Ellen Ripley explained: how Alien created a new kind of hero

Ellen Ripley explained: who she is

In Alien, Ripley is warrant officer on the commercial towing ship Nostromo. She is not the captain and not set up as the lead. When the crew bring a creature aboard, she is the one who insists on following quarantine rules, and she is the last survivor.

A role written for anyone

The script described the crew in a way that let any role be played by a man or a woman. Scott first pictured Ripley as a man and changed his mind after studio executive Alan Ladd Jr. suggested a woman. Weaver, then known mainly for theatre, was the last actor cast and won the part with her audition. It was her first leading film role.

Key scenes in Alien

Scott added what he called a fourth act after the Nostromo explodes. Ripley thinks she has escaped in the shuttle Narcissus, then finds the alien hidden aboard. She blows it out of the airlock.

Scott had wanted the alien to bite off Ripley's head and record the final log in her voice. The producers refused. Instead, Ripley records her log and goes into stasis with Jones, the ship's cat. Four cats played Jones, and Weaver turned out to be allergic to the mix of cat hair and the glycerin used to make actors look sweaty.

Weaver kept working with the cats once the glycerin was removed, and Jones's survival gives the ending a small note of warmth after so much loss.

How the character grew

Each sequel took Ripley somewhere new.

• Aliens (1986): she returns to the colony planet and protects a young survivor named Newt. Weaver earned an Oscar nomination for Best Actress, rare for a science fiction role.
• Alien 3 (1992): she ends the story by throwing herself into a furnace to destroy the alien inside her.
• Alien Resurrection (1997): scientists clone her as Ripley 8, who has acid blood and a link with the creatures.

Why she matters

Ripley is competent, cautious and right when others are wrong, and the films rarely treat that as remarkable. In Aliens she becomes a protector to Newt, adding a maternal side without softening her. That combination is why she keeps appearing near the top of character polls, including Premiere's list and MTV's ranking of movie badasses, where she came second.

Behind the scenes, Weaver did most of her screen tests on the sets while they were still being built, and Meryl Streep was considered but never contacted. Alien's budget was doubled from $4.2 million after Scott's storyboards impressed Fox, and H. R. Giger designed the creature she spends the film fighting. Her performance earned Saturn and BAFTA nominations, early signs of how the character would grow.

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