#encountering an unlike species and deciding to use them as resources. deeming them not worth respect | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

raceandspeculation · 7 years

Text

Ripley vs. Patriarchy and Colonialism

The Alien quadrilogy is a major milestone in science fiction and horror film history. The protagonist of the quadrilogy, Ellen Ripley, goes through major transformations because of her constant battle with the series’ primary antagonist, the Xenomorphs. Although Ripley spends a majority of her time on-screen trying to survive the violent Xenomorphs, she is also contending against enemies that exist off-screen and in our own reality. Patriarchy and colonialism are themes that Aliens and Alien 3 explore in detail, as well as create different narratives and ways for the movies to be understood. These themes play off of each other, allowing for the audience to identify the social implications created by them, and a deeper understanding of Ripley’s reaction to these invisible forces.

The Xenomorphs are similar to beasts and other sci-fi monsters because they kill indiscriminately. As noted by the android Ash in the first film, they do not have “delusions of morality”. They are not mindless creatures, as displayed in the final scene of Aliens, when Ripley points a gun at the queen in order to allow herself safe passage to get to Newt. The queen lets out a roar, and the warrior drones back away, acknowledging the queens warning. Again, we see the Xenomorph in Alien 3 refuse to attack Ripley because she is pregnant with an alien queen. There is a clear and distinct respect among the Xenomorphs, especially for the queen, who serves as the mother of their species. Unfortunately, the human species doesn’t have the same set of values in regards to women.

Vasquez, the only female Marine that the film pays particular attention to, is also framed by her relationship to patriarchy. When the Marines are introduced early on in the movie, misogynist comments are directed at her by some of the male Marines. She casually and humorously brushes them off, proving she can take it and dish it out. It seems as though her bravado and gung-ho attitude are attempts to assimilate herself into an all male military unit. Her occasional use of Spanish expletives seem like a form of resistance against her white and mostly male colleagues.

Despite Ripley’s experience and intelligence, she is constantly ignored by men in charge. In Aliens, she is asked to accompany a unit of Marines investigating a colony on the same planet her crew first encountered the Xenomorphs. Despite her experience with Xenomorphs, her advice on how to deal with them falls on deaf ears. When she explains that the pulse rifles the Marines are using could possibly hit a reactor and cause an explosion that will kill them all, her warning isn’t acted on until Burke, a representative of the Weyland-Yutani corporation, supports this claim. The officer in charge then decides that it would be wise to use other weaponry to combat the Xenomorphs. It is only until a majority of the original crew is killed off that Ripley’s counsel is taken into consideration.

The prison warden in Alien 3 is another example of patriarchy that exists in the film. When she requests an autopsy be performed on Newt, Ripley makes no mention of Xenomorphs or her past experiences, despite the numerous questions she is asked by the prison’s doctor. She has already been conditioned to understand that men in power either disregard her warnings or don’t believe her. The scene in which some of the prisoners ambush Ripley in an attempt to rape her is important because of the way in which she survived that situation. In an article titled, “You’ve been in my life so long I can’t remember anything else”: Into the labyrinth with Ripley and the Alien”, the author states, “ Dillon, too, rescues Ripley from the three prisoners who are about to rape and perhaps murder her, just as Parker rescued her when Ash attempted to kill her by ramming a magazine down her throat. Without their help, Ripley would not have survived” (Gibson, 47). Ripley is able to successfully defend herself from a vicious Alien species mostly by herself, but is always rescued by another man when she is brutalized by men. Later in the film, when Ripley witnesses the attack of the prison doctor by the Xenomorph, she is yelled at and told to be quiet by the warden when she alerts them of what has just happened. This isn’t the first time he has disregarded her warnings or suggestions, but it proves to be the last. After he is snatched up by the Xenomorph, the surviving inmates and staff decide that Ripley is someone worth listening to, but only because they’ve witnessed what happens to those that don’t. Her sacrifice at the end of the film is not just a means to an end, but also a political statement. The men that wish to possess her body in order to exploit it have been denied by her sacrifice, and the galaxy is all the more safer for it.

The Weyland-Yutani Corporation plays an important role in the telling of the story in these films. They manage to be present in every film by way of proxy. In Aliens, they are represented by Carter Burke. Carter Burke does a good job at fooling Ripley and the audience into believing that the Weyland-Yutani Corportations involvement and interest in the military operation is to righteously eradicate the alien scum that destroyed their colony. We realize later on in the movie that the only reason Burke was dispatched with Ripley and the unit was to oversee the possible capture of the Xenomorphs to study and possibly use as a biological weapon. In the book, Alien Woman: The Making of Lt. Ellen Ripley, the authors state,“Whereas in Alien, Ash (and Mother) were simply following orders, Burke, the self-serving bureaucrat, pursues only his interests with no consideration for law, morality, or common human decency. In a way, he is worse than Ash, for unlike the android, who was obviously programmed to be scientifically curious (as is Bishop), Burke displays no respect for, or aesthetic interest in, the Alien. He does not even acknowledge its danger; for him, the Alien is just a commodity to be traded for profit.”(Gallardo-C. & Smith, 84). It’s clear that the Weyland-Yutani Corporation is engaging in a futuristic form of colonialism. With access to an unimaginable number of planets, corporations have become their own sovereign states, taking from the galaxy as they see fit. Because of the nature of Xenomorphs and their need for human hosts, Weyland-Yutani is willing to exploit human bodies for a profit. What’s even more telling is the military unit that is dispatched to the colony on LV-426. Although they speak and behave like the Marines we know on earth, these Marines are a bit different. They are actually called the Colonial Marines, and sent on a mission deemed necessary by a corporation. The movie doesn’t make a big deal of it, but it’s worth noting that a governmental organization like the military is doing the dirty work for a mega-corporation.

Alien 3 may not have the presence of the Colonial Marines, but that doesn’t necessarily mean it doesn’t expose the colonialism practiced by the Weyland-Yutani Corporation. The planet Ripley has crash landed on is actually a penal colony, where the prisoners work as foundry workers. This time, the resource being exploited is convict labor. The Weyland-Yutani Corporation quickly dispatches a unit once they realize that a Xenomorph is alive and present at the prison. The resource to be exploited again becomes the Xenomorph, with the added inclusion of Ripley. Her body, and the body of the Xenomorph, are to be exploited for economical gain. In the essay, The ‘Alien’ trilogy: from feminism to Aids, the author states “In Alien 3, the body, which in retrospect seems to have been remarkably repressed in the first two films, becomes a landscape, obsessively probed and examined with fingers and eyes, pentrated in close-up with needles, knives, and saws” (Taubin, 93). The bodies of both Ripley and the Alien have become “landscapes”, waiting to be pillaged by the invasive scientists of the Weyland-Yutani corporation.

Patriarchy and colonialism are responsible for some of the most exploitative acts and practices in human history, and according to the creators of the film, they manage to live on well into the future. The films exist in a dystopian future, where human lives are considered expendable by the corporations that employ them. Men are still mostly in charge and still manipulate a woman’s body, both figuratively and literally, to serve their own wants and needs. Ripley challenges the status quo, and in the end, gives her own life to reclaim some semblance of power and control. Ripley serves as a symbol of resistance against patriarchy and colonialism, and ends up a martyr that has gained victory over her on-screen and off-screen enemies.

Word Count: 1543

Works Cited

Taubin, Amy. “The 'Alien' trilogy: from feminism to Aids.” Women and Film: A Sight and Sound Reader, edited by Pam Cook and Philip Dodd, Scarlet Press, London, 1997, pp. 93–100.

Gibson, Pamela Church. “"You've been in my life so long I can't remember anything else": Into the labyrinth with Ripley and the Alien.” Keyframes: Popular Cinema and Cultural Studies, edited by Matthew Tinkcom and Amy Villarejo, Routledge, London, 2001, pp. 35–51.

Gallardo-C., Ximena, and C. Jason Smith. Alien Woman: The Making of Lt. Ellen Ripley. London, Continuum, 2004.

9 notes · View notes