A mixed bag of a sequel

Rating: 6/10 (15 May 2020)

Alien3 was famously a troubled production that went through multiple script ideas, started filming with an unfinished script, and suffered from a conflict between the director and the studio. And this shows with Alien3 being a compromised product.
Alien3 is a mixed bag of a film. The beginning where Hicks and Newt die did undermine the ending of Aliens and due to David Fincher disowning the film we'll never get to see his true vision. On the plus side, Fincher did make a bleak film that fitted the tone of the first two films, had some great characters like Dillon (Charles S. Dutton) the murderer/rapist turned religious zealot, and Clemens (Charles Dance), the doctor living on Fiorina "Fury" 161 as a penance. Alien3 does have one of the most iconic images from the Alien, the moment where the Xenomorph was just inches away from a terrified Ripley. The downer ending where Ripley sacrifices would have been a fitting conclusion for the series but Hollywood can't let anything die.
Alien3 is an interesting film to play movie archaeology because Vincent Ward's idea was to set the sequel on a wooden planet run by monks and the concept evolved into a prison planet. There were some obvious ways it was done like the colony was dominated by men, the men have turned to religion, and the prisoners having no weapons. There were more subtle ideas as well such as the use of the ox in the Assembly Cut and Elliot Goldenthal's music had religious cues.
Alien3 was an interesting and ambitious experiment that was a clash between artistic vision and commercial interests.