THE FOLLOWING REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS OF THE DISCUSSED FILM READERS DISCRETION IS ADVISED.
Alien vs Predator was admittedly flawed, but had enough perks for me to call it guilty pleasure. I wish I could say the same with the sequel Requiem.
PLOT
The 2007 film takes place immediately following the events of the first film. A hybrid mixed of both Xenomorph & Predator species bursts from the chest of the deceased Predator Scar and wreaks havoc once fully grown. When killing other Predators onboard their ship, it causes a crash into a forest near the small town of Gunnison, Colorado. Upon crashing, the hybrid roams the forest with escaped face huggers. However, a distress signal does get sent out to a veteran Predator credited as Wolf to kill the opposing aliens. The hybrid doesn’t waste time in human casualties when attacking homeless people in the nearby sewers, while face huggers kill a father-son duo named Buddy & Sam Benson (Kurt Max Runte & Liam James). When their absence alerts the former’s wife Darcy (Chelah Horsdal), she reports them missing and starts a search party. The same day, Dallas Howard returns home after serving a sentence for burglary. He reunites with his young brother Ricky who crushes over a girl named Jesse (Kristen Hager), but is constantly bullied by her boyfriend Dale (David Paetkau). Kelly O’Brien also returns home after serving for the US Army, reuniting with her husband Tim (Sam Trammel) and daughter Molly (Ariel Gade). When Wolf arrives, he dissolves evidence of the xenomorph’s presence and avoids being spotted by the search party, killing his witness that was a deputy named Ray Adams (Chris William Martin). When his absence gets noticed by morning, it causes his wife Carrie (Gina Holden) to worry as well. Wolf finds multiple xenomorphs in the sewers, but gets overwhelmed by the hybrid. He follows them outside the sewers to a power plant and on the way, the opposing aliens kill Carrie and her coworker Richie ( at the diner they work in. The confrontation between both species gets hectic to the point where they cause a power outage in the town. As the next day reaches night, Jesse has broken up with Dale and invites Ricky to go swimming at their high school pool. They don’t get a chance however when Dale interrupts them, with the company of his friends Mark & Nick. Once the power goes out, the xenomorphs continue attacking the town by killing Dale’s friends in the school, causing the others to retreat and tell Sheriff Eddie Morales what they saw. Another xenomorph kills Tim, causing Kelly & Molly to retreat from their home to a cemetery. They keep moving when another civilian named Karl (Tom McBeath) gets killed by the Predator who he deemed a threat for carrying a gun of his own. With a traffic jam becoming difficult for everyone to get out of town, Eddie leads his group to a sporting good store in hopes to defend themselves from the aliens. There they meet Kelly & Molly, but also another duo credited as Earl & Scotty (Raimbow Sun Francks & Juan Riedinger) who were stoned going in there. The National Guard shows up, but even they get overwhelmed by the xenomorphs. Wolf uses Dallas as bait to kill another alien, which works at the cost of killing the stoners in the crossfire. Dale even gets himself killed when getting exposed to the xenomoprh’s acidic blood that dissolves his face. Eddie calls the Army from a satellite phone for the sake of reinforcements. Colonel Stevens (Robert Joy), who discovers what’s going on from the National Guard’s feed, instructs him to go to an airlift in the center of town. Kelly suspects them to lie and will probably contain the fiasco, encouraging the others to go to the hospital and take a chopper for themselves to escape. Eddie and Darcy however choose to go to the rendezvous they believe to be legit. At the hospital, the hybrid has made a new nest by impregnating women by replacing their unborn children with alien embryos. Wolf arrives too and kills more xenomorphs, but Jesse and Ricky's boss from the pizzeria he worked at, Drew (David Hornsby), get killed in the crossfire. Ricky tries avenging his crush, but gets himself injured by Wolf. He still reaches the rooftop with his group, but Dallas ends us using a plasma blaster left behind by Wolf to better their chances. They find the chopper and are able to fly away from the alien mayhem and Wolf faces the hybrid on the rooftop, severely injuring each other in the process. The madness reaches an end when an F22 Raptor passes through and drops a nuke onto the town which not only kills both aliens, but also all the civilians that include the likes of Eddie and Darcy. Kelly’s group is able to avoid the impact as they crash land into the forest. When they end up getting picked up by the military, Wolf’s blaster gets confiscated from Dallas. While both families seemed relieved of the monstrosity to be over, the film ends in a cliffhanger where said blaster is presented to Ms. Yutani (Françoise Yip).
THOUGHTS
I wanted to give the benefit of the doubt this would work out because I still thought the preceding cliffhanger was pretty cool. Of course once things pick up where they left off story wise, that also means a continuous mess of a story. Both co-directors Colin & George Strause fail to make any improvements and just make a shitload more. The biggest gripe I have to get off my chest is how the lighting is so damn dark for the nighttime scenes I can't see fucking shit. I had to adjust my television setting just to get an idea what the fuck was going on. Like I couldn't tell if any soldier shot an alien or not. Of course no one had this problem when this was in theaters at the time of release, but for someone who didn't see it than, I shouldn't have to ever adjust my tv to watch a movie. After I do that, I can give a few merits on what was done. The biggest nightmare of xenomorphs roaming an american neighborhood is indeed no one wants to imagine because they're one of the most dangerous alien species ever depicted and it's not easy to take them on. The fear kicks in high due to them being led by a hybrid. The crew may have cleverly named it the 'Predalien' but since the eyeless aliens have a legit name, I prefer calling it a 'Predamorph' just because it sounds better to me. Having said that, this thing was hella scary due to many features are incredible to notice. It has Predator fangs and dreads, but still has two jaws and has green blood that neither glows nor is it acidic. The scariest thing it can do other than killing is being able to impregnate women via mouth-to-mouth and produce more than one offspring in a single host. That definitely gets the job done compared to the queen, who has to lay face hugger eggs. Wolf is a cool Predator because it is a one man army cleaning up a huge mess, similar another character of the same name from Pulp Fiction. The skilled alien was consistent in getting the job done and definitely died trying. While both opposing species are cool and look extremely realistic thanks to fantastic costumes, it's still boring due to not relating to the characters strongly enough. I respect all their will to survive the ordeal, but they feel either too easily written or not written well enough. I can pick the pieces that Steven Pasquale plays Dallas as one who wants to pick up where he left off since it feels like he committed a crime to try looking after his brother as their parents aren't around. Johnny Lewis shows Ricky as one who feels so lost in his life that he doesn't know how make things go his way and the return of his brother confuses him since he had to take care of himself when he was gone. It's a miracle Jesse gave him a chance for seeing his heart, hence making a prick like Dale instantly jealous. Their arc seemed well handled for the fact that the way they had each other's backs as they escaped the monster mash that dropped into their hometown. John Ortiz was cool in playing Eddie as a guy who didn't want to give up on hope and he paid the price for it. The government nuking the town without a heads up because everyone deserved a chance to fight for their lives. Those babies at the hospital definitely didn't, let that sink in. The one arc that's too simple for me is Kelly. Reiko Aylesworth does make her tough as nails and smart enough to know when something is up, but the fact her family is all that drove her to live was just too easy for me to care. I'm glad she and her daughter made it, but it looked too easy on their end which is weird because they're with the Howard brothers for the second half of the film. The Alien canon even gets weird with the fact claiming that it took one Predator to lose a blaster that leads to Yutani's corporate success in advanced technology. I mean that is pure fucking luck if you ask me. Then there are more things within the story that don't make any fucking sense. Like why would Buddy & Sam go to the crashed ship when they can tell from above it was alien. And the fact Sam didn't keep running after his dad was down for the count was so dumb. Don't duck, run. And if Ricky has issues with Dale on the job, he could've told his boss and also could've reported the police when his keys were tossed in the sewer. Also, why was Wolf still in the woods by the time of the search party pulling up? He's a smart Predator, so he should've left immediately after getting rid of the xeno-evidence. Moving on, why were the xenomorphs still in the sewers after being born out of homeless people? It's not clear that they were waiting for Wolf, so they should've left right after being born. Jesse makes two dumb decisions that make very bad repercussions. Her not checking if Dale was following her caused the death of her friends and her running into the tunnel caused her own demise. I almost liked where her head was at, but thinking sadly wasn't her strongest suit because she could've waited for Kelly to take the lead. And the fact Ricky survived his revenge boner is another act of pure luck at its finest because anyone else would've died trying to fight a Predator without knowing any weakness. Not only was Dallas lucky, but the fucking chopper as well when it came to no damage encountering the acid blood. I mean that chopper should've melted before the remaining survivors took flight when you think about it. And you think I wasn't going to notice they used a different for the table Scar's table was put in compared to last time. Not even the angle of the planet was inaccurate and the hybrid is facing the wrong way after bursting out of the chest which is so fucking stupid to look back on. It may have been reasonable to have a distress call for Wolf, but it would've been much easier by blowing up the ship before the hybrid escaped. Would've saved us from this shit storm for sure. Wolf also lacked consistency when not dissolving the construction worker at the plant who got killed by the xenomoprh. Even if it didn't matter due to the nuke, he should still cover the tracks. Also, shouldn't Buddy have bled out way before his gets chest gets bursted by the alien? If he's gonna die either way, I don't see the point in him still being alive after losing his arm without being tended to. I don't even get why Dallas would wait in the dark when Ricky gets home which makes the reunion all the more bland than it had to be. If this is because Ricky couldn't pay the electric bill in time, any of them could've said that. The same mistake is made on how no one saw a Predator's ship, particularly Wolf's, upon crash landing. It's like no one watches the sky in this franchise at all. While it's obvious that Ricky and Dallas' parents aren't around anymore, does the same apply with Jesse? It feels weird there's not a single scene she's worried about her parents or the other way around which I can't stand at all. I also didn't see the point of Dallas being used as bait by Wolf if there were so many humans in the store he could've just waited to see it play out on who would be attacked by the xenomorph and go from there. Putting Dallas in danger like that made no suspense the way it was supposed to. On top of that, how come there are no other casualties caused by the xenomorphs during the traffic jam? I don't want to see the innocent die but if the aliens didn't hesitate attacking the National Guard and follow the central characters to the store To get this over with, there is no reason for them to not have a melee killing spree right then and there. Aliens vs Predator: Requiem is the worst entry for both franchises that cross over. It had no flair the way Freddy vs Jason had and should've been left alone after the first attempt. Whichever fan you are, avoid it at all costs.
Comments