The Pyramid

leading from

AVP: Borrowed from the Alien saga

a) A main plot element in the film is the discovery of an ancient pyramid that contains an

Alien birthing temple and Paul Anderson borrowed this idea as something unused from Dan O'Bannon's original Alien script.

AVP' s Hologram of the underground pyramid

The pyramid in O'Bannon's script

1. "Originally, when they were going back from the derelict ship to the Nostromo, they were going to find this pyramid and there was the suggestion of a civilisation that was somehow tied into the Alien eggs" Anderson explains." The concept was always stuck in my mind - Aliens in a pyramid." (Total Film, November 2004, p102)

AVP's The sacrifice chambers beds

b). The sacrificial chamber in the pyramid was loosely inspired by Dan O'Bannon's concept for the birthing chamber inside the pyramid in his Alien script as illustrated by Ron Cobb

  birthing chamber design by Ron Cobb

c ) It was arranged in a way vaguely reminiscent of the cryotubes of the seven 'petaled' sleep chamber aboard the Nostromo in Alien (right)

AVP's  seven 'petaled' sacrificial chamber 

Alien's seven 'petaled' cryogenic sleepers

d ). Poster art from Alien 3

Alien 3 poster

On the floor in the centre of the birthing chamber decorating a drainage hole is found an image of the spiral like alien queen embryo which is based on the emblem for poster for Alien 3 

1. Woodruff ? : Hey that's nice there, that little grating right there that they just pulled out from was the poster art from the Alien 3 poster. (DVD commentary)

AVP's spiral queen embryo design on the grating