#The 12 Best Action Movies On Amazon Prime Right Now

If there’s anything about the Alien franchise that’s beyond dispute, it’s that “Aliens” (1986) is an action movie and “Alien” is not. That’s the argument. There’s no counter. “Alien,” directed by Ridley Scott, was an edge-of-your-seat sci-fi horror film that also flirted with body-horror, war movie tropes, and a commentary about the ’70s working class. There’s a whole lot of running, but very little shooting; Ripley (Sigourney Weaver) takes a job, a smiling Xenomorph hitches a ride, and one working stiff after another — Yaphet Kotto, Harry Dean Stanton, Veronica Cartwright, John Hurt, and Tom Skerritt — takes a turn screaming.

“Aliens,” in stark contrast to the original, exchanges a ship full of labor workers for a crew of cocky, stereotypical troops, including Weaver and Bill “Game over, Man!” Paxton, and shares a similar slow burn in the first half hour. But, like a storm landing on shore, once the trigger is pulled on the now-plural aliens, the running and gunning starts in earnest. From that point on, “Aliens” becomes an unrelenting action movie for a good hour and change.