Alien: Romulus is the latest Alien film, directed by Fede Alvarez, who previously directed Don’t Breathe. The film was produced by Ridley Scott and was originally announced for the Hulu streaming service but in June 2023, it was revealed it will be getting a theatrical release. The film was released on August 16, 2024.

Alien: Romulus Development

After Fede Alvarez had finished making 2016’s Don’t Breathe, he had a meeting with Scott Free – Ridley Scott’s production company just before they were about to make 2017’s Alien Covenant. Alvarez happened to mention things he would like to see in an Alien film and pitched his story ideas. In 2021, Ridley Scott remembered his pitch and called him and asked him if he was still interested in writing and directing it. President Steve Asbell said his pitch was a good story with some interesting characters.

Álvarez’s take is being kept deep inside the studio’s chest cavity, but sources describe it as unconnected to the previous movies.

According to sources, Álvarez is a rabid fan of the franchise and casually pitched a take to Scott many years ago. The idea remained implanted in Scott’s brain until late last year, when he called Álvarez out of the blue and asked him if he was still up for it. Álvarez didn’t have to be asked twice.

20th Century picked up the project “purely off the strength of Fede’s pitch,” said division president Steve Asbell. “It was just a really good story with a bunch of characters you haven’t seen before.”

Asbell, who recently spoke to THR about the future of 20th Century Studios, said by doing the project for Hulu, there wouldn’t be the pressure to whittle down the potential edginess that could come with theatrical considerations. “It’s not a film that has to be all things to all people with those gargantuan budgets. They get to be authentically what they are. And this is closer to its genre roots.”

Alien: Romulus Casting

Actor Cailee Spaeny was in talks for the lead role in Alien: Romulus and recently posted a piece of H.R. Giger artwork to her Instagram. In March 2023,  Isabela Merced was confirmed to be appearing. Later, Cailee Spaeny, David Jonsson, Archie Renaux, Spike Fearn and Aileen Wu were announced as cast members. Phoebe Waller-Bridge remains unconfirmed to be playing one of the movie’s android characters.

David Jonsson is playing Andy, the synthetic ‘brother’ of Cailee Spaeny’s Rain.

Alien: Romulus Storyline

The film is set between the events of Alien and Aliens. In March 2023, Variety posted a short synopsis of what we can expect from Alien: Romulus.

While the premise for the yet-to-be-titled movie has been kept under wraps, the studio did reveal that the film will follow “a group of young people on a distant world, who find themselves in a confrontation with the most terrifying life form in the universe.”

A short synopsis was released when the final trailer was released.

While scavenging the deep ends of a derelict space station, a group of young space colonizers come face to face with the most terrifying life form in the universe.

Alien: Romulus Production

The Alien sequel began filming in Budapest in March 9th and lasted until July 3, 2023. Some shooting is said to have taken place at Origo Studios in Budapest, where several notable recent sci-fi films like Blade Runner 2049, and Dune and The Martian have also been filmed.

The special effects were handled by Legacy Effects (formerly Stan Winston Studios) and Studio Gillis led by Alec Gillis whose company Amalgamated Dynamics worked on many previous Alien films. Alvarez said all the sets were physical and had to be built. They built spaceships and miniatures and tried to use CGI to augment the effects.

WETA worked on the Facehuggers while Filmefex Studios in Budapest provided the human parts required for the movie like taking face casts of the actors, building human bodies and prosthetics. Studio Gillis, run by Alec Gillis, worked on the Chesburster and Offspring egg.

Legacy Effects was responsible for the Xenomorphs, the Cocoon, the Rook Animatronic and the Offspring. Instead of sculpting in clay and making molds, the team sculpted in a computer, quickly building prototypes and printing full-scale sections of the bodies. They created the mechanisms first and then put the skins over them with the digital sculptures.

The Chestburster

Studio Gillis, led by Alec Gillis, worked on the Chestburster. Director Fede Alvarez was looking for something different than what had seen before and a bit less explosive. Alvarez was interested in giving the Chestburster time to breathe. Concept artist Dane Hallett initially did some concept art for the creature. Studio Gillis interpreted it in their own way and brought their materials and mechanisms as well as incorporated Alvarez’s ideas as to how it should work.

Studio Gillis started work on the digital sculpt of the Chestburster in ZBrush, led by concept artist Mauricio Ruiz. The 3D model then went to the mechanical designer David Penikas who could begin designing the mechanisms in 3D. He didn’t have to wait for the mold to be made or for a core to create the skin. Alec Gillis said that the creature should have more fluid and more organic mechanism that we’ve seen before. Zac Teller also worked on the animatronics.

The Chestbursters on Alien, Aliens and Alien Resurrection are all the same size but on Alien: Romulus, they wanted to make the creature smaller. This was due to actress Aileen Wu being smaller. The Chestburser seen in the film is about half the size as previous Chestbursters.

Fede Alvarez then asked for the Chestburster to colour-shift during the sequence. Alec Gillis said that this is something that could be done digitally but Alvarez wanted to do it practically. Alec Gillis and his team had to figure out a way to make the dome darken by injecting dark fluid underneath. They made a separate transparent dome on the top of the head and they injected black fluid underneath. They created a capillary system in the head so that it would give it a membranous, cartilaginous and fleshy look.

The Xenomorph

The Xenomorph suits are large 3D-printed pieces that are all connected and assembled. The suits are sculpted on the computer by key artists Scott Patton and Darnell Isom and are then grown to scale, assembled, and finished with hard surface modeling. The pieces are then remolded, cast in urethane plastic and then put together and painted by Ryan Pintar and Parker Hensley. What you see in the film is a combination of an actor in a suit, a Bunraku puppet and a 8 foot tall animatronic.

They cast lightweight urethane castings to keep the weight of the animatronic as low as possible. Trevor Newland wore the action suit. The sub-base was foam rubber with lots of detail but it had features to allow it to compress and move. It had sections over that made from the same material as the animatronic so the head, chest and arms were the same.

Nicknamed, the Scorcher Xenomorph, the team wanted the Xenomorph to feel like an offspring of the Queen. It was given a narrower torso and the tail is similar to the Queen’s. Director Fede Alvarez wanted the skin surface to be rough and sharp. So the team gave the Xenomorph lots of ridges and sharp points. The team gave it translucent panels in the legs and arms so that light could come through. There are moments in the film where light shines through and they wanted the audience to know it isn’t a man in a suit.

The animatronic is very heavy at around 200 pounds and it can’t leap on wires or crawl up walls. That’s why it’s important to match the suit to the animatronic. The director and the team wanted the Xenomorph to feel new but also familiar, incorporating the subliminal skull but altering the surface so it wasn’t shiny and smooth. They didn’t want it to feel like a mechanical element so the biomechanical part was reduced.

Offspring

The Xenomorph Offspring appears in the final act of the film and is played by 7’7″ actor Robert Bobroczkyi in his film debut. Bringing the creature to life was done by Savannah Suderman, Glenn Hanz and Andy Bergholtz who created 13 individual prosthetic pieces that were applied to Robert Bobroczkyi’s body. They wanted to have as much of the actor’s real skin visible as possible. Once he had painted, he was to have shades of the Prometheus engineers. Legacy Effect sculpted a tongue for reference and provided a reference for the tail which was created at the last minute through CGI.

Rook

The Rook android was originally written as a random synthetic female science officer. Concept artist Alex Nice has posted some of his artwork depicting the female android. Legacy Effects was going to do the half-body torso makeup on an actress and she would act like a damaged android. Director Fede Alvarez had the idea of creating another model of the Ash android from Alien. Unfortunately, Ash actor Ian Holm died in 2020  and any molds of his head from Alien could not be found.

The team managed to find molds of his head in New Zealand from effects company Weta FX. Ian Holm filmed one of the Hobbit films where he had his cast done. Fede Alvarez spoke to Ian Holm’s wife, Sophie de Stempel, who felt that Hollywood had ignored Holm in the last years of his life. She was pleased with the idea of the Rook android and agreed to allow his likeness to be used in the film.

For the mold that they found from The Hobbit, Ian Holm would have been 77 years old when the mold was taken compared to in his 40s for Alien. It gave the team an idea of what the proportions were in relation to his forehead, nose, and chin. After further research, they realised  Lindsay Macgowan’s body was similar to Ian Holm’s. A life cast was taken of Lindsay in a sitting position and then Andy Bergholtz did a portrait sculpture in clay from photographs using the life cast they had been given. They scanned that and put it into a computer. The design team, led by Scott Patton, digitally did another pass to make it cleaner.

A full animatronic was built by Legacy Effects and digital enhancements were added in post-production to animate the mouth, eye and nose which were done by Metaphysic. Actor Daniel Betts did the voice of Rook and that recording was fed through a software called Speecher, which altered Betts’ voice based on Ash’s dialogue from Alien.

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Both Ridley Scott and James Cameron had seen Alien: Romulus and liked it. Alvarez said they both gave him notes about the film and the filmmaking process and were different from each other.

Marketing

Director Fede Alvarez shared the first behind-the-scenes image from Alien: Romulus which showed a Facehugger wrapped around a clapper board. 20th Century Studios released the first teaser trailer for Alien: Romulus on March 20, 2024 along with the first poster. The full red-band trailer was released June 4, 2024. A flood of promo videos came out on July 11, 2024. (#1, #2, #3). 20th Century Studios had sent press outlets an Alien: Romulus VHS Tape containing a 3-and-a-half-minute clip from the film. The final trailer was released July 18th, 2024.

Reception

Alien: Romulus currently has a score of 80% Fresh on Rotten Tomatoes after 317 reviews. This is the highest score after Alien and Aliens. Alien: Romulus received mostly positive reviews from critics.

Outlets have praised the young cast, especially David Jonsson as Andy. The film’s terror and creepy atmosphere got some praise. Many reviews commend the controversial third act which is very polarizing – some critics love it but said it might not be for everyone.

In terms of criticisms, some critics point out there is a pacing issue in the second act and the film is filled with a few too many callbacks to the previous Alien films including memorable lines from past films. Some reviews say the practical effects were great but the CGI isn’t always spot on.

IGN scored the film 8/10, saying “Alien: Romulus’s back-to-basics approach to blockbuster horror boils everything fans love about the tonally-fluid franchise into one brutal, nerve-wracking experience.” Likewise, ComingSoon.net scored it 8/10 and said “Unlike other movies, this film works least when it relies on fan service and nostalgia and works most when it offers new, fresh ideas. Offering an unforgettable experience, Alien: Romulus proves once again that in space, no one can hear you scream.” Collider scored the film 7/10, praising David Jonsson’s Andy and the horror elements but Alien: Romulus has too many callbacks to previous Alien films with one being unnecessary.

Box Office

Alien: Romulus had a budget of $80 million. In its opening weekend, Alien: Romulus earned $41.5 million domestically and $66.7 million overseas, giving it a $108.2M global opening. The top 5 opening markets overall overseas were China ($25.7M), Korea ($5.4M), UK ($4.8M), France ($3.8M) and Mexico ($2.8M).

Home Media

Alien: Romulus was released digitally on October 15, 2024 and will be released on 4K Blu-Ray/Blu-Ray on December 3, 2024. It was also announced that it will be getting a limited edition VHS release.

Future

In October 2024, President of Production at 20th Century Studios, Steve Asbell, mentioned that they are working on a follow-up to Alien: Romulus.

We’re working on a sequel idea now. We haven’t quite closed our deal with Fede [Alvarez], but we are going to, and he has an idea that we’re working on. The two survivors, Rain and Andy, played by Cailee Spaeny and David Jonsson, were real highlights of the film. And so I always think of it like, “Wow, where do people want to see them go next?” We know there’s going to be aliens. We know there’s going to be great horror set pieces. But I fell in love with both of them and I want to see what their story is.

Production Stills

You can view more images tagged with Movie - Alien Romulus - Stills here.

Latest Alien: Romulus News

Alien Romulus 2 Is Fede Alvarez’s Next Film, Hopes to Shoot This Year (15/02/25 21:45)
Fede Alvarez Talks Ellen Ripley’s Easter Egg in Alien Romulus (15/02/25 21:31)
Dane Hallett Shares New Alien Romulus Chestburster & Mutated Rat Concept Art (12/02/25 21:46)
“May Not Be A Direct Sequel” – Alien: Romulus Producer Michael Pruss Talks Next Alien Film (11/02/25 15:47)
Alien Romulus Takes Home The “Best Horror” Saturn Award! (11/02/25 15:14)