Chrono Critique: The Seiko x Giugiaro SCED035 "Ripley" Review: A truly unique watch that brings back unique memories

Hey friends, welcome back to It’s About Time. The Alien franchise shaped me into the person I am today, so no wonder I love this watch so much.

Watches made exclusively for movies and then released later on to the public are extremely rare. In fact, I can’t think of a single other example.

Full disclosure notice: No conflict of interests to disclose here, other than this is my watch, and I try to bribe myself every day to write more about watches. If you want to help me write about watches more, you can support me on Patreon, where you get to see reviews like this before anyone else.

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I swear, I will stop making all of these reviews about my childhood. Even I’m not that interested in it. However, while today’s watch wasn’t as burned into my memory as the dial on the Marnaut I reviewed last week, the movie it is linked with is perhaps the most important film I have ever seen and I’m pretty sure that the story of how I saw it the first time is what got me accepted into college in the U.S.

I couldn’t have been older than five, because I clearly remember it being in our old apartment. My sister still wasn’t born and I had a nasty tendency of waking up way too early for regular humans — don’t worry, I got over that habit — and my parents really didn’t appreciate it all that much. So, to buy an extra hour or two of sleep, my dad sat me down and showed me how to use the VHS player. We had an awesome tape collection. All the classics were there, we had amazing Disney pictures and since my dad went to film school, we had a bunch of tapes with pirated copies of cult movies he had to wait up to 4 AM to record off an illegal satellite broadcast. Or at least he says it was that hard to get. So, I was finally completely independent. I would shoot out of bed, run to the living room, pick a tape and play it all on my own. I felt more proud in that moment than when I moved out of my parents place and did my first load of laundry.

While the details are hazy, I like to imagine this fateful day as a wonderful spring Sunday. The garden was in full bloom, birds were chirping and the light snoring from the bedroom meant that I had at least one move in front of me. I dragged my finger over the shelf, from tape to tape. I stopped on one that just look too alluring to bypass. It was an all black tape with super thin letters. There’s no way I was able to read what the text said, but the glowing green orb on the cover had me mesmerised. I popped the tape into the device and I was gone for the next hour or so, just glued to the screen. You couldn’t have stuck a hair between my nose and the screen. I was so enthralled with the movie I didn’t even hear my mom screaming at my dad.

The screaming could be summed up to her reminding him that this would not end well and that I shouldn’t really be allowed to pick my own movies. The film I was so amazed by was Ridley Scott’s Alien, a movie that was certainly never intended for kids, let alone those under five. And while it’s hard to claim this with absolute certainty, seeing as to all the issues I still deal with, I came out the other end of the viewing experience as a better man. Alien thought me the power of cinema — not just with what was on screen, but also what was hidden and how it would make you feel without showing you scary stuff. Don’t get me wrong, Alien was scary as all hell. But I fell in love with that fear and creepy feeling. It wasn’t just horror movies. I was hooked into this whole thing of movies. I couldn’t stop watching and I have since averaged at least 3-4 movies every week. Movies marked most of my life, led me to college and got me my first jobs. I will be forever grateful for that fateful choice of tape.

As years passed, other interests popped up and faded, but movies were always there. And then this whole thing with watches started. The two, of course, overlapped and you can always find me trying to spot what watch a character is wearing, and making mental lists of who has the best taste in watches. It was, of course, James Bond, who wore a Submariner, Breitlings, a Gruen, numerous Seikos and, of course, the plethora of Omega watches since the Brosnan days. And then, years after getting into watches, I rewatched Aliens, the second instalment in the series, one that took the horror premise of the original and cranked it up to 11, turning it into a bonafide SF-action-horror. For the first time, despite seeing the movie dozens of times, I noticed that the main character, Ripley, was wearing a watch.

That watch… that watch started burrowing a hole in my mind. It was made by Seiko, designed by Giugiaro and it was unfortunately named the 7a28-7000. But it was such a special watch, one that fit the Syd Mead-designed, lived-in, and futuristic blue collar interior and exterior of the Sulaco spaceship, perfectly. At the time, Seiko and Giorgetto Giugiaro had already worked together on a number of watches that ranged in their nature from a few funky colors to some very experimental pieces. The Italian designer was best known, however, for his car designs. A huge number of Alfa Romeos carry his signature, as does the incredible BMW M1. However, his most famous design has to be the iconic DeLorean. A slight aside — Giugiaro designed the DeLorean, while the original Alien ship, the Nostromo, on which Syd Mead based the Sulaco, was designed by Ron Cobb. His most iconic work of design? The Back To The Future DeLorean. Small world.

Anyway, on Ripley’s wrist in Aliens was the Seiko x Giugiaro 7a28-7000. I knew this watch was floating out there, changing hands among collectors, but never even fathomed the idea of buying one. That all changed a couple of years later in 2016, when Seiko decided to release the SCED035. Behind the cryptic name is a fairly accurate recreation of the Ripley Seiko. With modern build quality, updated movement, limited to 3,000 pieces and retailing in Japan for just $350, this thing was an instant classic. If you wanted one in Europe at the time, it set you back $450, which is still one of the best values for money in the watch game. Well, not for everyone, of course. But for a kid that grew up on the Alien movies? There is no better way to spend money.

The SCED035 keeps the same case shape as the original, one that’s not easy to visualise. It measures 43mm wide, 11mm thick and has a 42.25mm lug-to-lug, but it’s a much more complicated story than the numbers would tell. The watch part of the watch measures 40mm wide, while on the right size you’ll find an eccentric housing that houses the pushers for the chronograph on top and bottom. And it’s this addition on the side that gives it a very industrial and futuristic look. While the watch looks complicated, there’s really not much to it. The watch part of the case is fully round, with short and covered lugs and an appearance of a bezel that’s just a trench that runs around the case. The case on the right also houses a tiny hidden crown which is the one thing I deeply hate about this watch. The small size makes it near impossible to use, and good luck digging it out of its hidden cubby. Thankfully, the quartz movement means you don’t have to fiddle with it too much.

One thing that should also be noted are the pushers. Overall, the watch is very light but very sturdy. Except for the pushers. They are made out of plastic, which is not the issue. The issue is the fact that they have a huge amount of play, ruining the experience of using them. The case has a matte grey color. I say color because it actually looks to be painted on. Of course, I’m sure this is not the case, as I don’t see any paint chipping off despite a lot of wear.

A watch as strange as the Ripley deserves a strange bracelet, and this one does not disappoint. First off, there’s the size. The part that connects to the lugs is 18mm wide, widening instantly to 20mm, only to taper down to 18mm again. This is not the strange part, however. The strange part are the thin rectangles that are the links, each with 3 windows that break up the links to give it a different look. Those windows also show the inner workings of the somewhat complicated links. Each link is made out of folded steel with a hole in the center and a hinge piece that connects it to the next link. Then there’s the wedge piece you insert into the hole to hold together the link to the hinge. Sounds complicated, but it’s actually very easy and allows you to quickly adjust the links with minimum tools. I’ve seen people describe the links as a nightmare to take apart, but it’s likely the easiest bracelet I’ve ever resized. Just make sure to keep around a couple of baggies to not lose all the tiny parts.

The dial is also very much similar to the original release, and that’s a good thing. We’ve seen similar dial renditions from modern micro brands, showing how forward-thinking Giugiaro’s design was. There are three main sections to the dial. On the very edge is a chapter ring that features all the numerals for a tachymeter scale, but without that traditional tachymeter text on top, a welcomed change. The dial itself is made out of two parts — a matte black top part and a bottom part that has a matte grey finish, within a semi-circle cutout at the 6 o’clock position. The top part has a yellow index ring featuring large rectangles at the hour, smaller lines per minute/second and very small lines per 1/5th second.

The lower part houses the sub-dials at 3, 6 and 9 o’clock. These are, in the same order, the 24-hour indicator, 60-minute counter and a running seconds. This is the biggest departure from the original 1983 model, as that featured 1/10th second, running seconds and a 30-minute counter at 3, 6 and 9. The difference is not a big deal, except for the inclusion of the 24-hour sub-dial, which is just pointless — if I need to know if it’s AM or PM, I can likely just look out the window. However, this sub-dial is a dead giveaway for a Seiko mecaquartz movement, only this isn’t the mecaquartz you know. It uses the Seiko 7T12 movement, which is a fully quartz movement that pulses its chrono hand 5 times per second, making for a smooth sweep. Also, there’s a tiny date window that cuts into the 24-hour sub-dial. The hour and minute hands are fence posts in burnt orange with black lines running down their middle. I’m usually not that hell bent on watches needing to have lume, but for some reason I can’t really articulate, this watch would benefit greatly from a bit of glow. The chrono-seconds hand is then a thin stick that matches the mustard yellow of the index.

Since it’s release in 2016, the price of these watches has gone crazy. I see them regularly selling for upwards of $2,000. Is it a $2,000 watch? No, not even close? Is it a $500 watch? Absolutely. If you ever find one under $1,000 and have an even remote interest in the Alien franchise, Giugiaro design or quirky watches, go get it. I’m off to re-watch all the Alien movies all over again, this brought up some serious nostalgia!

-Vuk