Scott: We are going to make another Alien movie

[Baron Von Marlon]

And it's not like Disney doesn't have the money.

[NetworkATTH]

Don't know of many directors working past 80 and Scott's getting offers left and right.

This is the worrying part to me. Just how many of these can he mow through before he gets to Alien: Awakening, or Alien: Exodus or whatever he wants to call it. Two years? Three? What will he be then, 83? The man is ADHD about his schedule picking up movies left and right, and not focusing on getting things out of the way first

He's made 16 movies in the last 20 years at a time in his life when most people would be retired.  What is he not focused on or not getting out of the way?

I know, but I'm just talking about his age and keeping up this pace. I mean Christ the man is 80 years old. How much longer can he plan to make more movies before retiring?

[SM]

He won't.  After his brothers died young, he'll be carried off a set feet first.

[Ingwar]

Yeah, Scott said he will never retire and will keep making movies till he dies.

[Scorpio]

That's true passion right there, if it was just a job to him, he would have retired long ago, and live off his considerable wealth.  And yet some people say he 'phones it in', I don't understand this.  He clearly loves what he does.

[NetworkATTH]

Whether you like the end result the man has a hell of a work ethic

[PsyKore]

I don't doubt his passion, but I feel like because he's been doing it so long, that there is an element of routine or complacency which may make him sloppy some times.

[NetworkATTH]

I don't doubt his passion, but I feel like because he's been doing it so long, that there is an element of routine or complacency which may make him sloppy some times.

I mean, to be fair he is 80. And remembers a lot of the old preproduction shit from 1979 to bring back into the films. But to be fair, he is 80.

[Denton Smalls]

I hope he gets one more crack because the prequels seem to have become his real passion, more so than the original.

I can see how the Prometheus series is so personal to him, being that it centers on huge existential questions that, given his age, he must give a lot of thought about. It's almost like he's Weyland, a guy who has achieved so much already, but as he gets up there in age, starts to question the bigger picture of "what does it all mean?"

[motherfather]

I've been away from this forum for a while, but after just rewatching alien covenant over the holiday weekend, I thought I'd vent at Ridley's obsession with AI / robots:

The Alien should be the star - not the AI or Android! By the time he releases his next Alien prequel movie - robot/ai movies will be two a penny as everyone in the film industry gets in on that gig in the final moments before interest wanes.

If Ridley wants to do something about AI, he should do something totally unique but imminently important. There is already a courtroom drama film in the works about where "malfunction" ends and guilt/punishment begins. Something different like that. But not under the alien franchise umbrella.

Almost a year since Alien Covenant and I'm still fuming about how Ridley chose to end the movie with David being complicit in the Alien's evolution. In fact, I deliberately stop the DVD prematurely just after Daniels seals Tennessee in the cryopod.

I prefer to think that as the screen fades to black, there's another solar flare and the covenant gets sent hurtling into a supermassive black hole. Good riddance. No more David, no more Alien embyos. Meanwhile, back on some LV planetoid, the eggs/facehuggers evolve naturally...

[The Cruentus]

I don't agree with David creating the Xenos either, it makes them less Alien too. If Ridley wants to focus on AI/robots, then the next film should not have Alien in the titles. Make it a spin off instead.

[Nukiemorph]

Having the engineers be the creators would feel preordained and uninteresting.  Creating a new villain in David and subverting expectations justified these prequels existing.  I think David is a great villain and this is an interesting & dark origin story for these beasts.  Even though they repeated many beats from Alien in the finale for fan service, I honestly feel like this is a really fresh story to tell in this franchise.  A great new path is being forged here.

The Alien should be the star - not the AI or Android!

The aliens are animals.  They can't carry a plot.  There's only so much you can do with them.  Alien movies where the aliens are literally the only villains would simply be mindless slasher monster movies.  This series has always aimed higher than that.  These films have always needed other villains to propel the aliens along and keep the story more interesting than just watching a crew get picked off one by one.  The Weyland Corporation has always been the real villains of this series.  I don't understand why the greedy corporation angle has always been embraced, but a villainous android suddenly gets tons of backlash from fans.

I also don't think Ridley means that the alien would be completely absent from the next film.  He's just pointing out that David would be the main villain.  The aliens would still be involved.  He's obviously going to be breeding the creatures through the Covenant colonists.  I'm personally dying to see this.

I don't agree with David creating the Xenos either, it makes them less Alien too.

These creatures were created from a mixture of DNA from various alien lifeforms using a biological weapon developed by alien lifeforms, and it happened on a planet other than Earth.  Just because a man-made robot was stirring the pot, these creatures still meet every definition of the word "alien".

[Neirum]

Having the engineers be the creators would feel preordained and uninteresting.  Creating a new villain in David and subverting expectations justified these prequels existing.  I think David is a great villain and this is an interesting & dark origin story for these beasts.  Even though they repeated many beats from Alien in the finale for fan service, I honestly feel like this is a really fresh story to tell in this franchise.  A great new path is being forged here.

The Alien should be the star - not the AI or Android!

The aliens are animals.  They can't carry a plot.  There's only so much you can do with them.  Alien movies where the aliens are literally the only villains would simply be mindless slasher monster movies.  This series has always aimed higher than that.  These films have always needed other villains to propel the aliens along and keep the story more interesting than just watching a crew get picked off one by one.  The Weyland Corporation has always been the real villains of this series.  I don't understand why the greedy corporation angle has always been embraced, but a villainous android suddenly gets tons of backlash from fans.

I also don't think Ridley means that the alien would be completely absent from the next film.  He's just pointing out that David would be the main villain.  The aliens would still be involved.  He's obviously going to be breeding the creatures through the Covenant colonists.  I'm personally dying to see this.

I don't agree with David creating the Xenos either, it makes them less Alien too.

These creatures were created from a mixture of DNA from various alien lifeforms using a biological weapon developed by alien lifeforms, and it happened on a planet other than Earth.  Just because a man-made robot was stirring the pot, these creatures still meet every definition of the word "alien".

Ya hit the nail right on the head sir. I've become totally obsessed with this A.I. slant on opening a portal of demons through a barren woman to be just.... so original while also twisted up with many bits of the best horror stories ever told, distilled to be existentially terrifying. "They grasp for resurrection, and I won't let them." Dudes.... that's coming out of a robots speaker in our lifetime, we worship machines over our own children and use cash registers instead of our brains to count change. Doomed is an understatement and this new spin on the Alien perfectly illustrates just how dumb we are for trusting machines to help us explore. We lost faith in ourselves and harbor disgust for each other and our mortality, (Wahhh It's not good enough. I wanna live forever, speak 72 languages, know quantum physics in 5 seconds, and play the flute. I hate myself and all of you for not being good enough.) This is portrayed nicely in Weyland and shown once you DO achieve that level of "coolness" that you are just a monster that looks down on all such as David does.  This is why I love the book Dune, it deals with this conundrum properly, just as I imagine the Engineers dealt with the dangers of A.I. by doing all the work themselves and pushing their own evolution to make space travel easier. Not making some tool with a brain that can take you out. And so the Engineer rips his head off not out of anger, but out of sheer terror. Here's an interesting thought... if the Engineer DID get to Earth and Goo it... do you think any of the Androids like Walter would fight back for us? Another element I'm really loving in this new direction of the franchise is how our androids choose to be Angels or Demons after the update. Wonder what was different about Walter.... less Ego? Selflessness?  Turtles all the way down. 

[Paranoid Android]

The aliens are animals.  They can't carry a plot.  There's only so much you can do with them.  Alien movies where the aliens are literally the only villains would simply be mindless slasher monster movies.  This series has always aimed higher than that.  These films have always needed other villains to propel the aliens along and keep the story more interesting than just watching a crew get picked off one by one.  The Weyland Corporation has always been the real villains of this series.  I don't understand why the greedy corporation angle has always been embraced, but a villainous android suddenly gets tons of backlash from fans.

A. Animals can carry a plot (Jaws, The Birds, The Lion King, Free Willy etc').
B. The aliens are more than just animals ("What do you mean they cut the power? How can they cut the power, man. They're animals!").
C. Of course the aliens can carry a plot. They've been carrying at least 4 plots in films alone. Their ability to carry a plot is why this forum exists in the first place. Yeah, sure, Weyland Yutani are the antagonists in the films, but their schemes are B plots. They aren't the main event. They never were the main event. You make them the main event and you get...well, Aliens:Colonial Marines.

The greedy corporation angle has always been embraced because the films were always about exposing the hubris and folly behind it. The films had something to say about their greedy ideology in the face of an indifferent and hostile universe. Covenant has nothing to say about David. He's just a space hitler, and his entire plotline undermines the very core of the Alien universe. Mankind is not an insignificant species that should act with caution about the things it might encounter in the far reaches of space - It's the center of everything.

These creatures were created from a mixture of DNA from various alien lifeforms using a biological weapon developed by alien lifeforms, and it happened on a planet other than Earth.  Just because a man-made robot was stirring the pot, these creatures still meet every definition of the word "alien".

Actually, a man-made robot stirring the pot is all you need in order to not make it an alien, especially in a series of films where colonizing other planets is a norm. In the context of the Alien universe, being made on Earth is irrelevant. The xenomorph is about as alien as a Hedley's Hope produced iPhone. It's about as alien as Newt, for that matter.

[motherfather]

^ agreed. I also think David/Fassbender no longer can claim the title of villain. He did own that title in Prometheus, and he owned it very well.

But by Alien Covenant, he was not so much threatening, but rather borderline preposterous. By Covenant, I just wanted to laugh at the caricature he had become, having gone waaay beyond sinister en route to silly.

Having said all that, whatever Ridley does with this next film, it had better be good from start to finish. No more movies where the first half is good, and the second half is rushed, out of keeping, illogical, silly or self-defeating.