Watching James Cameron’s Aliens is such an intense experience that it’s incredible how the film simultaneously manages to achieve a disquieting, solemn effect. Indeed, with all of its horrific images and numbing, relentless action sequences, it can be argued that the implied horror that exists within Aliens is every bit as terrifying as what’s visible on screen.

Specifically, the mere thought of what happened to the Hadley’s Hope colonists on moon LV-426, also known as Acheron, which was home to approximately 158 people, before aliens killed, or cocooned, them all, instantly conjures disturbing images of unspeakable horror while raising various intriguing possibilities and questions: How did the colony become infested with aliens? How was the colony’s last survivor, Rebecca Jorden, better known as Newt, able to survive long enough to be rescued by Ripley and the Space Marines?

From the exploration of the derelict alien ship to the appearance of the first alien face-hugger to an excruciating, minute-by-minute battle for survival within the colony’s main complex to scenes of parents desperately trying to protect their children, the fall of Hadley’s Hope, the massacre of the colonists, is a source of compelling drama and unspeakable terror and would doubtlessly make for an absolutely spellbinding Aliens prequel film or miniseries. Here’s how such a project could, and perhaps should, be conceptualized.

The Beginning of the End of Hope

Sigourney Weaver as Ripley in the James Cameron movie Aliens
20th Century Fox

Hadley’s Hope was a human terra-forming mining and research colony established by the all-powerful and seemingly morally-bankrupt Weyland-Yutani Corporation, also known as The Company, on LV-426 in 2157.

In one of the deleted scenes filmed for Aliens, it is revealed that the Company ordered an exploration of the derelict ship, where, of course, the crew of the Nostromo previously discovered the alien eggs in Alien. The new exploration is performed by Newt’s parents, husband-and-wife salvagers Russ and Anne Jorden, who drive out to the derelict ship in a tractor with daughter Newt and son Tim. In another deleted scene, a hysterical Anne returns to the tractor holding an unconscious Russ, who was impregnated by a face-hugger.

In Alien: River Of Pain, a canon novel by Christopher Maggs, Russ is subsequently taken to the colony’s medical lab, and a second exploration team, an armed unit, is then dispatched to the derelict ship. Accordingly, the members of this unit are also overwhelmed and impregnated by face-huggers. At the same time, a chest-bursting creature hatches inside Russ and then explodes out of his chest approximately twenty-four hours after Russ is impregnated.

In Aliens: Newt’s Tale, a two-issue comic book adaptation based on Cameron’s Aliens screenplay, Newt and her brother Tim hide in a vent overlooking the medical lab and watch a doctor tell an awakened Russ about the second exploratory team. But, of course, this horrible dynamic continues to repeat itself until the surviving colonists are forced to fight for their lives within the colony’s main complex.

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The Last Stand

aliens
20th Century Studios

As revealed in Aliens: Newt’s Tale, within forty-eight hours of Russ’s impregnation, the surviving colonists discover that the aliens are abducting the colonists and taking them to an alien hive, or nest, where they are being turned into hosts. However, when an armed team enters the hive, located in and around the colony’s Atmosphere Processing Plant, to find and hopefully rescue the missing colonists, the team members are overmatched and turned into hosts themselves.

Moreover, in Alan Dean Foster’s Aliens novelization, which was written with Cameron’s input, the colony’s communications up-link system is revealed to have been disabled, and the colonists are unable to call anyone for assistance. As shown in Aliens, slimy Company executive Carter Burke ordered the colonists to investigate said derelict ship, and both he and the Company clearly viewed the colonists' lives as being entirely secondary to the military value of the alien species.

After the failed attack on the hive, the aliens head for the colony, where the surviving colonists attempt to barricade themselves within the colony’s basement and storage rooms. However, since the colonists unwisely opened the colony complex’s main door and the barricades to help possible other survivors, the aliens can easily capture, or kill, everyone.

Amidst this carnage, Newt and Timmy are in a storage room with their mother, Anne, who has a gun and is prepared to kill her children rather than have the aliens take them alive. However, Anne is killed by an alien warrior, which is then shot by Tim, who is then killed by the wounded alien’s acid, while Newt manages to escape in one of the complex’s vents.

Related: James Cameron Warned Ridley Scott Would Get Credit If Aliens Was a Success

The Sole Survivor

Newt Aliens
20th Century Fox

The only sliver of light to be found within this parade of misery appears in the form of Newt, the first person born to Hadley’s Hope on LV-426. Being a Hadley’s Hope native, Newt knew the colony structure intimately, inside and out, especially as Newt enjoyed playing within the colony’s air ducts and vents with her brother.

As is made clear in Aliens, Newt’s ability to navigate the colony’s ventilation duct system was crucial to her survival, just as Ripley’s knowledge of the inner workings of the Nostromo space freighter played an important factor in allowing her to survive in Alien. Moreover, Newt’s knowledge of the colony structure allowed her to search for food whenever the aliens weren’t around, as her childlike form obviously allowed Newt to move in and out of tight areas that the aliens couldn’t get into.

The fact that Newt was able to stay alive in this hellhole for two weeks, the approximate amount of time before she was rescued by Ripley and the Space Marines, is a testament to her uncommon courage and intelligence, and resourcefulness. Accordingly, Newt would make an excellent heroine, a young Ripley in training, for any prospective Aliens prequel film or miniseries.