Ridley Scott signs up to direct Alien prequel

Ridley Scott, the original director of science fiction horror classic Alien, has signed up with Fox to helm an upcoming prequel. Plot details for the film remain a closely guarded secret, aside from the fact that its events will occur before the Nostromo answers a fatal "distress call" that leads to a deadly encounter with a …

[Sceptical Bastard]

Introducing a very human element

The question on everyone's lips... will we see Sigourney in her knickers again?

Mine's the one with the bag of popcorn and the Kleenex in the pocket.

[H 5]

Inverse correlation : Takings Vs Quality

As long as its more like the 1st two films and nothing like AvP or Alien:Ressurection ill be happy.

[Anonymous Coward]

They know nothing

Obviously the company ordered the hold full of Alien eggs from the same supplier the Predators use a century earlier, with the rendezvous to be arranged as they got closer. But they wrote the frequencies down in imperial units (hmm...) and forgot to convert them, so the ship drifted around and ultimately crashed when the pilot was 'got' . They were supposed to swap the eggs for a few dozen humans (hand-picked by the Torchwood team, obviously) to be taken back and turned into bio-mechanical rack servers for the originating aliens. And the pilot wasn't one of them either, he was just another poor sap converted into a navcom and grafted onto the ship. So we still won't see what they really look like.

Or not.

[Simon C]

Interesting

I like the idea of a prequel - what I dont like, is it sounds awfully like the studios have run out of ideas and looking for a rehash - in which case it may be a turd-spurt.

Additionally who said Humans have to involved at all. Can they just not create a race of humanoid aliens in addition to the alien alien, what transpires is an alien on alien alien encounter - which if your head is hurting at the thought of a synopsis about alien aliens on alien aliens, I'm sure the alternate Hollywood has a budget version - google search methinks.

Anyhow, mines the one with the pulse rifle in the pocket.

[Ed Blackshaw]

Gah!

The money would be so much better spent doing a proper Aliens vs Predator, based upon the original graphic novel of the same name.

[RMartin]

No no no, Den of Geek

The Nostromo WAS deliberately sent to LV426, as Dallas mentions that Android Ash was only added to the crew at the last minute for unexplained reasons, and when the crew wake up they don't know where they are as the ship is way off course. Sheesh, obvious really.

[Anonymous Coward]

Why not

Why not just not put humans in at all. I realise that it could ruin the planned wet t-shirt scene and snappy one-liners but surely that's a risk worth taking. Maybe they could even do something crazy and unexpected like, say, a tense sci-fi horror with its own unique style, for example.

[Destroy All Monsters]

I bet Cylons will be involved

No really, the interior of a basestar is a dead ringer for the original Alien egg storage area. And then, what's a Raider except Alien in metal and without the roving light, right?

That would be fun, but would I watch it? Probably not.

[Anonymous Coward]

first

First 2 films = fight for best films ever spot, the rest dire dire tripe I have little hope (especially as alot of what seemed to be done post aliens was done just to annoy the fan writers who put ouot some awsome books and comics)

[Annihilator]

Plot

1) Weird aliens on unknown planet fight acid-blooded weird aliens

2) A-BWA's win

3) Single WA manages to set off distress call

4) Roll end credits

Am I missing anything else? Simon C is closer to the mark than you might think. IIRC, the distress call the Nostromo (apparently) receives is not human.

Maybe the plot revolves around the secret military people sending A-BWA's onto the planet to test them. Nostromo is unwittingly sent there to retrieve them.

[HoRnO]

There have been....

4 films

Alien (1979)

Aliens (1986)

Alien 3 (1992)

Alien: Resurrection (1997)

Although I think everyone would like to forget the last one ever happened

[Stevie]

Bah!

Because, obviously, there're no new, noteworthy ideas waiting to be turned into the Next Big Thing. Next up: A "reimagining" of Blade Runner.

"If a thing's worth doing, it's worth redoing, doing all over again, re-imagining, rebooting as a franchise and invalidating in a string of wannabe prequels."

AVP is a perfect example of the lack of accumen in Hollywood today. The real problem is that I know people who honestly believe AVP was "awesome". Said people do not otherwise resemble Ricky Bobby in any way.

For my money, the idiots who came up with the phrases "reimagining" and "rebooting the franchise" should be horsewhipped around Universal Studios.

Gah!

[call me scruffy]

The problem with origins,

Is that ultimately you have to deal with where the environment that nurtured the object arose from.

To explore the origins of the xenomorph species you either need to cover it's evolution (Which wouldn't be particularly gripping viewing.) Or you need to explain why someone created it. That could be quite fun, lots of alien species gabbling to each other with english sub titles, and a few distinctive words and phrases, then as the audience has subconsciously learnt alien for a couple of hours they could introduce some puns and other jokes.

To explore the origins of "The Company"'s knowledge and interest you basically have a political/office based drama set in the Alien universe. Something akin to "State Of Play", "Conspiracy Theory" or "LA Confidential". This could be quite interesting as it implies that the company was already aware of at least one alien species (The pilot's race) and had kept that knowledge from the public. This could be a lot like a cerebral prequel to "Independence Day", which might be a good thing.

[Martin 6]

Better than a remake

Having remade all the decent 60s movies they have started on the 70s.

Taking of Pelham 123 was 1974 so we only have 5 years to wait for the Alien remake (with Denzel Washington and car chases) anyway.

[Anonymous Coward]

Worried

If they try "engineered in a lab by the Americans" I'm gonna puke!

[Anonymous Coward]

Wait a minute,

"...ignored the dark sexual imagery of the main Alien franchise..."

So does that mean we'll see some hot Ripley-Queen Alien action in the next one?

[Anonymous Coward]

Please, nobody mention Predator ever again!

Fox cocked up the entire franchise by listening to morons who spotted an Alien shaped skull in a trophy case at the end of Predator 2.

Not that Alien wasn’t starting to suffer in 3 and 4. Opps, double negatives!

I agree with other posters who have stated “why bother with the human element at all?” I want to know where the alien ship came from, why the Aliens were created, where they were going and why.

Rather than pay a fortune in actors, pay Giger a few million to commission a really eldritch alien society. Hell, CGI the entire thing and have voice actors only. If the story was good I’d watch it if didn’t have voice actors at all, just subtitles. Wall-E managed to portray a story with very little voice acting. Why not here?

[Alan Esworthy]

@Sceptical Bastard, re: Sigourney's knickers

The real question is will we see Sigourney in knickers as she appeared 30 years ago.

(I've just started working on my seventh decade so I might well enjoy that view whether or not she's chronologically adjusted!)

/Mine coat's the one dirty both outside and inside

[blackworx]

Wow

@ Joefish & AC 16:13

You're both the sort of talent Hollywood wants to eat. Brilliant.

[raving angry loony]

already done?

I thought "Alien vs Predator" was pretty much a prequel, showing as it did the existence of "Alien" on earth long before the Nostromo was built.

[Russ Williams]

Not seeing a problem here

Assuming that there was no reported human contact before the first film - a big assumption given how easy it would be to lie - then all it proves is that nobody made it back to civilisation...

What's more interesting is how they'll tie it in to the later canon. For Ripley to have "to all intents and purposes" wiped out the species by the end of Alien 3, there can't have been that many of them. Could mean that it's a Top Secret (human?) biowarfare lab that gets a bit carried away with itself... or that there was a natural evolution but the planet(s) involved got glassed by an alien fleet... lots of options to play with.

[John P]

hmm

The only problem with not putting humans in it, is that it forces the writers to come up with ideas for a new alien race, an idea which they will have to think of ALL BY THEMSELVES!

As long as there is no sign of the human crew in the prequel remaining at the end of the film, then they will be able to say that canon has not been violated as, as far as the Nostromo crew are aware, they will still be the first humans to encounter the aliens.

Could be good but I have a feeling it will be as heartless as all of the recent Hollywood remakes.

IT angle? Why all the snazzy impressive effects they will have to put in to compensate for the complete lack of plot, of course!

[Anonymous Coward]

Please God, No.....

Having just seen the original Alien on cable and Aliens on cable a month or two back, my question is--why???

Of course I know the reason why--money--but I still have to protest this once great film franchise being dragged down as it has since the first two movies.

Alien--one of the great all time "monster in the house" movies

Aliens--redone as more of an action movie/Western style tale of redemption with Aliens instead of outlaws, but still excellent.

Alien 3--pretentious crap. Saw it once--once was more than enough

Alien Resurrection: crap, but at least it wasn't pretentious. Never watched the whole thing

Alien vs. Predator: Decent movie if you kind of disengage your brain and dig into the popcorn

Alien vs. Predator 2: Saw second half of it on cable recently. Not as bad as I had heard but still rather dumb.

[Bad Beaver]

What I want to see in an ALIEN movie

is Sigourney Weaver wasting xenomorph like there's not tomorrow. No more. No less. What I don't want to see is some other female lead put in the same role under a different name. If we cannot get Ripley, give us something completely new. But with GOOD effects this time around, no more shitty CGI. It's not like there are no talented prop makers out there.

[Anonymous Coward]

Please everyone.....

Throw in Darth-Vader, replace Ash with Bender, and set it on the USS Enterprise. Everyone is happy, and the Hollywood clan get to make another terrible Alien's film (I suppose at least its not a rehash of an original, which appears to be the norm lately).

[Mr Bear]

Humans, who needs em?

Well Human history seems to have involved lots of Predator/Alien action and so why can't humans have been taken from the Earth in the past and used as slaves on other planets in a Stargate style way.

However I hope they don't include any humans as the film would be much better without them. Humans ruin too many films, especially those clueless humans in Hollywood.

[Nordrick Framelhammer]

I am looking forward to this.

I think that Ridley will helm a good movie. Now, if only there was a way to get Joss Whedon involved :)

@RMartin

Yes, that is right. In the movie (which was shown on my local pay TV station on Sunday) Special Order 937, which was coded For Science Officers Eyes Only and only accessed by Ripley via a command over-ride, stated:

Nostromo rerouted to new co-ordinates. Investigate life form. Gather specimen. Priority One. Insure return of organism for analysis. All other considerations secondary. Crew expendable.

I think that the movie will be leading up to that point. It certainly is the most logical route as a prequel, showing the path that led up to the diverting of the Nostromo from her scheduled route.

[Charles King]

Ageist comment alert!

"will we see Sigourney in her knickers again?"

Are we talking about the Sigourney Weaver born in 1949 here? The depressing thing is that makes me realise how old I've got myself...

Yeah, despite all the mucking-around they've done with the franchise there are enough plot holes in the films to let them graft all sorts of stuff onto it. Scott's films have been hit-and-miss ever since he decided to go mainstream, let's just hope we get the Scott who did Thelma and Louise and not the one who did G.I. Jane. And if he insists on bringing along Russell again for a drinking-buddy I'll have to throw something.

[galaxysurfer]

The worst type of discrimination; the type that discriminates against me!

The beauty of the first film was that one was always left to wonder who/what the 'gunner' alien-thing (the one with the apparent burst 'chesticle-type-thing', found in the belly of the alien ship on LV-426) was...or from whence it came.

No questions asked, and none answered.

It was all left alone for the viewer to wonder/ponder.

Now - it seems - all is about to be revealed.

This can't be a good thing, as endless re-re-re-makes of (fairly recent) films seem to show, (The Taking of Pelham123 anyone?) unless, that is, it's done properly..

..in which case, 'revealed' WILL be the operative word, and not 'Reviled'!

Sheesh! I really hope it works! *hands over eyes, peering through finger gaps*

[Anonymous Coward]

This will be interesting...

...considering that the aliens who encountered the nasties on LV426 (ie from the first film), did so a long, long time in the past. The state of the carcass discovered with its chest blown open implies this.

Yeah, why have humans? No need for paying actors, no need for script writers (other than those required to write 'hiss, hiss, squeak' every now and again).

Hmmm...

I wonder how they will do this.

Am looking forward to it nonetheless. I love the A L I E N films.

[Andy 97]

Ridley won't fail!

Knowing just how pedantic Ridley Scott is, I can't see him settling for anything less than the best.

Let's hope the screen writers are good and not graduates from the tv soap school of shit dialogue.

[TeeCee]

@Pad.

"......pay Giger a few million to commission a really eldritch alien society."

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!

Don't say that. They might hear you in Hollywood. They'll have Orlando Bloom and Liv Tyler signed up and a supply of pointy ears laid on before you can say "dictionary".....

[Stef 4]

What a suprise...

... a bunch of people complaining that Hollywood has run out of ideas, yet steadfastly ignoring the fact that the original Alien was based on an earlier film about a creature they pick up on Mars. And even ignoring that, the original Alien isn't an original idea, it is just a monster chasing a bunch of people in a confined area. Might as well be a haunted house.

The reason Alien is an excellent film is because of the way it was made. The story itself is nothing special. That is why any film, no matter what the source material, is good or bad based on the talents of the people making it. Uwe Boll take note.

What is wrong with sequels? The average sequel only has the main character with the same name as the earlier film, the rest is new. If Die Hard 2 were called "Airport Disaster Movie 1" with Detective Mohn JcClaine as the lead character, no one would have said "Oh, why can't Hollywood have original ideas?" Just take a look at "The Last Boy Scout". It was a Die Hard film without the name.

(The original Die hard was of course based on a book, and is pretty much a page for page scene for scene, yet no one seems to mind that it wasn't an "original" idea, whatever that is).

I would love to see another Ridley Scott directed film. I loved Blade Runner and Alien so I look forward to this. Just because they are making another film based on an existing IP, it doesn't somehow delete the originals from history. Having said that, I am not a fan of prequels. I like some mystery. I think it would be a mistake to explain away the beginning of Alien (With that alien pilot and his ship).

AvP 1 & 2 were both big messes of films. But I think that is down to some poor actors and dull direction.

I know Alien 3 has a big following, but I never really enjoyed it (either version). Alien resurrection has a couple of nice scenes (Under water bit for example) held together by an OK story, with a pitiful ending.

Aparently Sigourney Weaver has expressed an interest in reprising Ripley.

[goggyturk]

One reason why it *might* be good

Ridley Scott - if it was Michael Bay, then I'd be fucking disgusted. But ol' Ridley knows how to make a movie.

Btw, for the Nostromo to be routed to the site of the creature, there must have been some human contact prior to that, so I don't see the problem.

[John Square]

Ahh...

... let's play "Speculate"!

The special order (ref: Nordrick Framelhammer 22:38) shows the company already knew about the Aliens. However, they'd presumably never gotten hold of one, but there was some form of contact pre-the first film. So, if you want them, you can have humans. You could even have a little conspiracy going on, with the company's raison d'etre being to get hold of the Alien before anyone else, and all the deep space mining just being a cover.

As for the folks on the ship, why can't they be mid 21st century humans on one of the first deep space journeys? Some sort of Columbus-style journey out to a promised new land? Maybe they pick something up off an asteroid, or on some little planetoid (a little like O'Bannon's early draft of the Alien script back when it was called Star Beast, and Ripley was a man)?

Either way, set it on board a big new shiny ship with some nice new technology for them to iron the wrinkles out of (who is to say that they even know an Alien is on board with them- maybe it's all just caused by a few missed bugs?) Maybe the alien wants to get somewhere bigger and better stocked with food?

You don't have to have all the people survive either, do you?

[Glyn 2]

why

@RMartin - that's what I thought, maybe these critics aren't too bright...

The AvP films are set in the near future with Lance Henrikson as the man who's used as the template for the droids. So if you take all Alien based films as canon, then they've already shown that humans and Xenomorphs have met.

The AvP comics were great. Good stories, characters and settings. They should have lifted one of those stories for the films which are set in a similar timeframe to the Alien films.

As to the question of “why bother with the human element at all?” the Transformers film has humans in which are the centre of the story not the giant talking robots. Like Moviebob on escapist.com says (top reviewer, he rants a bit :) Godzilla has humans to speak and add plot elements, which you don't need when the stars talk and have personalities all there own.

<heretical ranting spoiler alert>

Personally I don't know why they're bothering. Alien is dull. Nothing happens for 45 minutes and not in the tension building way, in the watching-paint-dry way. Ship flys over, they land they find a seat, he looks into an opening, no-one is surprised when something jumps out. They go back to the ship, they eat, they die. Even the bit with Tom Skerrat in the tunnels isn't tense as the woman getting all upset is hilariously bad at acting.

A bit like the Harry Potter 6, a decent Hitchcock style director could have pumped the tension up to the max, instead we get things happening which we really don't care about.

Aliens is a joke as a film. It makes Commando look like a serious study of battle tactics. I can't take that much American macho BS. "Get away from her you bitch"....oh please

Aliens 3 had the best actors in, which is damning with faint praise I know, playing parts you could believe in at least. That the characters knew from the outset what was coming gave more tension as they actually had the ability to *look* scared.

Alien 4 was bad in every single way humanly possible

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: I am looking forward to this.

"Now, if only there was a way to get Joss Whedon involved :)" Ugh! I hope that was a troll. Do you want some kind of Buffyized Alien / Dawson's Creek crossover with flawless bland teenagers stumbling into romance while they hunt the alien? That's what Whedon would pump out of his dumbgland.

[fajensen]

I want robots!

I.M.O. (restoring the IT angle here), The Alien are advanced bio-weapons to be used in some forgotten alien war between intelligent machines intent on cleansing the universe for impure fleshlings and a race of fleshy aliens that are really into biotech.

However, due to an unfortunate accident the bio-robotic units are activated before they can be programmed for their mission and therefore they go to the deadman-switch version of Millitary Security "Control presumed dead - Launch!!".

The Evil Megacorp was indeed hoping to get their mitts on The Alien and reprogram it for Homeland Security duty and assistance at various biofuel projects ... err War on Terror (tm) ... in Africa - but indeed one of their advanced prototype androids senses the machines and is itself detected by them thereby causing the machines to divert a task force in our direction.

Knowing the robotic menace is approaching, The Evil Megacorp realise that they need to take a loss on biofuel production in order to ramp up Alien production instead in preparation for the approaching robotic apocalypse. Management, all care and consideration for the human ressources, buys life insurance on the Nostromo crew before redirecting Nostromo to retrieve The Alien, sending Bishop to program the little bugger.

[dunncha]

I have the scoop

The message sent from LV426 was rather more comprehensive than the company had let on....It was actually a Wikipedia page explaining about the origins, make up and destructive force of the Aliens.

So what about the ASH switch?

The Company had actually got the message years before but it took the Wiki so long to load that they didn't get the message until years later just in time for the launch of Nostromo and a quick crew change.

So what's the new story. They are going to tell us (John Hurt voice over) what the Wiki page said and sprinkle some recreations in there as well. Much like what was done at the start of the LOTR when they filled in the story of the origins of the ring

Job done. Cheques to the usual address please. I'll still watch it

[Anonymous Coward]

Why not use the original writers

Rumour has it that Dan O'Bannon got very pissed off with the way his baby was treated in the sequels. Why not sign him on and let him do the job right?

Paris, for no apparent reason. Except maybe to see her chest burst.

[Witty username]

Well

Aliens was my favorite film ever, bar none. if they mess this up, i might cry myself to death

[AlistairJ]

Avatar

Lets wait and see what Camerons forthcoming epic "Avatar" turns out like. If its a special-effects laden turd-spurt then we can write-off Holeywood as a thing of the 20th Century.

And I have to stick up for David Fincher here as I consider Alien 3 a triumph, given the amount of interference the studio subjected him to during production its a miracle he was able to pull the thing together, let alone make a distinctive and imaginative SF horror as part of a franchise.

My plot for Alien: 0.5 The Early Eons has early Human space explorers getting involved in an Alien v Another-Alien fracas and ALL DIEING. Sadly Holeywood could never stomach a film in which the mammal meat-sacks come out as anything other than glorious victors. Sadly.

[rhydy]

humans

ok so maybe humans are unfortunatelya must, in order to seel a film to humans (who aren't geeks like us). This is easy enough. The film show the predators engineering the aliens. They are intended for use only on predators who can host them, and birth them without being permantly harmed (as that is how they themselves reproduce). The idea is that you hunt your own alien. Then they have a little fun messing around with other species, and discover that human derived aliens are bad arse! They find it fun to let the humans come to them, so they orchestrate that. How come ripley was the first? As already mentioned, almost none of them survive, and any comms are intercepted by the evil corporation. Who then decide to keep it quiet and "accidentally" send one of thier mining vessels to intercept, having somehow sabotaged the transport ship containing the eggs so that the giant piloting it gets gob raped (before or during flight).

[Winkypop]

Alien & Aliens

Excellent sci-fi action films. Excellent.

The other two were only so-so, still I enjoyed them.

This new one needs to be more like the original.

Still, I'll watch it....I just like the Alien world and Giger's flavour of art.

[Anonymous Coward]

Can only be about the colonists

The only contact prior to the first film (and how the company knew about the aliens) could have been by the colonists who were terraforming the planet. Either the new film either isn't actually about the original planet (maybe cavemen bump into the aliens on earth and somehow win since the entire human population having survived kind of depends on it) or it's about the colonists and their discovery/destruction by the aliens, maybe there was even another ship before ripleys sent to help them.

[Mike Taylor]

Roswell, in the 1950s

UFO crashes.

Alien autopsy.

Out pops our friend.

Old style sci-fi action ensues.

[Shakje]

Films in order:

AvP: Not a terrible film, drastically spoiled by its happily ever after ending

AvP2: Better movie than AvP, but still a bit too optimistic about itself, and too generic to work with the franchise.

Alien: Don't even need to say anything...

Aliens: In Hollywood, taking a film and going in a completely different direction like Cameron did was not only unexpected, but one of the best sequel-moves ever.

Alien 3: Pretty good film, if it wasn't for the precedent set by the previous films it would have done a lot better I think. The setting is as grimy as the first film and it's realised that everything's already been done, so adds a bit of splatter to proceedings.

Alien Resurrection: I've spent a while working out why this is terrible, because occasionally I do that strange thing of "oh it can't be that bad" and watch it, then promptly realise what a twat I've been. The problems that I see with this movie are - direction isn't great, it's too "French", lots of stupid facial angles, bright colours, and too much Americanised comedy (ie not the dry and occasional wit of the other films, even in Aliens) and action. The whole place is too bright, and it just wrecks the atmosphere, never mind the fact that the film doesn't kill enough people off, there's far too happy an ending. The 'baby' alien looks shit, I know what they were trying to do, but it's still shit. It looks like a person with a broken face covered in phlegm. If the whole film was the guy talking about the butterfly it would be 300% better. Aliens swimming is just natural, but there's no real terror involved. They should have cut the power in the first 10 minutes of the film and then let loose a swarm of aliens on the base. The grenade moment pisses me off, it's just rubbish. It's like they took Commando, mixed in a bit of Amelie, and then grabbed the colours from The Wizard of Oz and pasted the Aliens on top. The film makes me angry.

However, the prequel may well turn out pretty good, there's clear prior knowledge shown in AvP so I don't know why anyone thinks that the Nostromo was the first encounter. The first game was also pretty enjoyable and kept the dark foreboding nature of the (first three) films (particularly good is the level that is based on a space station, if anyone is interested, think it's about level 6 or something).

With Ridly Scott in charge it's going to be interesting at least, and I can see him doing something good with the film (if not something great). As mentioned by someone else, at least it's not Michael Bay.

[Ad Fundum]

@ Marketing Hack

I would argue that Alien4 is the most underrated of the sequeks - possibly not the best, but certainly one that bears repeated viewings. David Fincher doesn't do popcorn movies, and certainly getting under the skin of Alien3 brings its own rewards. I managed to write 27,000 words of a Biblical Studies dissertation based on the themes in Alien3, and I could easily have doubled that. I certainly wouldn't be so quick to dismiss it.

For my part, I'm disappointed that the Xenomorphs aren't real. Stick a Xenomorph in the Big Brother house - now that would be reality TV worth watching.

[weirdcult]

@Why not # By Anonymous Coward

Woah there horsey, no need for that sort of ambitious thinking!

[Tony Paulazzo]

Can't wait...

Alien - great

Aliens - great

Alien3 - not so great but the alternative version was better

Alien R - I don't get the hate, the hybrid was awful awful awful and should never have been written in, but I loved the characters, not one hero in the entire movie (wow movie is not in the Firefox dictionary - wtf!), but sigourney as part alien (why doesn't the acid blood burn thru her skin?), that shoplifter actress as a robot with a heart, Hellboy as ugly guy with heart, guy in wheelchair with speech impediment as guy in wheelchair with speech impediment with a heart, heartless scientist guy who gets his comeuppance in the end by annoying citizen with alien baby - probably with a heart... yea ok, maybe I get it, but the CGI aliens were awesome! (can you tell I'm bored at work?).

AVP - black chick who climbs mountain gets a free pass from me, and at least they tried to tell a story, even if it was popcorn bad.

AVPR - bad actors, no story, cheap looking and awful lighting (awesomely awful - it's been a while, but do you ever get a clear view of the predalien?). Surely, when you go to movie making school this must be held up as how not to create a film.

Having said all that, I own all 5 DVDs, will watch AVP3 and the new Ridley movie, what can I say, I love me some aliens.

[Yorkshirepudding]

corn bread?

its either gonna be great or suck donkey balls

[Anonymous Coward]

You always were an asshole Gorman...

Nothing will be better than Alien and Aliens, they just can't make films like that anymore.

The recent AVP films should be buried and forgotten.

I recon this will be rubbish.

[Matt Devney]

I quite liked all the Alien Quadrilogy

I really liked #2 the best though. Got bored at times with 1,3 & 4, but overall liked them. Cannot remember if I have seen either of the AVP ones - I'll probably watch them sometime...

Anyway, to the point. Hollywood would want to build upon the so-called 'touch points' of the franchise (forget AVP - that's a different franchise), so it's likely it'll be set in Nostromo-era outer space, with humans as the protagonists.

Also, they would have The Company there - so we can have big spaceships as either a set or as plot device. That would also help us to empathise with the victims (who doesn't know of a faceless, soulless company willing to do anything to get what it wants?)

But, would they use LV426? I think that the execs would find it good to include the set with the dead alien 'navigator' in it: (http://www.allmoviephoto.com/photo/1979_alien_006.html) That guy was huge!

It has opportunity in that it already had humans on there, and that we don't really know that much about their history (LV426 could have been quite populous for a time, but restricted to a particular area geographically. By the time Alien came around, the tech to colonise out to where the alien ship was is present, but interest in the planet itself has waned. Or something)

But it presents issues in that my explanation above is messy, and why make it that messy? I'm sure Hollywood has its best scriptwriting minds on that very subject RIGHT NOW.

So, using yet another spaceship (again, a touch point for the series) is more likely. But that just makes it into a Alien 'Shared World' movie. Not necessarily a prequel. Unless they put in it the date or something - but even then , I don't think just having it chronologically earlier than Alien would make it a prequel. It has to have an obvious connection IMNSHO.

Anyway, those are my thoughts. And if it's anything like the last time I posted a message to El Reg, I'll be the last person to post anyway, as everyone will have lost interest by now...

As an aside I think that John Square Posted Tuesday 4th August 2009 08:01 GMT was a good post on this. Thanks John.

[Anonymous Coward]

The Alien Dead?

Don't get rid of Ash: just make him a different Ash. A masterful blend of Nukem, They Live and Evil Dead II.

I don't know if Mr Scott's on good terms with Sam Raimi, but they should talk: if there's anyone born to fight aliens, it's Bruce Campbell.

[Tom 11]

@ Ripley in kickers OP

Dude, she has to be about 70 now, whatever salts your gravy.

If ahyone everplayed any of the most excellent AvP games, there was a good sub caste story of Alien origins they need to explore, I'd love to see the pilot's re-visited, especially after the connotations the game throws up.

Mine's the one with spukmeyer all over it

[Gavin 2]

Time travel

Hollywood have missed a trick, by using time travel they could have gone for a

Aliens vs Predator vs Terminator vs Star Trek vs Futurama vs Doctor Who

[Anonymous Coward]

@Sceptical Bastard

Sigourney is too old for that now. Maybe Summer Grau?

[Graham Bartlett]

Prequel concept

Not too tricky. 2 and 3 both involved people killing themselves and taking aliens with them. Extrapolate to the scale of a film, realise that in "Alien" the Company do know about the xenomorphs but haven't their hands on one, and it's simples. Last scene becomes the last survivor pushing the "blow-up-the-ship-in-a-really-big-special-effect" button just as the aliens break through the door. Add in the Company overriding control of the ship so he/she can't stop it coming back to Earth, mix in a little slicing-and-dicing action, and that's yer film.

And in four sentences, I've still covered more plot than the whole of Alien: Resurrection managed. What a singularly pathetic waste of celluloid *that* turkey was.

[Bounty]

"Is this going to be a stand-up fight, sir, or another bug hunt?"

Space marines or maybe company scouting/mining ship v.s. alien ship = no more marines and broken alien ship on LV426 + distress signal. Perhaps "Alien" was the second attempt for the company. Finally realizing how tough the bugs are, they send marines the third time.

Aliens 5: "The boarding party"

Paris.... How about some more of that Arcturian poon tang!

[Anonymous Coward]

Alien still is my favourite suspence film.

It's also one of my favourite films in general.

The visual design by Giger was truely unique and nothing has come close to this day. The direction was superb and the suspence hasn't been beaten since IMO.

This didn't last long.

Aliens was a great action film but thats all

Alien 3 stood out for it's visual style and great directing but was very formulaic.

The last film was utter garbage.

It will take a lot to do anything with this tired franchise.

My feelings are that they will screw this up completely.

I reserve judgement until I see for myself.

[Peter Mellor]

Alien: missed opportunity

I saw Alien (the original) and loved it. I don't see what the whingers are whingeing on about. Also saw Alien II (the one with the little girl who has to be rescued from the infested ship by Ripley). I thought the idea of aliens as a nest of ants all hatched from eggs laid by a gigantic queen was pretty clever (and done with admirable SFX).

The opportunity for a sequel to the original film that was sadly missed was connected with Ripley rescuing her cat from the doomed ship at the last minute. Given that the cat had been at loose on the ship with the alien (which, you will recall, turned up in the top bunk of the escape module, and had to be blasted into space by evacuating the air) for several hours, I fully expected that an Earth-bound sequel was planned, in which pussy turns out to have an interesting infestation of worms on return to terra firma.

I obviously missed my vocation: I should have been a Hollywood script writer.

I don't care if Sigourney Weaver is nearly 70. She's two years younger than me, and I still want to see her in her knickers.

[Paris, 'cos she's the closest you've got to a "dirty old man" logo!]

[Anonymous Coward]

Shock News

Sad-lifes speculate on woman wearing knickers and foam at the trouser.

[Gordon861]

Hope

I'm really hoping that Scott gets Geiger involved in the new movie.

I don't think Scott will let this be just the normal Hollywood crap.

The last scene has got to be the Nostomo leaving Earth on the way to do it's scheduled mission.

Whatever happens I'm looking forward to the 3hr extended DVD version of the movie that is bound to come out.

[Adam Foxton]

How about the prequel

being a "first contact" style film, where the Aliens and Mankind first encounter one another. Man's spacecraft is using matter-scoops or other sci-fi nonsense for power, "bio-filter" picks up an egg, egg extracted from "matter scoop" and inspected, empty egg puzzles scientists.

Meanwhile generic "ensign Ricky" character gets an awesome chestburster scene. Use an epileptic for this so the rest of the cast will genuinely fuss over him if he starts convulsing during a short "break in filming"...

Alien does Alien stuff, people die in what are dismissed as bizarre "accidents" (accidentally fell into an engine, asphyxiated in a narrow air-duct [unseen- the lower half of his body torn to shreds]) but eventually the crew start to realise what's happenning.

After the Alien's known of- but not dealt with, the Human crew notices a huge spacecraft flying towards them, deduces what's on-board, crashes into them and downs the alien ship- which crashes onto LV-426. Humans have time to send out a report to the Company detailing just how awesome they are, last shot is shady looking company man going "realllyyy.... *over intercom to secretary* Miss Smith, what's the closest vessel to LV-426? The Nostromo? Send them a message...."

Alternatively, the all-alien idea sounds good. The problem is how to make that into a good film and not just have the humans directly substituted for a bunch of blue-skinned, pointy-eared Star Trek rejects.

Anyway, this could be a good movie- here's hoping!

[phoenix]

Alien The Begining

The ship shown could have been a transport vessel for a genetically bread race of bioweapons that were in transit to a war in another part of that galaxy. Engineering fault causes the big alien crew to investigate. Queue face sucking job and they are all wiped. Managed to activate distress signal. Crash on planet. Distress signal still active after many centuries - nuclear power source. You could either tackle it before this point with pure CGI - no humans (we're still launching rockets at the moon) which could be very interesting alien on alien intergalactic space war. Or at point after crash but before mining ship Nostromo tasked to investigate queue humans and "the company".

IMHO

Alien - probably the based SiFi movie every made. As plausible and technically feasable: no teleport and breaking light barrier crap of Star Feck and no good verses bad SiFi rehash of some Zen Samuria genre of Star Wars. 2001 great but way too arti for SiFi.

Aliens - yawn obvious plot alien Vietnam. Yanks rolling in with high tech weaponns to fight an enemy they haven't a clue about but feeling superior to - loose

Alien 3 OK mostly British cast probably saved it as we are more plausble actors.

Alien 4 Lets milk this cow till it drops dead.

[p1nk_k1tten]

I love Alien!!

This is great news! I've been looking forward to another installment of Alien! However I just hope they don't ruin it by just bringing out some rubbish that will just sell on the back of the success of the other films, not on it's own merit and ruins the whole set!!

[Damien Thorn]

ripley

The big questions will we see the android go beserk so we finally see the "i dont like androids"

If its before they find the alien - there shouldnt be any aliens.

OR will it be based on the station BEFORE ripley arrives, so we see why she has to come, and then we get to see the space station turned into a battery hen farm :P

or is it something completely different>

[Aristotles slow and dimwitted horse]

I think you are all forgetting that...

This is to be a Ridley Scott production. Like him or loath him, the one reason that he is as successful as he is is that he makes damn sure that his plotlines are true and sound.

Like most here, I'm dubious... but given that it is Ridley Scott producing/directing - I feel it has a much better chance of being a quality product.