A fourth film in the Alien franchise is officially in the works from director Ridley Scott.
In a new 40th anniversary interview with Variety, the famous director revealed that a sequel to 2017’s Alien: Covenant is already in the script phase.
It would follow 2012 Alien film Prometheus and of course, 1979 film Alien, 15 years after inspiring the crossover films Alien vs. Predator films.
Before Covenant was even released, two years ago, Scott seemed to suggest that the next film would be tentatively titled Alien: Awakening.
He told Fandango: ‘There will be another one before we kind of literally and logically, clockwise, back into the rear back head of [the original] Alien. It will go Prometheus, Awakening, Covenant.’
Scott also said that if Covenant was a success, which unfortunately it wasn’t when it underperformed Prometheus at the box office, then he would ‘definitely’ make three more.
That last science fiction film followed a crew of a colony ship who discovered an uncharted paradise.
But the world is inhabited by synthetic David, a survivor of the doomed Prometheus expedition, and is more dark and dangerous than their wildest imaginations.
It’s claimed that the plot of Awakening would focus on the Engineers seeking revenge against David for acting out against the Covenant.
And Michael Fassbender, the actor who played David, recently said that he would ‘love’ to return to the role after the last film left his fate undecided.
‘I would love to. I absolutely love working with Ridley. That was a real moment for me when I stepped on the set of Prometheus and got to work with him.
‘I love the character. It’s a lot of fun, so I would definitely enjoy that,’ he said in an interview with BadTaste.it.
Since Disney merged with Fox, the future of franchise has been called into question.
It has so far been speculated that the Alien franchise would get a full-on reboot, instead of bringing David’s story to a natural end.
Scott himself recently said that the existing narrative had almost ‘run out’.
Scott said in 2017: ‘I figured it was a good piece of business to follow through Prometheus, which, from ground zero, had good lift-off.
‘So we went to Covenant to perpetuate the idea and [revive] the franchise of the Alien. I think the beast has almost run out, personally. ‘
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