Anyhow, after some discussion with my wife we decided that our oldest boy could watch the Alien movies with us (there was no real need to worry, because as he said, he's okay with monster films). The results were interesting...
I remember being blown away by Alien at the cinema when it was first released, enjoying Aliens for managing to continue the series and expand upon the original without losing quality. Alien 3 took some time to get into and Alien Ressurection being enjoyable up until the last 20 minutes - we won't talk about the last twenty minutes.
Naturally I enjoyed them all again. But this time I came away liking the first and third film better than the other two. For me Aliens has dated badly, the effects are poor and there's an 80's vibe to the script, which somehow cheepens the movie. Alien Resurrection was okay until the last 20 minutes. But Alien and Alien 3 stood up well, both as cinematic specticle and stories. The scripts were good and tight and they had stories to tell.
My son thought the whole series was good, but when I asked him which he liked best, thinking he was going to say Aliens, he surprised me, he thought Alien 3 was the best, more atmosphere, more scary and a good story.
Kids, who'd have them.
They are all worth a watch though. Hope if Ridley Scott does another Prometheus movie that he manages to make it consistent and better than the first.
