Aliens (1986)

Screenplay Genre: Action / Sci-Fi

Movie Time: 137 minutes

1. INCITING INCIDENT

Outside the colony headquarters on LV-246, one of the surveyors, along with his wife and their two children, discovers the derelict alien ship. He and his wife go in to investigate, leaving the kids in their all-terrain vehicle, but upon their return, his wife frantically calls for help on the radio, her daughter, Newt, screaming as she sees her father lying on the ground with a creature attached to his face. (00:17:45).

2. LOCK IN (End of Act One)

Burke (Paul Reiser), a company man for Weyland-Yutani, informs Ripley (Sigourney Weaver) that contact with the colony on LV-426 has been lost, and the "Company" intends to send a squadron of Marines to check it out, requesting for Ripley to go with them as an advisor. She refuses, but unable to overcome her Alien nightmares, she calls Burke, agreeing to go on the condition that they're going "out to destroy them. Not to study. Not to bring back". (00:24:58)

3. FIRST CULMINATION (Midpoint)

After arriving on the planet, locating the main colony complex, and discovering an eleven-year-old girl, Newt, the Marines take an APC vehicle to the atmosphere processor where they find an alien hive containing the dead bodies of the colonists, but then… the aliens attack. Lt. Gormon, who is back in the APC with Ripley, Burke and Newt, is totally unprepared for the battle and panics, forcing Ripley to take control, driving the APC into the nest, saving Vasquez, Hicks, and Hudson. (1:21:15)

4. MAIN CULMINATION (End of Act Two)

The remaining survivors barricade themselves back at the main colony complex, sealing themselves off and deploying sentry guns at the main entrances to the building, but all this preparation proves futile as the aliens cut the power and attack from the crawlspace above the ceiling, killing everyone except for Ripley, Hicks, and Newt, who escape through ventilation ducts, but Newt is snatched by an alien. (2:02:00)

5. THIRD ACT TWIST

After saving a cocooned Newt and narrowly escaping on the rescue ship just as the entire processing facility explodes, Ripley, Newt, and Bishop are back aboard their main ship the Sulaco, but as Ripley thanks Bishop for saving their lives, Bishop is speared from behind by a huge stinger and ripped in half at the waist by the Alien Queen: she has stowed away by hiding inside the recess of the landing gear. (2:23:05)