James Cameron has often referred to the experience
of Aliens as 40 miles of bad road - if you've watched his introduction on the Special Edition
of Aliens, you've no doubt heard him describe it that way, and very clearly declare the
SPECIAL EDITION as his preferred and intended version of the film. It's the longer, more grueling and involving
experience - the true version of the film Cameron wanted audiences to see. Integral scenes were restored, such as Ripley
discovering the death of her daughter, the subplot involving the sentry guns, and all
of the moments on Hadley's Hope before the infestation - which saw the return of the
derelict ship as seen in the first film. When it comes to all other NON-SPECIAL EDITION
deleted footage, James Cameron has played it pretty close to chest. Of course one of the biggest omissions from
restored scenes in the special edition is the moment where Ripley finds Burke cocooned
in the hive. For years, people were aware of its existence,
it was confirmed by Cameron as being filmed and cut out, and eventually bootleg footage
found its way to the internet, but that scene wasn't even made officially available simply
as a separate home video special until 2011, as part of the Alien Anthology Blu-ray release. It's undoubtedly the crown jewel of the film's
deleted scenes, even presented separately on the Alien Anthology Blu-ray set's Archives
disc, listed above the deleted scenes reel. The deleted scenes reel is a 4-minute presentation
mainly consisting of extended scenes and pieces of dialogue; There's an extension of the scene where Ripley
finds out about her daughter - Burke offers some trite, unhelpful words, and as she grieves
he CHECKS HIS WATCH LIKE THE COMPLETE ASSHOLE HE IS. There's a new lead-in to the processing station
scene where Newt once again tries to escape, but Hicks catches her, making sure to watch
his hand this time, and theres even the Ultra-Rare Spunkmeyer audition tape for Lethal Weapon. All interesting stuff for sure, but nothing
particularly mind-blowing. Te Blu-ray menu claims that this reel represents
the remainder of deleted footage not found anywhere else. But, is there more unseen deleted footage? Hiding somewhere, maybe. With the Burke Cocoon scene having a long
history of imfamy, finally resolving with its official release on the Blu-ray, perhaps
the title of most talked-about missing scenes is one involving Bishop in the tunnels of
the colony complex, apparently having a close call with one of the Aliens along the way. Going out there, WITH THOSE THINGS RUNNIN
AROUND, was a big risk, but, Bishop, of course, steps up during the group's darkest moment
thus far. With the atmospheric processor hours away
from reaching meltdown, Bishop volunteers to enter the access tunnels with a portable
terminal to access the Sulaco's second dropship - unnofficial designation: SMART ASS - from
the colony's uplink tower. It's a sefless and brave act, if such a thing
is possible with an artificial person, and as far as anyone involved knows, it's just
as dangerous - android or not. He employs logic to this decision, stating
he's the only one qualified to remote pilot ship anyway, but in more personable comments,
he admits he'd prefer not to. Say it with me now: I MAY BE SYNTHETIC, BUT
I'M NOT STUPID. He's sealed into the tunnel - unarmed, alone,
and in the dark as he makes his way to the tower. These moments, though brief, are pretty nerve-wracking
and claustrophic -- the fear of what could pop out of the shadows at any moment is scary
enough, so if there is a deleted scene where he runs into an alien, it couldn't possibly
be any more frightening than the pure anticipation of it actutally happening. In the finished film, he arrives at the uplink
tower unscathed, able to bring SMART ASS down from the sulaco, a seemingly uneventful trip
down the pipes preceding this. So, was Bishop just extremely lucky to not
encounter any of the beasts during this mission? Where the aliens unable to pick up on his
activity due to being synthetic? Did they know where he was and just not care,
not percieving whatever this being in the pipes is as a viable host to propogate the
hive? The reasoning and context could depend on
the version of the film you're watching. If it's the theatrical version, it could just
amount to luck, though in the special edition, there's at least an explanation in the fact
that all the aliens were busy against the sentry guns during this time. The other explanation, though, is that he
DID encounter a xenomorph along the way - we just didn't see it. So where did talk of this scene come from? Over the years maybe you've even heard from
folks who are absolutely convinced they've seen this scene in a version of the movie,
who 100% swear to god, they caught it on some TV broadcast back in the late 80s or something
like that. More than likely, they did not. More than likely fans first caught wind of
this missing scene from the Alan Dean Foster novelization, released to coincide with the
film in 1986, which contained many unseen moments, including scenes eventually restored
in the special edition, and plenty that did not. In Alan Dean Foster's Aliens, this scene does,
in fact, play into Bishop's subplot and his encounter is described. The passage from the novelization plays out
as follows: No matter how quiet he tried to be, Bishop
still made noise as the portable flight terminal and his sack of equipment scraped along the
bottom of the conduit. No human being could have maintained the pace
he’d kept up since leaving Operations, but that didn’t mean he could keep going indefinitely. There were limits even to a synthetic’s
abilities. Enhanced vision enabled him to perceive the
walls of the pitch-dark tunnel as it continued receding ahead of him. A human would have been totally blinded in
the cylindrical duct At least he didn’t have to worry about losing his way. The conduit provided almost a straight shot
to the transmitter tower. An irregular hole appeared in the right-hand
wall, admitting a feeble shaft of light. Among the emotions that had been programmed
into him was curiosity. He paused to peer through the acid-etched
crack. It would be nice to be able to take a bearing
in person instead of having to rely exclusively on the computer printout of the service-shaft
plans. Drooling jaws flashed toward his face to slam
against the enclosing steel with a vicious scraping sound. Bishop flattened himself against the far side
of the conduit as the echo of the attack rang along the metal. The curve of the wall where the jaws had struck
bent slightly inward. Hurriedly he resumed his forward crawl. To his considerable surprise the attack was
not repeated, nor could he sense any apparent pursuit. Maybe the creature had simply sensed motion
and had struck blindly. When no reaction had been forthcoming from
inside the duct, there was no reason for it to strike again. How did it detect potential hosts? Bishop went through the motions of breathing
without actually performing respiration. Nor did he smell of warmth or blood. To a marauding alien an android might seem
like just another piece of machinery. So long as one didn’t attack or offer resistance,
you might be able to walk freely among them. Not that such an excursion appealed to Bishop,
since the reactions and motives of the aliens remained unpredictable, but it was a useful
bit of information to have acquired. If the hypothesis could be verified, it might
offer a means of studying the aliens. Let someone else study the monsters, he thought. Let someone else seek verification. A bolder model than himself was required. He wanted off Acheron as much for his own
sake as for that of the humans he was working with. He glanced at his chronometre, faintly aglow
in the darkness. Still behind schedule. Pale and strained, he tried to move faster. To be sure, it's not an unusual occurance
that a novelization of a film not only works on certain artistic licenses, but also is
developed from earlier versions of the script, incorporating elements and plot points that
eventually ended up scrapped during production. This is especially true when it comes the
Alien movies, especially with the first 3 films in the series adapted by Foster. They're plentiful when it comes to scenes
that we'd eventually find were removed from the films, as well as certain concepts that
only really became realized the closer they got to the film's completion. You may recall in the novelization of Alien,
the beast was described as having big, bulbus, insect-like eyes. Obviously not a reflect of what we see in
the final film. So, we can gather that this scene with Bishop
must have been something from an earlier version of Cameron's screenplay. A really nifty resource in narrowing this
kind of stuff down can be found with Aliens: The Illustrated screenplay, a publication
from Orion books. There's a whole section here , Aliens; The
Script Cuts, curated by Paul M Sammon, which outlines the removed scenes, special edition
or otherwise. There's useful disctinction on that end, and
information on WHERE they would have appeared in the film if not removed, and in some cases
even some explanation as to WHY they cut. Very thorough. Very convenient. The only problem - there's no mention whatsoever
of this bishop-in-the-tunnel scene. Not even a clue to its existence. This supplementary section of the screenplay
goes to the trouble of reinserting even the smallest of lines that were omitted, yet this
scene, this infamous moment which many have discussed and debated the existence of over
the past 3 and a half decade - is SOMEHOW omitted from the section specifically devoted
to omissions. So how can this be? Well, the reason we don't see it showcased
in the screenplay cuts is because in the revised final draft of the screenplay by James Cameron,
SCENE 134, Bishop's enounter with the xenomorph in the tunnel is... in tact. Same scenario here, though we can see from
Cameron's description that we were meant to see the reveal of the alien from Bishop's
point of view, with snarling xenomorph jaws jumping right at the screen, surely meant
to give us a good scare as the audience. Scene 134 is set between Ripley and Hicks
bonding over the pulse rifle - in both the theatrical and special edition vesions of
the film, 134 is represented simply by the cutaway shot of Bishop continuing his journey
to the uplink tower. Did James Cameron shoot the scene as described
here but substitute it for the more straightforward cut we see in the final film? Could it possibly have been something left
to second-unit filming, but either not ultimately filmed due to time restrictions, or filmed
but not ultimately up-to-snuff? Cameron has had lots to say of the film's
cuts over the years but not so much of this scene specifically. The closest we've come to getting an answer
is from actor Lance Henriksen, who was asked about the scene during a 30th Anniversary
QandA for Aliens - the same QandA, by the way, that gave us this wonderful clip: FUCK alien 3. A fan gets up to ask about the tunnel scene,
and the answer Henriksen gives...isn't everything we could hope for. I don't know if it's ever written or filmed,
but in one version of the script... Where you're, like, crawling through the pipe
and run into an alien. Was that ever shot? And if that was, how do you, like, react to
the alien? And do you just keep, like, crawling after
him? I didn't have any problems with the aliens
because they didn't - They didn't even notice me. Cause I was synthetic. And there was no... I mean, they were not a visual thing. They smell it, they taste it, they want it,
you know? But me.... that'd be like stepping over a
fire hydrant. But you don't even notice it. Soduku. Did that answer you question? I did crawl through the pipes! It seems that Henriksen interpreted more as
a what-if scenario, speaking of his character and the rationale that the aliens would leave
him alone while he was down there, not so much about a lost scene that was never included. He was safe. He never ran into any beasts in the dark. Bishop has spoken. Either way this is a very entertaining and
informative Q&A, well worth checking out - so if you're interested I'll leave a link below. All things considered, we can surmise that
the scene simply wasn't filmed. It wasn't necessarily cut, either, at least
not from the shooting script, but when the time came to put the film together, a dark,
uneventful journey through the colony's service tunnel sufficed for Scene 134. But, who knows? Maybe it was filmed. Maybe it's submerged somewhere, deep in James
Cameron's aquatic lair - along with proper HD transfers of True Lies and The Abyss. Anything's possible. Unfortunately, though, I have to lean more
toward the belief that this scene has only existed on the written pages of the screenplay
and the film's novelization. But what do you think? Could it have been filmed? Let me know thoughts below. As always, I'd like to Thank you very much
for watching. I really appreciate it, and If you enjoyed
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