I’m Putting Together A Team
Sequel Soldiers - Part Two
Team Two: Heroes of second installments of movie franchises that were better than the original.
Fictional heroes, villains, and everyone in between have formed unlikely alliances to answer a common calling: which group of kindred characters is the mightiest of them all? United by a shared theme, troops of four fabulous fictional characters will figuratively compete in a tournament of television, movie, and literature’s finest where only one foursome can be crowned kings and queens of popular entertainment. Join in on the roll call to learn more about these similar characters and delve into their individual histories. It's time to assemble the analogous all-stars and find out who is the best, one team at a time.
The second time's the charm for these cinematic commandos, and they have the box office blowouts to back them up. Each member of this “Part Two” party is featured in a film that is widely considered to be superior to the first. Subjectivity can sway opinions, but there is no doubt that these characters are a force to be reckoned with.
Sequel Soldiers, assemble!
2. Corporal Dwayne Hicks
First appearance: Aliens (1986)
Popular entertainment of 1986:
Ferris Bueller’s Day Off - film starring Matthew Broderick
ALF - television series starring Max Wright and Anne Schedeen
The Prince of Tides - novel by Pat Conroy
Alien first hatched in 1979, scaring moviegoers like never before - the Ridley Scott-directed horror film took a future crew of space truckers and had them face an extraterrestrial monster unlike any that had come before it. The Xenomorph immediately established itself as the new insect-like face of terror, and would be a thorn in the side of Ellen Ripley (played by Sigourney Weaver) for many sequels to come. James Cameron helmed its successor, unleashing Aliens onto cinemas in 1986, but this time it was indeed war.
Colonial Space Marines accompanied Ripley on a new mission to hunt the bugs in an adventure set years after Ripley’s cryogenic slumber. Among the rough and tough platoon was the frosty-headed Corporal Dwayne Hicks (played by Michael Biehn). The combat unit investigated a colony that had gone mysteriously radio silent, but the sole survivor of the previous alien attack, Ripley, knew the danger they would face. Hicks battled alongside his comrades as things quickly escalated into a(n) (acidic) bloody war with the horde of monsters.
The Xenomorphs had overrun the remote colony, and they hunted the Space Marines one-by-one. The human crew found a surviving young girl called Newt stuck on the station, somehow keeping hidden from the nasty predators. Hicks and the other heroes protected her but the aliens were too devastating - and things only got worse when their queen emerged. Hicks fought valiantly but would suffer severe injuries from getting doused in the aliens burning blood. Ripley fought off the queen in a power-loading robotic suit, then, with the aid of the android Bishop, escorted the wounded soldier and Newt to safety aboard a ship so they could escape. Though they were placed in a cryo-sleep chamber, Hicks and Newt did not survive a crash landing. Ripley lived on to fight the aliens (again, and again after that).
Armed with an M41A Pulse Rifle, Cpl. Hicks keeps a level head during even the most intense battles. Smart and quick, this battlefield veteran is a tough warrior who has faced the deadliest creatures in the galaxy and lived (for a while, anyway). Hicks will do whatever it takes to stop his enemies, even if it means nuking them from orbit.
The Terminator, Hicks, Rambo, and Peacemaker make for an impressive party of four, but they’ll have to use their brains (or cybernetic learning computers) as well as brawn to the test if they want to be the last team standing.
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