I think what they did to Ripley at the beginning of 3 was an absolute travesty. Kick *** hero from 2 gets what she gets during the opening credits? Not cool.
She deserved better.
Yeah that was the huge issue with 3, that, the awful production and directing nightmare, and the horrible CGI alien.
But the Assembly Cut, which is what Fincher had envisioned, does make it better. Scenes are more fleshed out. More context. The deaths of Newt and Hicks are at least given more background. I liked the prison setting and it also had some quality acting with Charles S Dutton, Pete Postlewaith, and Charles Dance. I like that they at least attempted to change the alien to be a dog-breed alien and not born out of a human. There's some scenes in Alien 3 that are some my favorite in the series, the birth of the dog alien juxtaposed with the prison inmates burning the bodies of Hicks and Newt. And the conversation with Dance and Weaver about his past as a doctor. Real Fincher like stuff there. I always found it interesting that they had to fight back against the alien without any weapons, luring him into various areas and using what they could. Idk I liked it.
Speaking of, I've been starting to go down a habit hole of "director cut" movies, where Hollywood botched the original and the director had to release the real intended version. Alien 3 is a good example, but I grabbed DC copies of Brazil and Once Upon a Time in America.