Ridley Scott has seen the next Alien movie (and he loves it)

It’s an interesting time to be an Alien fan. The last film in the legendary franchise created by Ridley Scott was 2017’s Alien: Covenant, which tied together the prequel film Prometheus with the rest of the Alien mythology. That one didn’t do too well at the box office, so Disney has been taking its time rolling out the next one. And yes, in case you forgot, Mickey Mouse now owns sci-fi horror franchises like Alien and Predator following its acquisition of 20th Century Fox, which might bode well for funding future installments but will never not feel weird to me.

There are two Alien projects currently in the works: a TV show run by Fargo creator Noah Hawley, which tells a story of how corporate greed on Earth ties into the genesis of the Xenomorph; and a new sequel film from Fede Álvarez, the director of Evil Dead (2013). Details about Álvarez’s movie have been relatively scarce. We know it’s called Alien: Romulus and that Cailee Spaeny was in talks to star in it.

Now, at last, we’re hearing more. Álvarez spoke about the film at the DGA Latino Summit in Los Angeles this week during a conversation with Guillermo Del Toro, and revealed that his director’s cut of the film is complete. Moreover, Alien creator and producer Ridley Scott has seen it and given it his enthusiastic blessing.

Ridley Scott loves Fede Álvarez’s new Alien movie

Álvarez described being especially nervous to show his cut of Alien: Romulus to Scott, who is about as close to a living legend as directors can get. Scott was apparently very hard on Denis Villeneuve’s Bladerunner 2049, a movie Álvarez believes is a “masterpiece,” and also felt particularly “meh” about the box office hit Top Gun: Maverick. You get the feeling that Ridley Scott is past the point of caring about giving anything other than his unfiltered opinion.

Nonetheless, Álvarez was determined to open himself and his film up to any criticisms the Alien creator might have. “Even if he didn’t ask for it, I was gonna go there and sit at a table and look at him and get it,” Álvarez said. “Even if he was gonna say, ‘You destroyed my legacy,’ I wanted to be in front of him and see him in the eye. I didn’t want to get an email where it says, ‘Ridley says…’”

From the sounds of things, Alien: Romulus won Scott over pretty hard. His response: “‘Fede, what can I say? It’s fucking great.’”

Needless to say, Álvarez was over the moon to get such a positive response from Ridley Scott. “My family knows it was one of the best moments of my life to have a master like him, whom I admire so much, to even watch a movie I made, particularly something like this, and talk to me for an hour about what he liked about it. One of the best compliments he said was, ‘The dialogue is great. Are you the writer?’ Yes!”

Consider me officially hyped for Alien: Romulus. Álvarez described it as a separate entry in the Alien saga that isn’t connected to the rest of the movies. It follows “a group of young people on a distant world, who find themselves in a confrontation with the most terrifying life form in the universe.”

If you ask me, making it totally unconnected from the wider universe is a smart move. That worked really well for last year’s Predator prequel Prey. Here’s hoping the Xenomorph can get a similar shot of franchise adrenaline.

No release date has been announced yet for Alien: Romulus. But if Ridley Scott has seen the director’s cut, there’s good reason to hope for a 2024 release.

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