In Aliens (1986), Ripley returns to LV-426 with Colonial Marines after contact with a settlement is lost. There she finds Newt, a girl who survived the infestation, and discovers the alien queen. The story culminates in a dangerous rescue and a final confrontation aboard the Sulaco.
Warning: full spoilers for Aliens (1986) follow.
The survivor returns to LV-426
After escaping the Nostromo in Alien (1979), Ellen Ripley is found drifting in space and awakens after 57 years in hypersleep. Weyland-Yutani questions her account of the creature while she struggles with nightmares. When the human colony on LV-426 loses contact, she agrees to accompany Colonial Marines to the place where her ordeal began.
James Cameron directed this 1986 sequel. The first movie followed one creature stalking an isolated crew; this time an armed mission faces an infestation and must improvise an evacuation.
An empty colony and the discovery of Newt
The team lands at Hadley's Hope and finds abandoned facilities, acid damage and evidence that the colonists were attacked. The only surviving child they locate is Rebecca Jorden, known as Newt, hiding in ventilation ducts. Ripley gains her trust, while Hicks stands out among the Marines and Bishop, an android, makes Ripley uneasy because of her earlier experience with Ash.
Tracking the colonists to the atmosphere processor, the soldiers discover people trapped in the hive's organic structure. An attack by multiple aliens inflicts heavy losses. Ripley takes control of a vehicle to retrieve the survivors, but the dropship crashes, putting their escape in jeopardy.
Burke, the siege and the last escape route
The survivors barricade themselves inside the complex. Ripley discovers that Carter Burke directed colonists to investigate the derelict ship containing alien eggs and intended to exploit the organisms commercially. Later, she and Newt are locked in a room with released facehuggers, but they alert the others and survive. Ripley holds Burke responsible for trying to turn them into hosts.
The situation worsens as the processor approaches a catastrophic explosion. Bishop travels through a service passage to arrange another rescue craft. The creatures break through the defenses and enter the operations room from above. Hudson is overwhelmed, Burke disappears during the attack, Gorman and Vasquez die fighting back, and Hicks is injured. Newt is taken while trying to escape through the ducts.
Ripley rescues Newt and confronts the queen
Despite the approaching evacuation, Ripley goes back alone for Newt. She finds the girl trapped in the hive and frees her. Looking for an exit, she discovers the alien queen surrounded by eggs, the source of the creatures' reproduction there. Ripley destroys the eggs and the queen's egg-laying apparatus, triggering a pursuit.
Bishop retrieves Ripley, Newt and the injured Hicks in a second dropship shortly before the explosion destroys the installation on LV-426. Their escape seems complete, but the queen has hidden in the landing gear and travels with them to the Sulaco.
How does Aliens end?
Aboard the Sulaco, the queen attacks Bishop and tears him in half. When she threatens Newt, Ripley enters a mechanized industrial power loader and fights her. The battle ends at an airlock: Ripley manages to eject the queen into space while the survivors remain aboard.
The film ends with Ripley, Newt, Hicks and the damaged Bishop returning to hypersleep. Ripley's bond with Newt gives the final confrontation a protective dimension: Ripley saves the child, while the queen retaliates after the destruction of her own eggs. This parallel is a narrative interpretation, not a literal biological explanation.
What changed from the 1979 film?
Alien (1979) ends with Ripley surviving the monster aboard the Nostromo. Aliens (1986) builds on that survival, moves the conflict to a colony and reveals a collective structure among the creatures, culminating in the queen. The new emotional center is the trust between Ripley and Newt. This recap focuses on the 1986 narrative rather than comparing scenes exclusive to alternative cuts.
