney Weaver) can remember is going to bat for Alien 3 director David Fincher and the movie itself. While the third installment in the Alien franchise has its supporters, the behind-the-scenes story of its disastrous production and wide release cast a far deeper shadow than any positives one can find.
Weaver recently appeared at the New York Comic Con where she chatted up her appreciation for Alien 3. “I like it because it’s so utterly different from the first two. I felt that [20th Century] Fox was smart to keep choosing very gifted directors who wanted to do something completely different with the Alien story…I had total confidence in David.”
Where Weaver didn’t have so much faith was in the original Alien 3 screenplay by Vincent Ward, adding, “It had all these monks in space, in a kind of medieval garden. My character, I guess, crash landed and then I was in a coma for about half the movie. So I wasn’t crazy about that script…I feel like David would’ve loved a chance to work on the script before we had to start shooting. We did delay but not enough for him to feel he’d solved a lot of the problems. I think we had the most amazing group of actors, amazing crew. It’s meaningful to me and I don’t really compare them.”
There is a lot of debate as to whether or not Alien 3 has its merits – heck, we devoted an entire video to just that. Personally, I’m nowhere near being on Weaver’s side of things, but it’s not nearly as godawful as it was made out to be upon release. Sure, it’s nothing compared to the first two but I thought it handled Ripley quite well and had a grim tone that helped it set itself apart from the horror of Alien and action of Aliens.
Sigourney Weaver is truly showing how faithful she is to her Alien directors, also recently saying that she found herself standing up for James Cameron during the making of the sequel as the crew was reluctant working under the director.
Where do you stand on Alien 3? Chime in in the comments section below!
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