The Alien Saga

Scott Hardie: “It was ok.”

The best that can be said about this generally pointless made-for-TV documentary about the "Alien" series is that is sure has some exciting footage when it plays whole scenes from the famous films. Normally I'm irked whenever a behind-the-scenes feature overuses footage from the film it promotes, because it points to a lack of content. In this case, that footage is the best content, because the doc itself is essentially a summary of the films. What behind-the-scenes material it does contain is either so abbreviated as to misrepresent the true story (such as portraying Walter Hill and David Giler's screenplay for the original as a valuable, welcomed contribution) or to omit important parts of the production story (such as barely mentioning Vincent Ward's involvement in the third film). I suppose it's useful for anyone who doesn't want to sit through the exhaustive documentaries included on four discs of the "Alien Quadrilogy" boxed set, or to serve as a two-hour trailer for anyone who has not seen the series, but mostly it's a waste of time.

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