After surviving Alien, Ripley (Sigourney Weaver) became the star of the franchise, but the Ridley Scott film’s original ending killed her off. When it comes to sci-fi and horror combinations, few command as much respect as Alien. Boasting the iconic tagline “In space, no one can hear you scream,” Alien essentially functioned as a claustrophobic haunted house movie in space, only instead of a house it’s a spaceship and instead of ghosts it’s a predatory alien.
Alien was of course a huge hit with both critics and audiences, and Weaver’s Ripley would return to battle Xenomorphs in three sequels. Ripley’s journey through the sequels would see her team up with space marines in Aliens, make the ultimate sacrifice in Alien 3, then come back as a part-alien clone in Alien: Resurrection. Ripley is today regarded as one of the most badass female heroes in cinema history. However, her legacy was almost limited to the first Alien film.
It turns out that Ridley Scott originally wanted to end Alien with what would’ve been a huge blow to fans who just spent the the last two hours hoping at least one of the Nostromo’s crew members would survive the Xenomorph’s assault. Here’s what almost happened in Alien’s ending.
Alien’s Original Ending Killed Off Ripley
Alien as we all know it today ends with Ripley escaping the Nostromo in a shuttle, only to discover the titular creature is aboard, and engaging in one last fight with it that ends with the Xenomorph eventually blasted out of the airlock into the darkness of space. Ripley then records a log entry, and enters stasis alongside Jonesy the cat. As revealed by Ridley Scott himself, the director’s original idea for the ending went in a different direction. At one point in the theatrical ending, Ripley shoots the Xenomorph with a grappling gun, as it struggles to prevent going out the open airlock. This ends up inadvertently tethering the alien to the shuttle, and Ripley uses a blast from the engines to get it knocked loose.
In Scott’s original ending idea for Alien, the grappling gun has no real effect on the Xenomorph, and it then moves forward, crashing onto Ripley. The Xenomorph busts straight through her space helmet, and rips her head clean off. As if that wasn’t depressing enough, the alien monster would then be seen pressing buttons on the shuttle’s dashboard, before mimicking Captain Dallas’ voice saying “I’m signing off.” Presumably, the Xenomorph would then wait to be “rescued,” by another hapless human crew. While studio executives often get a bad rap, in this case it was executives at Fox who vetoed the dark ending with Ripley’s death, even threatening to fire Scott from the film if he refused to change it. See, not all executive meddling is bad.
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