Film Illiterate, wherein the proprietor records movies seen, and sporadic progress through assorted lists of the "best". Originally started after regretfully renting something forgettable for the third time. I've forgotten what, but never again! A tedious endeavour since 2005. Hello. 🙂
The best thing about Alien³ is the script on which it was originally greenlit, reputedly a religious parable involving monks living on a wooden planet. A planet made of wood. Inhabited by monks.
Indeed, IMDb trivia blithely suggests that, "[a]lso, the alien itself would not be appearing." I mourn the loss, but even the shooting script had its share of insanity. As you can see on the special edition DVD, originally the beast didn't gestate in a dog, but in an ox -- a furry cow obviously being just the sort of thing one finds in a lead works on a maximum-security prison planet.
It's fairly obvious that the original concept was ambitious in a way that the final production was not. Some of that ambition comes through: there's a religious aspect to the film; the comparison with the prisoners invites discussion of what makes a monster a monster. There's an obvious parallel between the alien "impregnation" and an attempted rape.
It just doesn't work. It never goes anywhere. Aliens escapes comparison with Alien by virtue of being so thoroughly different in character. The third, despite its difference in tone -- a horrible, disorienting muddy-brown (I can only assume it was a strong influence on Farscape) -- is essentially a rehash of the original: a small number of under-equipped people trying to fight a murderous alien.
Elliot Goldenthal's score deserves particular mention -- if you can, set the film on mute.