Alien TV Series From Noah Hawley and Ridley Scott CONFIRMED

[BlueMarsalis79]

I'll take my chances with the guy who managed to turn Fargo into a great TV series and was behind the inspired lunacy of Legion.

Bingo.

[TheBATMAN]

https://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/noah-hawley-alien-series-probably-193857364.html

[Ingwar]

https://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/noah-hawley-alien-series-probably-193857364.html

"It's very exciting that I get this opportunity, with films like 'Fargo' or 'Alien,' to live within the world that was created by these directors and storytellers. It raises the hair on the back of your neck in a good way to walk onto a set where you feel like you're on the 'Nostromo,'" Hawley said before clarifying that his series does not actually take place on the "USCSS Nostromo" but on a set that was inspired by the design of the original film. "You're like, 'Oh my god, I'm in the movie.'"

From Esquire:

Esquire: FX's John Landgraf described your upcoming Alien spin-off as "a beast," and "a really big world-building exercise" for you. What can you tell us about how the world-building exercise is going?

N.H.: It's going great. It's going slowly, unfortunately, given the scale of it. I've made a certain business out of reinvention. Alien is a fascinating story because it's not just a monster movie; it's about how we're trapped between the primordial past and the artificial intelligence of our future, where both trying to kill us. It's set on Earth of the future. At this moment, I describe that as Edison versus Westinghouse versus Tesla. Someone's going to monopolize electricity. We just don't know which one it is.

In the movies, we have this Weyland-Yutani Corporation, which is clearly also developing artificial intelligence—but what if there are other companies trying to look at immortality in a different way, with cyborg enhancements or transhuman downloads? Which of those technologies is going to win? It's ultimately a classic science fiction question: does humanity deserve to survive? As Sigourney Weaver said in that second movie, "I don't know which species is worse. At least they don't f**k each other over for a percentage." Even if the show was 60% of the best horror action on the planet, there's still 40% where we have to ask, "What are we talking about it, beneath it all?" Thematically, it has to be interesting. It's humbling to get to play with the iconography of this world.

https://www.esquire.com/entertainment/books/a38591125/noah-hawley-anthem-alien-fargo-interview/

[Gimitko]

https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2023/11/fargo-season-5-noah-hawley-interview?utm_social-type=owned&utm_brand=vf&utm_source=twitter&mbid=social_twitter&utm_medium=social

You're currently working on a series version of Alien, which I assume is also pretty time-consuming.

We had to put things on hold because of the strikes, but we'll now pick back up in January and try to get it on the air in 2025.

All the studios are eager for IP and reboots, but you just kind of take the shell and fill it with your own inventions.

Under the auspices of making a Coen Bros. movie, I've gotten to make 5-to-10-hour movies about America. And under the auspices of making Alien, I get to tell a story that's very much my own story. It borrows some elements from Ridley Scott's movie and James Cameron's movie, and yet, you know, there's no version of it in which I'm rehashing their stories. To make something great in television, you need multiple hours. It has to be bigger and more sprawling and have more elements and play out in time-released story with themes that are meaningful.

[Gimitko]

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/tv/tv-features/noah-hawley-fargo-alien-star-trek-1235646824/

As you said, you had a partner in Landgraf who said, "Make your version of Alien." So, what have been the challenges of doing that?

There was a challenge early on simply because this process started in a pre-Disney Fox, and then became a Disney Fox, which was Bob Iger, and then Bob Chapek and now Iger again, and there was definitely a moment in which it felt like, on a corporate level, the people who make the creative decisions are different than the people who make the financial decisions and there was a lot of internal pressure that the show should do a specific thing or not do a specific thing.

How did that get communicated?

It was doubt. There was an element for my partners of having to navigate an org chart that was trying to take some creative power up to the next level in a way that makes it harder for artists. That said, it was temporary. We're not in that moment now, but I think that was part of what extended the development period.

What is Ridley Scott's involvement in the TV show? Having directed the film, is he involved?

I mean, are the Coens involved in Fargo? Let's just say, I've probably had more conversations with Ridley than I've had with Joel and Ethan. Scott Free [Productions] is producing Alien and Ridley is making two or three movies a year is basically how that's working. I mean, Ridley has been an amazing collaborator to the degree that I can pick his brain about all of his thoughts, processes, decisions and the things that he's learned. And I try to keep him [in the loop] and send him material so that he feels respected and included. But also, he's doing his thing.

[Nightmare Asylum]

Interesting to hear that, even with Napoleon and Gladiator 2 and the Western and Romulus and Blade Runner 2099 and Sinking Spring and God knows what else on his plate, Ridley's had more conversations with Hawley than the Coens have in five seasons of Fargo.

Spoiler

Would it be asking too much to get Raised By Wolves back on that plate, too?

[close]

It's also wild to think back on just how long the gestation period of this show has been, going back to the original rumors of it pre-Disney acquisition of Fox, like Hawley talks about there.

From the Vanity Fair piece a couple posts above, it's nice to hear that even though the series seems to be very indebted to Alien and Aliens, it doesn't seem like Hawley has any interest whatsoever in making a product that is The Force Awakens to Alien's A New Hope.

[Darkness]

New interview with Hawley talking about the Disney Fox merger troubles and collaborating with Ridley Scott.

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/tv/tv-features/noah-hawley-fargo-alien-star-trek-1235646824/

[BlueMarsalis79]

A few years ago, you told me, "What I've found with the franchise stuff, which I've flirted with, is that people don't have a good sense of humor about that stuff the way they do when there is less money involved. So, I'm trying to figure out, is it worth pushing that rock up the hill." Where did you net out?

I've been at FX for a decade now, and worked with John Landgraf for years before that, so everything I said in that interview is true with the caveat that when you find the right partner and they ask, "Do you want to do Alien?" — which is a hugely valuable franchise to this company — it's, "Do you want to do your version of Alien?" It's a very different conversation. What I found with Star Trek was I got onto the runway and then there was a managerial changeover. In retrospect, it's not that they killed the movie. It's that I got as far as I did with a wholly original idea, until someone said, "Well, wait a minute, what are we even doing with this valuable IP? Just giving it to him to make up a story? That's not how corporate filmmaking works." So, if the call came in to do a big franchise film again, it would have to come with a sense of, "We want you to do your version of it."

[XENOMORPHOSIS]

Ridley spoke in one interview that this tv series so to be as good or as scary as his film,  it came across like he didn't approve of it, pervades changed his tune and is given the project his blessing, he was complimentary to Fede's Alien Romulus assuming he's being honest with his opinion. I'm rather curious at what degree of Ridley Scott is involved with shepherding the Alien Franchise as of recently whether he's just given a paycheck n he gets an executive producer credit though he didn't do anything for the project, or if he helps to finance and oversee development or that he intrinsically provides creative consulting considering g he's Alien's co creator with Dan OBannon, Ron Shusett and producers David Giler, Gordon Carroll and Walter Hill.

I'm sure somebody has guessed this on the forums already that due to the number of times composer Roque Baños has collaborated with Feds Alvarez it's rather likely he'll due the score for Alien Romulus. Also I predict that composer Jeff Russo who collaborates frequently with Noah Hawley on projects that he's very like to provide music for Alien's tv series, though this is a wild guess, we'll wait and see.

[BlueMarsalis79]

I love Jeff Russo from time to time, do not know the other guy, but do wish Elliot Goldenthal and Jed Kurzel could get more work.

[Nightmare Asylum]

Jeff Russo is doing some very good work on For All Mankind.

[Still Collating...]

So it's all his idea and vision. Great that he's getting the opportunity do do it like that knowing how much trouble the filmmakers before him had. If it's great or bad, whatever the result, we'll know who was at the helm.   

[ralfy]

It's probably not so much a matter of shepherding the franchise as rebooting it, and then looking for various directions in which it can travel, e.g., AI, cloning, hybrids, corporate drama, and so on.

This is inevitable for TV shows but is also needed for features if owners want to milk the franchise.

[Nightmare Asylum]

AI, cloning, hybrids, and corporate drama have all been part of various films in the series in the past.

[[cancerblack]]

AI, cloning, hybrids, and corporate drama have all been part of various films in the series in the past.

You forgot political intrigue.