Do we like Ellen Ripley?
A character from Alien (1979)
Our score: 10 out of 10. Yes, without hesitation. She is sensible, brave and stubborn, and she looks after other people even when it costs her. If you had to pick one person to follow into trouble, it would be her.
Ellen Ripley is a warrant officer on the Nostromo, a crew of seven tired space truckers hauling cargo home. The crew is woken early to answer a mysterious signal from a nearby moon. The ship is a long way from help, and the trip goes wrong quickly. Ripley is the one who sticks to procedure and keeps a clear head while others are distracted, curious or after a bonus.
What makes her a hero is that she isn't a swaggering one. In Alien (1979) she is practical and hard to rattle, and she is willing to say the unpopular thing out loud. The film explores the sexism she faces in a male-dominated workplace, and she keeps doing her job anyway. Britannica notes that she set the standard for female protagonists in film. In the sequels she keeps trying to stop the alien lifeforms from reaching Earth.
Her score is a 10 because she is dependable and humane. She isn't a lone wolf who only cares about herself. When the story gets bigger in the sequels, she is a protective, almost maternal figure. She shields others at real cost to herself, and she is angry at the people who put profit ahead of lives. Her ordinary grit is why she lasts as a hero: she is a worker who refuses to let the worst day of her life make her smaller.
In Aliens (1986) she is brought back after years in stasis and returns to the danger she thought she had left behind. There she becomes the fierce protector of a young survivor. Her story goes on through Alien 3 and Alien Resurrection, where she faces deeper losses and stranger versions of herself, and her sacrifices grow more severe.