A few years back, District 9 director Neill Blomkamp caused a stir when he revealed his plan to create a new sequel for the Alien franchise. Initially, Blomkamp’s vision was to essentially ignore the last two Alien movies and bring back original cast members Sigourney Weaver and Michael Biehn for what was described as a “spiritual sequel” to James Cameron’s Aliens.
In mid-2015, Blomkamp ramped up the excitement for the project by sharing a stream of concept pieces for it on social media, and with fans still split on Ridley Scott’s Prometheus vision, Alien 5 was soon the talk of the town.
In late 2015, however, things started to move less smoothly. With Ridley Scott’s plans for his prequel franchise accelerating, Blomkamp’s project was put “on hold” so as not to muddy the waters for what would eventually become Alien: Covenant.
alien is kinda holding/ pending prometheus 2. So I shall be working on other things… as much as I love the xeno- and Lt ripley
— NΞill Blomkamp (@NeillBlomkamp) October 30, 2015
Now it would seem that things have taken a turn for the worse for Blomkamp’s movie, with Ridley Scott revealing in a new interview that he believes it’s very unlikely the movie will ever be released.
“There was never a script,” Scott told Allocine. “It was an idea that evolved from, I believe, a 10-page pitch, and I was meant to be part of the producers on that. It didn’t evolve. Fox decided that they didn’t want to do it and that was it. I’d already done ‘Prometheus’ and I was planning ‘Covenant’ so I dunno.”
When he was pushed on whether or not he thought the movie could happen in the future, Scott replied bluntly with “I don’t think so, no.”
Considering both Sigourney Weaver and Michael Biehn had talked openly about their plans to appear in Blomkamp’s movie, this news might come as a surprise to many Alien fans. Over the years it appeared as though the story was gradually solidifying, with plans to feature a grown-up version of Newt from Aliens being made public, and Weaver even stating that the movie would be “worth the wait” after news broke that it was on hold. But, alas, it would appear that 20th Century Fox is aiming for a more singular vision for the Alien franchise, and if Ridley Scott is to be believed, that vision does not include Neill Blomkamp’s Alien 5.
