What Happened To Bishop After The End Of Aliens (All Versions)

Here’s what happened to fan-favorite android Bishop following the events of Aliens, including alternate versions. Despite being a huge event, it took seven years for a sequel to Alien to materialize. While there had been talk of a potential, low-budget follow-up or TV series in the film’s aftermath, a dispute between the studio and the movie’s producers saw it delayed. It was worth the wait, however, with James Cameron’s Aliens being considered another sci-fi classic that switched genres from horror to action.

Aliens added a lot of iconic characters to the universe too, including Hicks, Newt, and Hudson. Yet another was Bishop, played by Millennium’s Lance Henriksen. Despite his friendly, benign exterior the character is greeted with suspicion by Ripley, following her experiences with Ian Holm’s Ash in the original movie. While the Alien Queen slices him in half during the finale, being an android allows him to survive such things and he’s one of the few characters left alive when the credits roll.

Here’s what happened to Aliens’ Bishop following the movie, including some non-canon timelines.

Alien 3

Alien 3 was mighty controversial for its bleak tone and killing off Hicks and Newt in the opening scene, and later killing Ripley in the finale. Bishop didn’t fare much better as what remained of him was so damaged when the Sulaco’s escape pod landed on prison planet 161 that he was tossed on the scrapheap.

Ripley later retrieves what’s left to question him about what happened on the Sulaco. Despite being heavily damaged, Bishop confirms her worst fears that a Xenomorph was onboard the ship – and it followed them down. He later asks Ripley to disconnect him for good as he’ll never be complete again, which she does.

Alien III: The Unproduced Script

Alien 3 went through one of the most tortured pre-production periods of any major blockbuster, which four wildly differing screenplays being written and rejected. The first came from cyberpunk author William Gibson (Neuromancer) and found the survivors of Aliens caught up in a Xenomorph outbreak and a political scuffle. Newt is quickly sent back to Earth while Ripley spends most of it in a coma, as Sigourney Weaver’s return was up in the air at time.

Gibson’s script was rejected but was recently adapted for both a comic series and audio drama, with Henriksen and Biehn reprising their roles in the latter. The story opens with an Alien egg growing out of Bishop’s severed torso – which grew from material left by the Queen – and he’s later repaired. He and Hicks lead the survivors to safety while fending off attacks. The story ends with Bishop giving a speech declaring the Xenomorphs must be traced back to their home planet and destroyed, setting up a fourth and final movie.

Aliens: Space Marines – Desert Storm

During the early 1990s, a line of Kenner toys based on the Aliens franchise was released that included mini-comics following the continuing adventures of the cast. While the comics made Aliens canon, dead characters like Drake still appeared, while Bishop became a badass combat droid complete with a minigun. “Desert Storm” was the first comic where he and Hicks must rescue a fellow marine from an Alien nest.

Aliens: Colonial Marines

While Aliens: Colonial Marines takes place after the events of the third movie and was sold as a canon sequel, it’s universally negative reception puts this in doubt. Lance Henriksen steps in the shoes of the USS Sephora’s version of Bishop, and while he’s not the same model as Aliens’ version they’re pretty much identical in terms of personality. Henriksen pulls double duty in the game by voicing the new Bishop AND Michael Bishop, his creator from Alien 3 who returns as a villain.

About The Author

Padraig Cotter
(3484 Articles Published)

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It’s pronounced Paw-rick, not Pad-raig. Now that’s out of the way, a brief introduction. Padraig has been writing about film online since 2012, when a friend asked if he’d like to contribute the occasional review or feature to their site.

A part-time hobby soon blossomed into a career when he discovered he really loved writing about movies, TV and video games – he even (arguably) had a little bit of talent for it. He has written words for Den of Geek, Collider, The Irish Times and Screen Rant over the years, and can discuss anything from the MCU – where Hawkeye is clearly the best character – to the most obscure cult b-movie gem, and his hot takes often require heat resistant gloves to handle.

He’s super modern too, so his favorite movies include Jaws, Die Hard, The Thing, Ghostbusters and Batman. He can be found as i_Padds on Twitter making bad puns.

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