Aliens vs. Predator 2: Requiem
Written: Jan 01 '08
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Shows the Predator home planet, cool ending
Cons: Not much development
The Bottom Line: If you liked the first one, you'll like this one, too.
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| phungus's Full Review: |
I thought Aliens vs. Predator 2: Requiem was better than the first A vs. P movie, but that isn’t saying a whole lot. This is still a 90-minute science fiction action movie, meaning there isn’t much character development or room for a lot of plot advancement, but it still does pretty well as an action horror movie. It could have been a lot worse.
This movie begins with a Predator spaceship flying outside earth. Inside the ship, they have various pods containing those octopus-like Alien things that attach to the host’s face and ultimately make an Alien baby pop out of their chest. Also in the ship is a dead Predator who has an Alien inside of him. When it bursts forth, it looks like a cross between an Alien and a Predator, so it’s extra tough. When this Alien/Predator starts attacking the other Predators on the ship, they end up crash landing on Earth. Just before the last Predator dies and all the Alien octopus things escape out into the wilderness, a distress signal is sent back to the Predator home planet. We get to see the home planet for about ten seconds as one of the honchos up there boards his ship and heads down to Earth to clean up the mess.
The Predator ship crash landed outside a small Colorado town, and very soon a few people become hosts to the Aliens. After that, Aliens start attacking people and the local Sheriff doesn’t know what to make of the situation. When the Predator arrives, he begins killing all the Aliens he can find, plus any humans that get in the way of his mission. Early on in the movie, the Predator and an Alien get in a big fight inside the local power station, and an explosion knocked out the electricity for the entire town. From there, it becomes a lot like 30 Days of Night, but with extra terrestrials instead of vampires. The National Guard gets called in, but there’s not much they can do about the problem.
At only 90 minutes long, this one is a bit formulaic. The first few minutes set up the story, then the next half hour introduces the characters. There’s a mild love story and a little bit of back story on some of the characters, but it’s all there just to provide a thin layer of humanity to these people once the Aliens and Predator start to attack. After the violence begins, it’s pretty much a non-stop series of shoot-outs and killings as the group of survivors dwindle down in number.
There are really no main characters, and all of the actors are unknown, so you don’t really know who will live or die. In fact, I was surprised by the body count in this one, and that’s what at least helped it be a better movie. The best horror movies are the ones where you don’t know who will make it to the end, and this one is like that. The characters in this movie consist of your typical teenager lovers, a local Sheriff who gets along with everyone, a female soldier just getting back from Iraq, and a whole bunch of cannon fodder.
I found the action in this to be pretty cool, and we get to see the Predator use a couple of new gadgets that I don’t remember from the previous movies. Unfortunately, the movie makes no attempt to further look into the personality of the Predators. At least the first movie did this, like when the one Predator helped the girl after she killed an Alien. I was hoping to see more of that, but there wasn’t. The hybrid Alien/Predator thing was pretty cool, but basically he just behaved like another Alien who happened to be a little taller and stronger than the rest.
Ultimately, this movie was made to appeal to fans of the Aliens and Predator series. If you saw the first one and thought it was mostly just OK, like most people, then you will probably think the same of this one. It’s not as bad as a lot of sequels, and the ending opens the door for another sequel. Given the box office performance of this one, I wouldn’t be surprised if the next movie went direct to DVD. I’d watch it.
Recommended:
Yes
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phungus
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Member: William Fulks
Location: Biloxi, MS
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About Me:
My short story, When Dragons Sleep, now on Amazon - visit http://www.wfulks.com for more info.
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