Alien, Aliens, and the Art of the Sequel (a review)

This week, I continued to chip away at the list of Movies I Have Not Seen And There's No Excuse For That. There's still a lot of films on this list, notably the Tim Burton era Batman films (and The Dark Knight Rises, I mean, come on, what am I doing with not seeing that?). But this week managed to knock two glaring entries off the list: Ridley Scott's Alien and James Cameron's Aliens. I've been meaning to see these for a while, especially because they've been in the pop culture consciousness a lot recently. Alien consistently shows up on lists of the scariest films ever made, I've read a lot of articles about this series on Cracked.com, a lot of discussion about the merits of Avatar include references to Aliens, and in the past five years we've seen not just a recent prequel to Alien but also the sequel to Alien vs Predator, and when they make sequels to crossover movies from overexposed franchises, not seeing the originals becomes akin to mortal sin for a film enthusiast like me. So when a friend of mine offered to show me both Alien and Aliens, I couldn't turn down her offer.

Before I continue forward, I should probably make good use of a SPOILER WARNING in case you, like me, have waited too long to watch these movies.

But that might not be terribly necessary for discussion of Alien, at least. There's not much I can say about this film that hasn't already been said. It is a very tight, very well-crafted horror film. The villain(s???) are threatening, the suspense is well done, the atmosphere is rarely broken, and except in one or two cases, the plot does not rely on characters making idiotic decisions. So you're not going to hear anything particularly novel on the topic of Alien from me.

No, what I really want to discuss is Aliens. A straight sci-fi action contrast to the first installment's Gothic-horror-in-space, I've heard a lot of opinions on this film in a number of directions. I mean, it's certainly classic: a lot of the mainstays and iconic moments come from this film rather than the predecessor. But there's a lot of discussion on whether this film is good or bad, better or worse than the original, an example of James Cameron as a good director or a bad director, etc.

I think there's a very strong reason for such split opinion. When this film is good, it is excellent action with high stakes. When this film is bad, it is cheese and schlock and questionable one-liners. Let's not be mistaken: this film has flaws. Space Marines are often kind of hit or miss, especially being everywhere these days, and Aliens has them in all their meatheaded, obnoxious glory. You won't feel for the ones that get killed off early, and you likely won't remember any of their names. The young actress who plays the little girl Newt is not very good at all, though at least she feels important. More than a bit of the dialogue is bad, many of the line reads are either flat or hammy, the list goes on and on.

I would argue that these flaws to not prevent it from being a good movie. But even more than that, I would state that this film is an example of how to make a fantastic sequel.

Sequels can fail for a lot of reasons. Airplane 2 made the mistake of trying to be exactly the same as the original. Indiana Jones 4 was hated because it wasn't enough like the originals. Iron Man 2 is unsatisfying because the stakes feel too low. Pirates of the Caribbean 2 and 3 spiral out of control by raising the stakes too high and too fast. A sequel has to have enough continuity without being a carbon copy, and it has to feel bigger while not getting away from itself. This has often been a difficult thing to do. Some times sequels are studio-slaughtered abominations of filmmaking. And even when a sequel is a great movie, like The Dark Knight, it can still be an ill-fitting sequel. So the balance between respect for the original and creating something new can be incredibly touchy.

Aliens hits this balance almost perfectly. James Cameron couldn't have possibly captured the same sense of suspense and terror that Ridley Scott managed in Alien; no one could have. So he made the right decision and didn't even try. Instead of focusing on the isolation and fear of a small group of untrained survivors fighting off a single unknown foe, Aliens brings in a squadron of marines with guns blazing against an army of hivemind xenomorphs. But at the same time, Cameron manages to hold back, showing the aliens in surprisingly few shots, much like the original. Additionally, Aliens expands on a lot of concepts and story presented in the first film, while never really contradicting existing mythos or derailing the one recurring character.

In Aliens, the stakes are higher and the action is grander. More people are involved, more lives are lost, but also more is risked on a personal level for these characters. The insider isn't acting merely on orders, he's acting out of self-interest, as idiotic as it might be. Ripley isn't just fighting for her life, she is fighting for the lives of the colonists and, when that doesn't work out, for one colonist in particular. There is a sense of pathos on some levels of this film that doesn't get achieved in many sequels, and indeed in many films in general.

Is Aliens as good or as tight of a film as Alien? Certainly not. Have better science fiction action films been made before and after it? Goodness me, yes. But Aliens succeeds on possibly the most important front for a film like it. It expands upon the original while keeping true to its roots as a story. Aliens is a fantastic sequel. And that, for me, is enough.

There's Nothing Wrong With That

I touched on a topic on Wednesday that I feel I should explain further. My daily writing, as I said, doesn't always have to be good, and this is one of the things that very much helps me to keep doing it. But this raises the question, I suppose, on whether or not that's a good thing. Does writing then become something I do to maintain a schedule or a habit? Is that the only benefit I gain from those days where no ideas come?

The reason why many people often don't like putting out sub-par work is probably related to the belief that writing without substance isn't truly practice. Certainly in the past I, too, have held this view. Something should be done right or it shouldn't be done at all. How can you practice if you don't practice doing something well? Why bother writing if you cannot show it to someone else? Why would you ever work on something that won't come to anything?

But the thing is that, as a writer, any writing I do helps. Every time I put my thoughts down in words, I am honing this ability in a certain way. Certainly, not all work is equal or produces the same effect. Writing a novel helps you in a different way from drafting an essay, and both of those produce a much different effect from everyday journaling.

But the point is that every type of writing that you do is helpful. Writing frequently in a number of styles allows you to experiment in order to find what works and what doesn't. The book Composition in Four Keys contains an essay by James Moffett called “I, You, and It”. In this essay, Moffett discusses the differences in various types of writing, as well as how ideas evolve alongside considerations for audience and the amount of thought and reflection that has gone into them. The argument continues by stating that if he were to teach a writing course, it would cover all sorts of different genre work before ever approaching argumentative essays. He probably says this far more eloquently than I could:

Many teachers may feel that such a program slights exposition in favor of so-called personal or creative writing. In the first place, one doesn't learn exposition just by writing it all the time. An enormous amount of other learning must take place before one can write worthwhile essays of ideas; that is in the nature of the whole abstraction process. All writing teaches exposition.(Moffett 27)

This is an important thing to keep in mind because it is something that so many people will judge you for. A lot of literary study seems all wrapped up in itself, arguments about the literary canon, this belief that there is a set collection of works that should be deemed literature and that nothing else contains any value. I have heard of creative writing professors who will severely downgrade students who write anything that is not strictly realistic fiction. I may be only a student, but as a writer, I have to say this is nonsense. The only thing you will learn by just reading the literary canon is how to be narrow minded and unoriginal. The only thing you will learn never challenging your writing style is how to get stuck in a self-recursive rut.

I myself feel inadequate a lot about the things I read. If you look at my summer reading list, there are some classics, but there are also a lot of young adult, fantasy, and humor books in there too. When I got back to school, I was discussing books with a classmate only to find out that the reading he did included Vonnegut, Cormac McCarthy, and a number of other things that were intensely cerebral and highly regarded. I honestly felt embarrassed, and I changed the subject.

But the thing is, I shouldn't have felt that way. There is a time and a place for everything you will read, from modern masters to literary classics to groundbreaking science fiction to erotic fanfiction to bad novelizations of blockbusters. Everything you read can influence you or inspire you in some way. My challenge to you this year, for every book you read for either fun or for classes, is to find something that really stuck out to you either as a good idea for later use or a bad idea to be avoided. Approach everything you read and write with the knowledge that it's a good decision.

On Writers' Block

Part of what helps me write every day is keeping in mind the fact that not everything I write has to be good or even presentable. My life has often been plagued by this notion that I either have to do something write or not do it at all, and I think I know a lot of people like that. It is the reason why the better portion of my education was dominated by the ever-present spectre of missing assignments, and it has always been the main thing that prevents my writing. I never felt that I could write unless I was inspired, unless I could figure something out in advance, unless I knew exactly what I wanted to do. I don't mean to say that I outlined, because I never did, but there was this unspoken agreement with myself that I should never produce anything that couldn't be shown to someone else.

I don't think I am the only person who has felt this way. So many people I have met have told me about their great idea for a book, or a play, or a seven volume series, but they always seemed reluctant to start until the moment felt right. The problem, however, is that the moment almost never feels exactly right. That sort of mindset will prevent you from almost anything you want to do. And I know that it's difficult to get past. Goodness knows it still stops me from taking action on a lot of ideas or emotions that I have.

But at least in the area of writing, I have gotten past that feeling. Even if I have nothing to write, I can sit down at a computer and write four hundred words on the fact that I have nothing to write. It's a rather freeing thing. I only regret that I had not found out the key to successful journaling in the past. For me, that key is a comfortable medium (in this case, computer and keyboard) and a suppression of critical instinct if needed. Anything you write can be revised. Ideas don't always come on their own; most of the time you'll have to force things out. And that is okay.

A Summer Reading List, Part 3

Seeing as classes start tomorrow for me, I cannot think of any better time to finish up my thoughts on the books I read this summer. Part 1 is here, Part 2 is here.

15. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams

I already explained how I feel about this book earlier, but I figure it cannot hurt to gush a little more. For those not in the know, this is one of my favorite novels of all time, and this summer was probably my fourth time reading it. It's interesting that I haven't read this book as many times as some others of my favorites – Ender's Game and Speaker for the Dead by Orson Scott Card have been read five or six times already, and nothing comes close to the number of times I have read Jurassic Park and The Lost World by Michael Crichton. But that doesn't mean I love this any less than them. The perfect blend of ridiculous sci-fi, insane humor, and the most logical faulty logic in writing anywhere come together to make this one of the greatest books ever written. I also hope to reread the rest of the series soon; I've read Restaurant at the End of the Universe a couple times, but I've only read all the others once each. It's possibly because the series takes on a very different feel in the fourth and fifth books. They're still good though! They're just a little more cynical than even the others.

16. Anansi Boys by Neil Gaiman

After reading Good Omens, I knew I had to find some more stuff by Neil Gaiman, and my eyes naturally settled on his well known works American Gods and Anansi Boys. On the recommendation of a friend, I started with the latter. At first, I wasn't particularly sold on it. It wasn't bad by any means, but I couldn't get into it. The first half of the book took me about two weeks to read. But then the second half of the book took me about two hours. Once this book gets going, it really gets going. It's fun, it's fascinating, and the characters are great. I've always been a sucker for mythical themes in fiction, and this is certainly no exception. A great book, and I recommend it highly.

17. 1984 by George Orwell

As an English student in years past, people had always been shocked by some of the books I haven't read, the two chief ones being The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald and 1984 by George Orwell. People have been pressuring me for years to read these books, saying that I couldn't truly call myself a student of literature without reading them. And since I eventually read The Great Gatsby at the beginning of this year, I decided it was time to finally get around to reading 1984. I'm glad I did. For me, it wasn't the most gripping book. I didn't particularly like or even care for any of the characters. But the book was tight. It was so well thought out, so thorough, that it almost felt real. There was some distance, obviously, but so many of the things that happened in this book seemed so logical that you couldn't help but wonder if these could be the natural progression of things. In my mind, of course, it would be basically impossible to pull off a society like that in today's world, and the book seemed to leave out exactly how a government like that could fully come to power. But in the world of the book, it is watertight in a way that is thoroughly impressive and terrifying. And when the events of the book are explained, when someone finally says why this all is happening, it's the most unsettling reveal I have ever read. This is a very, very good and thought-provoking book, but you probably did not need me to tell you that.

18. Henry IV part II by William Shakespeare

If you are a consistent reader of this blog, you might remember my thoughts on reading this play. But if you are not a consistent reader, and statistics indicate that you are not (Hello, Russia! I don't know why you are reading this!), then allow me to reiterate. I hated this play. I generally do like Shakespeare, and I enjoyed Henry IV part I, as difficult as it was. But I sorely disliked Henry IV part II. Perhaps some of the fault goes to the Shakespeare class I took recently, which informed me of the popularity of the character of Jack Falstaff, the charmingly insolent ruffian sidekick of Prince Hal (later King Henry V). Knowing that he was so well received makes me awfully suspicious of the merits of a play that gives him a much expanded role, similar to how a Hollywood studio might conceive of a sequel where a popular bit character is given greater prominence to the point where they focus on nothing else. In any case, the biggest problem with this play is the fact that almost nothing significant happens until the fifth act. That's honestly too much time to spend with nothing but Falstaff being sassy. It'd be like making a sequel series to a groundbreaking cartoon fantasy epic with a well-developed mythos and beloved characters and then spending half of it on playing sports and unjustified love triangles.

19. Steam Ticket: A Third Coast Review Volume XII Spring 2009

This might not completely count. This is a volume of a national literary magazine that is produced out of my university. I hope to get on the staff before I graduate, so I figured I should read some of it before I apply. It was good! I mean, there's not much else to say about it. There was an especially good story that imagined what R.L. Stine must be doing with his life now. It was equal parts depressing and hilarious. But there was a great mix of enjoyable poems and memorable stories. I look forward to looking into this magazine further.

20. Frankenstein by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley

Every English program everywhere has that one book that shows up again and again in the curriculum. At my school, that book is Frankenstein. A friend of mine had to read it five times before she graduated, and I myself have been assigned it twice. It's kind of a bad thing, then, that I'd never read it all the way through. Oh sure, I read parts of it, but I jumped around a lot to catch up in class, filled in some blanks with SparkNotes. I even wrote two papers on it without ever reading it all the way through. So naturally, I decided that it would probably be in my best interest to finally read the whole thing from front to back. This decision was aided by a particularly inexpensive hardcover edition I found in the Barnes and Noble clearance section. I like this book. It's dense, it moves too quickly at times and too slowly at others, but all things considered, I like this book. The nice thing about it is that it lends itself to so many different readings, messages and explorations. As long as I'm going to have to study a book over and over again, it's nice to know that it's a book that can be taught in a number of different ways. It's not light reading, not by any means. But if you have the guts and the fortitude, it's a pretty damn good book.

21. The Importance of Being Earnest, and Four Other Plays by Oscar Wilde

Ah, Oscar Wilde. This collection, featuring The Importance of Being Earnest, Lady Windermere's Fan, A Woman of No Importance, An Ideal Husband, and Salomé, has been sitting on my bookshelf for a while. I had been meaning to read it for the longest time, since the little I had read of The Importance of Being Earnest was fantastic. I finally did, and I must say it was a good decision. There is a reason Oscar Wilde is so well-regarded: his humor is incredibly tight and incredibly influential. I'd wager that the writers of Monty Python, Douglas Adams, and many others owe at least some of their inspiration to the man's writing. Granted, some of the quips get a little predictable after reading four comedies in a row, but the characters remain charming, the plots (while not necessarily groundbreaking) remain entertaining, and the plays remain thoroughly enjoyable. This collection also includes the tragedy of Salomé, the story of the daughter of King Herod and the death of John the Baptist. Some critics hate it, but as for me... Biblical themes? Again, I'm sold.

22. Selected Poems by Langston Hughes

If there is one poet who can challenge Billy Collins for the position of my favorite poet, it is Langston Hughes. His work is just so phenomenal, working in a number of recurring themes that overlap just as easily as they work on their own. This collection was selected by Hughes himself, arranged in several sections by either recurring themes or continuing stories. I've always loved his work on its own, and in this collection, it is absolutely sublime. The poetry I write has borrowed a lot from his style and influence, and his work will always be close to my heart. I may not be able to relate to the oppression and striving that he encountered and his poetry describes, but I will always, always love it. I thoroughly recommend this book, and all poetry by Hughes in general.

And here, with 22 books, is where my summer draws to a close. Tomorrow, I begin classes in my third from final semester as an undergraduate. I've changed a lot over the past year, and I've changed the way I view my work as recently as this summer. I've never read so much or written so much as I have in 2012, and a great deal of that is thanks to the reading and writing I have done almost every day this summer. I recommend all of these books very highly (well, except Henry IV part II, which I hated, or Kingdom Hearts, which was all right but not astounding) and I would love to hear what you think of them or what you have been reading lately.