The Dog Alien

visually, the CGI of the time didn't do the dog alien any justice but the concept is great. that the xeno takes the characteristics of its host was def original. makes me think, would xenos, birthed from different animals on the same planet be aggressive towards each other? is the base dna of the xeno strong enough for them to view each other as simply a xenomorph and co-exist?

If it takes a lot from animal behavior,then it seems very likely that they would not get along.

The Dog was cool. I could overlook the CGI. What made me wonder was how it crawl on ceilings and we could see what it saw with that fish eyed FP POV. Strange but not a deal breaker for me.

 The cgi while not great is not a problem for me either.The thing is down right vicious and that's something i love about it.

It wasn't CGI.  It was either Tom Woodruff Jnr (or a stunty) in a suit, or a rod puppet.

The only CG Alien in Alien3 was the bambi burster shot specifically created for the Assembly Cut in 2003.

It's probably my least favourite design 'cos I like the dorsal tubes, and some of the compositing is very average.

The puppet is what i mean.I also think the close up of it's dome cracking after the molten lead is also CGI.

There's varying accounts of that, but as far as I know it's just the cracks that are CG over the practical full scale suit.

At any rate, I liked the Dog. The lack of dorsal tubes was different but fit its sleek and fast design.

The lack of dorsal tubes i never noticed.

to get onto the point of the vicious nature of the dog alien. going by my earlier question, do u think the viciousness of the dog alien was because it was the only one of its kind and knew it had no way of reproduction? as queried, xenos birthed from different host species may very well not get along. to my knowledge the dog it birthed from was the only one so its species of xeno wasn't going to continue. now that it has no reason to keep hosts alive, we may just be seeing the raw aggression of the basic xeno dna?

I like to think the Dog was extra vicious since its host was a creature that was more about survival and opportunity- not about being calculating such as ones from human hosts?

Intriguing question ali81.I agree with dk on the viciousness part.It knowing it can't continue can be reinforced by it ensuring the survival of Ripley's queen.

maybe if it knew its species (dog alien) could continue then it may have killed ripley thus eliminating a rival species. by knowing it had no way for more of its kind to be berthed, it allows ripley, and the rival species queen, to live. the queen may even kill the dog alien when birthed

 It's a possibility.I would be curious to see how a hive might treat an animal.Would they view it as a bastardisation of their species?

that's what im theorising. in essence they r all the same but still come from different host species so how much of the host dna other than characteristics r present? if different species of xeno wont tolerate another then id imagine the queen would kill the dog alien first chance it got. it may just be that the dog alien doesn't kill ripley because it senses the embryo is a queen and the basic xeno instinct would kick in and allow ripley to live. if it was just a standard xeno embryo, it may think differently and kill ripley?

This is an intriguing idea.I think this warrants its own thread.

would be interesting to see others opinions on the theory

 I just started one.Check it out.

tbh I don't think fincher put too much thought into this concept and its most likely as simple as xeno protecting its queen and the host animal doesn't have much influence other than characteristics such as appearance etc. though I don't think other than sheer professionalism fincher ended up putting too much fresh ideas into the project after a point. he had so little creative control if any control over the project and has stated he would like to be disassociated with it altogether

I agree.Fincher came in and said he wanted something more animal like,so they gave him an animal.It more or less left us fans to speculate on It's true purpose considering how comprised the film was.

from what iv hear and read he wanted to do ward and fasanos' wooden monk planet script and the alien to burst through the dog mattias but all he got was the dog idea.

I know the general Wooden Planet outline.I know some animal concepts consisted of sheep and a horse.

yea and that's the query, say there were many sheep and horse xenos, how would they react to each other? neither host is particularly aggressive in nature though can be when on the defensive but the xenos nature is purely aggressive

Totally depends on how the Organisms can interact during Procreation....

Would there be Pheromones or Psychic connection during the Infection part... so when Ripley was infected.. something triggered the type of Embryo the other Face Hugger would release so that it would release something that would have the objective to protect the Queen Host.... Eradicate any threat and gather Hosts for use for Genetically to Produce a Hive and for Hosts for Eggs?

Or again away from a set up Hive, or away from contact with other Eggs either by Pheromones or Psychic connection.... was the other Face Hugger simply just going to produce a Drone Type Alien like in Alien so that it would seek out to then start to Procreate its species maybe via Egg Morph?

Who knows

But i always thought the Alien 3 Alien was more similar in purpose to the Big Chap in Alien?

Maybe no Dorsal Spines/tubes... means its role is different and thus it can detect at Face Huger Stage there was a Queen local or in the making and thus it was only needed to ensure the Queen can be born and protected and provided with Hosts

Then we have to ask why do the Aliens Warriors have Dorsal Pipes/Spines?

I think the Organism takes on traits of the Hosts so they can fit in with the Environment of the Hosts..

The big question would be the nature of the Organism once a Hive is set up.... to they react and work well with others... is there some kind of Pheromone or Genetic Trait thats detected that allow them to determine which Hive they are from.

I think something like this would determine how they react with each other like different Ant Colonies... rather than being different Species..

For example... in Aliens... if 10 Humans became Hosts and created Warriors and a Dog was infected on the same outpost... i would think some programing is passed on to them.. so that the Dog Xeno and Human Xeno would work together for the greater good of that hive.

so basically the xeno coding is the dominant trait and regardless of host species they see each other as simply a single xeno? the characteristics taken from the host r simply that, a resemblance to the hosts form? would create variation within the species for sure and maybe a cast system would evole, xenos berthed from less intelligent species being at the bottom say and xenos birthed from say humans and engineers ranking at the top of the hive cast system maybe?

A question regarding the sheep xenomorph.Why did it Have a human face on It's a$$?

Think that was a nightmare concept.

"to get onto the point of the vicious nature of the dog alien. going by my earlier question, do u think the viciousness of the dog alien was because it was the only one of its kind and knew it had no way of reproduction? as queried, xenos birthed from different host species may very well not get along. to my knowledge the dog it birthed from was the only one so its species of xeno wasn't going to continue. now that it has no reason to keep hosts alive, we may just be seeing the raw aggression of the basic xeno dna?"

The idea behind the viciousness fit with the change to the dog (from Ox), according to Fincher.

As far as reproduction - it knew there was a Queen coming after it killed Clemens. Good way to protect that Queen is to remove any potential threats.