Can you begin a review of a book on what you thought this book was going to be about, rather what you thought the original idea for a third movie would have looked like? Course you can; here goes; "William Gibson's never before adapted screenplay for the direct sequel to Aliens, revealing the fate of Ripley, Newt, the synthetic Bishop and Corporal Hicks." Well, there you go, for good or ill this was what William Gibson had in mind, for a brief time, coming off the back of the celebrated Alien. William Gibson, the " founder" or "father" of cyberpunk must have seemed like a cunning choice at the time for this project, as he was riding a wave of growing fame and respect for his genre busting contributions to the writing field. I had come to think of him as the Doctor Frankenstein of a new science in that he used the decaying parts of science fiction tropes in order to construct a new body from old.
It is a hugely different take on the place in the Alien franchise and history line we are so familiar with. Some characters come to the fore while others disapear altogether. This script, this unused script, was created in an era where there was less confidence in the notion of evolving story arcs across expensively produced movies. Marvel movies were a long way off at this point and continuing arcs were reserved for television and soap operas. The idea that a movie genre, especially a quite adult toned blend of horror and science fiction would put bums on seats was not something beyond the realm of dedicated fan fiction and their notions of shared universes. The tiresome and repetitive wearing quality of such a world striding series of movies would perhaps indicate that strong stand alone movies would have been the wise way to go. In most viewers eyes the Alien movies series has more in common with Halloween than The Avengers.
William Gibson's star was shining bright at this time, which is remarkable given the aesthetics his work remains cloaked in. Some might describe it as cyber-marmite while others might quite rightly see his genre shattering turn as a healthy extension to an ailing franchise. Its all the product of a cinema world that never was, a" what if" I suppose.
It is well worth experiencing even should you be a mere Alien dilettante.
Which even the most louche of us remains...
