Corporal Dwayne Hicks
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Corporal Dwayne Hicks is a fictional character in the 1986 science fiction movie Aliens. The character is portrayed by Michael Biehn.
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[edit] Character History
Corporal Hicks is a member of the fictional military unit USCM Sulaco (United States Colonial Marines) that is deployed to the planet LV-426 to investigate the sudden loss of contact with the colonists on that moon. The events of this investigation are depicted in the movie Aliens.
Corporal Hicks is portrayed as a soft spoken and level-headed heroic leader, providing contrast to other members of the team, including the hot-tempered Private Vasquez, the emotionally paranoid Private Hudson, the inexperienced Gorman and the greedy Carter Burke.
At the start of the movie Corporal Hicks is third in rank of the military unit, but after they venture in the Xenomorph nest, he becomes acting commanding officer when the majority of his team are killed and the actual commanding officer, Lieutenant Gorman, is knocked unconscious. Ripley, protagonist of the film, points this out when she comes head-to-head with Burke over the next course of action after the danger of the Xenomorph becoms apparent. Hicks, as acting commanding officer, declares that they will leave immediately and use a thermonuclear warhead to destroy the colony. Although this plan does not come to fruition, throughout the rest of the movie Hicks provides calm leadership to help the human survivors escape the moon successfully.
[edit] Family Unit
A running theme of Aliens is family unit, contrasting the Xenomorphs' efficient bee-like family structure with the humans' emotionally-bonded family structure. Corporal Hicks completes the family unit of the film's survivors along with Ripley, Newt and Bishop. Accordingly, a romantic relationship is hinted between Hicks and Ripley.
[edit] Next Sequel
Although Corporal Hicks survives the events of Aliens, he is killed off-screen before the events of Alien³, when the Sulaco's escape pod malfunctions and crash-lands on Fiorina 'Fury' 161.
[edit] Alternate Sequels
Before production began on Alien³, Dark Horse Comics produced a comic book series that follows-up on the characters after Aliens. In that series, Hicks, Newt and Bishop all survive the escape from the Sulaco with Ripley and continue to fight the Xenomorphs. With the release of Alien³, this comic books series was considered an alternate universe from "official" Alien series canon.
[edit] Similarity to other characters
Michael Biehn's portrayal of Corporal Hicks is similar to his portrayal of the character Kyle Reese in the movie The Terminator. Both Aliens and The Terminator were directed by James Cameron and in both movies Michael Biehn plays sympathetic but heroic military men that bond with the strong female protagonists.
