You mean this scene:
https://youtube.com/watch?v=iusPorC4wZE
Was the entire scene cut in the theatric version? Cause I am quite fond of it. It shows Hadley's Hope before the Aliens attack and introduces a hand full of interesting bits:
- It establishes that someone send those workers to check out the location of the ship, which sets up the reveal that Burke is to blame
- It shows that it was a pretty busy place with many people, including kids, which makes the loss of life pack more of a punch
- We get a bit of a glimpse into Weyland Yutani's corporate culture ("It takes two weeks to get an answer out here and the answer is 'Don't ask'!"), that entire exchange fleshes out the setting a lot
- It establishes that kids play in the airducts, which helps explain how Newt could hide there for so long
And I don't think the movie loses that much in exchange when the scene is put into the movie tbh. The audience knows the reason for the communication blackout and that there's going to be aliens in Hadley's Hope with or without this scene, so it's not like the Marines going there and not finding anyone is that big of a surprise anyway and the scene where they arrive is still pretty intense, cause you don't know if they'll get attacked or what they'll find. And I feel the empty, desolate state of that settlement very well contrasts with the scene earlier with the kids in the corridor.
Well, I've seen Aliens before Alien as a kid so I had no clue what was coming, most people ho were born after the first one came out saw Cameron's movie first.
The lack of that scene made act 1 a lot scarier and when the aliens attacked for the first time, it had impact.
Also, we get pretty much told all the info from the opening scene throughout the movie so we don't need it, at least I don't think we do, the studio shared my thoughts on that
It's nice as a bonus scene like that one in Terminator 3 where you see the soldier that the T-800 was made after and Arnold doing a cheesy southern accent.
See, I think there could be a good Terminator sequel set after Judgement Day, but it would require some liberties. For instance, ignore everything after T3, which was a serviceable film that just had some really bad shit thrown in. I liked the concept of the Terminator being sent back to drag him to the bunker where he survives, but that's about it. Retcon some shit and leave out the craptastic parts.
Now, as for a sequel set in the future when the machines and humanity are trying to murder each other, what if we see a new chapter in the war? Set after all the times they sent back a Terminator to protect John or get him to the bunker, the knowledge of reprogramming Terminators to fight for humanity is actively being used against the machines as humanity manages to capture one of their production facilities and make robots that fight for our side.
Maybe I've said it on KF before but The Terminator is a slasher movie,
The first one plays out very much like the first 2 Halloween movies.
Sarah Connor is Laurie Strode, Kyle Reese is Dr Loomis, the Terminator is Michael Myers.
T2 is still horror even though there's more action but T-1000 is a horror movie villain and his kills are slasher kills.
All the Cyberdyne and future war stuff is just something to raise the stakes and give the movie a gimmick, it's the looming threat, not the actual movie.
The sci fi elements could be removed and replaced with a zombie murdering people instead of a robot and it would work just fine, the effects would be different and a few lines of dialogue but the entire thing could play out in the same exact way.
That's why when they do focus on the sci fi aspects, the movies don't work.
T3 is the first one that dropped the horror and it failed.
I think that a good sequel needs 3 things:
1. It has to be scary (that's the most important thing)
2. An unstoppable killer has to be chasing our heroes
3. You can't show a Terminator killed on screen until the very end (in fact, show multiple times how it can't be killed and it just keeps coming after it's target)
