Despite attracting the absolute best talent, the Aliens franchise has been on a bit of a rough patch for the last, oh, 30 years or so.
Ridley Scott’s Prometheus prequel? It sucked. Alien: Resurrection, a joint written by Joss Whedon and filmed by the director of City of Lost Children? It blew. Alien 3, directed by multiple Academy Award winner David Fincher? Well, I’ve personally always thought it got a bum rap, but the general consensus is: It’s terrible.
Now Neil Blomkamp, the talented South African director behind District 9 and the upcoming Chappie, has been hired to film the next Alien movie. And thanks to Blomkamp, we have a pretty good idea what the movie will be about.
Back in January, Blomkamp began dumping a large volume of concept art for an imaginary Alien sequel to his Instagram account that he said he hadn’t been hired to film. It was the result of spitballing with Sigourney Weaver on the set of Chappie, and the art he showed brought back Ripley (in some sort of Alien-inspired biomech suit, no less!) and Dwayne Hicks, the marine corporal whose face got half burned off in Aliens (and who was killed at the beginning of Alien 3).
Since both Ripley and Hicks are officially dead, this would seem to suggest a return to the cloning concepts of Alien: Resurrection. But time will tell: Perhaps this will be a side-quel of some sort, in the same way Prometheus is a side-prequel to Alien.
Anyway, it’s now all official, with 20th Century Fox announcing last night (and Blomkamp confirming on Twitter) that he’ll film the next Alien movie. Personally, though, I’m not quite ready to get excited. Blomkamp’s a talent, but we’ve seen better directors fall beneath the Alien curse.
Um… So I think it's officially my next film. #alien https://t.co/QO5WrH2d6x
— Neill Blomkamp (@NeillBlomkamp) February 18, 2015
Source: io9
John Brownlee is a writer for Fast Company, and a contributing writer here at CoM. He has also written for Wired, Playboy, Boing Boing, Popular Mechanics, VentureBeat, and Gizmodo. He lives in Boston with his wife and two parakeets. You can follow him here on Twitter.
14 responses to “District 9′s Neil Blomkamp will direct the next Alien movie!”
“Ridley Scott’s Prometeheus prequel? It sucked.”
Really Alex, “It sucked?” Even pandering to a younger reader, that’s an awfully adolescent way to describe a movie you didn’t like. Wouldn’t it have been better to just say, “Prometeheus (sic), wasn’t to everyone’s liking?”
Personally, I thought Prometheus was a very good film, with a compelling back-story to Alien. The effects were stunning, and, except for Charlize Theron who chewed the scenery with her overly-intense under-acting, had a pretty good cast of players. In any case, I think it’s dicey to slam movies, especially in a tech column. But if you must, a bit of word-smithing would help.
I think “sucked” is about as good as Prometheus deserved.
If “sucked” is as articulate as you can be in describing something you don’t like, maybe you could write for Cult as well. Go for it!
I’d like to go on record as saying that “Prometheus sucked” isn’t a unanimous Cult of Mac opinion. I really enjoyed it, and ever since the dreadful AvP movies I’ve gained a new appreciation for the previously-maligned Alien 3 and Alien Resurrection, too. I wonder if we’ll ever see a Cameron sequel? It would be amazing to see some of those 1990s spec scripts about an Alien homeworld now we’ve got the technology to do so.
Thanks for weighing in, Luke. I hope it’s clear that I believe everyone should express their opinion. Je suis Charlie Hebdo! I just thought “sucked” is below Cult’s journalistic standard. Certainly, CofM skews to a younger readership, but that doesn’t mean it has to wear its journalistic pants around its knees.
And yes, an Alien treatment by Cameron would be interesting. (Maybe without Charlize Theron :)
I can see why people were disappointed by Prometheus, if they went in expecting a movie that more obviously linked into the Alien franchise. Personally, after seeing years of people trying to rehash Cameron’s Aliens, it was a refreshingly original — and smart — way of expanding the franchise mythology. But then again, I grew up reading the Alien comics so the kind of side stories and tangents that are boring to some were interesting to me. Here’s a better question though, since you seem to be a fan: Alien 3 – yay or nay? I love Fincher for the most part (excepting Panic Room and The Game, which are merely average) but I’ve never been able to like that film as much as I want to. There are aspects of it that are interesting, but it just doesn’t entirely hang together.
At first I didn’t care for Alien 3, but it grew on me… fortunately not •in• me. :) I think the premise and writing is good and the new, faster, dog-like aliens were certainly menacing enough for edge-of-seat entertainment. The rain-coated team at the end was goofy and unnecessary for my taste. But individual performances by Charles Dance, Charles Dutton, Weaver and others were great.
Alien: Resurrection, on the other hand, left me as cold as LV-426. I love the basketball scene with clone-Ripley and Ron Pearlman. (I like Pearlman in almost everything!) But I thought there was way too much gore and ugliness. I enjoy the horror of the Alien, as in the original Movie, but the extremely biological-type scenes were gratuitous and disturbing to me. Jean-Pierre Jeunet’s direction was just too over the top.
Two of my favorite movies by Fincher are The Social Network (very sharp), and The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. It too was over the top in some scenes, but then so is the book. I never saw the Swedish version, but I plan to.
I simply do not understand why some people react so negatively to Prometheus. A few of my friends even insisted it has nothing to do with Alien. Imagine. I guess many people cannot watch and enjoy beyond the level of effects and simple story lines. But then, I enjoy almost any kind of movie, slow or fast, color or B&W, even some of the great silent movies. (Sorry, rambling here on Cult’s bandwidth.)
I actually really enjoyed Prometheus. I was hoping that they would make a sequel to the prequel…
I think Ridley Scott still is. This is unrelated.
The first two left a lot to live up to.
You have no idea what you’re talking about. As a fan who’s seen all but the original in the theater when they were released, Prometheus was pretty amazing.
People who say that Prometheus sucked are just children who were jumping up and down during the film shouting “i wanna see the alien, I WANNA SEE THE ALIEN” They aren’t worth arguing with, they like action films but pretend to like/understand scifi. They probably think that moon is boring, we shouldn’t waste our breath.
YOLO CUZ MY NAME IS FLIPPING JEFF DEAL WITH IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
22 JUPSTREET WATCH IY