Both the Alien and Predator franchises have defined what movie fans expect from the blending of sci-fi and horror on the big screen for decades. Over the past forty years, each one has forged its own extensive fanbase and lore, with overlap between the two.
Each one still lives on to this day, with the enormous critical success of the most recent Predator movie, Prey, inspiring confidence in the decision to produce a new Alien film that will also be released straight to Hulu. That said, critics haven't always been enthusiastic about each franchise and the consensus between opinions that are shown on movie review aggregate sites may not always sync up with what fans would expect.
Alien vs. Predator (2004) – 29
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Many science-fiction fans often feel conflicted about the teaming up of the two titular movie monsters but critics mostly agree with the movie's tagline that, regardless of which one of them wins, it's humanity that loses.
The comic book adaptation was spearheaded by the main creative driving force behind the original live-action Resident Evil movies, Paul W.S. Anderson, and it certainly has its entertaining moments despite never really living up to the pedigree of its cinematic roots for critics or audiences.
Alien vs. Predator: Requiem (2007) – 29
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Though Metacritic gives them identical overall scores, the sequel to Paul W.S. Anderson's first movie is a little more universally hated than its predecessor thanks to baffling lighting decisions that leave most scenes of the movie so dark that they're virtually incomprehensible.
Moving the title fight from an undiscovered pyramid buried beneath the ice near Antarctica to a sleepy Colorado town also doesn't help the generic story and characters in this all-around bomb.
Predator (1987) – 46
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John McTiernan's game-changing hybrid of sci-fi horror and machismo action was not, as its score on Metacritic still shows, initially as big a hit with critics as many of its fans may have assumed that it was.
Nevertheless, the original Predator movie remains a deceptively intelligent romp in the jungle as Arnold Schwarzenegger and his crew of comedically macho soldiers face off against an invisible alien monster that hunts them for sport. Its mixture of horror, science fiction, action, and comedy may not have been a hit with a majority of critics at the time but it did present an entertaining formula that filmmakers have been trying to either riff off of or just flat-out copy for decades.
Predator 2 (1990) – 46
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Replacing the South American jungle with the concrete jungle of Los Angeles for the Predator's new hunting ground, and Schwarzenegger's Commando-inspired lead for Danny Glover's more Lethal Weapon-inspired cop, Predator 2 expands the lore of the franchise quite a bit.
Despite never becoming as big a hit with audiences as the original, the movie has developed a healthy fanbase beyond its similarly low critical score and began plot mysteries that are still at the forefront of the franchise today. It's another strong example of how effects-driven genre films can age well in unexpected ways.
The Predator (2018) – 48
Available on fuboTV and FXNow
Veteran Hollywood screenwriter Shane Black, who starred as one of the original team of soldiers in the first Predator movie, returns to write and direct in this comedic attempt at revamping the franchise for a more modern audience.
Whilst quite clearly altered by its studio to the point of the final cut becoming close to incoherent at certain points, The Predator still ended up as a relative box office hit for the series. Nevertheless, the lack of enthusiasm for its open-ended, MCU-like, shenanigans prompted an entirely different approach to the material for the franchise's next movie, Prey.
Predators (2010) – 51
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Despite showing a polarized score on Metacritic, a significant portion of fans and critics agree that this belated back-to-basics sequel in the Predator series, from writer and producer Robert Rodriguez, is one of its better entries.
The main characters facing off against the alien hunters this time around are an eclectic group of killers that are quite literally dropped into the story together and their unusual circumstances create a satisfyingly pragmatic sci-fi action movie experience.
Alien 3 (1992) – 59
Available on Starz
Director David Fincher's threequel in the iconic Alien franchise is a famously incomplete vision due to creative conflicts that lead to him effectively disowning the film, but it's still bursting with some of both the franchise's and the director's best qualities.
Taking things back to basics on an almost-entirely weaponless prison planet, Sigourney Weaver's franchise lead faces off against one of the series' iconic monsters once again. Its generally bleak atmosphere and shock ending have allowed it to stand out but have no doubt contributed to its
Alien: Resurrection (1997) – 63
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Following the character's death at the end of Alien 3, Sigourney Weaver's Ellen Ripley is reborn and supercharged as a clone in this much more action-heavy and upbeat fourth entry in the Alien franchise's continuity. As scores on both Metacritic and Rotten Tomatoes show, Resurrection's clear distancing of itself from the tone of Alien 3 paid off at least a little with critics.
Screenwriter Joss Whedon brings a lot more humor than usual to the proceedings this time around whilst auteur director Jean-Pierre Jeunet dials up the grotesquery of the VFX to create a memorable cocktail. However, this direction for the franchise would ultimately be abandoned also, with Weaver yet to appear in another Alien movie since.
Prometheus (2012) – 64
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Though not without its controversies among critics and fans of the series, in particular, Ridley Scott's sort-of-prequel to his original Alien movie realizes a bold vision for a moderately unique horror movie set in outer space.
Prometheus keeps the franchise's penchant for great casts and weird gore intact but detours things even further into the often underplayed android side of the fictional universe that the Alien franchise shares with the Blade Runner films, creating an iconic movie monster of its own in the form of Michael Fassbender's Machiavellian robot butler, David.
Alien: Covenant (2017) – 65
Available on FXNow
Focussing much more on the character of David from Prometheus as the new center of the series' universe, Scott returns again to direct this much more fast-paced, though equally debated, installment to the Alien franchise's extensive lore.
Whilst initially appearing like a simple reboot of the core premise of the original movie, Covenant transforms at the halfway point into something more akin to Prometheus' Frankenstein-in-space aesthetic and it breathes some new life into the now-archetypal setup. Critical scores and box office results seem to indicate that the prequel approach to the Alien franchise achieved an overall greater level of success than the sequels in the 90s, despite pockets of harsh criticism.
Prey (2022) – 71
Available on Hulu
The most recent entry into the Predator franchise is the most highly-rated one yet amongst critics, gathering widespread praise for its stripped-down approach to its action and dialogue, as well as its representation of its Comanche main characters in this period prequel set in 18th century North America.
Though a perfect late summer popcorn movie, Prey was the first live-action movie of either the Predator or Alien franchises to be released straight to streaming. It remains to be seen whether Prey's apparent success will impact the distribution of the upcoming Alien project being produced for Hulu.
Aliens (1986) – 84
Available on Starz
One of the few sequels to a classic horror movie to truly live up to its predecessor, James Cameron's Aliens introduces action to the claustrophobic horror of the original without taking anything away from its visual aesthetic.
Returning to the place where it all went wrong in the first movie, Ellen Ripley and a team of space marines go to all-out war with an army of creatures for what critics have recognized as an explosive landmark in both the science-fiction and horror genres.
Alien (1979) – 89
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Ridley Scott's original masterpiece has yet to be topped by anything in or out of the franchise in the eyes of most critics but that's not an issue when considering just how much there is to notice within it.
Over 40 years later, fans are still unpacking the intricate details in its fascinating production design and psychoanalytical subtext, with the relative simplicity of its plot only serving to make the experience all the more enduringly intense.