Since ranking the Alien movies, there are two franchise installments that almost always come dead last.

The widely-reviled Alien Vs. Predator movies were both hated by critics and fans, albeit for very different reasons. 2004’s Alien Vs. Predator has style to spare and an impressive director in Event Horizon’s Paul WS Anderson, but the crossover was hamstrung by an inexplicable PG-13 rating that sanitized the movie’s violent action beyond recognition. Alien Vs. Predator scarcely even felt like an Alien movie or a Predator movie, resulting in 2007’s sequel Aliens Vs. Predator: Requiem going to the other extreme.

If Prometheus Could Be Saved, Then So Can Alien Vs. Predator

The Alien Vs Predator Movies Wasted A Killer Premise

To be fair to Aliens Vs. Predator: Requiem, the sequel wasn’t lacking in explicit gore. The problem was that the showdown between the two titans of sci-fi horror cinema had nothing else going for it, and violence alone wasn’t enough to salvage the sequel. Aliens Vs. Predator: Requiem’s woeful lighting meant viewers often had trouble working out what was happening on-screen, meaning no amount of gore could have saved the laughably bad, un-scary effort.

While the back-to-back failures of the two movies might seem like evidence that the monsters simply aren’t supposed to cross paths on-screen again, it is not too late to save the Alien Vs. Predator movies. In 2024’s Alien: Romulus, director Fede Alvarez cleverly incorporated elements of the lore established in Ridley Scott’s controversial 2012 sequel Prometheus, retroactively making the blockbuster a vital part of the franchise’s story. Thanks to Alien: Romulus, no re-watch of the series would be complete without Prometheus, and a better Alien Vs. Predator movie could do the same for those ignominious efforts.

ittedly, while Scott’s divisive Alien prequel Prometheus wasn’t his most popular movie, it did fare better with critics than either of the Alien Vs. Predator movies. That said, I’ve always thought that the Alien Vs. Predator series had a better pitch to begin with. Prometheus just offered to explain the backstory of the Alien franchise’s famous monster, the Xenomorph, and even then, it took its sequels, Alien: Covenant, and 2024’s Alien: Romulus to connect the dots fully. In contrast, Alien Vs. Predator promised to blend two great individual franchises.

There’s A Problem: Alien Can’t Really Make Alien Vs. Predator Canon

The Alien and Predator Series Can’t Cross Over Anymore

The biggest problem with redeeming the Alien Vs. Predator movies is the franchise’s timeline, or rather its lack of a cohesive one. Thanks to the events of Scott’s prequels, the Alien Vs. Predator movies are now a mess in of their place in the Alien and Predator timelines. For one thing, Prometheus and Alien: Covenant both implied that David might have engineered the Xenomorph, meaning they could not have fought Predators on Earth centuries before David was even created.

Aliens Vs. Predator: Requiem set a whole swathe of Xenomorphs loose on Earth, whereas the Alien franchise itself has never introduced a Xenomorph to the planet.

However, even if viewers discount this issue, there are other plot problems. For one thing, Scott’s Prometheus introduced a new CEO for Weyland-Yutani, effectively retconning Lance Henriksen’s character from Alien Vs. Predator out of existence. For another, Aliens Vs. Predator: Requiem set a whole swathe of Xenomorphs loose on Earth, whereas the Alien franchise itself has never introduced a Xenomorph to the planet. These problems all complicate any Alien Vs. Predator movie’s plans, making it harder to introduce a new crossover to the franchise thanks to their lack of connective tissue.

A New Alien Vs. Predator Movie Ignoring The Previous Ones Is What We Need

A Fresh Take On The Series Could Work Better

In a Hollywood Reporter interview from October 2024, Fox executive Steve Asbell hinted at the possibility of another Alien Vs. Predator movie in the near future. Notably, Absell was careful to couch this promise in some mysterious qualifiers, saying that the crossover could happen but “Not in the way that it will just be called Alien vs. Predator or anything like the original movies.” While this might sound confusing, Absell’s subsequent clarifications signaled a welcome shift in how the properties are viewed by their studios.

Not a lot would be lost by retconning Alien Vs. Predator and its sequel out of existence, but this move could pave the way for the crossover movie that viewers wanted over twenty years ago.

Per the executive, “If we do this, they’ll be organically created out of these two franchises that we’ve continued with characters that we fall in love with.” This is a promising start, since any new Alien Vs. Predator movie would need to ignore the previous installments to make sense. Not a lot would be lost by retconning Alien Vs. Predator and its sequel out of existence, but this move could pave the way for the crossover movie that viewers wanted over twenty years ago. Furthermore, the two franchises are now in a perfect place to pull off this new match-up.

There Has Never Been A Better Time For A New Alien Vs. Predator Crossover

Prey and Alien: Romulus Revitalised Their Respective Franchises

Not only was Alien: Romulus a strong, scary, clever sequel to the series, but Prey was my favorite Predator movie since the 1987 original. After Prometheus and Alien: Covenant made the Alien franchise’s story needlessly complicated, while 2018’s The Predator struggled to keep the franchise feeling interesting, Alien: Romulus and Prey independently proved that the Alien and Predator movies remain as relevant as ever. Thus, this is the best time since 1988 for the franchises to cross over.

The primary problem with her original Alien Vs. Predator movies is that they never knew what they wanted to be in of tone, style, or even rating. This is reflected in the massive differences between Alien Vs. Predator’s frozen Antarctic setting, plodding pace, and deathly serious tone, and Aliens Vs. Predator: Requiem’s small-town setting, absurdly fast pace, and black comedic gore. The reason neither movie knew what to do is that both franchises were in weak places at the time.

Alien: Resurrection and Predator II failed to inspire confidence in viewers, so the crossover lacked a cohesive vision. In stark contrast, Prey and Alien: Romulus both presented similar stripped-down, back-to-basics, suspense-centered stories that succeeded because they knew their tone first and foremost. This means that, much like the Alien franchise salvaged Prometheus, the Alien Vs Predator movies can now be redeemed as the two series continue.

Source: Hollywood Reporter