80s gungho pap

Rating: 6/10 (13 March 2001)

I remember when I first saw the original I thought it was the scariest film I had ever seen. On subsequent viewings I became more aware of the levels of craft and thought that went into this ground-breaking film. So you could say I was looking forward to the sequel, but even then I had my reservations. I was right to be reticent. What I got was Rambo in space with all the levels of forethought, scriptwriting skills and character development that made films like Commando and the Rambos etc. what they were - very bad movies. The makers of Aliens missed the point of the original completely - the original alien was scary because they couldn't kill it, the characters were imperfect and real and had real fears - in this gungho rubbish the aliens get splattered all over the place and the characters seemed only scared that the director might not get their best angle. So what we were left with was less than indestructible aliens and cardboard cut-out characters from the gungho 80s - the decade not quickly enough forgotten.