Ellen Ripley

"Final report of the commercial starship Nostromo, third officer reporting. The other members of the crew — Kane, Lambert, Parker, Brett, Ash and Captain Dallas — are dead. Cargo and ship destroyed. I should reach the frontier in about six weeks. With a little luck, the network will pick me up. This is Ripley, last survivor of the Nostromo, signing off."

―Ripley (from Alien)

Ellen Ripley
Biographical Information
Rank	Warrant Officer (formerly) Lieutenant 1st Class
Affiliation	Weyland-Yutani (formerly) USCSS Nostromo crew (formerly) USCM
Status	Deceased as of July 6th, 2179 (age 30).
Physical Description
Species	Human
Gender	Female
Height	5'7"
Hair color	Dark Brown Shaved on Fiorina 161
Eye color	Brown
Other Information
Notable facts	Sole human survivor of the USCSS Nostromo Xenomorph encounter. Survived the first Hadley's Hope Xenomorph infestation.
Portrayed by	Sigourney Weaver

Warrant Officer Ellen Louise Ripley was third in command aboard the commercial towing vehicle USCSS Nostromo. In 2122 she encountered a deadly alien species, Xenomorph XX121, an event that led to the death of the rest of her crew and the destruction of the ship. Her discovery of the Xenomorph would change the course of her life and plague her for the rest of her existence.

Later promoted to Lieutenant 1st Class while on a mission with the United States Colonial Marine Corps, she would go on to have several more encounters with the creatures over the following decades, before eventually giving her life on Fiorina "Fury" 161 to put an end to the Alien menace once and for all. Her exploits were well-known among certain groups that dealt with the Xenomorph.

Biography

Early life

Ellen Ripley was born on January 7, 2092 at the Olympia colony on Luna. After gaining a Masters in engineering from the New York Aeronautics University, she served with the US Merchant Navy aboard the Zelazny, where she acted as co-pilot. She eventually met and married her husband Alex, and during a layover between trips they conceived their first child. Despite the fact it violated Weyland-Yutani regulations, Ripley allowed the pregnancy to come to term, eventually resulting in the birth of her daughter Amanda. She was not disciplined for this discretion. Alex would later leave Ripley when Amanda was 3 years old, and had no further contact with either Ripley or his daughter.

Prior to the fateful voyage on which the Nostromo discovered LV-426 and the Alien, Ripley attempted to renegotiate her contract so that she could take a leave of absence and spend more time with Amanda. Eventually Ripley and Weyland-Yutani reached a compromise whereby she would agree to serve aboard the Nostromo for the forthcoming trip and take her leave subsequently.

Investigating the transmission

"Ash, that transmission... Mother's deciphered part of it. It doesn't look like an S.O.S."

―Ripley, regarding the signal from LV-426 (from Alien)

While the Nostromo was still ten months away from Earth on its return trip from Thedus, the crew was woken from hypersleep in response to a signal emanating from an unsurveyed moon, later designated LV-426. Following standard company directives requiring the investigation of any unknown signal of possible intelligent origin, the Nostromo set down on LV-426, and was damaged in the process when dust entered and clogged a damaged engine intake, causing systems to overheat and sparking an electrical fire on board. While Ripley stayed on board to supervise repairs, Captain Dallas, Kane and Lambert set out on foot to locate the source of the transmission.

While the team was away, Ripley attempted to decipher the signal that had brought them there, and with MU-TH-UR's help determined that it was not a distress call, as initially believed, but rather a warning of some kind. However, Dallas and the others were out of radio contact and she was unable to warn them.

Kane and his "guest"

"Open the hatch."
"Wait a minute, if we let it in the ship could be infected. You know the quarantine procedure."

―Dallas, being refused entry to the ship by Ripley (from Alien)

The exploration team eventually returned, reporting that Kane was unconscious and had something attached to his face. Ripley, citing quarantine protocols, refused to let them back aboard the ship with an unknown organism and insisted they remain in the airlock for at least twenty-four hours' decontamination. Despite Dallas' furious protests, she stood firm, but was undermined when Ash opened the hatch and took Kane to the infirmary. After a preliminary examination of the Facehugger attached to Kane, Ripley confronted Ash about his breaching the quarantine regulations and allowing the creature on board. Unsatisfied with his responses, she took her concerns to Dallas, but was rebuffed.

The Facehugger later detached from Kane, leaving him comatose but apparently unharmed, and with repairs to the ship completed, the Nostromo took off from LV-426 and resumed its voyage home. Kane soon revived, and the crew elected to have a final meal before re-entering hypersleep. During this meal the Chestburster laid inside him emerged, exploding from his chest before escaping into the ship. The remaining crew promptly began searching for the creature using motion detectors and armed with nets and cattle prods, but the Alien, already fully grown, quickly killed Brett and later captured Dallas.

Taking charge

"We'll go step by step, and cut off every bulkhead and every vent until we have it cornered and then we'll blow it the fuck out into space. Is that acceptable to you?"

―Ripley, to Parker (from Alien)

With Dallas gone and Kane already dead, command fell to Ripley. Despite their losses, she elected to continue with Dallas' plan of driving the Alien from the air vents where it was hiding, into the Nostromo's main airlock and expelling it into space. At the same time, Ripley's suspicions towards Ash were further fuelled when he claimed to have no useful information to give them regarding the creature, despite the length of time he had spent examining the dead Facehugger. Determined to find answers, Ripley accessed MU-TH-UR herself and learned of "Special Order 937", a secret directive given to Ash by Weyland-Yutani tasking him with recovering a Xenomorph specimen at any cost.

When Ripley confronted Ash in the ship's mess he attacked her, but before he could kill her he was beheaded by Parker, revealing him to be an android. Ripley reconnected Ash's remains and interrogated him, and the truth became clear — Weyland-Yutani had deciphered the transmission coming from LV-426 before the Nostromo even left Thedus, they knew of the Xenomorph, and the ship had been sent to the moon to recover one of the creatures, with Ash placed on board to ensure this happened. Confronted with this knowledge, Ripley elected to destroy the ship by detonating its engines, while she, Parker and Lambert would take their chances in the escape shuttle Narcissus. Now that they were reduced to only three, there was a good chance they could survive long enough to be rescued.

The Nostromo's destruction

"Mother? I've turned the cooling unit back on. Mother?!"
"The ship will automatically destruct in T-minus 5 minutes."
"You bitch!"

―Mother and Ripley (from Alien)

Ripley prepared the shuttle while Parker and Lambert gathered the spare oxygen tanks necessary to sustain them on the journey. After heading back onto the Nostromo to retrieve Jones, she heard the Alien attacking Parker and Lambert over the ship's intercom; she rushed to help, but arrived too late, finding only their bloody corpses. Now alone, Ripley activated the Nostromo's self destruct before racing for the Narcissus. Finding the Alien blocking her path, she returned to the self destruct and attempted to deactivate it, but missed the five-minute window for stopping the countdown by mere seconds. With the ship now heading for certain destruction, Ripley returned to the Narcissus, found the Alien gone, climbed aboard and launched, moments before the Nostromo's engines detonated and destroyed it in a huge explosion.

As Ripley prepared to enter hypersleep, she discovered that the Alien had stowed away aboard the Narcissus with her. After hiding in a cupboard, she silently slipped into a spacesuit and confronted the creature one final time, blowing it out of the airlock before shooting it with a harpoon gun and incinerating it in the shuttle's engines. With the monstrous creature finally dead, Ripley recorded a distress message detailing the fates of her ship and crew, and entered hypersleep for the journey home.

Director's Cut

In the Director's Cut of Alien, Ripley discovered the Alien's nest in the hold of the Nostromo while fleeing the ship, after activating its self destruct system. There, she found Dallas and Brett cocooned, the latter being transformed into a Xenomorph Egg. When Dallas begs her to kill him, she incinerates them both with her Flame Thrower before continuing with her escape.

To the Marion

"Actually... you're not really that safe, to be honest."

―Hoop, to Ripley (from Alien: Out of the Shadows)

While Ripley slept aboard the Narcissus, Ash kept the shuttle floating undetected in deep space, waiting for another chance to complete Special Order 937. In 2159, when he detected a distress signal being broadcast from the DSMO Marion that described details of the Xenomorph creature, he redirected the Narcissus to rendezvous with the vessel. Ripley awoke aboard the Marion expecting safety, but quickly learned that not only had she yet to reach Earth, she was in the midst of another Xenomorph catastrophe and Ash was still with her. The Marion was doomed, heavily damaged following a crash with one of its shuttles and destined to burn up in the atmosphere of LV178, around which it orbited. To escape the vessel, the Ripley and the surviving members of its crew needed to replace the spent fuel cell aboard the Narcissus, and the only spares were stored in the mining complex on LV178 where the Xenomorphs had been discovered. To make matters worse, the only shuttle capable of getting them there, the Samson, was sealed in the Marion's docking bay with four Xenomorphs aboard. After confronting the creatures and killing all but one of them, the survivors descended to the surface of LV178 in the Samson, leaving the surviving Xenomorph aboard the Marion.

LV178 and escape from the Marion

"We have to destroy them all."

―Ripley to the other survivors, regarding the Xenomorphs (from Alien: Out of the Shadows)

Ripley and the other survivors of the ship successfully reached the mine on LV178, but Ash immediately sabotaged the elevator they used to enter the complex and sent them crashing to the very lowest levels, where the Xenomorphs had been discovered. While fleeing from the creatures through the mine's tunnels, the group discovered a derelict spacecraft buried deep underground, and on board the fossilized remains of it's dog-like creators. They also stumbled upon a multitude of Xenomorph Eggs, realising that the Xenomorphs had intentionally herded them there with the intention of impregnating them with Chestbursters, a fate that befell Sneddon. As the situation in the tunnels beneath LV178 worsened, Ripley began to be plagued by increasingly horrific nightmares of her daughter Amanda. Despite being badly wounded fighting several Xenomorphs spawned from dog-like beings that had created the ship, Ripley survived to return to the Marion with the replacement fuel cell and the remaining Marion crew. At Ripley's insistence, Hoop set a second fuel cell to detonate in the mine with the intent of destroying the rest of the Xenomorphs on the planet.

Back on the Marion, Ripley was further injured in an attack by the remaining Xenomorph, although the creature was finally destroyed when Sneddon blew herself up to kill it. By now Ripley was unable to deal with the recurring nightmares of her daughter, and when Hoop placed her in a MedPod to heal her physical wounds, she begged him to also ease her memory of recent events, wiping from her mind all knowledge of the events aboard the Marion and on LV178. After carrying her comatose body back to the Narcissus, Hoop purged Ash from the shuttle's computer and launched Ripley back into space to continue her journey home.

Return to LV-426

"I am not going back, and I am... I would not be any good to you if I did."

―Ripley, to Burke and Gorman (from Aliens)

Ripley in 2179.

When Ripley next awoke 20 years later, she found herself aboard Gateway Station, having been rescued from deep space by a salvage team. While she had no recollection of events aboard the Marion, she was still plagued by memories of the Nostromo and the crew she lost on the vessel. She was also told by Weyland-Yutani representative Carter Burke that her daughter had died while she was drifting in space. Still crushed by this news, Ripley's story of the Nostromo's destruction was met with scepticism by the board of inquiry assembled to investigate the incident, and she was stripped of her rank and flight status. Following the whitewash, she pressed Van Leuwen on the matter, asking why her claims were not at least going to be investigated, and was informed that a terraforming colony, Hadley's Hope, had been established on LV-426 for twenty years, and no dangerous alien lifeforms had been discovered.

Now ruined professionally, Ripley relocated to Earth and found employment as a Power Loader operator. Some time later, she was approached by Burke and Lieutenant Gorman of the United States Colonial Marine Corps, who delivered the news that contact with Hadley's Hope had been lost. While Ripley initially refused to take part in the proposed investigation, her recurring nightmares eventually convinced her to join the mission and confront her fears. Ripely was promoted to the rank of Lieutenant, and she accompanied Burke and Gorman's Marines back to LV-426 aboard the USS Sulaco. The Marines met her story with the same elvel of cynicism as the investigative board on Gateway, and Ripley's experiences with Ash made her instantly mistrustful of the Sulaco's Executive Officer Bishop, who she discovered was an android.

Investigating Hadley's Hope

"The structure seems intact. They still have power."

―Ripley to Gorman, observing Hadley's Hope (from Aliens)

During the drop to the colony aboard Bug Stomper, Ripley's anxiety was aggravated by Private Hudson, who taunted her with his bravado and supreme confidence in the Marines' high-tech firepower and ability to overcome any enemy. When the APC touched down, Ripley remained on board with Gorman and Burke while the troops went in to sweep the colony. Their search revealed an abandoned colony and evidence of Xenomorph activity. Despite Ripely's reservations, Gorman declared the complex secured and Ripley reluctantly headed inside. Ripley and the Marines soon discovered several live Facehuggers being stored in the colony's medical facility, evidently for the purposes of research. The team also encountered Rebecca Jorden, better known as Newt, a twelve year-old girl and apparently the final surviving inhabitant of Hadley's Hope, who had spent the last few weeks hiding in the colony's ventilation ducts. Ripley immediately began attempting to bond with Newt, and after some persistence the previously withdrawn young girl opened up to Ripley about the colony's fate.

Following the discovery of the colonists' PDTs inside the nearby Atmosphere Processor, Ripley and Newt accompanied the Marines as they investigated, waiting in the APC as the men went in on foot. The Marines discovered the colonists cocooned inside a Hive on one of the station's lower levels, all but one of whom, Mary, were dead; Ripley watched in horror as a Chestburster tore its way out of Mary's body, and the Marines were then set upon by the Xenomorphs. When the inexperienced Gorman lost the ability to handle the situation, Ripley took action herself, commandeering the APC and driving it into the Hive to rescue the survivors. She succeeded, but many of the Marines were lost, including their experienced field commander Sergeant Apone. Gorman was incapacitated, and when the APC finally came to a rest outside it was wrecked.

Stranded

"I say we take off and nuke the entire site from orbit. It's the only way to be sure."

―Ripley, condemning Hadley's Hope (from Aliens)

Following the disastrous ambush, Private Vasquez immediately suggested retrieving Apone and Corporal Dietrich, both of whom had been captured alive, until Ripley pointed out they were likely already being cocooned and impregnated, just like the colonists. Instead, Ripley suggested the survivors retreat to the Sulaco and destroy the entire colony from orbit with a nuclear strike. Burke attempted to overrule her, citing the monetary value of the colony itself and scientific importance of the Xenomorphs, but Ripley reminded him that, with Gorman unconscious and Apone captured, Corporal Hicks was now in charge of the operation. Hicks, seeing sense in Ripley's plan, ordered Corporal Ferro to pick up the survivors in Bug Stomper for immediate evacuation.

However, a stowaway Xenomorph aboard the dropship killed Ferro and caused the vessel to crash, destroying the APC and most of the Marines' supplies in the process. Now stranded, the survivors reluctantly returned to the colony, where Ripley and Hicks devised the best way to barricade and fortify their position. After setting up robot sentries in the tunnels and corridors of the colony and sealing any entrances they can find, the survivors hunkered down to await a rescue. To help reassure her, Hicks gave Ripley a tracer bracelet allowing him to find her wherever she went, which he insisted was "just a precaution".

Confronting Burke

"A bad call? These people are dead, Burke!"

―Ripley to Burke, after learning of his role in the colony's destruction (from Aliens)

After putting Newt to bed in the colony's medical facility, Ripley learned from Bishop that Burke intended to return the live Facehugger specimens they had found to Earth. Her suspicions aroused, Ripley checked the colony's logs and discovered a telling piece of information — shortly before contact with the colony was lost, they received an order to investigate the co-ordinates of the derelict vessel where Kane had found the Xenomorph 57 years previously, information presumably gleaned from her report to the board on Gateway Station. The log revealed that the order had come from Burke. Enraged, Ripley confronted Burke with this information, rejecting his suggestions that helping the company could benefit them financially and vowing to see him brought to justice when they returned to Earth.

After the Xenomorphs assaulted and overran the first sentry gun position, Bishop informed the survivors that the colony's Atmosphere Processor was on course for an irreversible meltdown, having been damaged during the earlier ambush in the Hive. Ripley and the others agreed that retrieving the second dropship aboard the Sulaco was their only chance for survival, but with the Marines' transmitter destroyed someone would need to venture out to the colony's array and remotely pilot the dropship from there. Bishop volunteered, and Ripley and Vasquez saw him off. Soon after his departure, the Xenomorphs attacked the second and final sentry gun position, and while they are narrowly repelled, the guns used up virtually all of their ammunition and would not hold off another assault. A desperate Ripley had Hicks teach her how to operate an M41A Pulse Rifle before she joined Newt in the med lab for some much needed rest.

When Ripley awoke, she discovered to her horror that the two live Facehugger specimens from the colony's lab had been set loose in the room. With her Pulse Rifle gone and the door locked, Ripley set off the fire alarm in the room to attract the attention of the Marines, but was attacked by one of the Facehuggers before they arrived. Although she managed to stop the creature from latching onto her face, it began strangling her with its tail, and she was moments from being rendered unconscious when Hicks and the others arrived and saved her, killing both of the creatures. Ripley informed them immediately that Burke had been responsible.

Fight and flight

"Medical! Get to medical!"

―Ripley, urging the other survivors to retreat (from Aliens)

Ripley and the other survivors confronted Burke over his actions, Ripley calculating that he had intended to smuggle Xenomorph embryos back to Earth by having her and Newt impregnated. She also theorized that he would likely have sabotaged the Marines' cryotubes on the return journey to Earth to prevent them informing anyone of the Chestbursters inside the two females — after jettisoning their bodies into space he would be free to make up any story he liked regarding their demise. Hicks, having heard enough, prepared to execute Burke, but at that moment the power to the colony failed, shutting off the lights.

The Aliens had cut the power somehow, and the group realized that they must have found an alternate route into the station. The Marines got a tracker signal, but could not tell where it was coming from. As they retreated into the med lab, they realized that the signal had come so close that it ought to be in the room: but there were no Aliens in sight. Hicks discovered that they had been using the air ducts. The Aliens attacked through the ceiling. The Marines held them off, and the group escapes through the air ducts with Newt as a guide. Burke snuck away but ran face-to-face into an Alien. Everyone except Hicks, Ripley, Newt and Bishop (who has managed to guide in the dropship) is killed in the attack. Due to the death of Vasquez and Gorman, who used a grenade to kill two Aliens ambushing them, Newt was knocked into a duct and landed in a pool of water. Ripley and Hicks found her and tried to rescue her, but an Alien kidnapped her and took her to the nest. Ripley and Hicks escaped the complex, but during the escape Hicks was wounded by an Alien's blood. The three of them are ready to leave in the dropship, but Ripley refuses to leave Newt behind and instructs Bishop to land on a platform in the cooling tower. Ripley takes her Pulse Rifle, flamethrower and a flashlight and duck tapes them together, then grabs a ammo belt from the dropship's arsenal along with the tracker device she can use to find Newt. Prepped up, she enters the Alien Hive alone.

Ripley had less than half an hour before the reactor melted down. After an express elevator climbed down fifteen floors, she reached the nest. She did not see any Aliens and used marking flares to mark her path. Soon, she found the tracker beacon alone. Believing Newt dead, she cried in despair. Fortunately, Newt was indeed alive, and trapped in Alien webs, faced with an egg. Awakening, she saw the egg open and the Facehugger begin to emerge. Newt screamed, allowing Ripley to follow the scream to her. Ripley destroyed the Facehugger as well as some other Aliens before freeing Newt and making her way to the exit. However, they entered another chamber filled with eggs. In the heart of it all, producing the eggs, was the vast Alien Queen. Several Aliens were about to attack. Ripley demonstrated her flamethrower to the Queen and threatened to destroy the eggs if the guards did not stand down. The Queen, realizing this, complied. However, as Ripley backed away, she burned the eggs, killed the guards and fired grenades at the Queen's Egg sac, destroying it and stopping her from laying any more Eggs. The Queen became enraged and tore free of her ruined Egg sac, pursuing Ripley and Newt.

Ripley reached the elevator with scant minutes to spare before the reactor exploded, but it approached too slowly and the Queen caught up to them. Ripley tried the other elevator and began climbing a ladder, but the Queen appeared suddenly. Just as it looked like the Queen would attack, the elevator appeared and Ripley and Newt made their escape as the reactor began to collapse. However, when they reached the platform, they found the dropship gone. Screaming a curse at Bishop, Ripley discovered that the Queen had learned how to work an elevator and was progressing up to them. Her ammunition fully depleted, and with no way to escape alive, Ripley and Newt prepared to jump to their deaths rather than be taken by the Queen. However, at the last minute, the dropship reappeared and rescued them. The dropship rams into the Queen as they take off, but the survivors eventually reach the Sulaco as the colony is engulfed by the explosion.

Back on the Sulaco

"Get away from her you BITCH!"

―Ripley, to the First Acheron Queen (from Aliens)

On the Sulaco, Ripley commended Bishop for his bravery. Shortly after this, Bishop was impaled by the Queen's tail and torn in half; she stowed away on the dropship's landing gear. Newt ran into the floor vents after Ripley distracted the Queen, and Ripley escaped into a storage room. The Queen then goes after Newt. When it looked as if the Queen was about to kill Newt, Ripley appeared in a power loader, yelling at the Queen, "Get away from her you bitch!" Ripley then battled the Queen with the loader, and pushed her into an airlock. The Queen pulled Ripley down into the chamber with her, however. Ripley tried to climb out of the air lock chamber, but the Queen stopped her by grabbing her legs. Ripley then activated the air lock and held on for dear life. Eventually, the Queen lost her grip and was sucked out of the Sulaco and expelled into space. Ripley then struggled to climb out of the airlock, and turned it off. She, Hicks, the upper half of Bishop (which was still functioning) and Newt entered hypersleep for the voyage back to Earth.

Crashing on Fiorina 161 and Death

Ripley with her head shaved on Fiorina 161.

Shortly thereafter, an Egg, presumably hidden aboard the Sulaco by the Queen before she attacked Ripley in the hangar bay, hatched and the Royal Facehugger that emerged attacked Ripley as she slept in her cryotube. At around the same time, Weyland-Yutani PMCs infiltrated the Sulaco as part of operations to recover viable Xenomorph specimens, eventually leading to a firefight in the hypersleep chamber and a fire. In response to the situation, the remaining occupied cryotubes were automatically launched aboard a Type 337 EEV which then crash-landed on Fiorina "Fury" 161. Turk (who's corpse was mistaken as Hicks') was apparently impaled and crushed by a support beam and killed, Newt drowned in her cryotube and Bishop was further damaged and placed in a scrap heap by the prisoners at the Class C Work Correction Unit on the planet. Their loss greatly affected Ripley as she tried to figure out what killed her companions.

Ripley had the prison doctor, Jonathan Clemens, perform an autopsy on Newt. She feared that she was carrying an Alien embryo, though she did not share this information. Instead, she merely lied and stated that they were investigating a possible case of cholera. A funeral procession for Turk and Newt was later held at the facility's blast furnace, where their bodies were be dropped into the leadworks. The leader of the prisoners, Leonard Dillon, recited a poem that caused Ripley to weep.

Ripley's unusual behavior began to agitate the prisoners and frustrate the prison warden, Harold Andrews, who found her to be incredibly disruptive to the status quo in the prison. All prisoners embraced a religion that forbid sexual relations, and Ripley was a danger to this. She later walked to the scrap heap to recover Bishop's remains, however she was attacked by several prisoners trying to rape her. Dillon intervened and beat them back. Ripley then took Bishop's remains and partially repaired him. He confirmed Ripley's fears and suspicions that an Alien was involved in their crash. Bishop then asked to be terminated, and Ripley complied with his request

During the funeral, an Alien is seen gestating inside a dog, with the Chestburster maturing quickly. It later invaded the infirmary and killed Clemens then moving to kill Ripley, but strangely it restrained itself and left. Ripley and the mentally unstable Walter Golic were the only witnesses. Ripley then rushed to the mess hall to warn the prisoners, but as she arrived, she witnessed Andrews being pulled into the air ducts and killed.

The prisoners then started looking to Ripley for ideas on how to kill the Alien. Their first plan involved filling the ventilation system with toxic waste, and igniting it to flush out the Alien. Unfortunately, the creature struck and caused a large explosion that killed several prisoners. Ripley then started to feel sick and had shortness of breath, she thought it was a side affect from abruptly waking from hypersleep. Regardless, she then had Francis Aaron help her run a scan in the EEV and she then discovered she had been impregnated by an Alien. She then asked Dillon to kill her. He agreed to do so, but only after she helped kill the adult Alien.

Their new plan involved trapping the creature in the prison's lead works and drowning it with molten lead. The catch was that everyone was going to use themselves to bait the creature there. Most of the prisoners were killed with only Ripley, Dillon, Robert Morse, and Aaron left alive. The creature was trapped in the mold with Ripley and Dillon. Ripley then volunteered to stay behind to distract the creature, but as Dillon climbed the mold, the creature followed him; he then stayed behind to hold the creature off until the lead was dumped. Ripley reminded Dillon of his promise, but he told her, "God will take care of you now, sister!". The creature charged Dillon; even with his large build, Dillon was no match for the creature and was killed. After climbing out of the mold Ripley told Morse to pour the lead. It appeared that the Alien had drowned or was destroyed by the high temperatures. However, the creature was still alive and it escaped from the mold, now covered in hot molten lead, proceeding to set its sights on Ripley. Morse then told her to turn on the water sprinklers. When she did, it caused the Alien's exoskeleton to rapidly shatter via thermal shock and explodes.

She then had one final task to complete: kill herself and the Alien in her. As she put her plan into motion with the help of Morse; members of the Weyland-Yutani company arrived to retrieve Ripley. As they arrived, Ripley saw a familiar face, Michael Weyland who designed the Bishop android came to give her a "friendly face." He told Ripley how he planned to save her by removing the embryo inside of her, claiming that it would be destroyed. As tempting as the offer was, she had enough dealings with the company to see through the facade. Aaron then assaulted Bishop with a wrench; nearly taking off the man's left ear, believing he was another android. Bishop reasserted that he wasn't an android as Aaron was shot to death for the assault. Ripley continued to help the wounded Morse move up to the platform over the furnace as she declined Weyland's offer. Bishop then let the lie go stating he "must have it". Ripley was still unconvinced. As her Chestburster was about to erupt, she slowly and gracefully let herself fall towards the molten lead, an event witnessed by Corporal Hicks and Samwell Stone. The queen erupted from her chest, but she still had enough strength to hold onto it as they were taken by the lead. Lieutenant Ellen Ripley, the last survivor of the Nostromo's destruction, as well as the mission on LV-426, had died.

Life After Death

As a Synthetic

During the Alien infestation of Earth, not even twenty years after Ripley's death; There was an advanced model synthetic of Ripley, which had the real Ripley's memories up until after the disastrous mission at Hadley's Hope. This version of Ripley took part in taking back the Earth from the Aliens in the mid 2190's.

200 Years Later

Following the events on Fiorina, samples of Ripley's blood were recovered from the facility. It took two hundred years and seven attempts to successfully clone Ripley on the medical vessel USM Auriga. The eighth produced clone was dubbed Ripley 8. Ripley was cloned for the purposes of extracting the embryo in her body. This process left behind Alien DNA that turned her into an Alien/Human hybrid, providing her with superhuman abilities and a peculiar attachment to the Alien species.

Personality and Traits

Ellen Ripley is the primary protagonist of the Alien series of films, appearing in all chapters. Ripley was a strong willed woman that had a degree of professionalism while on the job and would follow the rules, such as when Lambert and Dallas demanded Ripley let them and Kane back on board with a creature attached to him, despite a code that required 24 hour quarantine. (The rule was broken by Ash, the android science officer aboard the Nostromo.) She kept her calm in certain situations that meant life or death. She demonstrated this when the Alien snuck on board the shuttle and startled her but calmly spaced the creature. She would also get emotional at times, such as discovering the company's secret orders as well as finding her dead crewmates.

The events on board the Nostromo, would traumatize Ripley and effect her greatly after being brought out of an extended hypersleep. She suffered from nightmares related to the creature and lost her flight status. Ripley had little tolerance for the ignorance of what happened on her last assignment and the cover up by company officials. Ripley was later asked by Burke to come back to LV-426 as an advisor to eradicate the creatures and not be brought back for study.

Ripley heads into the Hive on LV-426 alone to rescue Newt.

When the mission started to unravel when the Marines were in the atmospheric processor, Ripley took charge and took the APC to rescue the survivors of the ambush. She later told the Marines that they couldn't help their comrades that "survived" as they were being cocooned by the creatures. She later changed this attitude when she went back to rescue Newt, who she grew close to with loosing their families and dealing with the creatures. She also had to overcome her prejudice towards synthetics that she got from dealing with Ash. She eventually conceded to Bishop that he did "ok".

After crashing on Fiorina, Ripley was devastated by the loss of Newt and Hicks, suspecting that an Alien was involved. She would keep Doctor Clemens and Superintendent Andrews in the dark regarding the creature and her suspicions that Newt had one inside her. After discovering that she had a Queen gestating in her, Ripley attempted several times to have Dillon finish her and the creature off. She also lost faith in the company completely after the Hadley's Hope infestation and distrusted Michael Weyland when he came to "rescue" her. Ripley then took fate in her own hands to end the creature that was inside her and keep it from the company.

Rank

There seems to be some confusion over the rank that Ripley holds throughout the series. In Alien, her rank is never specified, although she is clearly subordinate to both Captain Dallas and First Officer Kane. At the start of the extended Special Edition of Aliens, her rank is stated to be that of Warrant Officer (although she is subsequently stripped of this rank following the inquiry into the destruction of the Nostromo). However, by Alien³ she is said to be Lieutenant Ellen Ripley. If this were the case, she should have had superiority over Corporal Hicks during the events of Aliens, when clearly she did not. What's more, Alien Resurrection states Ripley was a Lieutenant 1st Class at the time of her death.

While the issue is never addressed in the films, it seems likely that Ripley was given the rank of Lieutenant 1st Class upon her reinstatement in Aliens, once she had agreed to return to LV-426, and that the rank of Lieutenant ascribed to her in Alien³ was merely an abbreviation of her full title. Furthermore, as her rank was an ICC commercial rank, Hicks — who held a military rank — was still superior despite only being a Corporal; essentially Ripley's situation could be compared to the "Captain" of a commercial cruise liner being stranded with enlisted Navy SEALs. The fact that Hicks accepts Ripley's suggestion to "nuke the site from orbit" is merely a sign that he a) respects her experience with the Xenomorphs, and b) wants to get home alive.

Equipment

Ripley would use what ever she could for her survival. In her encounter with the Alien she used a Flame Thrower, harpoon gun and spacesuit to finish off the creature. After spending some time with the Colonial Marines and being instructed in how to use their weapons, Ripley became proficient with a M41A Pulse Rifle as well as a M240 Incinerator Unit, which she would combine together with a locater using duck tape, to rescue Newt later on. Ripley also made use of flares as well to illuminate and to mark her path inside the hive. She also used a locater to find Newt. Ripley even used a Caterpillar P-5000 Work Loader (Power Loader) to fight the alien queen in the climax of the second film. Ripley would also use pipes and flares to fight off the Runner when she was stranded on Fiorina 161.

Behind the Scenes

Alien³

Ellen Ripley's Body Level Organ Torso

Ellen Ripley's Body Level Organ Torso comes from the scene in which Ripley undergoes a CAT-scan, where she uncovers that she has been impregnated by a Xenomorph. For this sequence, this torso was was filmed as an insert for the monitor displaying Ripley's scan. Crafted from foam latex, this torso represents Ripley's inner organs, including her heart, lungs, and intestines, all of which have been highly painted with red and orange colors, while the reverse side that has not been painted or textured.

This organ torso measures approximately 16" x 9" x 28" (41cm x 23cm x 72cm) and today features wear from production use and age, particularly to the material which has hardened in several places, causing the foam to crack and flake. There is also a large hole within the foam that is located on the backside, exposing the organs. This torso has also been redressed with stage blood for use in another production after the completion of Alien³. Aside from the noted flaking, today this piece remains in overall fair condition despite its age.

A screenshot of the prop's page at the Prop Store, before it was purchased.

This prop was briefly available at the Prop Store's website in 2013, but it was purchased sometime between 3.50 PM the 15th and 7:15 PM the 16th of October the same year. The page for the prop was subsequently deleted.

Trivia

• Ripley actress Sigourney Weaver became worried she would lose the role when early in filming it was discovered she was allergic to Jones the cat. However, it eventually transpired that it was a combination of cat hair and the glycerin used to make the actress appear sweaty during scenes that she was allergic to; one without the other had no effect on her.
• While the majority of the characters in the original Alien script were written so that they could be either male or female, Ripley was always intended to be a man. Tom Skerritt was cast as Ripley before the decision was made to make the character a woman; Skerritt was subsequently recast as Dallas.
• British actress Meryl Streep was also considered for Ripley, being the studios first choice for the role.
• Ripley has an action figure made in her likeness in the Kenner line of Alien toys.
• Ripley is briefly mentioned by Karl Bishop Weyland in an audio log in the 2010 video game Aliens vs. Predator.
• In the Aliens arcade game by Konami, Ripley is mistakenly portrayed with blonde hair.
• Although Ripley died in the third instalment of the Alien franchise, Sigourney Weaver has expressed interest in a fifth Alien film reprising her role as Ellen Ripley.
• Ripley's combination M41A Pulse Rifle/M240 Incinerator Unit from Aliens appears in the video game Aliens: Colonial Marines as a "Legendary Weapon", but only to those who pre-ordered the Collector's Edition or purchase the weapon as additional DLC.
• Ripley is one letter off from Ridley (the director of Alien). Also, flipping the "p" in Ripley's name upside-down will create Ridley. However, this is merely a coincidence as Ripley was named before Ridley became involved with Alien.
• Dr. Ryan Stone from the 2013 film Gravity has been compared to Ripley.
• Sigourney Weaver has recently expressed interest in 'finishing' Ellen Ripley's story in a fifth Alien film.
• Several lines of Ripley's dialogue later inspired the titles of trophies/achievements in Aliens: Colonial Marines, including "I Can Handle Myself", as well as "I'm Happy to Disappoint You", "They Can Bill Me" and "It's the Only Way to Be Sure" from the expansion Stasis Interrupted.

Appearances

• Alien/novel/comic (First Appearance)
• Aliens/novel
• Aliens (video game)
• Aliens: Newt's Tale
• Alien³/novel/comic/game
• Aliens: Colonial Marines Technical Manual (mentioned only)
• Aliens: Earth Hive (indirect mention)
• Aliens: Nightmare Asylum (mentioned only)
• Aliens: The Female War (mentioned only)
• Alien Resurrection/novel/comic (mentioned only)
• Aliens vs. Predator (video game, mentioned only)
• Aliens: Colonial Marines/Stasis Interrupted (video game, mentioned only in base game)
• Alien: Out of the Shadows
• Alien: Sea of Sorrows (mentioned only)

Upcoming

• Alien: Isolation (DLC)

Non-canon appearances

• Aliens: Book One (appears in flashback)
• Aliens: Book Two
• Aliens: Earth War
• Alien Trilogy

Gallery

Ripley with her Flame Thrower in Alien.

Ripley in Alien.

Ripley as she prepares to face the Xenomorph.

Ripley as she faces the Xenomorph in the Narcissus.

Ripley in an MK 50 Compression Suit.

Ripley on the theatrical poster for Aliens.

Ripley and Newt after their first escape from the atmospheric processor.

Hicks teaches Ripley the weapon handling of the M41A.

Ripley and Hicks as they escape the colony complex.

Ripley loading her pulse rifle before her search for Newt.

Ripley as she descends in the elevator into the xenomorph hive.

Ripley welding her pulse rifle flamethrower combo in Aliens.

Ripley and Newt in Aliens.

Ripley on the theatrical poster for Alien 3.

Lt. Ripley with Dillon.

The Inkworks Alien Legacy Evolution of Ripley "Chase Set" showing Ripley as she appears in Alien, Aliens, Alien³ and Alien Resurrection.

Ripley as she appears in the Alien³ comic.

Ellen Ripley as she appears in DLC for Alien: Isolation

Ellen Ripley in Alien: Isolation.

Ditto.