Alien Explorations: Alien: Creating the Alien

leading from

a) Big 'Un, The Big Chap or The Big Fellow

The third stage was known as Big 'Un, The Big Chap and even The Big Fellow

Those working on the film called him ‘‘the big chap,’’ or ‘“‘the big fellow.’’ The nickname is not affectionate. The adult—as seen in the film—is huge and menacing and dark and loaded with teeth. Had the sets been more brightly lighted, though, audiences would have seen a tall, slender, half-lizardhalf-man creature with a tusk-shaped, extruded skull and an almost equally long tongue, a tongue that was equipped with a full set of vampirish teeth. And he has no eyes! (Starlog, September, 1979 p30)
(Their ‘‘pet’’ names for the various stages of the alien were: egg, face-hugger, chest-burster and the big chap.)

Scott explains the design, operation and shooting of that scene:

“‘It wasn’t physically possible for Giger to do all the stages of the alien; there just wasn’t time. But he had done some specific drawings of the four stages. He worked backwards; he designed the big chap first, then asked himself what a baby version of it would look like. Giger did the big chap and the egg—not the thing that comes out of it, just the egg".(Starlog, September, 1979 p24)
Ridley Scott: We decided that the big chap, in embryo form, would have a head either tilted down or tilted back. We tilted it back because it seemed more obscene that way, more reptilian, more phallic (Starlog, September, 1979 p25)