You Won't Recognize The Cast Of Aliens Today

When the Alien movie saga kicked off with Ridley Scott's intense and terrifying "Alien" in 1979, few would have expected that the next movie in line would be a radically different affair. Though James Cameron's "Aliens" didn't quite surpass the original's vibe, the action-heavy 1986 sequel remains one of the best movies in the Alien franchise, and its bigger stakes and tonal differences make it arguably just as memorable as the first film — though in a very different way.

"Aliens" is a very James Cameron movie. It introduces a memorable core group of characters, sends them on a dangerous mission, and constantly builds up the stakes and the action. This is perhaps best personified by Ellen Ripley's (Sigourney Weaver) evolution from the sole survivor of the Nostromo to a full-on action hero who puts the Colonial Marines to shame. You remember the movie, you know its iconic characters — but what do the cast members of "Aliens" look like today? Read on to find out. 

Franchise protagonist Ellen Ripley gets some of her most iconic scenes in "Aliens." Sigourney Weaver brings everything that was great in her performance in "Alien" to the movie, and handily shifts genres to infuse Ripley with the kind of courage under fire that enables her to fight the xenomorph queen with a power loader exoskeleton. Everything about Ripley is awesome in "Aliens," and Sigourney Weaver has an Oscar nomination for best actress in a leading role to prove it.

If "Alien" changed the course of Sigourney Weaver's career, "Aliens" showed that she can be a bona fide action hero. Both movies rank among the best in Weaver's lengthy résumé, which is saying something. After all, she has worked across a wide number of genres with equal skill. From the comedy classic "Ghostbusters" to the Dian Fossey biopic "Gorillas in the Mist," the three-time Academy Award nominee is one of the best in the game — and she continues to work in prominent projects like James Cameron's "Avatar" franchise.

Corporal Dwayne Hicks is the friendliest and most reasonable Colonial Marine in the movie. As such, it's not exactly shocking that he winds up taking charge after the Marines who outrank him end up out of commission in one way or another.

Hicks is portrayed by Michael Biehn. He's known for playing action-oriented characters who are slightly out of their depth, which sets him apart from the muscle-man action heroes of the 1980s. Much like Sigourney Weaver, Biehn is one of the key performers in the James Cameron back catalog. Outside "Aliens," Biehn memorably played the time-traveling hero Kyle Reese in Cameron's seminal 1984 sci-fi work "The Terminator," and he returned in the Cameron fold in 1989, playing the psychopathic Lieutenant Coffey in "The Abyss."

Biehn has acted steadily since the late 1970s. Outside his work with Cameron, some of the most memorable films in his career include the 1993 Western "Tombstone" and 1996's Michael Bay prison island epic "The Rock." More recently, he appeared in the 2026 action thriller "Onslaught."

In a movie full of drooling xenomorphs, it's almost impressive that Carter Burke still manages to be the slimiest character. The alien monsters are just following their nature, but Burke represents the worst of humanity: Manipulative, greedy, and thoroughly untrustworthy, the Weyland-Yutani exec wants to make a fat profit off the xenomorphs, and doesn't care how many people have to die for it.

After a role like Burke, it might have been easy for Paul Reiser to play deceptive villains and weaselly business types for the rest of his career. However, the actor was already known as a comedic performer, and ended up leaning that way. To date, he's likely best known for the Emmy-winning NBC sitcom "Mad About You," on which he played Paul Buchman opposite Helen Hunt's Jamie Buchman. 

In another display of his ability to avoid getting typecast, Reiser has continued to take roles across genre borders ever since the show ended. You may remember him from projects like Netflix's comedy-drama "The Kominsky Method" and the streamer's horror juggernaut "Stranger Things," as well as Damien Chazelle's acclaimed music drama "Whiplash" and Prime Video's dark superhero satire "The Boys."

The resident "artificial person" of the movie, Bishop is tasked with some pretty heavy lifting after the antagonistic actions of fellow android Ash (Ian Holm) in "Alien." However, despite Ripley's quite understandable reservations, Bishop turns out to be a capable ally who's instrumental in saving the day.

One of the many untold truths of James Cameron's "The Terminator" is that before Arnold Schwarzenegger got the role, it nearly went to Lance Henriksen. With Bishop, "Aliens" shows what kind of energy Henriksen brings to the role of a cybernetic being, even though the character is considerably more benevolent than the T-800.

A great character actor, Henriksen went on to become an integral part of the Alien multimedia franchise, playing various androids and characters affiliated with the Weyland-Yutani Corporation. A massively prolific performer who had well over 260 acting credits to his name as of 2025, Henriksen has worked in films, TV shows, and video games across the board. Notably, he starred in "The X-Files" creator Chris Carter's dark supernatural drama "Millennium," playing main character Frank Black from 1996 to 1999.

Adding a plucky child character to an action movie in order to raise the emotional stakes is always a tricky proposition. Few films have done this better than "Aliens," courtesy of the movie's portrayal of young colonist orphan Newt. Introduced as a young survivor from the Hadley's Hope colony, there's nothing overly cutesy about her — she's simply a young girl stuck in a nightmarish situation, and Ripley immediately makes it her mission in life that Newt gets to safety. 

A lot of Newt's effectiveness as a character comes from the slightly shell-shocked, matter-of-fact performance from Carrie Henn, who does a great job portraying a young survivor who's endured and hidden from horrors beyond all comprehension. Though Henn did an amazing job, she ultimately opted against pursuing acting, and Newt remains her only screen acting role. In an interview with the "AVPGalaxy" podcast, she explained the circumstances that led to this choice.

"I wanted to be a normal child and I'd lived in England since I was about two ... So it was quite a culture shock coming back to the States and especially coming back to California," Henn explained. "It was difficult at first because I was obviously different, cause not only have I been in a movie but also a different accent than a lot of other people. I said things differently, so I just continued with that and then I decided to go on and get my education to become a teacher myself."