Disney has decided to pump the brakes on the long-talked about Alien Nation remake. At the end of last year, Jeff Nichols revealed that he was nearly finished with the final draft of his “epic” script. Nichols has been attached to write and direct the remake of the 1988 classic for over three years now and it looks like the project may be dead after looking at what Disney has been doing to other Fox properties like Mouse Guard and plenty of others.
The Alien Nation remake has been “put on hold rather than being put into turnaround.” This comes just three months after the Disney and Fox deal closed. While putting it on hold has a better ring to it, the chances of it actually hitting the big screen under the Disney umbrella are more than likely slim at this point in time. However, there is a chance the project will be able to secure new funding from another studio and be put out that way. Things currently aren’t looking so good for the remake.
In November of last year, Jeff Nichols was very excited about his latest draft of the Alien Nation remake, which he hoped would be his last after working on it for two years at that point. The studio was reportedly into what they had seen so far, but Nichols new even then that there was a real possibility the project would never get off the ground. He compared it to constructing giant murals in sand. “It might just blow away, which would be a real shame,” said Nichols at the time.
Related: Sci Fi to Reboot Alien Nation
Unfortunately, it looks like Jeff Nichols may have been right about his sand mural analogy. Disney just came in and made a sandstorm out of what Nichols has been working on for quite a long time. Hopefully, Disney will either later green light the Alien Nation remake or at the very least let another studio take it over so long-time fans who have been anxiously awaiting the remake can finally see it after years of waiting. As for the direction Nichols was taking the project, he said it was going surprise a lot of fans and possibly even shock others as he pushed the story further.
Jeff Nichols said he put his “heart and soul” into the Alien Nation remake and one would have to believe him after putting forth so much time and effort into getting the movie done in the right way. For now, we’ll just have to wait and see what Disney decides to do with the project, but it really doesn’t look like it’s a priority at this time as the dust is still settling after the deal closure. Maybe Jeff Nichols will provide us all with an Alien Nation update in the coming weeks. Variety was the first to report on Disney’s latest Fox project shelving.
