Ever notice how half the cast in Alien (and Aliens, for that matter) smoke like chimneys? I know it wasn’t a big deal when the movies were made, but I couldn’t help making a comic out of it!
You may have noticed that the main character’s name tag reads “A. Ripley.” No, it’s not a way of saying “a Ripley” as opposed to “the Ripley” – this is Amanda Ripley, the daughter of Sigourney Weaver’s character, Ellen Ripley from the movies. You may never have heard of her as she was introduced in a scene cut from the theatrical release of Aliens, later restored in the director’s cut Special Edition. In that scene, Ellen Ripley, who has been asking after her daughter since awakening from a fifty-seven-year hypersleep, is told that Amanda died aged sixty-six, just two years before Ripley’s lifeboat is found.
When developing their game Alien: Isolation, the designers at The Creative Assembly were looking for a story that could drive the action of a game where the player faces a single, extremely powerful Alien. They asked themselves: Who would care that The Nostromo, the spaceship Ripley was aboard in the first film, had gone missing? Who would go looking for it?
As soon as someone said, “Amanda,” they knew they had their story.
And yes, I can’t wait until Alien: Isolation comes out on Tuesday (or Wednesday, depending on time zones and the actual release time)!
Lessons Learned for Next Time
- I’m still struggling with proportions; Amanda’s legs look a little too short in at least one of the frames.
Awesome Stuff I Can’t Wait to Try Again
- I wasn’t sure whether I was going to colour this one, but after I scanned the sketches I knew it needed darkness and shadows. Fiddling with light sources was, as it turned out, good fun!