Underrated, but it still has problems

Rating: 7/10 (8 August 2015)

Everyone in the Alien fan base seems to dislike this movie. I personally disagree, it's a fine movie. It still has problems, though. So here are my thoughts.
Story-There's really nothing wrong with it. It's basically about Ripley's experience on a prison planet. There's a new alien called a "Runner", which is born from a dog. The tone in this movie is even more hopeless and dark than the first Alien. This time, there is no flamethrowers, no pulse rifles, no spaceships, no escape pod, no weapons. They have one chance to kill the Xenomorph. This movie was very scary and intense, just like Alien 1. They did a good job at playing up the suspense and creepy atmosphere in this one. Unfortunately, the two favourites (Hicks and Newt) have an untimely demise. But this only makes the film scarier.
Characters: Ripley returns, but this time she's angrier. She is INTENT on killing the Alien. After all, it's killed her new family.
There's a new love interest. He's intelligent and likable, overall a great new addition.
Charles Ditton plays a man named Dillon. A heroic man who acts as a mentor for the other prisoners.
Aside from that most characters are just bald and British men who say "f*ck" a lot.
Soundtrack: While not as memorable as the first two movies' scores, Alien3's soundtrack is intense and fits the movie's tone.
Special effects: The effects constantly drop and rise in quality. Stan Winston's former team at ADI (known for movies such as Tremors) did the effects for Alien3, and they do a good job with the suit and animatronics. It's just that they used a rod puppet on a blue screen for like, 75% of the movie. The blue screen does not mesh well with the footage, thought the rod puppet itself is very impressive.
Overall, Alien3 is a great sequel to Aliens, it's not as good though. It's really underrated, which is sad because David Fincher put a lot of effort into Alien3. I feel the reason it was a bit of a let down was because of Fox putting too much pressure on the cast and crew to make this movie. That, and the fact that this movie had to live up to Alien and Aliens, two of the greatest movies ever.
6.5/10