Aliens is one of the few cases of a sequel that far surpassed the original. Sigourney Weaver returns as Ripley, who awakens on Earth only to discover that she has been hibernating in space so long that everyone she knows is dead. Then she is talked into traveling (along with a squad of Marines) to a planet under assault by the same aliens that nearly killed her. Once she gets there, she finds a lost little girl who triggers her maternal instincts--and she discovers that the company has once again double-crossed her, in hopes of capturing one of the aliens to study as a military weapon. Directed and written by James Cameron, this is one of the most intensely exciting (not to mention intensely frightening) action films ever, with a large ensemble cast that includes Bill Paxton, Lance Henriksen, Paul Reiser, and Michael Biehn. Weaver defined the action woman in this film and walked away with an Oscar nomination for her trouble. --Marshall Fine

Review from Minneapolis, MN
There is little doubt what my personal favorite movie of 1986 is, and if you're reading this it should be pretty obvious. James Cameron's Aliens was such a departure from Ridley Scott's 1979 Alien in that it was a wholly different film. In its essence Alien was a haunted house in space, whereas Aliens was an action thriller, with both thriving on the one thing that scares us most - fear of the unknown. Scott did this by providing us with the house, in the case, the USCSS Nostromo, and the haunt- the Alien, the preceded to scare the hell out of us with it. In Aliens Cameron ups the ante- this time there are several aliens and the humans have guns. As the trailer said- "This time it's war!"

"We're on an express elevator to hell: Goin' down!"

Aliens takes up where Alien left off with Warrant Officer Ellen Ripley (Sigourney Weaver) in hypersleep aboard the escape shuttle, Narcisis, who has been adrift for fifty-seven years. Rescued by a deep-space salvage team she is returned to Earth where she meets Carter Burke (Paul Reiser), an executive with Wayland-Yutani, the company that sent the Nostromo to investigate the derelict alien craft in the first all those years ago. It's Burke's job to see that Ripley adjusts well to her new environment before throwing her at the mercy of the board of executives for her to explain why she blew up their expensive ship. Demanding an explanation, Ripley learns that the planet the crew of the Nostromo found the ship has been colonized and that the colonists found nothing.

quot;We've lost contact with the colonists on LV-426."

Dispatched with the US Colonial Marine Corps aboard the space battleship Sulaco, Ripley finds herself thrust back into her original nightmare against the creatures that slaughtered her crew. The colony has been wiped out and the colonists missing, all the while the marines are finding more and more evidence that backs up Ripley's original claim. And when the marines locate the colonists, all of whom are dead having served as hosts for new aliens, Ripley gains their respect when she singlehandedly rescues them. Weaver received an Academy Award nomination for her role as Ripley, but as we all know, science fiction movies never win non-technical awards. She gains the attention of Corporal Dwayne Hicks (Michael Biehn), but being competent, and the later the respect of the surviving marines.

"Newt, wake up, we're in trouble!"

Cameron expertly builds tension through out the film as the humans realize they are fighting a losing battle against their alien antagonizers. It becomes much more than a monster movie where the creatures pick off members of the cast one at a time until there are only a few left since most of the marines are killed in the debacle in the atmosphere processor. Instead, Cameron relies on things that go bump in the night, such as the sequence where Ripley wakes up after some much needed sleep only to discover that the traitoress Burke has placed two face hugger parasites in the room. As they scuttle about unseen, Ripley and Newt (Carrie Heine) must find away to escape. Cameron also makes good use of lighting in the film wherein he changes the look of his sets simply by changing his light sources.

"Let's rock!"

Most importantly the pace of the film is unrelenting, and I personally feel this is his best work.(Yeah, yeah, 'Titanic'? Who cares.) I remember how I felt after I saw the film on opening night during a warm June evening in 1986, I was so pumped with adrenaline that I could hardly keep still. I welcomed the nightmares, because I knew James Cameron was directing them. What is striking about this film is its technical brilliance which lends itself to every aspect of the movie- sets, special effects, characters, and atmosphere. Made at a time when films were beginning to creep into the stratospheric budget range, Cameron pulled Aliens together for $18 million, but considering how good the film looks, it comes across as being much more expensive than it really was. I also wish he would return to this style of film making, because the Aliens/Terminator stuff is what he's best at.

"I say we dust off and nuke the site from orbit- it's the only way to be sure." --This text refers to the VHS Tape edition