How Every Film in the Alien Franchise Stacks Up According to an Expert

When Dallas-Fort Worth native Shaun Hamill sat down to write an Alien novel, the goal was not just to have a xenomorph wreak havoc on a group of unsuspecting spacefarers. That definitely happens in Alien: Perfect Organisms, his new novel hitting shelves Nov. 18, but it wasn’t the goal.

Instead, Hamill wanted to recapture the feeling of the classic Alien films he grew up on. He has an abiding love for the sci-fi horror franchise, citing the original as his favorite film of all time. Even the entries regarded as “lesser” have elements he admires. Because of his passion for Alien, when the UK version of his debut novel was published by Titan, who holds the Alien license, he asked how he might go about pitching an original story set in the universe.

Long story short: he got the job and Alien: Perfect Organisms is the result.

The book is set in the years following Alien 3 and tells the story of a crew venturing to a quarantined planet to find a reclusive artist. It has all the hallmarks of Alien, guided by Hamill’s authorial voice.

“People who have seen all the movies, who are fans, are gonna recognize all the little easter eggs,” says Hamill. “But it’s designed in a way so that somebody like my dad, who hasn’t seen an Alien movie in a long time but wants to read my book [can follow along].”

With the novel on the horizon and spooky season in full swing, we asked Hamill to share some thoughts on the franchise as a whole, specifically its major film entries. We’re leaving Alien vs. Predator out to keep this manageable, but rest assured, Hamill even has a soft spot for those misguided monster mashups.

Alien (1979) – The Best One

“It’s like cosmic horror in space, right?” says Hamill. “There are these vast unexplained things at the edges.”

“I find it genuinely frightening, even now,” he adds. “Which is… an interesting trick for a movie to be able to pull off when you’ve been watching it since you were in middle school. But it can still give me the creeps.”

Aliens (1986) – The Accessible One

“Whenever I was a kid, [Aliens] was my favorite,” says Hamill. “I think it expands the world while still feeling basically true to the precepts of the original.”

Even though it is the second installment in the franchise, Hamill says for newcomers it might be better to start here: it has a more modern sensibility in terms of pacing, and lots of action, whereas Ridley Scott’s original is a tense, slow build with a rhythm that may put off modern viewers.

Alien 3 (1992) – The Compromised One

“I think it’s genuinely upsetting and scary, and there’s some interesting character work. I do think it feels unfinished,” says Hamill of David Fincher’s Alien 3, which has been disavowed by the director himself.

It’s also the film set closest to when Alien: Perfect Organisms takes place within the universe, and plays with ideas Hamill was interested in. Namely the xenomorphs being perceived as a “messenger from a higher power.”

Alien Resurrection (1997) – The One Nobody Talks About

While most people write off Alien Resurrection as a failure, Hamill says it holds a special place in his heart because it’s the first Alien movie he saw in a theater. Of the original four films, Resurrection is his least favorite, but he loves that the Alien franchise is filled with auteurist directors who come in for an installment and leave their mark on it. And it features Ron Perlman, so it can’t be all bad.

Prometheus (2012) – The One That Grows on You

Hamill confesses that, on its original release, Prometheus didn’t quite work for him.

“I was confused and a little angry,” he says. “Especially that it… felt like the first part of what was meant to be an ongoing story. Like, I just wanted it to be a whole movie.”

Even now, though the film has grown on him in the years since its initial release, he acknowledges that Prometheus has its flaws. He calls out a moment when characters are hanging out in an alien temple and try to pet a snake-like monster that appears. It’s a dumb choice, even for a horror movie. He prefers when characters are desperate, not dumb, and driven into impossible situations because they have no other choice. It’s something Hamill tried to do in Alien: Perfect Organisms, driving the plot using impossible choices without an escape route.

Alien: Covenant (2017) – The Late Masterpiece

While Hamill was mixed on Prometheus the first time he saw it, Alien: Covenant was so good that it retroactively made him appreciate its predecessor due to its handling and evolution of the themes in its predecessor. Like all of us, he responds to the peculiar tension between the two androids (both played by Michael Fassbender), who drive the plot with their questionable motives.

“It’s like, ‘Oh, this is what I want from a new Alien movie,’” says Hamill. “It deepens the themes, it explores it, it actually wrestles with it. But also ramps up and uses modern technology to give us things that the old movies never could.”

Alien: Romulus (2024) – The Greatest Hits Playlist

Like many fans, Hamill walked away with mixed feelings about the latest Alien film. He loves the casting, especially leads Cailee Spaeny and David Jonsson, but bristles at the use of CGI to digitally recreate Ian Holm’s android from the first Alien (Holm passed away in 2020). 

There are sequences that work, but for Hamill, the barrage of easter eggs and callbacks are a blemish on the film. It’s like Alien 3 — the ideas are there, but something in the script fails to totally connect the dots between them. But, he says, if we come back to him in 10 years, he may have a different opinion.

Much like the xenomorphs themselves, our relationship to art is always evolving.