If you aren't going to try for a decent movie, don't do it at all

Rating: 2/10 (15 August 2004)

I'm an advocate of doing things right. If you're going to half ass it then just don't do it at all. And Fox really just half-assed this movie. Starting with hiring one of the worst directors out there, some no talented actors and actresses, and not giving a damn about two decent franchises.
I mean this isn't Nightmare on Elm Street or Friday the 13th here. Those franchises were garbage and New Line knew it so it was easy for that studio to keep the low standard by getting a hack director and crappy actors. The Aliens and Predator franchises actually were decent and had some respect so I have no idea why Fox treated them like they were on the Jason/Freddy level.
AvP failed on every damn level and that's hard to do with a typical summer popcorn movie. I honestly could have lived with the sub-par acting, story and dialogue if the action had lived up to the billing. But somehow the movie even managed to f**k that up. What the hell is up with all the close-ups, crappy editing and shaky camera work? You can barely make out what's going on half the time that I honestly stopped caring. Does ANYONE know how to edit a simple action scene anymore? First Bourne Supremacy, now this s**t.
And the Predators themselves are so freakin slow and not at all Predator-like. They can't fight at all in this movie and the Aliens own their asses. Yeah they're supposed to be young Predators (a lame cop-out to make them half-assed) but aren't these creatures supposed to be bred as stealthy, intelligent, killing machines? Since when are they all fat and pudgy lumbering around like Robocop? They actually get out-classed by a human woman. And don't get me started on the human/Predator team-up. Did they forget Predators make trophies of the humans? I (and a lot of the audience) sneered at the screen when they were running together in slo-mo. It was the single-most dumbest thing they could have done to The Predator mythos and took my feeling of dislike to downright hatred of this flick. I could type a novel of things wrong with this movie so I'll just stop here.
No matter how many lame references of the Alien franchise they try to throw in there to please the fans (Lance Henriksen comes to mind) the execution of this movie was straight up garbage. It appeals to 10-15 year olds and that's probably why they lowered the rating. So here's a middle finger to Fox for taking what could have been a jumpstart for both franchises to just another cheap piece of s**t movie made for a quick buck.