Was Neill Blomkamp Working on an Alien/Prometheus Movie?
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Back when he was promoting Elysium, director Neill Blomkamp let drop at a press conference that he’d love to do an Alien film. Yesterday on Instagram, he implied that it may have actually been in the works, dropping several bits of concept art including the above image of Ripley in a xenomorph costume, an Alien queen in what looks like some kind of space terrarium, an older Hicks and Ripley meeting an Engineer.
Was working on this. Don’t think I am anymore. Love it though. #alien #xenomorph
Predictably, many are bemoaning the fact that this project, whatever it is, won’t happen. I’m going to go out on a limb and say I’m glad it isn’t. While Blomkamp excels in making a “lived-in” universe, which was key to the first Alien movie, the franchise, if it is to survive, really needs to move on from being about Ripley, as Sigourney Weaver’s days of being the action heroine are numbered at best. And Hicks? Yeah, studios are just champing at the bit to work with Michael Biehn again. Besides, Blomkamp himself isn’t exactly dream director material after Elysium – do you want an Alien movie that’s an obvious allegory for the political issue du jour? Flawed as Prometheus may have been, it was at least an attempt to take things in a new direction. I’d rather Ridley Scott continue along his Alien Jesus lines than have Ripley learn that racism against xenomorphs is bigotry, and they view her as space-Hitler for the whole nuking from orbit thing. Not saying that would have been the premise, but you know there’s a decent chance it was.
This is fun fan fiction, just from a higher-profile fan than usual. Enjoy it for what it is.
About The Author
Luke Y. Thompson has been writing professionally about movies and pop-culture since 1999, and has also been an actor in some extremely cheap culty and horror movies you will probably never hear much about (he is nonetheless mostly proud of them, as he met his wife on one). As editor of The Robot's Voice since 2012, he can take the blame for the majority of the site's content, all of which he creates because he loves you very, very much. (Although he loves nachos more. Sorry.) Prior to TRV, Luke wrote for publications that include the New Times LA, Los Angeles CityBeat, E! Online, OC Weekly, Geekweek, GeekChicDaily, The L.A. Times, The Village Voice, LA Weekly, and Nerdist