Alien 5 is totally dead according to filmmaker Neill Blomkamp. We last heard from Ridley Scott himself a couple of months ago that Neill Blomkamp’s Alien 5 project was never going to happen. Scott indicated back then that there was never a script in place contrary to previous reports and that 20th Century Fox decided not to press ahead with the project.
Today, technology news site The Verge have posted an interview with the man himself Neill Blomkamp and asked him about his experimental filmmaking venture called Oats Studios. Of course, they managed to have a question about what happened to the doomed Alien 5 sequel. Unfortunately, Blomkamp puts the final nail in the coffin – Alien 5 “is totally dead” despite him putting a lot of work into the project.
You’ve been asked about this a lot, but I’m guessing that your Alien concept is completely done, right?
I think it’s totally dead, yes. That would be an accurate assumption at this point.
It’s sad. I spent a long time working on that, and I feel like it was really pretty awesome. But politically, the way it’s gone now, and the way that it all is — it’s just not going to live.
Blomkamp goes on to say that he wanted to be respectful to Ridley Scott’s films and the world he created with Alien. He almost implies that Ridley Scott himself put the brakes on the project because Blomkamp’s ideas were too close to Ridley Scott’s films.
As in studio politics?
Yeah. Ridley [Scott] was one of my idols growing up. He’s so talented and he’s made this film that really set me off in a direction. I want to just be as respectful and not go stamping around in this world that he created. I think that if the circumstances were different, and I didn’t feel like I was getting too close to something that he obviously feels a massive personal connection to, that things that may have played out differently. But I did want to be as respectful as possible.
Have you seen Alien: Covenant?
No I haven’t seen it yet. But I definitely want to check it out.
So there we have it, whether it was 20th Century Fox or Ridley Scott himself, Alien 5 is dead in the water. Neill Blomkamp originally posted some Alien 5 concept art in January 2015 and the story would have brought back Ripley and Hicks, played by Sigourney Weaver and Michael Biehn. There was a huge amount of reaction on the Internet about the project and within a month, 20th Century Fox had greenlit the project. By the end of the year, the Alien 5 sequel had been put on hiatus. You can check out the concept art that Blomkamp had posted below:
I know fans had their reservations about ‘resurrecting’ Ripley and Hicks but I think it would have been a cool movie to see. Unfortunately, with Sigourney Weaver and Michael Biehn getting older and older, the project seemed less likely as the days went on. I guess now we’ll never know what Blomkamp had in store for us – maybe he’ll post some more Alien 5 concept art in the future.
It's brilliant. I love it!
Or, hehe, go full throttle ridiculous, and eliminate the freakin' prequels. Say the David storyline was a "mental" product of Ash trying to imagine what his "kind" could accomplish if granted free will. Ripley has been in acoma since he attacked her on the nostromo. The remaining crew was "expended". The specimen was protected and returned to the company. There was no Alien's, Alien 3, or Resurrection. She awakens in a dark room, lights flickering, to haunting silence. She struggles to stand, and moves toward a mirror on the other side of the room. She sees her aged reflection, and screams. Weeping, she pushes open the door to the hospital room, and steps into the hallway. It is destroyed. During her coma, the Aliens broke loose and multiplied, escaping the facility and taking over the world. She hears a distant Alien screech, and something moves just ahead in the darkness. It charges, she screams, it's a man....Bryan Cranston in his season 1 undies. He pulls a .45 from nature's holster, and says "we gotta move baby!" Flash the amc logo.
Not to undermine Scott's achievements, but then again, he wanted to end Alien like this
http://ew.com/movies/2017/04/03/alien-ridley-scott-alternate-ending/
I agree 100%.
With a complicated, big budget film, there is no one creator in terms of the people involved. Big budget/complicated movies are a team effort.
Still, there is often going to be a debate about which person on the team was the most important in making a big budget/complex film which launches a franchise.
What does launch a franchise?
That can get confused with semantics and knowing the role of the director.
1. Follow the money; Movies that make good money can create a franchise.
"Alien" made money. That is why the studio approved the next sequel.
Why did it make money?
2. Scott as the director of "Alien", gets some credit for why "Alien" was a financial success.
- With a strong director, he / she is usually one of the main creative forces in a film.
When Ridley has a passion project, which is true of his science fiction movies expect for "The Martian", he is going to be involved with almost all aspects of the production.
3. Professional writers create stories but they may never get filmed such as with Asimov's "Foundation" series. Asimov being a professional writer has almost nothing to do if a movie franchise is created.
- Producers who get the funding and directors who call the shots on the set are usually not professional science fiction writers.
But directors who are not professional writers can have a tremendous effect in launching a science fiction film franchise.
- Take Star Trek movies. Director Robert Wise was not a professional science fiction writer but his "ST: The Motion Picture" made money.
The next ST movie, "Wrath of Khan", was directed by Nicholas Meyer who knew nothing about Star Trek so on that level would be an "amateur".
But Meyer was the right director. Of the thousands of decisions needed to make a film, Meyer made the right ones with "Wrath of Khan".
WOK not only made money but it started the formula for how Star Trek movies could be successful.
Leonard Nimoy has said that Meyer saved the Star Trek movie franchise.
4. Other directors who were considered for "Alien" before Ridley were going to make a schlock horror film where blood and guts were thrown at actors.
Scott as the director made many decisions about the visual look of the film.
- Importantly, Ridley guided Giger in creating the xenomorph and the Space Jockey.
- The movie's pace, use of lighting, the intensity of the film was mostly due to Scott.
* Once the team was beginning to form, no Ridley, no Alien franchise imo. In that sense Scott can be argued as the most important creator of the series.
Some people like Covenant, Alien 3, and A:R. We know nothing about Alien 5, but I'd love to see what the story was going to be about. I think that could settle this yay or nay once and for all. The fact that it hasn't leaked tells me that it's under tight wrap which means there is probably still a small glimmer of hope.
I was so looking forward to this...Aliens has been my favorite movie since I was about 6.
As I get older (33 now), I enjoy Alien more and more, but still prefer Aliens.
I would love to see the colonial marines one more time...if we dont get Alien 5...please give us some movie that takes place shortly after Alien 3, with different characters.
An Aliens rip off could be quite fun if handled right...
I feel emptiness by not seeing Weaver and Biehn , the rest of the team and for honoring Bill Paxton in A5.
Well this is it then.
This. All of this.
The retcon part of his A5 movie project is the last nail in the coffin and kind of relegates this whole thing to the same basket of silliness as AVP and AVP:R.
I would bet that Blomkamp's A5 would work much better as a big budget video game. You know - sequel to A:CM, or something like that. They already brought Hicks back from the dead in A:CM and they could easily circumvent Ripley's death as A:CM already isn't considered canon (Fox de-canonized the game, right?). They kind of have free reign to do whatever they want. Throw a late thirties-something Newt in there and call it a day. No need to remove two official Alien movies from the series out of spite and nostalgia.
Blomkamp is a bit different. District 9 is VERY well known and as a result so is his dirty cyberpunk aesthetic.
Best post in the entire thread, and I especially agree with the third paragraph.
That was stupid in Blomkamp's part. Now, he is only famous for his dead ALIEN 5.
Guillermo Del Toro makes all the time the same mistake. Guillermo talks about his DEAD projects. Both of them(Neill and Guillermo) are most famous for their dead projects: AT THE MOUNTAINS OF MADNESS, ALIEN 5, etc....
This.
I don't know that it was that smart a move. Sure it stirred up certain fan circles and got him name-checked a lot in news feeds looking for a new angle, but I'm guessing he's now most famous in Hollywood for a couple of significant failures and for muscling in on someone else's ongoing project.
The only positive spin you could put on the whole thing is that it probably compelled Scott to forge ahead a little sooner than he would have done otherwise.
I agree 100%.
I agree.
It's NOT realistic.
I agree.
Sir Ridley Scott loves to work. Right now, Sir Ridley is Filming his new film ALL THE MONEY IN THE WORLD.
John Carpenter is retired.
Don't forget Big Trouble in Little China.
As for him directing a new horror film, I just don't think his heart is in it. Say what you want about Ridley Scott, I think he's still pretty passionate about actually making movies. I can't say the same about Carpenter or Cameron. I think Blompkamp is a little disenfranchized, lately.
No. Because a) he shows no sign of interest in other projects than his own nebulous vapor-ware movie these days, and b) he hasn't made a good movie, less a studio contracted and restricted movie since, well, T2.
It's a fantasy idea.
The man is a great director, and the hate I see for him on this forum mostly stems from people who hold Alien and Alien 3 as the best movies in the series.
In 1997 I was young, stupid, drunk, and absolutely f**king brilliant. It's, sadly, 2017 now.
Here's how to think about Jim Cameron, director without a good film to his name since 1997 (that's not a criticism btw, just a fact).
John Carpenter made some of THE BEST MOVIES ever. Along with Alien, he made arguably the best lovecraftian horror ever, in the The Thing remake, and some of the best genre movies in cinema history, redefining horror with Halloween. Hell, I think In The Mouth of Madness is bordering on genius.
But as he hasn't made a good movie since the 90's, would I think he would be the best choice for a big budget horror movie? Um ....
Not sure what point you're trying to make.
It's NOT realistic to talk about Cameron because the man only made a movie every 11 years.
Cameron said his Avatar 2 is in 2020 and his final Avatar 5 is in 2025.
So is the weird 'James Cameron took a shit and made me smell it' attitude that a lot of his detractors have.
You go around enough fandoms and you find it's just everyday movie talk
I agree. 26 years ago.
And He made only 2 movies in the last 20 years: titanic(1997) and avatar(2009).
Terminator 2.
Could be another decade. He's consumed with Avatar for the foreseeable future.
Agreed. I have my problems with A3 but do I really want to pretend that it didn't happen in the main timeline?
It still has some connection with the franchise. I feel uncomfortable dumping any of the Alien movies as part of the main story.
* Also what really galls me about the A5 project is that Cameron wanted to make another sequel right after "Aliens" with Ripley, Hicks and Newt.
And Sigouney vetoed the idea.
Weaver approved of A3 and A4 and now she wants to get rid of them from the timeline?
smh
That might be the best place for this Alien story, as an alternate version in an EU novel.
www.io9.gizmodo.com/sigourney-weaver-pops-up-in-a-weird-new-trailer-for-nei-1795830348
(just noticed that she was also briefly seen in the first teaser trailer linked to in that article too, at the 0.41 secs mark)
That's so sad. We had a chance to see a proper ending to the series but mr Ridley had other plans.
Alien Covenant was such a bad movie because it didn't respect the franchise, and it destroyed the potential of the Prometheus. I wasnt waiting to see Ridley Scott deal so bad with Alien and scrapping Blomkamp's project .
Lots of people, Scott, Blomkamp, being blamed for this.
It's Fox. Making a commercial decision. The rest is tittle tattle and irrelevant.
Arsehole? Maybe. But smart all the same.