September 2, 2025 • 60 mins
What makes a horror film truly terrifying? In our deep dive into Ridley Scott's 1979 masterpiece Alien, we discover it's what you don't see that haunts you most.
The slow-burning tension of the Nostromo's corridors, the cosmic horror of that derelict alien spacecraft, the shadow-cloaked xenomorph – Scott crafts an atmosphere of dread that feels as fresh today as it did over forty years ago. We explore how this film brilliantly balances restraint with shock, particularly in the infamous chestburster scene. Did you know the cast's horrified reactions were genuine? They had no idea what was about to erupt from John Hurt's chest, creating one of cinema's most authentically terrifying moments.
Beyond its surface scares, Alien harbors deeper themes about corporate exploitation. The ship's very name, Nostromo, references Joseph Conrad's novel about labor exploitation – a subtle nod to how these working-class crew members are mere pawns in a corporate game. Ian Holm's android Ash embodies this corporate callousness, placing "company orders" above human lives. We dissect his brilliant performance and the shocking milk-white reveal of his true nature.
For Rich, experiencing Alien for the first time led to fascinating discussions about expectations versus reality. While some of us grew up with action figures from the more combat-oriented sequels, the original's horror roots came as a welcome surprise. Dakota and Anthony share their childhood memories of encountering the franchise, from Mad Magazine parodies to that unforgettable "mouth within a mouth" design that continues to disturb.
Whether you're revisiting this classic or hearing about it for the first time, join us as we celebrate the film that birthed a franchise and forever changed science fiction horror. And stay tuned – next week we're continuing our Alien journey with James Cameron's action-packed sequel, Aliens!
Twitter handles:
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Dakota's Twitter: https://twitter.com/geekritique_dak
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Geekritique (Dakota):
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCBwciIqOoHwIx_uXtYTSEbA
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome back to Project Geekology, the show
where we can't hear if youscream.
Basically, if you're screamingon the other side of this, I
genuinely, literally cannot hearyou, similar to how the poster
for this movie that we're goingto be covering today is in space
.
Nobody can hear you scream.
I was actually listening to theaudiobook like novelization of
(00:22):
Alien 1979 at work this week andI kept thinking at work, no one
can hear if I scream.
But that's not actually true.
There are other people thereand if I did scream while I was
listening to that audio book, itwould have been a bad time.
It would have been veryconfusing for others.
But anyway, all that preambleout of the way.
My name is Dakota.
I am joined as always with andjoining us, as always is rich
(00:49):
was it?
Speaker 2 (00:49):
well, welcome back.
You know, we uh, last week itwas just rich and I, we, we
covered the last of us, seasonone and the first video game.
We kind of did a little bit ofa you know, comparison and a
contrast.
So you know, now we're, now wegot you back here to talk about
the tall blue people the tallblue people, or am I talking
(01:11):
about the?
Wrong.
Sigourney weaver movie I mean,there are aliens in that one and
sigourney weaver is in it, soso technically I am right, it is
alien but and j and JamesCameron has touched this
franchise.
Speaker 1 (01:25):
So, yeah, we're talking Avatar people, Not Alien
.
We've switched it up on Rich.
Speaker 3 (01:31):
He hasn't seen Avatar either.
Speaker 1 (01:34):
No, we're talking Alien.
Yeah, I'm really excited totalk about Alien because this is
a movie series that was I don'tknow if it was big in my
household growing up, but it wasone of those series.
That's revered series, theoriginal quadrilogy, but really
the first two are the ones thatwere at least regularly spoken
(01:55):
about or we used lines from themovies in our dialogue.
Like I can remember, it's gameover man, which is from the
second movie.
Rich has no idea what I'mtalking about, but we will get
there because, friends, we havea very special plan for the next
couple weeks.
Actually, it's a little morethan a couple weeks.
We're going to be covering eachof the Alien movies and the TV
(02:18):
series that's currently airing,in the order that they came out.
So Alien, aliens, alien 3, andso on Resurrection, prometheus,
covenant, romulus, and thenAlien Earth.
So we're not doing the AVPmovies as they are not canon.
Only really the first one isany good, I think.
But anyway, before we jump intoour discussion of Alien, I want
(02:41):
to hear a little bit about howit went for you guys.
Last week you said that you hadthat mini, or not a mini, so
you had a full podcast tocompare and contrast of the last
of us, the first season, versusthe first game.
How did that go without me?
I haven't listened to theepisode yet.
Speaker 2 (02:56):
I think we're pretty good.
I mean, you know, I've I've hada, I've had a couple episodes
that were full episodes that Idid without you with some other
friends.
So you know that that's.
It's been a while now.
Like you know, we've been backat it regularly.
How did it feel, rich, withoutDakota there?
I mean, you know, you kind ofcame into the fold via Dakota
(03:18):
and then you your first, youknow, duo episode was with me
and not Dakota.
Speaker 3 (03:24):
I had a great time.
I mean, you know, obviously,dac, we missed you, uh, but I,
you know, I I had been doing Ithink I mentioned earlier but I
used to do, uh a podcast with abuddy of mine about wrestling.
So I'm just I've kind of Ithink actually with you guys was
one of the first times or thatI consistently did a
three-person podcast.
I found, you know, I kind offell back into the old habits of
(03:45):
the two-on-two and I will say Iproudly think that I managed to
not really mention the secondgame or season which is, as
listeners know, here I do haveto share.
I have been.
There are sanctions placed uponme by my podcast brethren.
Here, where I normally will,they'll say, hey, watch this,
(04:06):
and then I watch all of it.
But I've been told for the nextcouple of weeks I have to
control myself and only watchone thing at a time.
So it should be.
I think that it'll be nice forthe next couple weeks that
nobody will be like, hey, why isthis guy talking about the next
one again?
Uh, because I'll actually befocused on what we watch.
Speaker 2 (04:25):
I'll just watch them like five times yeah, yeah, no,
no, like when we talked aboutthe last of us.
You know, we just said that.
You know that there's stuffthat was set up for like the
next, the next game, or like thenext, uh, the, the next season,
or two, but yeah, no, we, um,we, we, we pretty much kept it
straight in the, the first gamein the first season.
(04:48):
So, yeah, man, not not bad, butyes, we have put sanctions and
embargoes on rich, you knowwe're just paying tariffs on it
for for every, for every mistake.
Speaker 1 (05:03):
Uh, so, guys, uh, what have you been up to this
this past week, anthony?
Speaker 2 (05:06):
we'll start with you well, yeah, man, while, while
you're gone, we, you know, justlike we spoke, we, we made the
episode.
You know, if you guys are fansof the the last of us, go and
give that a listen.
Yeah, man, like I've been, I'vebeen playing overwatch again.
I got the the new season justdropped.
You know, so, so happy we gotthe beautiful you just dropped.
You know, so, so happy we gotthe beautiful.
You know, persona 5collaboration that's coming out.
(05:30):
You know, I had to let Dakotaknow that.
You know, we, actually, Iactually mentioned that in the
last podcast.
I was like, you know, I had tomess with Dakota on that, but
yeah, I said, and then we alsosaid that one of these days
we're going to bring you intothe fold, even though I don't
know, has rich played?
Have you played any of thegames?
Speaker 3 (05:49):
I've only.
I only know about it becauselike I searched up the image,
like I wrote the thing afterthere.
Speaker 2 (05:56):
Yeah, I have no idea one of these days one of these
days y'all are going to join thefold, but yes, but yeah, I know
that.
And then just hopping kind ofinto world of warcraft, I want
to.
I'm trying to get myself one ofthose uh, in-game houses that
you can get in retail.
Now I'm trying to.
I've been saving my money, sooh yeah, what is up with that?
(06:17):
yeah, yeah.
Yeah, there's like in-gamehousing you can get like.
So there's like public, likeneighborhoods where it's like a
solo, like you get your house,and then there's like you know
just kind of randoms.
And then you could do privateneighborhoods where it's like
guilds or like friends can getthem together and like have like
houses like kind of next toeach other.
It's pretty cool.
(06:38):
I want to like play with somefriends so that we can do like a
private neighborhood.
That'd be awesome.
Speaker 1 (06:44):
How's the school zones in your neighborhood?
Speaker 2 (06:47):
Non-existent.
Speaker 1 (06:48):
Perfect.
Speaker 2 (06:50):
Just how I like them.
Speaker 1 (06:52):
Let's throw it over to you.
What have you been up to thispast week?
Speaker 3 (06:55):
Well, let's see, the school is in almost full swing,
so we had to start go back.
Speaker 1 (07:01):
You're starting up, yeah.
Speaker 3 (07:02):
So we started Monday.
We're recording on thursday.
So I I'm the head coach of thecross-country uh track team,
which is um absurd, because Idon't like to run for distance.
I don't really run, unless I'mrunning to the mets game because
I'm running late.
So, uh, this is new for me, uh,but I'm having a really good
(07:23):
time, other than getting up ateight in the morning and doing
that.
Speaker 1 (07:26):
And, hypothetically, if you were in the Nostromo,
would you be running from thealien?
Speaker 3 (07:30):
Oh yeah, no, no, I mean, that's different, like
I'll.
I mean, I'm actually going toget knee surgery in the next
couple of months and my mydoctor essentially said to me
hey, well, I got to get both.
I got to get both my aclsreconstructed.
Oh, man that stinks, so youknow that stinks, but my mom
(07:50):
just had knee surgery like twodays ago.
So yeah, it's I mean it's crazybecause they did say it's an
outpatient procedure, so I'll belike going in and coming home
that day, uh, and then I'll justhave a couple weeks off.
Would not great for a trackcoach to uh be hobbled.
But this is really what made meget the surgery, guys, and
we'll move on from negativethings.
I said to myself if a zombieapocalypse happens right now, is
(08:12):
your acl strong enough to notbuckle when you need to get away
from some of those fast fastwalkers?
And I realized my knee is in noshape to protect my family if
there is a zombie apocalypse.
So I need to get these.
Uh, I need to get fixed up likesix million dollar man, and
then I will be.
I don't know if that referenceis too old for everybody, but
(08:33):
I'll be good we got it we got it, we're not.
Speaker 1 (08:37):
We're not mental invalids um and how did uh?
Speaker 3 (08:41):
but I think you had a I mean my debbie downer week.
I don't think I can compare toyour week.
Speaker 2 (08:47):
Yeah, man, we like we essentially did nothing
compared to you.
Yeah, we're bearing the lead.
Speaker 1 (08:52):
You're the lead here I, I, uh, I went abroad.
I was in iceland, the land offire and ice.
Maybe you've heard of it.
Uh, they've filmed some stuffthere, um, batman Begins, game
of Thrones, the Secret Life ofWalter Mitty, and the list goes
on.
Sorry, I was just trying tofigure out a couple of things
(09:13):
that were just like wereactually filmed in Iceland, but
completely separate.
Yeah, it's a beautiful country.
It's a place I've been before Iwent in 2019.
So this was me going back.
Speaker 2 (09:27):
Dude, you've gone so, so many times, I feel like I
feel like you've gone at leastlike five times in your life to
iceland.
Speaker 1 (09:33):
No, this is I remember you went when you were
younger.
Speaker 2 (09:36):
I feel like you went like maybe set like several
years later and then maybe like2019 and I I feel like you've
gone I've gone to europe acouple times.
I remember you going to icelandlike a few times.
I do remember 2019.
You've got.
I mean, how many times wouldyou say like it's been at least?
Speaker 1 (09:54):
it's definitely been at least three times I promise
you, I've only been to icelandtwice like I.
That's a.
Speaker 2 (10:00):
It's a trip that I would not forget I feel like you
went when, when you wereyounger.
You know what happens.
Speaker 3 (10:06):
Do you remember?
You don't remember this era ofhis life, Anthony.
This is when he was given thered kryptonite.
Oh, okay, so he can't remember,so he can't remember, yeah.
Speaker 1 (10:16):
You guys are gaslighting me into, like
vacations I never took, and nowI'm depressed because I don't
got those memories.
Did you hook?
And now I'm depressed because Idon't got those memories.
Did you go to the lava?
You just forgot them.
I did not do the lava show.
I thought about it and I I kindof wanted to.
It did look kind of cool.
I knew it wasn't like real lava, like they.
It wasn't like lava like fromthe volcano, it's like just
heated rock.
So I was just like I will skipit for now, but I did do the
(10:41):
Blue Lagoon.
I did.
We saw a lot of waterfalls.
We did like a like an icebergboat tour where, like we, we saw
like the big glacier and itlike as it slowly melts,
basically it breaks up into hugeicebergs that eventually like
(11:02):
melt down into pocket-sizedlittle handheld ice cubes, uh,
or not.
Well, they can be handheld,yeah, but like some of them are,
um, you know, like man-sized,some of them are like just torso
size.
We, uh, we ended up grabbing,like me and my family, we found
a really perfect piece of icethat had a little like crevice
(11:24):
in the center.
So we took like icelandic vodkaand we were taking shots off of
it.
We were like holding the ice upso like ancient ancient ice,
potentially thousands of yearsold, uh distilling our um you uh
yeah, that was cool, you werechasing your alcohol with
ancient water.
Speaker 3 (11:46):
I drove onto the glacier and we got a bottle of
water when I was there, but youjust trumped me there.
You're like, I'm using it tocool the vodka.
I'm like, man, that's a bettertrip than mine.
Speaker 1 (12:00):
To be fair, we weren't using it to cool the
vodka.
It was like a perfect littlechannel.
So we were pouring shots ontothe ice and just bringing yeah,
it was an ice luge.
Yeah, and it was.
It was, uh, it was for the.
Everyone had a good time,except for me, with that, um,
because I I ended up getting alot of like sand in my mouth,
because this is it.
(12:20):
These are ice, like ice chunksthat wash up on the beach.
So oh my gosh, that soundsterrible yeah, so I was, I was
gagging, I was like why?
Speaker 2 (12:32):
why do I feel like it's it only happens to you?
Like everybody else just getsit clear, like clear and free,
but you're like the one thatgets the mouthful of, I feel,
like stuff like it happens to mea lot too, like whenever, like
whenever I was with you and yourfamily doing anything like
everybody's always having a goodtime having something and I'm
like the one that's just gettingjust the ridiculous things
(12:55):
happening to me.
Um but, yeah that, that uh dideverybody go.
Speaker 1 (13:00):
Uh, it was, it was just me, me, jen, uh uh, and my
parents and my aunt and herhusband okay, that's cool,
that's cool man so we're seeingfernando over there.
Yeah, it was a good time.
Uh, we spent a lot of time inreykjavik such a beautiful city,
awesome people like.
It's just so fun staying outlate in in a city like that
(13:24):
because it literally doesn'tsleep.
It's the weirdest thing.
Like um, you see, you're likewalking the streets during the
day and it's really cool.
Lots of, lots of cool shops.
Obviously it's it's touristy,but it's touristy with like a
really cool vibe, because youdon't get touristy like that
anywhere else in the world.
But as soon as it's like afterlike 11 pm, um, the streets are
(13:47):
somehow even more busy, butthey're not tourists anymore.
It's just like the actualiceland people and they're the
nicest people to to hang outwith.
It's.
It's a really, really fun placethat's cool.
That's cool man I have yet to gorecommend it I have yet to go.
Speaker 2 (14:00):
It is on my list, along with new zealand uh, it's
expensive.
Speaker 1 (14:04):
Yeah, that's.
That's the one thing that Iwant to.
Uh, caution people listening.
It is such an awesome trip.
I cannot wait to go back.
Um, I do think it's like one ofthe coolest places I've ever
been.
Uh, just because of theextremes, like the extreme
jagged rocks, the, the lowvalleys, the black sand on the
beach, the fact that there'sglaciers, icebergs, volcanoes
(14:28):
that are regularly erupting it'sthe most extreme environment
that I've ever been to or everheard of.
But it's expensive.
Like.
I spent way more than Iexpected to.
Like, even just like randomstuff is just there.
Our dollar does not go far atall.
It's really, it's really bad.
Speaker 3 (14:47):
Yeah, they said that everything gets in.
I mean, basically everythinghas to be imported the land, is
not very agriable, right, soeverything gets imported and the
prices shoot up.
It's a little.
Yeah, I remember when I wasthere, one of the things I was
trying to go to sleep so I putthe Met game on.
Obviously it was like the timedifference, right, so it's like
one, two in the morning.
But when it's one two in themorning and it's dark outside
(15:10):
and you're watching the Met game, you're like, okay, stop being
a degenerate and go to sleep.
But when it's light outside,you're like, well, this is
allowed, because I was, you know, like my body.
My body couldn't shut downbecause it wasn't dark.
Speaker 1 (15:24):
Oh, what time of year did you go?
Speaker 3 (15:26):
I went in August, okay, so yeah.
Speaker 1 (15:28):
Yeah, so, anthony, that was another weird thing
Sunsets, at least when I wasthere around 9.30 pm, but
because of the arc of like,where the sun has to go, it
never gets fully dark, like itdoesn't get like true
astronomical dark, so you barelysee the stars in the sky.
It's fully dark Like it doesn'tget like true astronomical dark
, so we don't, you don't.
You barely see the stars in thesky, and we were.
(15:49):
I was fortunate enough that Idid catch, like a week, aurora
Borealis.
Speaker 3 (15:54):
Oh nice, we didn't catch that one.
Speaker 1 (15:57):
It was hard to see.
Like at first we thought, oh,it's just clouds in the sky.
But then you like look up atthe clouds and they're like,
wait, where did the clouds go?
And then they're over there,and then they're over there and
it's just like that's not howclouds work.
We're looking at the auroraborealis, but it's it was so
light out that we couldn't seethe true colors flashing,
basically like it needs to bereally dark for that.
(16:18):
But we get, like, if you I haveuh like pictures, uh that you
know, on the phone it it picksup the colors a little bit
better because it takes a longerexposure.
So it's green on my phone butit's white and wispy to the
naked eye.
Speaker 3 (16:35):
But I can talk about Iceland forever.
That's cool, yeah, but let'sjump into Alien.
Speaker 2 (16:41):
Oh sorry, no no, no, yeah, let's hop into it.
Speaker 1 (16:44):
All right, so let's talk a little bit about our
experience with alien.
I spoke a little bit about whatum it was like in my household.
Like we had the alienquadrility quadrilogy box set,
the dvd box set that came out Ithink in the early 2000s or
something.
Um, it has the first alien,first four Alien movies and I
(17:05):
remember watching them a coupletimes.
I think I only saw the thirdand fourth maybe once in my life
.
The first two I've seen a bunchof times.
I think the second one is justa little bit more fun.
It's a little bit more of likea classic science fiction movie
in my opinion.
Speaker 2 (17:23):
Yeah, the second one is classified as an action movie
, the first one is a horrormovie yeah, so it's it.
Speaker 1 (17:29):
The the series bends genres quite often, um, and it
kind of bounces around, uh, sothat's something that should be
exciting for you rich, um,because I think in the past
you've mentioned that you'reyou're into horror.
Speaker 3 (17:44):
Yeah, I actually I'm glad to hear you say that
because I've agreed to embark onthe journey no matter what.
But I'm not really a horror guy.
So as I started to watch this,you know I was like, because you
know you're building andbuilding right, so you're an
hour in and you're like whoa,what?
Like you know there's no, Iwant to say it's like an hour 45
(18:06):
minutes before you really getwhat the threat is going to be.
Yeah, it's a slow burn.
You know, my my just kind ofstay on that topic of like your
first experience, I never sawany of the movies before I
watched this one.
I know I know of them, right,I've seen like clips of stuff.
(18:27):
I've seen like I had seen likethe alien, like like drooling
over somebody type stuff.
I think I may have seen likescenes of part two or of aliens,
but not the first one.
And I think my first exposurewas actually this is a throwback
mad magazine.
I loved mad magazine and Ithink one of the first issues I
(18:51):
bought was like an alien parody,so I learned about alien
through that.
And then my second exposure wasspace balls oh, naturally yeah
because at the end of spaceballs, so like there's the
chestburster scene, yeah, I, Idon't.
I I assume that most people gointo this movie maybe not
knowing that scene, right.
So I, I I was like, oh no, ohno, I know it's gonna.
(19:16):
I saw space balls.
I'm like don't, don't get nearhim.
Uh, so those were my, thosewere like actually my only
interaction.
I mean, I knew sigurd niviverwas in it, right, like that much
, and I did expect it to be moreaction.
I was kind of surprised, solike that's what happened, like
48 minutes in whatever I'm going, hey, uh, there's not a lot of
(19:37):
action here.
This is a horror movie.
Speaker 1 (19:39):
I'm like this is a slow introduction of the villain
, you know, or of the monsterand even even like the first
five minutes is just shots oflike within the ship and
nobody's woken up yet but it'sjust it's.
It's ridley scott literallyaura farming as he turns on the
lights in the ship.
You know, it's just like, yeah,this is a cool shot, film it.
Yeah, this is a cool shot filmit and it's five minutes of that
(20:02):
and I get.
I gotta give it to him becausea lot of the shots are like
gorgeous.
You know, like the I I wouldnever think to show a computer
screen from the reflection of anunused helmet or like an unworn
helmet, like it's it.
That's like one of the firstshots we see and I'm just like
that's, that's cool.
Speaker 2 (20:21):
Like I wouldn't, I would have never thought to do
that you know, like I like thatyou say that because I mean you
think that this movie was wasmade in 1979.
You know it came out in 1979.
Like, what they were able toaccomplish, you know, with shots
like that and with the, theeffects, just it blows my mind
(20:43):
was what they were able toaccomplish.
Like you know, this was what acouple of years after Star Wars,
and I still, and I feel likethere were a lot more impressive
visuals with this one than,like you know, maybe Star Wars
Right, but this one is this,it's a, it's a different movie,
so they're trying to accomplishsomething else, but they do a
(21:04):
really good job at like puttingyou into outer space and
somewhere that's away from Earth.
It's believable.
Speaker 1 (21:12):
Yeah, anthony, what is your first memories of the
Alien franchise?
Speaker 2 (21:19):
Yeah, I remember seeing it years ago.
I don't remember it being oneof those.
It wasn't like a householdthing for me, but it was
definitely one of those moviesthat my dad grew up with and so,
like a lot of these movies thathe grew up with, you know, star
wars, alien, uh, you know justindiana jones, all that stuff.
(21:42):
You know I, he, like you know Iwatched it and yeah, I remember
watching alien.
I remember it being, you know I, yeah, I remember, like you
know, as a kid, you know it's a,the first one's a little bit
more boring because there's alot of talking, but then, like,
once you get to that towards theend, where the, where the, the
(22:03):
is is like being shown a littlebit more than than that's where,
like you know the edge, youknow like you're on the edge of
your seat.
It's, you know, I remember, yeah, that memory kind of being a
little bit um, a little bit ofafraid because it looks so weird
.
You know, like you don't seeany eyes.
I specifically remember themouth within the mouth.
(22:24):
That's always a visual thatI'll remember, you know, of the
alien, you know, like, when itopens its mouth, there's like
another mouth on the inside.
I'll never forget that and Iremember that as a kid, that
visual of like the mouth, likejust shooting into, you know,
buddy's face.
Speaker 1 (22:42):
Yeah, you know buddy's face.
Yeah, with alien, uh, I've kindof gone like back and forth and
back and forth as far as, like,do I even like this movie?
Not that I don't respect it, II do, I definitely do.
And I remember like being kindof scared of it when I was a kid
, but it wasn't like aterrifying movie, um, but as an
adult I think I experienced theexistential dread more than I
(23:07):
did when I was a kid.
The monster itself was scary,yes, but the impending doom that
you're feeling throughout theentire film is really impressive
.
It's almost like Lovecraftian.
You know, like, uh, there's acertain ominous uh tone that, um
(23:30):
, as soon as they basically landon that planet, or like when
they get the distress call, orwhen they, um, enter that alien
ship, and it's just a vastcavern of like bones on the wall
and it's just, it's the mostbizarre thing you've ever seen.
Which, by the way, coolest setsever.
I don't know how they did that.
Those are sets, you know, likesome of it is matte paintings
and everything.
But like there are like crazy,crazy sets that they built for
(23:55):
this and I'm just like, how didthey even think of this?
But yeah, that that cosmichorror, like, almost like a
mental, like your mind's tryingto wrap its head around
something that's much biggerthan you can imagine, and that's
the kind of like Lovecraftianthing that Ridley Scott was
(24:15):
trying to.
I'm assuming that Ridley Scottwas trying to like latch onto,
because, yeah, you feel sohelpless watching it yeah, I
agree, I know I said the respect.
Speaker 3 (24:25):
You're not sure if you like it, but you respect it.
Like I can see the craft, thecraft and acknowledge the level
of difficulty and the the I meanridley scott here is the best
of his craft.
Like he right, like at the timeperiod with lack of cgi and
everything, like he did a greatjob of creating he world build.
(24:49):
Like he spent a lot of timeworld building before we got to
see anything you know, and thatdoom builds, so the pacing is
great.
You know, like he does a reallygreat job with that.
The shots are inventive, um,but I don't know if I love it,
but I can.
Yeah but I do like I hate thecharacters in great gatsby, I
teach it every year almost well,I used to teach it every year.
(25:09):
I I hate read it almost, butit's meticulously crafted and I
can acknowledge how good, howwell it's done while you can
explain.
Speaker 1 (25:20):
You can understand that this is actually an amazing
story or an amazing uh work ofart, while also hating the
insides of it um yeah, no, I, Itotally get that, and so what I
what I was trying to say earlieris I've had this like wow, I
really love this movie.
Wow, it's not actually as good,or it's overblown, you know, or
(25:41):
it's not actually that scary.
But coming at it as a, you know, early 30s person who hasn't
seen it in a long time, Iappreciate it so much more
because I'm just I'm I'm justhere trying to understand the
artistic intent of like what isbeing uh shown to me, and I
think I, you know, I'm in aposition where I can see that
now I can pick up, uh, whatrelease god is putting down.
(26:04):
And he's putting down a lot oflike uh, just existential dread
and and I, I love how they, howhe handled that.
And you mentioned, rich, thatthere are like 45 minutes before
we even like get to see thelike the face hugger, you know,
and that's our first like realuh glimpse of the alien.
(26:27):
Then there's the chest bursarscene and the actual like
xenomorph that's actually theynever call it a xenomorph in
this movie do you guys have anunderstanding of the life cycle
of this species from this movie?
Speaker 3 (26:39):
I was trying to understand that personally,
because the latcher right you golike we get the latcher, who
presumably now like implants aseed right, but like when the
burster comes out, I would thinkthe burster would go to latch
mode and it doesn't.
Speaker 1 (26:54):
Right, I don't have a solid answer, but the way that
I understand it is if the facehugger, If the facehugger like
(27:19):
the latcher that you said, ifthat latched onto, say, a
primate, a gorilla, thechestburster and eventual alien
would look different, becauseit's taking our DNA Xenomorph.
Okay, it's in the name.
Yes, okay, yeah, yeah, okay,yeah, yeah.
So we do see variations.
I don't want to like spoil toomuch, but we do see variations
of the Xenomorph in future films.
Speaker 3 (27:33):
Would you compare this to the brood almost from
X-Men then when, like the, I'msorry, maybe I'm going too deep
in X-Men comic book stuff.
Speaker 1 (27:52):
But the brood, basically, were like the
Xenomorphs and when they tookover the X x-men, like it,
looked like wolverine, but axenomorph.
You know?
Yeah, no, I know what you'retalking about.
Um, yeah, I guess that would bethe comic book comparison.
Okay, anthony, we haven't heardfrom you in a while.
What's what's going throughyour mind right now?
Speaker 2 (28:01):
yeah, so I was kind of dancing around the name
because they they actually't sayXenomorph in this one, but yeah
.
Speaker 1 (28:07):
Yes, do they ever mention it in future films?
Speaker 2 (28:12):
Yes, they must Second one, they must Second movie
yeah, so yeah, no, I agree, it'salso like coming into this
movie knowing that you'rewatching it to discuss.
It also changes the lens of howyou watch it too.
And so, yeah, like you donotice a little bit more of like
(28:34):
the minor details, like you.
You talked about the sets.
The sets were very impressive,even.
Even I was even impressed withwhat they were able to do with
the xenomorph and I was actuallyanalyzing it because you know
it has like spines out of theback and like I kind of look at
it and be like you know, whatdid they use to to make that
(28:55):
right?
You know, I try to analyze tosee if I can notice any, any
like you know, maybe householditem that they might have used
right, like some tubing from,from a vacuum cleaner or
whatever, but it's, it all looksimpressive.
It doesn't look cheap.
You know they really do put alot of money into this, but you
(29:16):
know, kind of you know, andwe've been talking about you
know really like what they'veaccomplished in a little bit of
like the future stuff.
But you know, this film has apretty like solid group of like
like a casting, you know.
I mean you know it's helmed bysigourney weaver, which you know
she was 29 years old in thatmovie.
(29:36):
Isn't that crazy like thinkingthat, like she was 29 years old
in this movie.
Speaker 1 (29:41):
Um yeah, and like she looks it she actually looks
young like.
Speaker 2 (29:45):
Sometimes I'll I'll like look back at old films and
I'll look to see how old theywere and they'll they'll be like
, yeah, there were, there were25 in this movie, but they look
like they were almost 40, youknow.
But she actually looked young.
Speaker 1 (29:56):
You know, I was actually surprised it's crazy
how young john hurt looked inthis yes, yeah, because most of
the john hurt performances thatI've seen have been a much older
john hurt right but yeah, he,there's a number of really,
really incredible actors in thismovie.
Speaker 2 (30:14):
Um, I'd say, ian home looked maybe a little younger
than he did in fellowship, likemaybe a lot a lot younger yeah,
I know no but he still lookedolder, though, though.
Speaker 1 (30:25):
No, he definitely was older.
Speaker 2 (30:28):
You could tell he was maybe touching 50.
He was definitely middle-aged,so yeah.
I mean you could tell he wasdefinitely older.
I mean obviously he didn't lookas old as Fellowship, but he
was getting there.
You could tell he was gettingup there in age john hurt.
Speaker 3 (30:49):
I mean oh yeah, john hurt, actually surprised me and
I know him best as the voice ofthe dragon in merlin.
So I I was like, wait, is thatthe merlin guy?
Uh, that was exciting.
And then, um, I don't know theactor's name, I forget the
character.
Uh, so it's the other darkhaired gentleman.
He was in the show big love.
(31:10):
He played like a very sleazy,basically like the head of the
mormons uh out there in uh utah.
Speaker 1 (31:17):
He plays the character brett.
Yes, um.
Speaker 3 (31:20):
So I he's, I don't know his name, yeah he's kind of
not a great guy, you know, inthe movie and yeah, I could buy
it like it's just like he, he'slike a character actor, I think,
who like just plays like kindof a a not great guy all the
time and he does it well.
So I was excited by the casting.
I I honestly, when they allwere on screen I was like, hey,
(31:41):
I know almost all these actorsyou know, so that was actually a
really cool thing to see andsee, uh, one of their earlier
works yeah, um, everyone didfantastically.
Speaker 1 (31:52):
Jen even commented like I don't understand.
People don't look like thisanymore.
Like you're looking at some ofthe cast and uh, so the other
female lambert she wasspecifically talking about her
and she's just like I've neverseen anyone who looks like that
and, it's true, like they justlook like they're from the
seventies.
You know it's it's a.
It's a really bizarre thing that, uh, I think everyone just has,
(32:16):
I um, like iPhone faces now,where everyone's used to looking
at a screen, so our faces arejust a little bit different.
It's the blue light morphing us, the blue light, yeah, oh, what
I?
What I?
I understand what I was tryingto say earlier.
Basically, it's the, the, theuse of the actual villain takes
(32:36):
a while and they do that to kindof put you at a state of unease
, because if they show you theirhands at the beginning, the
villain is no longer scary bythe end.
You know they want thatbuild-up, they want you to
emotionally feel uneasy whenyou're going into.
You know when you're finallyseeing the face on it, when
(32:57):
you're finally seeing the, thechest burster and then finally
it's.
You know final form, um, andthey knew their limitations.
You know, like, this is a guyin a rubber suit, but they
didn't want it to look likedoctor who you know, like they,
they wanted it to or god.
Speaker 2 (33:14):
They wanted it to look like a.
Speaker 1 (33:16):
They didn't want it to look like godzilla, so they
they kept the creature inshadows and only showed very
sparse glimpses at it, justenough to freak you the heck out
.
And they do a pretty good jobof it for a 1979 film yeah, yeah
, I like the, the utilization ofdarkness, it it definitely it.
Speaker 2 (33:39):
it definitely works well with this type of movie and
I mean honestly that they havea game called alien isolation
and it kind of uses like thesimilar you know you've got the
xenomorph, you're trying toavoid it and it's, you know
it'll pop up on you at any timepretty much like this one.
You know you're not gunsblazing, you know, like some of
(34:02):
the later ones, but yeah, thisone is this one.
They did well because, I mean,you're right, you said that they
knew their limitations and theyslotted well into that.
You know, and even though theydid show, like you know, a full
body xenomorph, it with thecamera work, it didn't look
(34:24):
corny no, it doesn't, and andthey're only showing.
Speaker 1 (34:29):
I love the extreme close-ups too.
There's a lot of extremeclose-ups on people's faces in
this movie, um, to show eitherfear or just to like, give you a
unique glimpse at the person orcharacter.
And uh, they do a lot of extremeclose-ups of like the, the
sleek shine, of like the dome onthe xenomorph's head, or just
like it's slowly opening itsmouth and like strobe lighting
(34:53):
to like, because strobe lightingis uneasy to look at.
You know like it's hard to.
You know see movement.
And when you eliminate movementwith a strobe light, that also
helps heighten, like the, theunease of everything.
Speaker 3 (35:08):
So the only thing I thought and and this is probably
my space balls, this is my, myspace balls like background when
the z, when the chestburstercomes out, I just the way it
kind of like skitters off screenit it just reminded me of in
Spaceballs when the chestbursterjumps into song and dance on
the diner top.
(35:29):
So I giggled when I saw himskitter because I was like I
just in my head heard like hellomy baby, hello my darling, you
know, like that same exact scenefrom Spaceballs.
Speaker 2 (35:42):
So that's the only time that I felt like the
xenomorph took me out of it,like just that little skittering
you know, thinking back like tothe 1970s and like kind of what
they did with like horror filmsback then, you know it was
really hard to make like aserious one that didn't look
corny, you know, and like theacting wasn't like over the top,
(36:04):
like you know, like, know, likeoh you know, like.
It didn't look corny Like, butthis movie they didn't show fear
in a way that looked corny, itlooked genuine.
And so like I really have tolike put it up to like the
actors for really like actingvery well and making, making a
film that just set off thiswhole series, that we're still
(36:27):
getting stuff today yeah, yeah,um, and it's, it's kind of
bigger than ever right nowbecause, uh, we just had a very
successful alien movie intheaters, um, and it was a very
good one like I was.
Speaker 1 (36:39):
I'm blown away by how well um romulus was and I've
heard very good things about thefirst.
I think there's four episodesnow of alien earth, so I'm
excited to to dive into thatsoon and I'm hoping to to start
making like timeline contentwith you know, I want to make
individual short uh videocontent for the alien series.
(37:02):
Um, slowly working my way up tosomething a little bit bigger,
but yeah, so you mentionedanthony that uh, you were like
were you specifically talkingabout the chestburster scene
that everyone was like super,you could tell like the fear was
like real or not, notspecifically the the
chestburster scene, but likethere's that, and then the build
(37:24):
up to when the xenomorph umthis scene right here yes, so
behind anthony, uh it's.
Speaker 2 (37:30):
It's a scene where, uh, lambert the, the other
female, is confronted by thexenomorph and she's unable to
get around it or do anything andshe and she's crying, but like,
like it looks genuine, like itdoesn't look fake, like I don't
know, know, like I've seen someof, like you know, older horror
movies that are from around thesame era and a lot of them are,
(37:54):
like, really corny, but likethis one, I felt like it broke
through like some stereotypeswhen it came to horror.
I mean it was also partly asci-fi movie but I mean, like, I
mean the main element of it ishorror.
You know, they're building up,like you said, there's that
existential dread that builds upthroughout the film until you
(38:16):
get to the climax.
And yeah, man, dude, it's.
It might not be the one thatmost people talk about.
A lot of people talk about thesecond one.
That's the one that, like youprobably saw most clips of rich
was the second one, but I like,like dakota said you, you have
to respect it, you have toappreciate what this film did
(38:39):
can dakota?
Speaker 3 (38:40):
you're a timeline guy .
When did aliens come out, likeyear wise?
Yeah, because I'm trying tofigure out like I remember
seeing the toys so like.
That's essentially why Ithought this was an action
franchise, because I rememberlike the action figures of like
riley and like the xenomorphsand stuff were a big deal in toy
stores when I was younger so itum, it took a quite a quite a
(39:02):
while for a sequel to come out.
Speaker 1 (39:04):
It came out in 1986, this one came out in 79.
Speaker 3 (39:07):
So uh like so maybe seven, eight, eight years later,
so maybe it was three, threewhen three came out.
I think that's when I saw that.
I remember seeing the toys instores that would make sense.
Speaker 1 (39:17):
Yeah, the three, I think was 91 that makes more
sense.
Speaker 3 (39:21):
Yeah, because I would have been.
I would have been nine okay.
Speaker 1 (39:23):
So I want to go back to the chestburster scene, uh,
because that has, uh, a prettyiconic piece of like filming
lore behind it.
Basically, the cast knewsomething was going to happen,
but they did not know what.
And they they understood that,like, basically they were told
(39:46):
all right, just just eat yourfood, have a good time.
And something's going to happento John Hurt's character.
John Hurt obviously knew whatneeded to happen.
You know, he acted his heartout with that.
It was a disgusting performanceof him, like just coughing up
his food and shoving food in hisface.
But everyone else had no ideathat there was going to be an
(40:09):
alien that bursts out of JohnHurt's chest, that's so cool
which is such an insane thing tocommit to doing.
That's amazing and also to putonto your cast.
But they all, it was perfect,they kept in character.
Because I'm trying to thinklike if I was present, obviously
(40:29):
I would know that this is afilm and that we're doing
special effects, but I would belike wait what.
Like because you could see themoment there's like blood
spurting out of his chest beforethe chestburster even pops up.
You see Sigourney weaver justlike kind of like take a step
back, like what you know, likeshe didn't realize that there
(40:52):
was something underneath his,you know, underneath his shirt
or whatever.
So I think that that's such acool uh bit of uh like
filmmaking lore, because I likeit when you do that it colors
the whole, the whole filmmakingbehind it and, like the, it
makes it actually really scary,because these are people
actually terrified because theyhave no idea what's coming yeah,
(41:15):
yeah, I, I love it when they dostuff like that, when they
withhold like certain pieces ofinformation from from.
Speaker 2 (41:23):
Like you know, you're trying to get like a good scene
and I feel, I feel like thatscene was perfect for nobody
else to know what's going tohappen, except for you know the
subject, that that happened.
You know john hurt.
So, yeah, yeah, I remember that.
Actually I didn't it.
(41:45):
That's been a piece ofinformation.
I sat in the back of my minduntil when, until you actually
brought it up, I was like, oh mygosh, I remember that dude.
Yeah, that's awesome yeah yeah,I completely, I man.
Speaker 1 (41:57):
Now I kind of want to go back and watch that scene,
like now that I remember thisyeah, because if you, if you
watch it now, that you know thatthese people didn't know what
was happening, you could tell,tell genuine surprise is on
their face.
It's really cool Going intoSpaceballs a couple years later.
When was Spaceballs?
(42:18):
I think it was the same year orthe year after Return of the
Jedi.
Speaker 3 (42:23):
I think it's 83.
Speaker 1 (42:24):
Okay, so the same year as Return of the Jedi.
And there's this scene at theend where I think it's 83.
Okay, so same year as return ofthe jedi.
And there's the scene at theend where I think it's john hurt
in a diner yes and, and he'sjust, you know, he's having a
good time, they're having alaugh and all of a sudden, he,
he's doing the same exact thingagain.
He's, and he's actually sayingnot again, not again.
Speaker 3 (42:43):
It's it.
You know what.
I'm so glad you said it wasjohn hurt, because when I see it
happening right, I'm going.
Man, like this is not just likekind of familiar, like it looks
like the same guy and I now Ijust love mel brooks, by the way
.
I'll.
I'll correct before ouraudience does.
Space balls was actually 87 87.
Speaker 1 (43:03):
Okay, very good, thank you for checking that.
What did we think of ian homeas the android like and and like
his?
Because you can argue that he'sactually the villain of the
movie, because it's.
It becomes apparent that thiswasn't a random stop that they
(43:25):
made on their trip.
You know, someone programmedthem to go here, uh, and he very
, very much, you know, nurturedthe aliens growth throughout the
entire film until, you know, toa point where, like, obviously,
like he was trying to keep thealien alive, like he was trying
to, you know, bring it back toearth.
(43:45):
What?
At what point, rich, did yourealize that ian holm was the
bad guy or a bad guy?
Speaker 3 (43:51):
I'm not saying he is the bad guy, but yeah well, it's
funny because so when he, whenhe breaks the protocol to, you
know, let the guy come on.
I think probably, you know,obviously probably a little
problematic for me is that goinginto it.
I knew that, like, the aliensare bad, right.
Speaker 1 (44:08):
So when I see like oh , let's get it Not fun aliens
yeah.
Speaker 3 (44:12):
You know, let's get him on the ship.
I'm thinking like, what are youdoing?
Like I forget protocol, likehow about survival?
Like you guys don't really seemto be a cohesive team, right,
they don't like seem to havereal, true, like love and care
for each other.
So, no, I'm like what are youdoing?
(44:32):
Like scientifically, like as ayou know why would you do that?
So I didn't figure it out, Ididn't get it until sigourney
weaver gets it that he's bad,right.
And then, yeah, the, the whatI'll call is the milk teardrop,
right, is like forming and I'mlooking and I'm going that's a
really weird effect.
I'm like, why is it white?
And I thought that it just wasme, like I, it's such a maze,
(44:54):
it's such an amazing scene,because I ignored it away until,
like he splits open and I think, like my dog had come into the
room or something.
So I'm like, wait, what?
And I had to like rewind and Iwas like, what?
He's a robot.
Uh, that blew my mind.
Uh, I won't lie, like I had noidea, didn't see it coming at
all.
Speaker 2 (45:14):
And then I was like, oh, so that's why he's the worst
, you know, that's why he's socold and calculating and you
know like there's just somethingnasty about like that milky
substance that was like pullingout, like I feel like if it was
like like oily, like if it wasblack, it wouldn't, it would
have been like whatever, butlike that white substance just
(45:35):
made it look worse.
Speaker 3 (45:37):
Yeah, there's something inherently I think
kind of off putting about thatand I was thinking about it.
I was like, if he's a robot,why isn't it oil or grease?
You know why isn't it darkabout it?
I was like, if he's a robot,why isn't it oil or grease?
You know why isn't it dark?
And I and now that you say that, I think I would have been like
it would have been a clue thatI would have picked up on too
quickly.
But because it was that milky,you know substance, you're like
(45:57):
what is that?
And it's that's enough to holdyou off for a couple more
minutes, like that's brilliantto me.
That was brilliant.
His hair gel's dripping oh no,he's he.
He accidentally booked a uh uhspeech at the wrong place and
now he's oh, man, oh, but yeah,it was.
(46:17):
It was really very well done.
I yeah kudos to like I didn'tsee it coming and then when you
go back, I think the best typesof surprises.
The foreshadowing was rightthere, but you miss it, you know
, and he, it was so good did youget an opportunity to watch
this like a second time, or youjust?
Speaker 1 (46:37):
it was just the one?
Speaker 3 (46:38):
time, I watched it twice okay the second time.
Speaker 1 (46:41):
Did you see all of the instances where he was
purposely yes, um like, insteadof keeping them outside for
quarantine?
Speaker 3 (46:50):
he's just like nope, it's like yeah it was like, oh
my, like it was that it feelsrewarding, almost, to watch it
and see it again and see howwell it's done and and you could
see, like you know, yeah, likeon that that second watch, like
(47:10):
every instance that he was likegoing against the grain of the
crew.
Speaker 2 (47:15):
You know, at that point you're like hmm, like why?
Like what?
What?
What's this guy like why?
Why does he care?
You know, and then you you seethat you know he, he got those
orders from the company he keptsaying we haven't finished
collating, and I'm just like,yeah, that's a very normal thing
for a person to say.
(47:37):
Like nobody on that ship wouldsay anything like that but him.
But yeah, no, and you know itis.
I think it was such a smartmove Because you go into the
movie and I'm pretty sure, likethis was rich, you go into the
movie knowing that there's goingto be this alien creature right
in there, but you're notexpecting there to be like a
(48:01):
secondary antagonist, right Didnot see that coming.
You know, yeah, like he, prettymuch yeah, and Dakota Dakota's
right in a way, like you couldsay that he is the villain of
the story because he made it sothis creature was able to fully
form and almost kill everybody.
Speaker 1 (48:21):
So, rich, you mentioned earlier that nobody
had any love for each other, andthat's, that's on purpose.
You know, these are just peopledoing a job.
They're, they're tasked to shipor from one planet to another.
You know they're going back toearth at this point.
But the actual ship name,nostromo, has some actual
(48:42):
meaning, um, and when you takethat into consideration, the
whole plot makes a lot moresense.
So the the nostromo is namedafter, uh, there's a book by
joseph conrad from like theearly 19th century or sorry, the
early 20th century, it wasearly 1900s where it's the name
(49:02):
of the ship and that ship inthat book, or yeah, in that book
, it basically signifies likeit's a story of exploitation of
labor force.
And that's exactly what thecompany because they don't
really call it wayland yutani inthis movie, they, they just
call it the company.
They are exploiting the, thelabor force, for whatever reason
(49:28):
to, so that they can gainaccess to the secrets of this
alien.
So that's that's whyley Scottnames their ship the Nostromo,
because it puts the emphasis oncorporate capitalist greed and
each of the crew members hasmoments of thinking for
(49:52):
themselves, not necessarily inthe movie, in the original
drafts of this movie and thenovelization, which fleshes out
the characters quite a bit more.
You see a lot of the selfishnessof each of the cast.
You see a little bit of it whenParker's like we should get a
bonus, we need a full share.
But there's a lot more of thatin the novel, or the
(50:18):
novelization of it, from prettymuch everyone.
I don't.
I think Ripley isn't reallyincluded in that, she's the only
one just trying to do her job,but I just think that's kind of
like a cool little background.
Detail is the Nostromo is namedafter a Joseph Conrad book from
like the early 1900s and itmeans corporate greed basically,
(50:40):
and that's what we we seehappening throughout this whole
movie.
This whole, this wholeadventure is stemmed by
corporate greed.
It's really that's.
Speaker 3 (50:47):
That's a really like nice easter egg there that I
didn't um pick up on, but, um,you got me, you got me searching
it now and I'm just, uh, I'mgonna have to go read some more
joseph conrad.
I mean, I thought heart ofdarkness was it, but I think, uh
, they wouldn't have to dive inhere heart of darkness is not
where joseph conrad ends.
Speaker 1 (51:03):
My friend, I love this movie.
I, I think, coming back to itnow with fresh eyes and just
eager to you know, experiencethe whole series instead of just
bite-sized portions of it,because each of the films is
fairly separate in uh, in toneand story, because you have the,
(51:26):
the original four, withSigourney Weaver in it, but then
the.
There's two prequels that don'thave Sigourney Weaver in it at
all, and they're more.
I don't even know how todescribe it.
It's more like an explanationof, like, the origins of uh,
faith and the universe andeverything, and it's like uh,
have you seen Prometheus Anthony?
(51:47):
long time ago yeah, I mean I'mexcited to get to that one,
because I think a lot of peoplewrote it off as being like, uh,
trying way too hard, but I thinkit's probably the smartest film
in the series.
Um, I think it's just.
I think it's really good we'recoming up on an hour.
We can keep going for a littlebit more yeah, yeah, we can.
Speaker 2 (52:09):
We can, uh, go back to the good old days.
Speaker 1 (52:12):
You know, hit a two-hour podcast, two and a half
so another thing that I thoughtwas interesting is, um, the.
The film is very vague on abunch of stuff and it's
purposely vague on a bunch ofstuff.
Uh, we mentioned they didn'tgive a name to the, the alien
species in this movie.
That's something that comeslater in the series.
(52:35):
They didn't even give Ripley.
They didn't give SigourneyWeaver a first name in this
movie.
She's just Ripley.
Everyone in this movie only hasa last name Kane, parker,
lambert, brett, dallas, ripley.
They all have only a last nameand a designation on the ship.
(52:56):
So it's basically likeeverything is stripped down to
its base stuff that you need toknow basically what they do on
this ship, why they're here andwhat they're going to call each
other.
So I think that's pretty cool.
We don't learn that her name isEllen Ripley until later.
But yeah, and the same with thecompany.
(53:18):
They don't name the company byverbiage in this movie.
It's on some background, easter.
There's some Easter eggs of thename of the company,
weyland-yutani in the background.
So there's a lot of it.
You don't even know what timeperiod, uh, this film takes
place and it doesn't give you adate.
You only learn like when thismovie takes place in future
(53:41):
movies because they can backdateit.
It's, it's the whole idea ofgive them as little as possible
but just enough so that theyunderstand, uh, their setting.
Basically, and it just, it,just it's meant to disorient you
and I think they did a good jobbecause I'm I haven't been
(54:01):
right.
Speaker 2 (54:01):
Ever since I watched this, I've been disoriented
because I was like I need tocontinue so that I can get on
the timeline.
We know, we know that you'retimeline obsessed and so this
movie, with a lack of its time,is just throwing you through a
loop man it really?
Speaker 1 (54:19):
yeah, no, but it's, it's.
I think it's an easy ishtimeline once they start like
actually giving you dates.
It's just no dates in this one.
But, um, guys, I think we shallcall it here, let's.
Let's give some last thoughtson Alien and get all riled up
for Aliens.
Right, riley Next week.
Speaker 3 (54:40):
Riley, ripley, ripley , sorry.
Speaker 1 (54:44):
That's OK, Rich.
What did you?
What are your final thoughts onthis first Alien film?
Speaker 3 (54:48):
So I think I went in with expectations of Alien 3 and
got a very different experience.
I as usual my first watch I was, like you know, this is a
horror movie.
The end of the movie is what Ireally liked, as it started to
ramp up, probably from fromchest bursting on, like I was, I
(55:10):
was invested.
I'm really excited to explorethe rest of the franchise and if
this is a building block that Ineeded to digest in order to
enjoy the franchise as itevolves, then I'm happy I
engaged in it.
If this was a standalone movie,just this and nothing else was
(55:32):
after it, I'd say it was good.
It was really well done.
I can acknowledge the craft,but it's not my type of movie.
So I'm you know, I'm a littlelike I know about the alien
versus predator movies and, likeman, I love predator, like that
guy.
So I was expecting kind of likepredator-ish stuff with
(55:52):
sigourney weaver and that's notwhat I got here.
But that's my own fault.
So definitely recommended towatch something that was
exceptionally well done in atime with limited resources um,
before I hand it over to Anthony.
Speaker 1 (56:08):
Uh, I, I like what you said there.
Specifically, this is abuilding block to what comes
next.
I think you need this movie tofeel any sort of weight for the
character of ripley um and afear of the alien, you know so.
So keep that moving forward,because it is an important film,
(56:29):
not just for like film history,but in this franchise, like
it's, it is the.
It is a new hope for thisseries.
Um, anthony, go ahead yeah, manit.
Speaker 2 (56:40):
It'd been a long time since I had seen this movie.
I would say that I've seenaliens more than I've seen the
original alien, but I have seenthe first two more than I've
seen, uh, three and four, so itwas nice to go back to this.
I always like it when, when wepick something, that kind of has
(57:02):
me go back to it because Idon't know if I would have gone
back to this movie anytime soon.
Not because I hate it, justbecause you know, just like I
really.
You know it hasn't been on myradar, you know, to watch the
first alien movie, but I'm gladthat we did and I really do feel
like coming into this.
(57:22):
I I did notice a bit more and Idid feel a lot more of an
appreciation for it, for thetime period that it came out and
for what they were able toaccomplish.
And, yeah, that the fact thatthis is it came out and for what
they were able to accomplish,and, yeah, that the the fact
that this is one of thefoundations for what we have
today.
Speaker 1 (57:41):
Yeah, I really liked this movie.
I I'm happy that we like likeAnthony said, revisited it
because I'm able to appreciateit with a new eyes and a new
like perspective on art andeverything and filmmaking.
So that's awesome and I'mexcited to jump into future
films in this franchise.
Uh, next week yes, next week.
(58:03):
Aliens sounds good episode 132aliens with an s at the end.
Uh guys, thank you so much forlistening to us here for our
131st episode of ProjectGeekology.
We appreciate all the screamsthat we couldn't hear, but we
know it was scary at timeslistening to three white men.
(58:27):
But I'm going to end this now,I'm just going to ramble.
Guys, if you want to check outany of our socials, be sure to
click into our show notes downbelow and click something.
You'll find something new.
Have a good one.
Speaker 2 (58:43):
Oh yeah, and don't forget to give us Dakota.
It's your turn.
There's something that werequire of our listeners.
Speaker 1 (58:59):
Not require, but we ask of, we ask, uh, we ask with
the flamethrower to the back ofyou, um now, uh, yeah, so
there's something that we weusually like uh receiving here
on this podcast, a, a favor ofsorts.
It's kind of like a it's afive-star juicy review,
specifically, I didn't knowwhere the favor was going.
Speaker 3 (59:21):
I was like whoa it's just a review.
Speaker 1 (59:25):
Five stars make it juicy like ian holmes.
Uh like milky, milky innardsyeah, I was looking at that same
exact thing, or perfect, youknow crunchy or or crunchy, like
, like the, the shell of thealien and the chestburster, you
know, the exoskeleton,everything it's.
(59:47):
It's a.
It's one of those movies youget, you get a little juice, you
get a little crunch.
Give us a five star review,people.
That's, that's what we'retrying to beg for you.
Welcome back to Project Geekology, the show
where we can't hear if youscream.
Basically, if you're screamingon the other side of this, I
genuinely, literally cannot hearyou, similar to how the poster
for this movie that we're goingto be covering today is in space
.
Nobody can hear you scream.
I was actually listening to theaudiobook like novelization of
(00:22):
Alien 1979 at work this week andI kept thinking at work, no one
can hear if I scream.
But that's not actually true.
There are other people thereand if I did scream while I was
listening to that audio book, itwould have been a bad time.
It would have been veryconfusing for others.
But anyway, all that preambleout of the way.
My name is Dakota.
I am joined as always with andjoining us, as always is rich
(00:49):
was it?
Speaker 2 (00:49):
well, welcome back.
You know, we uh, last week itwas just rich and I, we, we
covered the last of us, seasonone and the first video game.
We kind of did a little bit ofa you know, comparison and a
contrast.
So you know, now we're, now wegot you back here to talk about
the tall blue people the tallblue people, or am I talking
(01:11):
about the?
Wrong.
Sigourney weaver movie I mean,there are aliens in that one and
sigourney weaver is in it, soso technically I am right, it is
alien but and j and JamesCameron has touched this
franchise.
Speaker 1 (01:25):
So, yeah, we're talking Avatar people, Not Alien
.
We've switched it up on Rich.
Speaker 3 (01:31):
He hasn't seen Avatar either.
Speaker 1 (01:34):
No, we're talking Alien.
Yeah, I'm really excited totalk about Alien because this is
a movie series that was I don'tknow if it was big in my
household growing up, but it wasone of those series.
That's revered series, theoriginal quadrilogy, but really
the first two are the ones thatwere at least regularly spoken
(01:55):
about or we used lines from themovies in our dialogue.
Like I can remember, it's gameover man, which is from the
second movie.
Rich has no idea what I'mtalking about, but we will get
there because, friends, we havea very special plan for the next
couple weeks.
Actually, it's a little morethan a couple weeks.
We're going to be covering eachof the Alien movies and the TV
(02:18):
series that's currently airing,in the order that they came out.
So Alien, aliens, alien 3, andso on Resurrection, prometheus,
covenant, romulus, and thenAlien Earth.
So we're not doing the AVPmovies as they are not canon.
Only really the first one isany good, I think.
But anyway, before we jump intoour discussion of Alien, I want
(02:41):
to hear a little bit about howit went for you guys.
Last week you said that you hadthat mini, or not a mini, so
you had a full podcast tocompare and contrast of the last
of us, the first season, versusthe first game.
How did that go without me?
I haven't listened to theepisode yet.
Speaker 2 (02:56):
I think we're pretty good.
I mean, you know, I've I've hada, I've had a couple episodes
that were full episodes that Idid without you with some other
friends.
So you know that that's.
It's been a while now.
Like you know, we've been backat it regularly.
How did it feel, rich, withoutDakota there?
I mean, you know, you kind ofcame into the fold via Dakota
(03:18):
and then you your first, youknow, duo episode was with me
and not Dakota.
Speaker 3 (03:24):
I had a great time.
I mean, you know, obviously,dac, we missed you, uh, but I,
you know, I I had been doing Ithink I mentioned earlier but I
used to do, uh a podcast with abuddy of mine about wrestling.
So I'm just I've kind of Ithink actually with you guys was
one of the first times or thatI consistently did a
three-person podcast.
I found, you know, I kind offell back into the old habits of
(03:45):
the two-on-two and I will say Iproudly think that I managed to
not really mention the secondgame or season which is, as
listeners know, here I do haveto share.
I have been.
There are sanctions placed uponme by my podcast brethren.
Here, where I normally will,they'll say, hey, watch this,
(04:06):
and then I watch all of it.
But I've been told for the nextcouple of weeks I have to
control myself and only watchone thing at a time.
So it should be.
I think that it'll be nice forthe next couple weeks that
nobody will be like, hey, why isthis guy talking about the next
one again?
Uh, because I'll actually befocused on what we watch.
Speaker 2 (04:25):
I'll just watch them like five times yeah, yeah, no,
no, like when we talked aboutthe last of us.
You know, we just said that.
You know that there's stuffthat was set up for like the
next, the next game, or like thenext, uh, the, the next season,
or two, but yeah, no, we, um,we, we, we pretty much kept it
straight in the, the first gamein the first season.
(04:48):
So, yeah, man, not not bad, butyes, we have put sanctions and
embargoes on rich, you knowwe're just paying tariffs on it
for for every, for every mistake.
Speaker 1 (05:03):
Uh, so, guys, uh, what have you been up to this
this past week, anthony?
Speaker 2 (05:06):
we'll start with you well, yeah, man, while, while
you're gone, we, you know, justlike we spoke, we, we made the
episode.
You know, if you guys are fansof the the last of us, go and
give that a listen.
Yeah, man, like I've been, I'vebeen playing overwatch again.
I got the the new season justdropped.
You know, so, so happy we gotthe beautiful you just dropped.
You know, so, so happy we gotthe beautiful.
You know, persona 5collaboration that's coming out.
(05:30):
You know, I had to let Dakotaknow that.
You know, we, actually, Iactually mentioned that in the
last podcast.
I was like, you know, I had tomess with Dakota on that, but
yeah, I said, and then we alsosaid that one of these days
we're going to bring you intothe fold, even though I don't
know, has rich played?
Have you played any of thegames?
Speaker 3 (05:49):
I've only.
I only know about it becauselike I searched up the image,
like I wrote the thing afterthere.
Speaker 2 (05:56):
Yeah, I have no idea one of these days one of these
days y'all are going to join thefold, but yes, but yeah, I know
that.
And then just hopping kind ofinto world of warcraft, I want
to.
I'm trying to get myself one ofthose uh, in-game houses that
you can get in retail.
Now I'm trying to.
I've been saving my money, sooh yeah, what is up with that?
(06:17):
yeah, yeah.
Yeah, there's like in-gamehousing you can get like.
So there's like public, likeneighborhoods where it's like a
solo, like you get your house,and then there's like you know
just kind of randoms.
And then you could do privateneighborhoods where it's like
guilds or like friends can getthem together and like have like
houses like kind of next toeach other.
It's pretty cool.
(06:38):
I want to like play with somefriends so that we can do like a
private neighborhood.
That'd be awesome.
Speaker 1 (06:44):
How's the school zones in your neighborhood?
Speaker 2 (06:47):
Non-existent.
Speaker 1 (06:48):
Perfect.
Speaker 2 (06:50):
Just how I like them.
Speaker 1 (06:52):
Let's throw it over to you.
What have you been up to thispast week?
Speaker 3 (06:55):
Well, let's see, the school is in almost full swing,
so we had to start go back.
Speaker 1 (07:01):
You're starting up, yeah.
Speaker 3 (07:02):
So we started Monday.
We're recording on thursday.
So I I'm the head coach of thecross-country uh track team,
which is um absurd, because Idon't like to run for distance.
I don't really run, unless I'mrunning to the mets game because
I'm running late.
So, uh, this is new for me, uh,but I'm having a really good
(07:23):
time, other than getting up ateight in the morning and doing
that.
Speaker 1 (07:26):
And, hypothetically, if you were in the Nostromo,
would you be running from thealien?
Speaker 3 (07:30):
Oh yeah, no, no, I mean, that's different, like
I'll.
I mean, I'm actually going toget knee surgery in the next
couple of months and my mydoctor essentially said to me
hey, well, I got to get both.
I got to get both my aclsreconstructed.
Oh, man that stinks, so youknow that stinks, but my mom
(07:50):
just had knee surgery like twodays ago.
So yeah, it's I mean it's crazybecause they did say it's an
outpatient procedure, so I'll belike going in and coming home
that day, uh, and then I'll justhave a couple weeks off.
Would not great for a trackcoach to uh be hobbled.
But this is really what made meget the surgery, guys, and
we'll move on from negativethings.
I said to myself if a zombieapocalypse happens right now, is
(08:12):
your acl strong enough to notbuckle when you need to get away
from some of those fast fastwalkers?
And I realized my knee is in noshape to protect my family if
there is a zombie apocalypse.
So I need to get these.
Uh, I need to get fixed up likesix million dollar man, and
then I will be.
I don't know if that referenceis too old for everybody, but
(08:33):
I'll be good we got it we got it, we're not.
Speaker 1 (08:37):
We're not mental invalids um and how did uh?
Speaker 3 (08:41):
but I think you had a I mean my debbie downer week.
I don't think I can compare toyour week.
Speaker 2 (08:47):
Yeah, man, we like we essentially did nothing
compared to you.
Yeah, we're bearing the lead.
Speaker 1 (08:52):
You're the lead here I, I, uh, I went abroad.
I was in iceland, the land offire and ice.
Maybe you've heard of it.
Uh, they've filmed some stuffthere, um, batman Begins, game
of Thrones, the Secret Life ofWalter Mitty, and the list goes
on.
Sorry, I was just trying tofigure out a couple of things
(09:13):
that were just like wereactually filmed in Iceland, but
completely separate.
Yeah, it's a beautiful country.
It's a place I've been before Iwent in 2019.
So this was me going back.
Speaker 2 (09:27):
Dude, you've gone so, so many times, I feel like I
feel like you've gone at leastlike five times in your life to
iceland.
Speaker 1 (09:33):
No, this is I remember you went when you were
younger.
Speaker 2 (09:36):
I feel like you went like maybe set like several
years later and then maybe like2019 and I I feel like you've
gone I've gone to europe acouple times.
I remember you going to icelandlike a few times.
I do remember 2019.
You've got.
I mean, how many times wouldyou say like it's been at least?
Speaker 1 (09:54):
it's definitely been at least three times I promise
you, I've only been to icelandtwice like I.
That's a.
Speaker 2 (10:00):
It's a trip that I would not forget I feel like you
went when, when you wereyounger.
You know what happens.
Speaker 3 (10:06):
Do you remember?
You don't remember this era ofhis life, Anthony.
This is when he was given thered kryptonite.
Oh, okay, so he can't remember,so he can't remember, yeah.
Speaker 1 (10:16):
You guys are gaslighting me into, like
vacations I never took, and nowI'm depressed because I don't
got those memories.
Did you hook?
And now I'm depressed because Idon't got those memories.
Did you go to the lava?
You just forgot them.
I did not do the lava show.
I thought about it and I I kindof wanted to.
It did look kind of cool.
I knew it wasn't like real lava, like they.
It wasn't like lava like fromthe volcano, it's like just
heated rock.
So I was just like I will skipit for now, but I did do the
(10:41):
Blue Lagoon.
I did.
We saw a lot of waterfalls.
We did like a like an icebergboat tour where, like we, we saw
like the big glacier and itlike as it slowly melts,
basically it breaks up into hugeicebergs that eventually like
(11:02):
melt down into pocket-sizedlittle handheld ice cubes, uh,
or not.
Well, they can be handheld,yeah, but like some of them are,
um, you know, like man-sized,some of them are like just torso
size.
We, uh, we ended up grabbing,like me and my family, we found
a really perfect piece of icethat had a little like crevice
(11:24):
in the center.
So we took like icelandic vodkaand we were taking shots off of
it.
We were like holding the ice upso like ancient ancient ice,
potentially thousands of yearsold, uh distilling our um you uh
yeah, that was cool, you werechasing your alcohol with
ancient water.
Speaker 3 (11:46):
I drove onto the glacier and we got a bottle of
water when I was there, but youjust trumped me there.
You're like, I'm using it tocool the vodka.
I'm like, man, that's a bettertrip than mine.
Speaker 1 (12:00):
To be fair, we weren't using it to cool the
vodka.
It was like a perfect littlechannel.
So we were pouring shots ontothe ice and just bringing yeah,
it was an ice luge.
Yeah, and it was.
It was, uh, it was for the.
Everyone had a good time,except for me, with that, um,
because I I ended up getting alot of like sand in my mouth,
because this is it.
(12:20):
These are ice, like ice chunksthat wash up on the beach.
So oh my gosh, that soundsterrible yeah, so I was, I was
gagging, I was like why?
Speaker 2 (12:32):
why do I feel like it's it only happens to you?
Like everybody else just getsit clear, like clear and free,
but you're like the one thatgets the mouthful of, I feel,
like stuff like it happens to mea lot too, like whenever, like
whenever I was with you and yourfamily doing anything like
everybody's always having a goodtime having something and I'm
like the one that's just gettingjust the ridiculous things
(12:55):
happening to me.
Um but, yeah that, that uh dideverybody go.
Speaker 1 (13:00):
Uh, it was, it was just me, me, jen, uh uh, and my
parents and my aunt and herhusband okay, that's cool,
that's cool man so we're seeingfernando over there.
Yeah, it was a good time.
Uh, we spent a lot of time inreykjavik such a beautiful city,
awesome people like.
It's just so fun staying outlate in in a city like that
(13:24):
because it literally doesn'tsleep.
It's the weirdest thing.
Like um, you see, you're likewalking the streets during the
day and it's really cool.
Lots of, lots of cool shops.
Obviously it's it's touristy,but it's touristy with like a
really cool vibe, because youdon't get touristy like that
anywhere else in the world.
But as soon as it's like afterlike 11 pm, um, the streets are
(13:47):
somehow even more busy, butthey're not tourists anymore.
It's just like the actualiceland people and they're the
nicest people to to hang outwith.
It's.
It's a really, really fun placethat's cool.
That's cool man I have yet to gorecommend it I have yet to go.
Speaker 2 (14:00):
It is on my list, along with new zealand uh, it's
expensive.
Speaker 1 (14:04):
Yeah, that's.
That's the one thing that Iwant to.
Uh, caution people listening.
It is such an awesome trip.
I cannot wait to go back.
Um, I do think it's like one ofthe coolest places I've ever
been.
Uh, just because of theextremes, like the extreme
jagged rocks, the, the lowvalleys, the black sand on the
beach, the fact that there'sglaciers, icebergs, volcanoes
(14:28):
that are regularly erupting it'sthe most extreme environment
that I've ever been to or everheard of.
But it's expensive.
Like.
I spent way more than Iexpected to.
Like, even just like randomstuff is just there.
Our dollar does not go far atall.
It's really, it's really bad.
Speaker 3 (14:47):
Yeah, they said that everything gets in.
I mean, basically everythinghas to be imported the land, is
not very agriable, right, soeverything gets imported and the
prices shoot up.
It's a little.
Yeah, I remember when I wasthere, one of the things I was
trying to go to sleep so I putthe Met game on.
Obviously it was like the timedifference, right, so it's like
one, two in the morning.
But when it's one two in themorning and it's dark outside
(15:10):
and you're watching the Met game, you're like, okay, stop being
a degenerate and go to sleep.
But when it's light outside,you're like, well, this is
allowed, because I was, you know, like my body.
My body couldn't shut downbecause it wasn't dark.
Speaker 1 (15:24):
Oh, what time of year did you go?
Speaker 3 (15:26):
I went in August, okay, so yeah.
Speaker 1 (15:28):
Yeah, so, anthony, that was another weird thing
Sunsets, at least when I wasthere around 9.30 pm, but
because of the arc of like,where the sun has to go, it
never gets fully dark, like itdoesn't get like true
astronomical dark, so you barelysee the stars in the sky.
It's fully dark Like it doesn'tget like true astronomical dark
, so we don't, you don't.
You barely see the stars in thesky, and we were.
(15:49):
I was fortunate enough that Idid catch, like a week, aurora
Borealis.
Speaker 3 (15:54):
Oh nice, we didn't catch that one.
Speaker 1 (15:57):
It was hard to see.
Like at first we thought, oh,it's just clouds in the sky.
But then you like look up atthe clouds and they're like,
wait, where did the clouds go?
And then they're over there,and then they're over there and
it's just like that's not howclouds work.
We're looking at the auroraborealis, but it's it was so
light out that we couldn't seethe true colors flashing,
basically like it needs to bereally dark for that.
(16:18):
But we get, like, if you I haveuh like pictures, uh that you
know, on the phone it it picksup the colors a little bit
better because it takes a longerexposure.
So it's green on my phone butit's white and wispy to the
naked eye.
Speaker 3 (16:35):
But I can talk about Iceland forever.
That's cool, yeah, but let'sjump into Alien.
Speaker 2 (16:41):
Oh sorry, no no, no, yeah, let's hop into it.
Speaker 1 (16:44):
All right, so let's talk a little bit about our
experience with alien.
I spoke a little bit about whatum it was like in my household.
Like we had the alienquadrility quadrilogy box set,
the dvd box set that came out Ithink in the early 2000s or
something.
Um, it has the first alien,first four Alien movies and I
(17:05):
remember watching them a coupletimes.
I think I only saw the thirdand fourth maybe once in my life
.
The first two I've seen a bunchof times.
I think the second one is justa little bit more fun.
It's a little bit more of likea classic science fiction movie
in my opinion.
Speaker 2 (17:23):
Yeah, the second one is classified as an action movie
, the first one is a horrormovie yeah, so it's it.
Speaker 1 (17:29):
The the series bends genres quite often, um, and it
kind of bounces around, uh, sothat's something that should be
exciting for you rich, um,because I think in the past
you've mentioned that you'reyou're into horror.
Speaker 3 (17:44):
Yeah, I actually I'm glad to hear you say that
because I've agreed to embark onthe journey no matter what.
But I'm not really a horror guy.
So as I started to watch this,you know I was like, because you
know you're building andbuilding right, so you're an
hour in and you're like whoa,what?
Like you know there's no, Iwant to say it's like an hour 45
(18:06):
minutes before you really getwhat the threat is going to be.
Yeah, it's a slow burn.
You know, my my just kind ofstay on that topic of like your
first experience, I never sawany of the movies before I
watched this one.
I know I know of them, right,I've seen like clips of stuff.
(18:27):
I've seen like I had seen likethe alien, like like drooling
over somebody type stuff.
I think I may have seen likescenes of part two or of aliens,
but not the first one.
And I think my first exposurewas actually this is a throwback
mad magazine.
I loved mad magazine and Ithink one of the first issues I
(18:51):
bought was like an alien parody,so I learned about alien
through that.
And then my second exposure wasspace balls oh, naturally yeah
because at the end of spaceballs, so like there's the
chestburster scene, yeah, I, Idon't.
I I assume that most people gointo this movie maybe not
knowing that scene, right.
So I, I I was like, oh no, ohno, I know it's gonna.
(19:16):
I saw space balls.
I'm like don't, don't get nearhim.
Uh, so those were my, thosewere like actually my only
interaction.
I mean, I knew sigurd niviverwas in it, right, like that much
, and I did expect it to be moreaction.
I was kind of surprised, solike that's what happened, like
48 minutes in whatever I'm going, hey, uh, there's not a lot of
(19:37):
action here.
This is a horror movie.
Speaker 1 (19:39):
I'm like this is a slow introduction of the villain
, you know, or of the monsterand even even like the first
five minutes is just shots oflike within the ship and
nobody's woken up yet but it'sjust it's.
It's ridley scott literallyaura farming as he turns on the
lights in the ship.
You know, it's just like, yeah,this is a cool shot, film it.
Yeah, this is a cool shot filmit and it's five minutes of that
(20:02):
and I get.
I gotta give it to him becausea lot of the shots are like
gorgeous.
You know, like the I I wouldnever think to show a computer
screen from the reflection of anunused helmet or like an unworn
helmet, like it's it.
That's like one of the firstshots we see and I'm just like
that's, that's cool.
Speaker 2 (20:21):
Like I wouldn't, I would have never thought to do
that you know, like I like thatyou say that because I mean you
think that this movie was wasmade in 1979.
You know it came out in 1979.
Like, what they were able toaccomplish, you know, with shots
like that and with the, theeffects, just it blows my mind
(20:43):
was what they were able toaccomplish.
Like you know, this was what acouple of years after Star Wars,
and I still, and I feel likethere were a lot more impressive
visuals with this one than,like you know, maybe Star Wars
Right, but this one is this,it's a, it's a different movie,
so they're trying to accomplishsomething else, but they do a
(21:04):
really good job at like puttingyou into outer space and
somewhere that's away from Earth.
It's believable.
Speaker 1 (21:12):
Yeah, anthony, what is your first memories of the
Alien franchise?
Speaker 2 (21:19):
Yeah, I remember seeing it years ago.
I don't remember it being oneof those.
It wasn't like a householdthing for me, but it was
definitely one of those moviesthat my dad grew up with and so,
like a lot of these movies thathe grew up with, you know, star
wars, alien, uh, you know justindiana jones, all that stuff.
(21:42):
You know I, he, like you know Iwatched it and yeah, I remember
watching alien.
I remember it being, you know I, yeah, I remember, like you
know, as a kid, you know it's a,the first one's a little bit
more boring because there's alot of talking, but then, like,
once you get to that towards theend, where the, where the, the
(22:03):
is is like being shown a littlebit more than than that's where,
like you know the edge, youknow like you're on the edge of
your seat.
It's, you know, I remember, yeah, that memory kind of being a
little bit um, a little bit ofafraid because it looks so weird
.
You know, like you don't seeany eyes.
I specifically remember themouth within the mouth.
(22:24):
That's always a visual thatI'll remember, you know, of the
alien, you know, like, when itopens its mouth, there's like
another mouth on the inside.
I'll never forget that and Iremember that as a kid, that
visual of like the mouth, likejust shooting into, you know,
buddy's face.
Speaker 1 (22:42):
Yeah, you know buddy's face.
Yeah, with alien, uh, I've kindof gone like back and forth and
back and forth as far as, like,do I even like this movie?
Not that I don't respect it, II do, I definitely do.
And I remember like being kindof scared of it when I was a kid
, but it wasn't like aterrifying movie, um, but as an
adult I think I experienced theexistential dread more than I
(23:07):
did when I was a kid.
The monster itself was scary,yes, but the impending doom that
you're feeling throughout theentire film is really impressive
.
It's almost like Lovecraftian.
You know, like, uh, there's acertain ominous uh tone that, um
(23:30):
, as soon as they basically landon that planet, or like when
they get the distress call, orwhen they, um, enter that alien
ship, and it's just a vastcavern of like bones on the wall
and it's just, it's the mostbizarre thing you've ever seen.
Which, by the way, coolest setsever.
I don't know how they did that.
Those are sets, you know, likesome of it is matte paintings
and everything.
But like there are like crazy,crazy sets that they built for
(23:55):
this and I'm just like, how didthey even think of this?
But yeah, that that cosmichorror, like, almost like a
mental, like your mind's tryingto wrap its head around
something that's much biggerthan you can imagine, and that's
the kind of like Lovecraftianthing that Ridley Scott was
(24:15):
trying to.
I'm assuming that Ridley Scottwas trying to like latch onto,
because, yeah, you feel sohelpless watching it yeah, I
agree, I know I said the respect.
Speaker 3 (24:25):
You're not sure if you like it, but you respect it.
Like I can see the craft, thecraft and acknowledge the level
of difficulty and the the I meanridley scott here is the best
of his craft.
Like he right, like at the timeperiod with lack of cgi and
everything, like he did a greatjob of creating he world build.
(24:49):
Like he spent a lot of timeworld building before we got to
see anything you know, and thatdoom builds, so the pacing is
great.
You know, like he does a reallygreat job with that.
The shots are inventive, um,but I don't know if I love it,
but I can.
Yeah but I do like I hate thecharacters in great gatsby, I
teach it every year almost well,I used to teach it every year.
(25:09):
I I hate read it almost, butit's meticulously crafted and I
can acknowledge how good, howwell it's done while you can
explain.
Speaker 1 (25:20):
You can understand that this is actually an amazing
story or an amazing uh work ofart, while also hating the
insides of it um yeah, no, I, Itotally get that, and so what I
what I was trying to say earlieris I've had this like wow, I
really love this movie.
Wow, it's not actually as good,or it's overblown, you know, or
(25:41):
it's not actually that scary.
But coming at it as a, you know, early 30s person who hasn't
seen it in a long time, Iappreciate it so much more
because I'm just I'm I'm justhere trying to understand the
artistic intent of like what isbeing uh shown to me, and I
think I, you know, I'm in aposition where I can see that
now I can pick up, uh, whatrelease god is putting down.
(26:04):
And he's putting down a lot oflike uh, just existential dread
and and I, I love how they, howhe handled that.
And you mentioned, rich, thatthere are like 45 minutes before
we even like get to see thelike the face hugger, you know,
and that's our first like realuh glimpse of the alien.
(26:27):
Then there's the chest bursarscene and the actual like
xenomorph that's actually theynever call it a xenomorph in
this movie do you guys have anunderstanding of the life cycle
of this species from this movie?
Speaker 3 (26:39):
I was trying to understand that personally,
because the latcher right you golike we get the latcher, who
presumably now like implants aseed right, but like when the
burster comes out, I would thinkthe burster would go to latch
mode and it doesn't.
Speaker 1 (26:54):
Right, I don't have a solid answer, but the way that
I understand it is if the facehugger, If the facehugger like
(27:19):
the latcher that you said, ifthat latched onto, say, a
primate, a gorilla, thechestburster and eventual alien
would look different, becauseit's taking our DNA Xenomorph.
Okay, it's in the name.
Yes, okay, yeah, yeah, okay,yeah, yeah.
So we do see variations.
I don't want to like spoil toomuch, but we do see variations
of the Xenomorph in future films.
Speaker 3 (27:33):
Would you compare this to the brood almost from
X-Men then when, like the, I'msorry, maybe I'm going too deep
in X-Men comic book stuff.
Speaker 1 (27:52):
But the brood, basically, were like the
Xenomorphs and when they tookover the X x-men, like it,
looked like wolverine, but axenomorph.
You know?
Yeah, no, I know what you'retalking about.
Um, yeah, I guess that would bethe comic book comparison.
Okay, anthony, we haven't heardfrom you in a while.
What's what's going throughyour mind right now?
Speaker 2 (28:01):
yeah, so I was kind of dancing around the name
because they they actually't sayXenomorph in this one, but yeah
.
Speaker 1 (28:07):
Yes, do they ever mention it in future films?
Speaker 2 (28:12):
Yes, they must Second one, they must Second movie
yeah, so yeah, no, I agree, it'salso like coming into this
movie knowing that you'rewatching it to discuss.
It also changes the lens of howyou watch it too.
And so, yeah, like you donotice a little bit more of like
(28:34):
the minor details, like you.
You talked about the sets.
The sets were very impressive,even.
Even I was even impressed withwhat they were able to do with
the xenomorph and I was actuallyanalyzing it because you know
it has like spines out of theback and like I kind of look at
it and be like you know, whatdid they use to to make that
(28:55):
right?
You know, I try to analyze tosee if I can notice any, any
like you know, maybe householditem that they might have used
right, like some tubing from,from a vacuum cleaner or
whatever, but it's, it all looksimpressive.
It doesn't look cheap.
You know they really do put alot of money into this, but you
(29:16):
know, kind of you know, andwe've been talking about you
know really like what they'veaccomplished in a little bit of
like the future stuff.
But you know, this film has apretty like solid group of like
like a casting, you know.
I mean you know it's helmed bysigourney weaver, which you know
she was 29 years old in thatmovie.
(29:36):
Isn't that crazy like thinkingthat, like she was 29 years old
in this movie.
Speaker 1 (29:41):
Um yeah, and like she looks it she actually looks
young like.
Speaker 2 (29:45):
Sometimes I'll I'll like look back at old films and
I'll look to see how old theywere and they'll they'll be like
, yeah, there were, there were25 in this movie, but they look
like they were almost 40, youknow.
But she actually looked young.
Speaker 1 (29:56):
You know, I was actually surprised it's crazy
how young john hurt looked inthis yes, yeah, because most of
the john hurt performances thatI've seen have been a much older
john hurt right but yeah, he,there's a number of really,
really incredible actors in thismovie.
Speaker 2 (30:14):
Um, I'd say, ian home looked maybe a little younger
than he did in fellowship, likemaybe a lot a lot younger yeah,
I know no but he still lookedolder, though, though.
Speaker 1 (30:25):
No, he definitely was older.
Speaker 2 (30:28):
You could tell he was maybe touching 50.
He was definitely middle-aged,so yeah.
I mean you could tell he wasdefinitely older.
I mean obviously he didn't lookas old as Fellowship, but he
was getting there.
You could tell he was gettingup there in age john hurt.
Speaker 3 (30:49):
I mean oh yeah, john hurt, actually surprised me and
I know him best as the voice ofthe dragon in merlin.
So I I was like, wait, is thatthe merlin guy?
Uh, that was exciting.
And then, um, I don't know theactor's name, I forget the
character.
Uh, so it's the other darkhaired gentleman.
He was in the show big love.
(31:10):
He played like a very sleazy,basically like the head of the
mormons uh out there in uh utah.
Speaker 1 (31:17):
He plays the character brett.
Yes, um.
Speaker 3 (31:20):
So I he's, I don't know his name, yeah he's kind of
not a great guy, you know, inthe movie and yeah, I could buy
it like it's just like he, he'slike a character actor, I think,
who like just plays like kindof a a not great guy all the
time and he does it well.
So I was excited by the casting.
I I honestly, when they allwere on screen I was like, hey,
(31:41):
I know almost all these actorsyou know, so that was actually a
really cool thing to see andsee, uh, one of their earlier
works yeah, um, everyone didfantastically.
Speaker 1 (31:52):
Jen even commented like I don't understand.
People don't look like thisanymore.
Like you're looking at some ofthe cast and uh, so the other
female lambert she wasspecifically talking about her
and she's just like I've neverseen anyone who looks like that
and, it's true, like they justlook like they're from the
seventies.
You know it's it's a.
It's a really bizarre thing that, uh, I think everyone just has,
(32:16):
I um, like iPhone faces now,where everyone's used to looking
at a screen, so our faces arejust a little bit different.
It's the blue light morphing us, the blue light, yeah, oh, what
I?
What I?
I understand what I was tryingto say earlier.
Basically, it's the, the, theuse of the actual villain takes
(32:36):
a while and they do that to kindof put you at a state of unease
, because if they show you theirhands at the beginning, the
villain is no longer scary bythe end.
You know they want thatbuild-up, they want you to
emotionally feel uneasy whenyou're going into.
You know when you're finallyseeing the face on it, when
(32:57):
you're finally seeing the, thechest burster and then finally
it's.
You know final form, um, andthey knew their limitations.
You know, like, this is a guyin a rubber suit, but they
didn't want it to look likedoctor who you know, like they,
they wanted it to or god.
Speaker 2 (33:14):
They wanted it to look like a.
Speaker 1 (33:16):
They didn't want it to look like godzilla, so they
they kept the creature inshadows and only showed very
sparse glimpses at it, justenough to freak you the heck out
.
And they do a pretty good jobof it for a 1979 film yeah, yeah
, I like the, the utilization ofdarkness, it it definitely it.
Speaker 2 (33:39):
it definitely works well with this type of movie and
I mean honestly that they havea game called alien isolation
and it kind of uses like thesimilar you know you've got the
xenomorph, you're trying toavoid it and it's, you know
it'll pop up on you at any timepretty much like this one.
You know you're not gunsblazing, you know, like some of
(34:02):
the later ones, but yeah, thisone is this one.
They did well because, I mean,you're right, you said that they
knew their limitations and theyslotted well into that.
You know, and even though theydid show, like you know, a full
body xenomorph, it with thecamera work, it didn't look
(34:24):
corny no, it doesn't, and andthey're only showing.
Speaker 1 (34:29):
I love the extreme close-ups too.
There's a lot of extremeclose-ups on people's faces in
this movie, um, to show eitherfear or just to like, give you a
unique glimpse at the person orcharacter.
And uh, they do a lot of extremeclose-ups of like the, the
sleek shine, of like the dome onthe xenomorph's head, or just
like it's slowly opening itsmouth and like strobe lighting
(34:53):
to like, because strobe lightingis uneasy to look at.
You know like it's hard to.
You know see movement.
And when you eliminate movementwith a strobe light, that also
helps heighten, like the, theunease of everything.
Speaker 3 (35:08):
So the only thing I thought and and this is probably
my space balls, this is my, myspace balls like background when
the z, when the chestburstercomes out, I just the way it
kind of like skitters off screenit it just reminded me of in
Spaceballs when the chestbursterjumps into song and dance on
the diner top.
(35:29):
So I giggled when I saw himskitter because I was like I
just in my head heard like hellomy baby, hello my darling, you
know, like that same exact scenefrom Spaceballs.
Speaker 2 (35:42):
So that's the only time that I felt like the
xenomorph took me out of it,like just that little skittering
you know, thinking back like tothe 1970s and like kind of what
they did with like horror filmsback then, you know it was
really hard to make like aserious one that didn't look
corny, you know, and like theacting wasn't like over the top,
(36:04):
like you know, like, know, likeoh you know, like.
It didn't look corny Like, butthis movie they didn't show fear
in a way that looked corny, itlooked genuine.
And so like I really have tolike put it up to like the
actors for really like actingvery well and making, making a
film that just set off thiswhole series, that we're still
(36:27):
getting stuff today yeah, yeah,um, and it's, it's kind of
bigger than ever right nowbecause, uh, we just had a very
successful alien movie intheaters, um, and it was a very
good one like I was.
Speaker 1 (36:39):
I'm blown away by how well um romulus was and I've
heard very good things about thefirst.
I think there's four episodesnow of alien earth, so I'm
excited to to dive into thatsoon and I'm hoping to to start
making like timeline contentwith you know, I want to make
individual short uh videocontent for the alien series.
(37:02):
Um, slowly working my way up tosomething a little bit bigger,
but yeah, so you mentionedanthony that uh, you were like
were you specifically talkingabout the chestburster scene
that everyone was like super,you could tell like the fear was
like real or not, notspecifically the the
chestburster scene, but likethere's that, and then the build
(37:24):
up to when the xenomorph umthis scene right here yes, so
behind anthony, uh it's.
Speaker 2 (37:30):
It's a scene where, uh, lambert the, the other
female, is confronted by thexenomorph and she's unable to
get around it or do anything andshe and she's crying, but like,
like it looks genuine, like itdoesn't look fake, like I don't
know, know, like I've seen someof, like you know, older horror
movies that are from around thesame era and a lot of them are,
(37:54):
like, really corny, but likethis one, I felt like it broke
through like some stereotypeswhen it came to horror.
I mean it was also partly asci-fi movie but I mean, like, I
mean the main element of it ishorror.
You know, they're building up,like you said, there's that
existential dread that builds upthroughout the film until you
(38:16):
get to the climax.
And yeah, man, dude, it's.
It might not be the one thatmost people talk about.
A lot of people talk about thesecond one.
That's the one that, like youprobably saw most clips of rich
was the second one, but I like,like dakota said you, you have
to respect it, you have toappreciate what this film did
(38:39):
can dakota?
Speaker 3 (38:40):
you're a timeline guy .
When did aliens come out, likeyear wise?
Yeah, because I'm trying tofigure out like I remember
seeing the toys so like.
That's essentially why Ithought this was an action
franchise, because I rememberlike the action figures of like
riley and like the xenomorphsand stuff were a big deal in toy
stores when I was younger so itum, it took a quite a quite a
(39:02):
while for a sequel to come out.
Speaker 1 (39:04):
It came out in 1986, this one came out in 79.
Speaker 3 (39:07):
So uh like so maybe seven, eight, eight years later,
so maybe it was three, threewhen three came out.
I think that's when I saw that.
I remember seeing the toys instores that would make sense.
Speaker 1 (39:17):
Yeah, the three, I think was 91 that makes more
sense.
Speaker 3 (39:21):
Yeah, because I would have been.
I would have been nine okay.
Speaker 1 (39:23):
So I want to go back to the chestburster scene, uh,
because that has, uh, a prettyiconic piece of like filming
lore behind it.
Basically, the cast knewsomething was going to happen,
but they did not know what.
And they they understood that,like, basically they were told
(39:46):
all right, just just eat yourfood, have a good time.
And something's going to happento John Hurt's character.
John Hurt obviously knew whatneeded to happen.
You know, he acted his heartout with that.
It was a disgusting performanceof him, like just coughing up
his food and shoving food in hisface.
But everyone else had no ideathat there was going to be an
(40:09):
alien that bursts out of JohnHurt's chest, that's so cool
which is such an insane thing tocommit to doing.
That's amazing and also to putonto your cast.
But they all, it was perfect,they kept in character.
Because I'm trying to thinklike if I was present, obviously
(40:29):
I would know that this is afilm and that we're doing
special effects, but I would belike wait what.
Like because you could see themoment there's like blood
spurting out of his chest beforethe chestburster even pops up.
You see Sigourney weaver justlike kind of like take a step
back, like what you know, likeshe didn't realize that there
(40:52):
was something underneath his,you know, underneath his shirt
or whatever.
So I think that that's such acool uh bit of uh like
filmmaking lore, because I likeit when you do that it colors
the whole, the whole filmmakingbehind it and, like the, it
makes it actually really scary,because these are people
actually terrified because theyhave no idea what's coming yeah,
(41:15):
yeah, I, I love it when they dostuff like that, when they
withhold like certain pieces ofinformation from from.
Speaker 2 (41:23):
Like you know, you're trying to get like a good scene
and I feel, I feel like thatscene was perfect for nobody
else to know what's going tohappen, except for you know the
subject, that that happened.
You know john hurt.
So, yeah, yeah, I remember that.
Actually I didn't it.
(41:45):
That's been a piece ofinformation.
I sat in the back of my minduntil when, until you actually
brought it up, I was like, oh mygosh, I remember that dude.
Yeah, that's awesome yeah yeah,I completely, I man.
Speaker 1 (41:57):
Now I kind of want to go back and watch that scene,
like now that I remember thisyeah, because if you, if you
watch it now, that you know thatthese people didn't know what
was happening, you could tell,tell genuine surprise is on
their face.
It's really cool Going intoSpaceballs a couple years later.
When was Spaceballs?
(42:18):
I think it was the same year orthe year after Return of the
Jedi.
Speaker 3 (42:23):
I think it's 83.
Speaker 1 (42:24):
Okay, so the same year as Return of the Jedi.
And there's this scene at theend where I think it's 83.
Okay, so same year as return ofthe jedi.
And there's the scene at theend where I think it's john hurt
in a diner yes and, and he'sjust, you know, he's having a
good time, they're having alaugh and all of a sudden, he,
he's doing the same exact thingagain.
He's, and he's actually sayingnot again, not again.
Speaker 3 (42:43):
It's it.
You know what.
I'm so glad you said it wasjohn hurt, because when I see it
happening right, I'm going.
Man, like this is not just likekind of familiar, like it looks
like the same guy and I now Ijust love mel brooks, by the way
.
I'll.
I'll correct before ouraudience does.
Space balls was actually 87 87.
Speaker 1 (43:03):
Okay, very good, thank you for checking that.
What did we think of ian homeas the android like and and like
his?
Because you can argue that he'sactually the villain of the
movie, because it's.
It becomes apparent that thiswasn't a random stop that they
(43:25):
made on their trip.
You know, someone programmedthem to go here, uh, and he very
, very much, you know, nurturedthe aliens growth throughout the
entire film until, you know, toa point where, like, obviously,
like he was trying to keep thealien alive, like he was trying
to, you know, bring it back toearth.
(43:45):
What?
At what point, rich, did yourealize that ian holm was the
bad guy or a bad guy?
Speaker 3 (43:51):
I'm not saying he is the bad guy, but yeah well, it's
funny because so when he, whenhe breaks the protocol to, you
know, let the guy come on.
I think probably, you know,obviously probably a little
problematic for me is that goinginto it.
I knew that, like, the aliensare bad, right.
Speaker 1 (44:08):
So when I see like oh , let's get it Not fun aliens
yeah.
Speaker 3 (44:12):
You know, let's get him on the ship.
I'm thinking like, what are youdoing?
Like I forget protocol, likehow about survival?
Like you guys don't really seemto be a cohesive team, right,
they don't like seem to havereal, true, like love and care
for each other.
So, no, I'm like what are youdoing?
(44:32):
Like scientifically, like as ayou know why would you do that?
So I didn't figure it out, Ididn't get it until sigourney
weaver gets it that he's bad,right.
And then, yeah, the, the whatI'll call is the milk teardrop,
right, is like forming and I'mlooking and I'm going that's a
really weird effect.
I'm like, why is it white?
And I thought that it just wasme, like I, it's such a maze,
(44:54):
it's such an amazing scene,because I ignored it away until,
like he splits open and I think, like my dog had come into the
room or something.
So I'm like, wait, what?
And I had to like rewind and Iwas like, what?
He's a robot.
Uh, that blew my mind.
Uh, I won't lie, like I had noidea, didn't see it coming at
all.
Speaker 2 (45:14):
And then I was like, oh, so that's why he's the worst
, you know, that's why he's socold and calculating and you
know like there's just somethingnasty about like that milky
substance that was like pullingout, like I feel like if it was
like like oily, like if it wasblack, it wouldn't, it would
have been like whatever, butlike that white substance just
(45:35):
made it look worse.
Speaker 3 (45:37):
Yeah, there's something inherently I think
kind of off putting about thatand I was thinking about it.
I was like, if he's a robot,why isn't it oil or grease?
You know why isn't it darkabout it?
I was like, if he's a robot,why isn't it oil or grease?
You know why isn't it dark?
And I and now that you say that, I think I would have been like
it would have been a clue thatI would have picked up on too
quickly.
But because it was that milky,you know substance, you're like
(45:57):
what is that?
And it's that's enough to holdyou off for a couple more
minutes, like that's brilliantto me.
That was brilliant.
His hair gel's dripping oh no,he's he.
He accidentally booked a uh uhspeech at the wrong place and
now he's oh, man, oh, but yeah,it was.
(46:17):
It was really very well done.
I yeah kudos to like I didn'tsee it coming and then when you
go back, I think the best typesof surprises.
The foreshadowing was rightthere, but you miss it, you know
, and he, it was so good did youget an opportunity to watch
this like a second time, or youjust?
Speaker 1 (46:37):
it was just the one?
Speaker 3 (46:38):
time, I watched it twice okay the second time.
Speaker 1 (46:41):
Did you see all of the instances where he was
purposely yes, um like, insteadof keeping them outside for
quarantine?
Speaker 3 (46:50):
he's just like nope, it's like yeah it was like, oh
my, like it was that it feelsrewarding, almost, to watch it
and see it again and see howwell it's done and and you could
see, like you know, yeah, likeon that that second watch, like
(47:10):
every instance that he was likegoing against the grain of the
crew.
Speaker 2 (47:15):
You know, at that point you're like hmm, like why?
Like what?
What?
What's this guy like why?
Why does he care?
You know, and then you you seethat you know he, he got those
orders from the company he keptsaying we haven't finished
collating, and I'm just like,yeah, that's a very normal thing
for a person to say.
(47:37):
Like nobody on that ship wouldsay anything like that but him.
But yeah, no, and you know itis.
I think it was such a smartmove Because you go into the
movie and I'm pretty sure, likethis was rich, you go into the
movie knowing that there's goingto be this alien creature right
in there, but you're notexpecting there to be like a
(48:01):
secondary antagonist, right Didnot see that coming.
You know, yeah, like he, prettymuch yeah, and Dakota Dakota's
right in a way, like you couldsay that he is the villain of
the story because he made it sothis creature was able to fully
form and almost kill everybody.
Speaker 1 (48:21):
So, rich, you mentioned earlier that nobody
had any love for each other, andthat's, that's on purpose.
You know, these are just peopledoing a job.
They're, they're tasked to shipor from one planet to another.
You know they're going back toearth at this point.
But the actual ship name,nostromo, has some actual
(48:42):
meaning, um, and when you takethat into consideration, the
whole plot makes a lot moresense.
So the the nostromo is namedafter, uh, there's a book by
joseph conrad from like theearly 19th century or sorry, the
early 20th century, it wasearly 1900s where it's the name
(49:02):
of the ship and that ship inthat book, or yeah, in that book
, it basically signifies likeit's a story of exploitation of
labor force.
And that's exactly what thecompany because they don't
really call it wayland yutani inthis movie, they, they just
call it the company.
They are exploiting the, thelabor force, for whatever reason
(49:28):
to, so that they can gainaccess to the secrets of this
alien.
So that's that's whyley Scottnames their ship the Nostromo,
because it puts the emphasis oncorporate capitalist greed and
each of the crew members hasmoments of thinking for
(49:52):
themselves, not necessarily inthe movie, in the original
drafts of this movie and thenovelization, which fleshes out
the characters quite a bit more.
You see a lot of the selfishnessof each of the cast.
You see a little bit of it whenParker's like we should get a
bonus, we need a full share.
But there's a lot more of thatin the novel, or the
(50:18):
novelization of it, from prettymuch everyone.
I don't.
I think Ripley isn't reallyincluded in that, she's the only
one just trying to do her job,but I just think that's kind of
like a cool little background.
Detail is the Nostromo is namedafter a Joseph Conrad book from
like the early 1900s and itmeans corporate greed basically,
(50:40):
and that's what we we seehappening throughout this whole
movie.
This whole, this wholeadventure is stemmed by
corporate greed.
It's really that's.
Speaker 3 (50:47):
That's a really like nice easter egg there that I
didn't um pick up on, but, um,you got me, you got me searching
it now and I'm just, uh, I'mgonna have to go read some more
joseph conrad.
I mean, I thought heart ofdarkness was it, but I think, uh
, they wouldn't have to dive inhere heart of darkness is not
where joseph conrad ends.
Speaker 1 (51:03):
My friend, I love this movie.
I, I think, coming back to itnow with fresh eyes and just
eager to you know, experiencethe whole series instead of just
bite-sized portions of it,because each of the films is
fairly separate in uh, in toneand story, because you have the,
(51:26):
the original four, withSigourney Weaver in it, but then
the.
There's two prequels that don'thave Sigourney Weaver in it at
all, and they're more.
I don't even know how todescribe it.
It's more like an explanationof, like, the origins of uh,
faith and the universe andeverything, and it's like uh,
have you seen Prometheus Anthony?
(51:47):
long time ago yeah, I mean I'mexcited to get to that one,
because I think a lot of peoplewrote it off as being like, uh,
trying way too hard, but I thinkit's probably the smartest film
in the series.
Um, I think it's just.
I think it's really good we'recoming up on an hour.
We can keep going for a littlebit more yeah, yeah, we can.
Speaker 2 (52:09):
We can, uh, go back to the good old days.
Speaker 1 (52:12):
You know, hit a two-hour podcast, two and a half
so another thing that I thoughtwas interesting is, um, the.
The film is very vague on abunch of stuff and it's
purposely vague on a bunch ofstuff.
Uh, we mentioned they didn'tgive a name to the, the alien
species in this movie.
That's something that comeslater in the series.
(52:35):
They didn't even give Ripley.
They didn't give SigourneyWeaver a first name in this
movie.
She's just Ripley.
Everyone in this movie only hasa last name Kane, parker,
lambert, brett, dallas, ripley.
They all have only a last nameand a designation on the ship.
(52:56):
So it's basically likeeverything is stripped down to
its base stuff that you need toknow basically what they do on
this ship, why they're here andwhat they're going to call each
other.
So I think that's pretty cool.
We don't learn that her name isEllen Ripley until later.
But yeah, and the same with thecompany.
(53:18):
They don't name the company byverbiage in this movie.
It's on some background, easter.
There's some Easter eggs of thename of the company,
weyland-yutani in the background.
So there's a lot of it.
You don't even know what timeperiod, uh, this film takes
place and it doesn't give you adate.
You only learn like when thismovie takes place in future
(53:41):
movies because they can backdateit.
It's, it's the whole idea ofgive them as little as possible
but just enough so that theyunderstand, uh, their setting.
Basically, and it just, it,just it's meant to disorient you
and I think they did a good jobbecause I'm I haven't been
(54:01):
right.
Speaker 2 (54:01):
Ever since I watched this, I've been disoriented
because I was like I need tocontinue so that I can get on
the timeline.
We know, we know that you'retimeline obsessed and so this
movie, with a lack of its time,is just throwing you through a
loop man it really?
Speaker 1 (54:19):
yeah, no, but it's, it's.
I think it's an easy ishtimeline once they start like
actually giving you dates.
It's just no dates in this one.
But, um, guys, I think we shallcall it here, let's.
Let's give some last thoughtson Alien and get all riled up
for Aliens.
Right, riley Next week.
Speaker 3 (54:40):
Riley, ripley, ripley , sorry.
Speaker 1 (54:44):
That's OK, Rich.
What did you?
What are your final thoughts onthis first Alien film?
Speaker 3 (54:48):
So I think I went in with expectations of Alien 3 and
got a very different experience.
I as usual my first watch I was, like you know, this is a
horror movie.
The end of the movie is what Ireally liked, as it started to
ramp up, probably from fromchest bursting on, like I was, I
(55:10):
was invested.
I'm really excited to explorethe rest of the franchise and if
this is a building block that Ineeded to digest in order to
enjoy the franchise as itevolves, then I'm happy I
engaged in it.
If this was a standalone movie,just this and nothing else was
(55:32):
after it, I'd say it was good.
It was really well done.
I can acknowledge the craft,but it's not my type of movie.
So I'm you know, I'm a littlelike I know about the alien
versus predator movies and, likeman, I love predator, like that
guy.
So I was expecting kind of likepredator-ish stuff with
(55:52):
sigourney weaver and that's notwhat I got here.
But that's my own fault.
So definitely recommended towatch something that was
exceptionally well done in atime with limited resources um,
before I hand it over to Anthony.
Speaker 1 (56:08):
Uh, I, I like what you said there.
Specifically, this is abuilding block to what comes
next.
I think you need this movie tofeel any sort of weight for the
character of ripley um and afear of the alien, you know so.
So keep that moving forward,because it is an important film,
(56:29):
not just for like film history,but in this franchise, like
it's, it is the.
It is a new hope for thisseries.
Um, anthony, go ahead yeah, manit.
Speaker 2 (56:40):
It'd been a long time since I had seen this movie.
I would say that I've seenaliens more than I've seen the
original alien, but I have seenthe first two more than I've
seen, uh, three and four, so itwas nice to go back to this.
I always like it when, when wepick something, that kind of has
(57:02):
me go back to it because Idon't know if I would have gone
back to this movie anytime soon.
Not because I hate it, justbecause you know, just like I
really.
You know it hasn't been on myradar, you know, to watch the
first alien movie, but I'm gladthat we did and I really do feel
like coming into this.
(57:22):
I I did notice a bit more and Idid feel a lot more of an
appreciation for it, for thetime period that it came out and
for what they were able toaccomplish.
And, yeah, that the fact thatthis is it came out and for what
they were able to accomplish,and, yeah, that the the fact
that this is one of thefoundations for what we have
today.
Speaker 1 (57:41):
Yeah, I really liked this movie.
I I'm happy that we like likeAnthony said, revisited it
because I'm able to appreciateit with a new eyes and a new
like perspective on art andeverything and filmmaking.
So that's awesome and I'mexcited to jump into future
films in this franchise.
Uh, next week yes, next week.
(58:03):
Aliens sounds good episode 132aliens with an s at the end.
Uh guys, thank you so much forlistening to us here for our
131st episode of ProjectGeekology.
We appreciate all the screamsthat we couldn't hear, but we
know it was scary at timeslistening to three white men.
(58:27):
But I'm going to end this now,I'm just going to ramble.
Guys, if you want to check outany of our socials, be sure to
click into our show notes downbelow and click something.
You'll find something new.
Have a good one.
Speaker 2 (58:43):
Oh yeah, and don't forget to give us Dakota.
It's your turn.
There's something that werequire of our listeners.
Speaker 1 (58:59):
Not require, but we ask of, we ask, uh, we ask with
the flamethrower to the back ofyou, um now, uh, yeah, so
there's something that we weusually like uh receiving here
on this podcast, a, a favor ofsorts.
It's kind of like a it's afive-star juicy review,
specifically, I didn't knowwhere the favor was going.
Speaker 3 (59:21):
I was like whoa it's just a review.
Speaker 1 (59:25):
Five stars make it juicy like ian holmes.
Uh like milky, milky innardsyeah, I was looking at that same
exact thing, or perfect, youknow crunchy or or crunchy, like
, like the, the shell of thealien and the chestburster, you
know, the exoskeleton,everything it's.
(59:47):
It's a.
It's one of those movies youget, you get a little juice, you
get a little crunch.
Give us a five star review,people.
That's, that's what we'retrying to beg for you.
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