Deathmatch -- Aliens vs. The Terminator

Deathmatch #2 here at Sure as Shiretalk has come around, and this time we're featuring a pair of sci-fi favorites in contrast to last time's fantasy characters. This one came up between my roommates and I after I purchased the first three Alien films recently. So, here it is: Aliens vs. The Terminator. Let's meet the combatants.

Disclaimer: I have not read, nor do I intend to read, the comic titled "Aliens versus Predator versus The Terminator."

Cyberdyne Systems Model 101, The Terminator

"That Terminator is out there. It can't be bargained with. It can't be reasoned with. It doesn't feel pity, or remorse, or fear. And it absolutely will not stop. Ever. Until you are dead."

Thus spake Sgt. Kyle Reese to Sarah Connor concerning her pursuer in 1984's The Terminator. The T800 is a highly intelligent sentient computer system housed inside a humanoid titanium alloy combat chassis. Virtually invulnerable to projectile weapons, this model Terminator basically needs to be decapitated before you can be sure it's done for -- or you at least need to make sure you smash that computer chip in its head.

Also, the Arnold version wears shades, rides a Harley, and wields a shotgun one-handed.

The Xenomorph, Alien

"You still don't understand what you're dealing with, do you? The perfect organism. Its structural perfection is matched only by its hostility... A survivor, unclouded by conscience, remorse, or delusions of morality."

Ash was certainly right about that in 1979's Alien. An organism that can survive intense heat, cold, and the vacuum of space without showing any signs of discomfort is certainly more structurally perfect than most. Nevermind that it has molecular acid (<-- not real, btw) for blood, which can apparently eat through basically any substance in moments (but takes considerably longer with Michael Biehn's skin... what a badass). They're also great predators, meaning they're stealthy, strong, and quite a bit smarter than your average bear.

Well, let's assume a couple of things: the Terminator is armed, and there are multiple Aliens. I hope we can all agree that, should the Terminator gain a vantage point from which he is more or less inaccessible, he wins by pumping them all full of hot lead. The Aliens are apparently vulnerable to normal gunfire, and a few good shots generally takes them out, acid blood a-splashing every-goddamn-where. Up close and personal might be a different story, though.

Given that the Terminator is made of titanium, I'm going to go ahead and say that skull-bashing thing from the Aliens' jaws-inside-the-jaws is just going to break some teeth. They also probably won't be able to do a lot of damage with their claws or that spiky tail, again because Terminators are pretty much solid as a rock.

However, in order to kill any of them, the Terminator is probably going to have to start breaking some skin, and that could lead to some serious battle damage. Like, Arnold-at-the-end-of-T2 battle damage. If he gets mobbed, the Aliens might be able to use their combined strength to just yank him apart, which would of course render him immobile and therefore defeated. Whatever the case, it would be an epic battle worthy of multiple Aliens versus The Terminator films regardless of how increasingly bad they might get.

So, Terminator wins, but with ever-decreasing odds the more Alien blood he spills. Sorry, Aliens, but you're just not quite as perfect against inorganic opponents. [insert xenomorph sadface here]

Btw, I love this picture, and I want to see the movie right now:

Top Five Most Reprehensible Corporations in Science Fiction

From an early age, we science fiction nerds have been taught that all corporate entities, regardless of size or field of interest, are inherently evil and seek only to make the lives of the little people more and more miserable. Here are the five that stick in my mind as the most reprehensible of all.

This post was inspired by a page out of this April's Game Informer magazine. There are plenty of evil corporations in gaming, of course, but some of the worst of the worst come from films as well. I'm also a bit peeved about GI's picks -- a few of them, such as Aperture Science (Portal) and Union Aerospace Corporation (Doom 3), seem to conflate the corporation itself with a single person (or in Portal's case, a single AI). In light of my disagreements, I've used the word "reprehensible" in my title so I can highlight some of those discrepancies between the corporate and the individual entities.

Weyland-Yutani Corporation, Alien

This corporation, generally referred to as "The Company" (indicating its sheer size and realm of influence), apparently finds it morally acceptable to impregnate its employees with chestbursters in order to acquire the Alien for their biological weapons development. So, disregarding the very real possibility that a single xenomorph could wipe out the human race, let's reverse-engineer these nasty buggers just so we can kill some stuff.

Who did they want to kill, anyway? I can't recall a single instance in any of the Alien films where they mention being at war with anybody.

VersaLife and Page Industries, Deus Ex

What's worse than manufacturing an extremely aggressive mechanical virus with a 100% mortality rate? Profiting from the cure. Under the direction of Bob Page and Walton Simons, VersaLife could have destroyed human life on Earth -- all in the name of shameless power-grabbing and greed.

Typical behavior from billionaire Majestic-12 puppeteers, I suppose.

Union Aerospace Corporation, Doom 3

Fooling around with teleportation devices will always get your shit fucked up. That's a fact. I mean, even on Star Trek the transporters break down once in a while, as Dr. Leonard McCoy is so quick to point out. And sometimes teleportation technology will even open a portal directly to Hell and spill all the evil in existence over into your high-tech R&D facility on Mars. Who knew?

Well, Dr. Betruger, that's who. UAC is partially responsible because there had to have been somebody who could guess at what he was up to and possibly have prevented it. Just think of all the ventilation shafts we could have stayed the hell out of if not for that wacko...

Fontaine Futuristics, BioShock and BioShock 2

So this classy bunch has no qualms with abducting little girls and subjecting them to ghastly physical and psychological conditioning to further the goals of a sociopathic conman and, after he was dead, a deranged political extremist. Oh, and they worsened the Rapture Civil War by increasing the supply of the very substance that drove everybody insane. So in essence, they are the persons most directly responsible for all of the things that want to kill you throughout the entirety of BioShock and BioShock 2.

On the upside, though, they did produce the Big Daddies, meaning you get to Drill Dash countless hordes of poor splicers into the walls. Oh the joy, after being so slow and cumbersome for the first couple hours of the game.

Multi-National United, District 9

Same story here as Weyland-Yutani, really -- experiment on living organisms to create bigger and badder weapons. Except the prawns are far less hostile than the xenomorphs, as they're more or less a metaphor for oppressed racial and ethnic groups of South Africa.

They've also got a paramilitary organization backing them, which is never a good thing when it comes to amoral corporate entities.

Midtown Global Market FTW

This is only barely related to sci-fi and fantasy, but I just wanted to gush a little bit about the magnificence of "open-air" markets like the Midtown Global Market in Minneapolis or the English Market in Cork, Ireland (the former isn't technically open-air, but you know what I mean). Great food, interesting crafts, and generally quite friendly people make for a great experience, and sometimes you come across great deals on things you wouldn't even expect to be there -- like used copies of Alien and Aliens for a total of six dollars. I also picked up Contact, and I'm planning on going back for Alien 3. Three bucks each!!! Buy secondhand, people. It's worth it.

Sci-fi badass of the day brought to you by: Sigourney Weaver.