The movies of the Alien series have always had as subtext the feminist view of abortion, but never more so than the latest, called Alien Resurrection . . . its mythic force derives from its imagery of women forced into subjugation by the things growing inside them—things which take over their lives completely and will ultimately kill them. The dragon-slaying hero is the new, omnicompetent woman invented by Hollywood—in this case Ellen Ripley (Sigourney Weaver) who has triumphed even over death through the miracle of cloning—and the dragon is her baby.

Ripley not only kills dragon-babies, she also effortlessly beats back the menacing male sexuality of Ron Perlman and Michael Wincott. She stronger and quicker than they are, and she's better at basketball too. Talk about hitting a guy where it hurts! Even her blood is an offensive weapon, since it boils like sulphuric acid whenever she cuts herself and a drop spill anywhere but on her. In the film's climactic scene she makes especially effective use of this quality to dispose of a giant, toothy alien fetus who regards her as its mother. After nuzzling with the horrible thing and showing apparently maternal feelings toward it (on this point she is always ambiguous, identifying herself as “its mother” at one moment and shooting it at the next), she flings a drop of her blood at the tiny window (a window?) of the spaceship, puncturing a small hole in it. The monster is then sucked through the hole in disgusting ribbons of flesh and blood.

The imagery of abortion is unmistakable. As the creature is cut to pieces and evacuated into space, Ripley whispers “I'm sorry” to it. Obviously not sorry enough to sacrifice not only her own life but also that of her lesbian love interest, a robot played by Winona Ryder.