Alien vs Predator Requiem 2007 Film Sequel
The Vicious Alien/Predator Hybrid Crashes in the United States
Sep 12, 2009
A new alien erupts from the impregnated predator at the end of Alien Vs Predator. It has characteristics of both species quickly slaughters all predators onboard the ship and manages to return to Earth. This is where Alien Vs Predator Requiem begins.
Alien Vs Predator: Requiem's Plot and Key Characters
A small shuttle or escape pod is launched from the doomed predator ship after the predators are killed. The ship crash lands in the United States and the ‘predalien’, along with several face huggers, escapes the wreckage. The face huggers make their way to a nearby town where they infest the sewers, impregnating the homeless that are living down there, resulting in the creation of a lot more aliens.
Meanwhile on some predator planet, a predator picks up a distress call from the doomed ship and after realising that the hybrid predalien was responsible, jumps into his ship and high tails it to Earth.
Back on Earth ex-con Dallas (yes named after the character Dallas from Alien) Howard (Steven Pasquale) has come back to town at the same time as Kelly O’Brian (Reiko Aylesworth) who is coming home after military service overseas. There are other cast members like Dallas’ younger brother Ricky (Johnny Lewis) and his love interest Jessie (Kristen Hager) but essentially everyone in town is just cannon fodder or alien hosts.
The characters struggle as the alien infestation increases and people start dropping like flies left and right. The National Guard put in an appearance and are promptly slaughtered by the overwhelming numbers of aliens. The predalien also wanders around during the film impregnating people and generally looking menacing. The predalien is a hybrid life form but for some reason it seems to be mostly alien as it leaves them alone but will attack any predator or human it finds.
Better Than the Original
Aliens Vs Predator Requiem (also known as Alien Vs Predator 2) is a huge improvement on the substandard Alien Vs Predator, and has some very gory moments. One highlight is witnessing the predalien impregnating humans with alien embryos which is seen in graphic and grotesque detail. Unfortunately, the first film set the bar so low it was never going to be too hard to produce something better. And whilst Requiem is an improvement, it is still a far cry from the franchises it is based upon.
During the film the predator uses a strange blue liquid to dissolve any evidence of the aliens, presumably so no one realises that the aliens were ever there. But then it goes and kills a guy, skins him, and hangs him up in a tree (not exactly subtle) which lets everyone know that something odd is going on.
Probably the most irritating thing about Requiem is the fact that the majority of the action takes place either at night or in the dark sewer tunnels. There is nothing more frustrating than poor lighting when trying to watch a film. It is very difficult to see what is happening. During the movie the aliens move into a power station, and the predator blows it up cutting the town’s power, which just makes the whole thing worse. Creating tension and fear through darkness can be an effective tool for a chilling horror but for a film like this, when all the audience wants to see is aliens fighting predators, it fails to create anything other than annoyance. Somebody really should have pointed out to directors Colin and Greg Strause that their film wouldn't be well-received if people can't see what is happening.
This is a superior sequel to a below average film but still nowhere near as good as any of the Alien or Predator films. Hopefully, if more sequels are made, they will follow this trend and get better each time. If they do then Alien Vs Predator 5 might actually be a decent addition to the Alien and Predator universe.
5/10
Better than the first, but that is not really saying much.
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