Ridley Scott's terrifying space horror Alien came out in 1979 and unwittingly created a franchise that's still going strong now. Alien: Covenant has just landed in cinemas, with Scott on board as director, taking forward the prequel story he started in 2012 with Prometheus.
To celebrate, we've revisited the six films from Alien to Alien: Covenant and controversially ranked them from worst to best. We haven't included the Alien vs Predator films, because 1. They're not canon and 2. They're not good.
6. Alien: Resurrection
Written by Avenger Assembler Joss Whedon and directed by Amélie man Jean-Pierre Jeunet, this really ought to have been WAY better than it is. But there's a sense everyone involved was just out of ideas of how to carry the franchise on.
So instead they just took a load of old ideas and spliced them together in a slightly sillier way. Set 200 years after Alien 3, scientists are still trying to ill-advisedly grow and tame their own alien, this time by cloning the long-dead Ripley mixed with DNA from an Alien Queen.
Think Ripley was kick-ass in Aliens? Yeah, well now she has super-strength, lightning-fast reactions and acid blood – suck on that! Liked HR Giger's genitally suggestive designs in Alien? Yeah, well now Ripley has a seductive writhe with an alien. Sexy times!
Resurrection is camp and infused with humour – it may be an antidote to Fincher's grimfest Alien 3 – but it's just not Alien enough. Too close to parody, easily the worst, and Winona Ryder's "Surprise! I'm an android!" performance doesn't help.
5. Alien 3
David Fincher's directorial debut is undeniably a mess. And with good reason. The third part of the series had been in development for years under a rota of different writers and directors before Fincher even got near it.
Numerous drafts existed with plans ranging from parts 3 and 4 being shot back to back and focusing on the corruption of the Weyland Yutani Corporation – with Hicks as the lead and Ripley taking only a small role until part 4 – to a bizarre but rather brilliant-sounding version developed by Vincent Ward set on a wooden monastery planet.
Directors came and went. And what was left over by the time Fincher came on board was not only confused but also just so bleak and populated by horrible people.
Poor beleaguered Ripley, battered from the intense ordeal of Aliens where she suited up and kicked ass, and managed to escape with survivors Newt and Hicks, only to find herself at the start of Alien 3 on a grim brown prison colony populated by male convicts – a mix of violent and semi-crazed murderers, paedophiles and rapists.
Newt's dead. Hicks is dead. And her only glimmer of hope, Medical Officer Clements (Charles Dance) gets unceremoniously knocked off in the first act. And then there's that ending. Bundle of laughs it is not.
While a feminist reading following on from Aliens where Newt arguably made Ripley "safe" might appreciate the removal of child and potential love interest, it makes for a grim, humourless movie which lacked either the terror and unpredictability of Alien or the action thrills of Aliens.
Fincher has since disowned the movie – he was the only director not to participate in the 'Quadrilogy' re-release (though the "Assembly Cut" release on the 2003 boxset has placated some fans somewhat).
4. Prometheus
Yes, we know, why DOES Charlize Theron run in a straight line at the end with that towering spaceship hurtling towards her? No idea. You know what? It really doesn't matter, and if you're weighing Prometheus up against the CGI monstrosities and creation by committee that have gone before, we're with Sir Ridley back in the director's chair every time.
The often unfairly maligned Prometheus started life as a direct Alien prequel, then decided it wasn't, and then leapt back at the last minute – a staggering feat of studio flip-flopping seemingly repeated with sequel-to-the-prequel Alien: Covenant (original title – Alien: Paradise Lost).
But the result is a surprising, often beautiful, occasionally obtuse adventure that establishes itself very much as its own film in its own right before edging off into familiar ooze.
Michael Fassbender's Peter O'Toole-aping David is arguably the best synthetic in the series, his quiet menace and veiled plotting underpinning and foretelling every beat and revelation, while Scott makes a surprisingly good argument for understated use of 3D, mixing physical sets with computer graphics in a way that suggests scale rather than silliness.
Sure, Jon Spaihts's original Alien: Engineers was way better before Damon 'Lost' Lindelof got involved, and the edits to get the running time down haven't helped the far-too-large fleet of actors, who all have to try to mean something.
But even if it can't tie up all its loose ends, Prometheus dares to think bigger than most blockbusters, and injects new meaning, as well as life, into the franchise, when Resurrection had seemingly taken it down a dead end.
3. Alien: Covenant
Okay, so it's not as stunning as Alien or Aliens, but then, what is?
Ridley Scott's follow-up to Prometheus took the philosophical ideas of that prequel, and added roaming xenomorphs, enthusiastic face-huggers and sloppy buckets of gloopy gore.
But Prometheus isn't the only Alien movie bursting from Covenant's chest – the film shares plenty of DNA with Scott's original film, both tonally and structurally. Scott listened to Prometheus' critics, and gave audiences exactly what they wanted, a scary thrill-ride packed with recognisable IP.
Related: Alien: Covenant Easter eggs
Which isn't to say this is pure fan service. Scott hasn't jettisoned every element of the story Prometheus started to tell out of the airlock, in fact, he doubles-down (literally in the case of Fassbender) on several elements of that film.
The resulting experience not only deepens the Alien universe, it pays off several dangling threads, which is sure to make Prometheus revisits more rewarding.
It's stuffed with standout performances, memorable set pieces and some gloriously quotable dialogue (well, except for that whole "fingering" thing – what were they thinking?)
So, Covenant is a worthy franchise entry that improves the film directly before it, whilst enhancing the films after it (in the timeline). If Ridders manages to stick the landing for the third instalment, this will be a prequel trilogy that could well end up moving even further up the rankings in future versions of this list.
Until then, it's all about the classics...
2. Alien
Alien is brilliant. Often described as a haunted house movie, a massive influence on the horror genre (containing the finest example of a perfect "cat scare" ever), with Ripley regularly cited as one of the most important feminist heroines in popular cinema, it's a masterpiece.
So why not number one? It was a very close run thing in Digital Spy towers, but ultimately being first and being important isn't the same as being the best and most enjoyable. More on this below, but back to Alien...
Directed by Ridley Scott, while not his first film (which was The Duellists), Alien was his breakthrough and paved the way for his career since. Inspired by Star Wars' epic scale and working with a script by sci-fi and horror writer Dan O'Bannon, Scott wanted to push boundaries and emphasise the horror (he called it "The Texas Chain Saw Massacre of science fiction"), fighting to keep HR Giger as designer when the studio were hesitant and creating a beautiful, terrifying psycho-sexual environment for his protagonist to be trapped inside, and the perfect antagonist in the Xenomorph.
Less is more here – they only need one to terrify – indeed it's the suspense and the sense of the unexpected that made Alien so electric.
And of course there's the chest-burster. Notorious for being a surprise to the cast themselves in that incredible scene where it violates John Hurt from the inside out, the design was inspired by Francis Bacon painting Three Studies for Figures at the Base of a Crucifixion. How's that for pedigree? Damn right it won the Oscar for VFX.
Shocking but still subtle. Revolting but gorgeous, if it's the Texas Chain Saw Massacre of sci-fi then it's the 2001: A Space Odyssey of horror movies. But it is ever so slightly slow…
1. Aliens
It might not be as subtle or as important as Alien. But be honest: right now, gun to head, pick one, which would you rather watch?
James Cameron's sequel swapped horror for war film-style action, turning the artistic and philosophical grandeur of Alien into a gritty balls-out romp packed with quotable one-liners and roaring set pieces. But that's not to say it's dumb. Far from it.
Sigourney Weaver's Ripley is at her panicked paranoid best as a woman who survived hell and is forced to go back there, slowly realising the insidious plans of corporate slime ball Carter Burke (Paul Reiser) and the danger the rag-tag crew is in.
Lance Henriksen is never more sympathetic as synthetic Bishop. Bill Paxton never more memorably crass as Hudson ("That's it, man. Game over, man. Game over!").
Aliens is incredibly '80s. And in a way it's done a TERRIBLE thing. Taking Ridley Scott's beautiful arthouse gem and turning it into a full on, gold-plated blockbuster. But it works.
Ripley goes from an everywoman to an ass-kicking mofo – the whole movie ends in one big bitch-fight between her and the Xenomorph Queen in defence of her own surrogate daughter Newt.
"Get away from her, you bitch!" Ripley barks. Is it the intelligent thoughtful discourse of Alien? No. It is not. Is it cool and eminently watchable? Yes. Yes, it is!
But that's what James Cameron does best. He brings the noise. He brings the bantz. His makes his blockbuster funny and quotable and exciting. While Alien may claim the higher ground artistically, would we still be fascinated by it without the big guns appeal and the mass watchability of Aliens?
Would there even be a franchise still ticking along some 37 years later? Aliens still holds up after 30 years – it's tense, exciting and cool.
And it was Aliens that cemented Ripley as an action icon for all time.
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