The Future Of The ‘Alien’ Series Involves Fewer Aliens, Says Ridley Scott
By Jacob Hall/Dec. 4, 2017 1:00 pm EST
Scott has been busy reshooting swaths of his new movie, All the Money in the World, replacing disgraced star Kevin Spacey with Christopher Plummer. And he’s also planning to shoot his adaptation of Don Winslow’s The Cartel next year. And he’s also taking time to talk about the next Alien movie with Entertainment Weekly. May you be so busy when you’re 80 years old.
Anyway, Scott says that the key to the series’ longevity will be replacing the drooling, acid-blooded alien with a different kind of monster – artificial intelligence. Here’s his reasoning:
In other words, he really wants to double down on what he did in Covenant, which sidelined the xenomorph and placed the androids David and Walter (both played by Michael Fassbender) front-and-center.
We are [going to make another], we are. I think what we have to do is gradually drift away from the alien stuff. People say, ‘You need more alien, you need more face pulling, need more chest bursting,’ so I put a lot of that in Covenant and it fitted nicely. But I think if you go again you need to start finding another solution that’s more interesting. I think AI is becoming much more dangerous and therefore more interesting.
While many audiences rejected Covenant for wanting to explore a devious robot and his not-so-devious counterpart rather than focus on aliens bursting out of people’s chests, this was my favorite aspect of the film. Alien: Covenant is not an interesting Alien movie, but it sure is an interesting Ridley Scott movie, one that sees the veteran filmmaker wallowing in his most nihilistic tendencies and seemingly coming to the conclusion that the human race isn’t worth the skin we live in. It’s dark, twisted, uneven, and frequently brilliant stuff. It’s also barely an Alien movie and it’s no surprise that the film was divisive amongst critics and audiences.
I have no doubt in my mind that we’re going to see more Ridley Scott movies. He’s never going to stop working. I also have no doubt in my mind that we’ll get more Ridley Scott science fiction. But another Ridley Scott Alien movie? That doubles down on the more controversial elements of Covenant? I’ll believe it when I see it. And then I’ll rejoice.
