S10 Reviews: Alien vs. Predator (2004)

Rating: 7/10 (24 April 2005)

When a heat signature from an ancient pyramid is seen from a satellite, billionaire industrialist Charles Bishop Weyland (Lance Henriksen) assembles the best technical team that money can buy to investigate why a structure of its' type is located 2,000 feet below the surface of Antarctica. But the reason becomes all too apparent when three Predators stop by to frag some Alien hides as a rite of passage.
Paul (Event Horizon / Resident Evil) Anderson once again tackles the sci-fi genre, this time with mixed results. After over ten years of development you'd think Fox would have came up with something better. They try to bridge gaps between the series and tighten timelines but what they throw out is a mixed mess. Some of the action sequences are decent enough but since they went with a teen friendly PG-13 "AvP" suffers from off-screen kills and closely cropped battles that leave fans unsatisfied. The script has the usual weak character development as they are mostly cannon fodder. The most developed character must be the survivor. Right? Sadly they use a lot of CGI when it would have been a lot better and cheaper to use a practical effect. About the only saving grace of the film is an excellent sound design which is showed off well on the DVD's dts track. Very disappointing.