If the news that current wunderkind of all things Hollywood and sci-fi in South African director Neill Blomkamp will be taking the reigns on a new instalment in the much beloved and iconic Alien franchise wasn’t enough to get you excited as is, then this development is bound to crank that Keen Meter into overdrive.
Speaking to Sky Movies ahead of the release of his new film Chappie, Blomkamp revealed that he wants this new film to be a “genetic sibling” to James Cameron‘s original two films in Alien and Aliens. This means that, at least as far as the canon of the franchise is concerned, the new film will slot in behind the first two, bypassing the slightly more forgettable Alien 3 and Alien: Resurrection.
What’s more, Sigourney Weaver has expressed her apparent keenness to reprise the role of Ellen Ripley in order to give the character a “proper finish.”
Film nerds, commence reacting.
Blomkamp and Weaver, who has a role in Chappie, began talking about a prospective new Alien film almost the second Weaver arrived on set. Over the course of the ensuing months Blomkamp began forwarding her all that extraordinarily cool concept art he’d been toying about with.
Now that the director is officially on board to take the franchise on its next step, and given the now-established working relationship between the pair of them, it’s seeming more and more likely that we’ll get another glimpse of one of the toughest women ever to appear on film in Ripley back on screen for one more dig.
How that plays into the already established canon that the subsequent films follow is yet to be seen – what with the dying and the cloning and whatnot.
But, and not to fanboy out too hard here or anything, if anyone can figure that out in 2015, it’s Neill Blomkamp.
*screams internally*
via Uproxx.
