On November 16, 20th Century Fox officially announced a title, release date and synopsis for the Prometheus sequel and first of the Alien prequels. The film, which is titled Alien: Covenant, is starting pre-production in Australia now for filming to begin at Sydney’s Fox Studios in March of 2016 for 16 weeks. Coming to theaters on October 6, 2017, Alien: Covenant was described by the studio as follows:
Ridley Scott returns to the universe he created in ALIEN with ALIEN: COVENANT, the second chapter in a prequel trilogy that began with PROMETHEUS — and connects directly to Scott’s 1979 seminal work of science fiction. Bound for a remote planet on the far side of the galaxy, the crew of the colony ship Covenant discovers what they think is an uncharted paradise, but is actually a dark, dangerous world — whose sole inhabitant is the “synthetic” David (Michael Fassbender), survivor of the doomed Prometheus expedition.
Fast forward to today, and Scott says that the line-up of Alien prequels to come are actually more like what James Cameron is planning for the three Avatar sequels, where Prometheus serves as the first film and will be followed by three more movies before linking back up to Scott’s 1979 release, Alien. So, unlike what the synopsis says above, Alien: Covenant will actually be the second movie of four in total.
“Its a very complex story. Its an evolution of what I first did with Prometheus 1,” Scott revealed at a press conference in Sydney, Australia, according to The Hollywood Reporter.“Prometheus 1 was borne out of my frustration that on Alien 1 in 1979 – I only did one as I don’t normally do sequels. I was amazed that in the 3 that followed that no-one asked the question ‘why the Alien, who made it and why?’ Very basic questions. So I came up with the notion of Prometheus 1, which starts to indicate who might have made it and where it came from.”
He added: “So I’m now going to the next one, which is the next evolution directly connected with the first one, which was this Shaw, when [s]he replaced Michael Fassbender in two pieces and we’ll kind of pick it up there and it will evolve. When that’s finished there’ll be another one and then another one which will gradually drive into the back entrance of the film in 1979… So in other words, why was this space jockey there and why did he have an Alien inside him? And those questions will be answered.”
Michael Fassbender is set to reprise the role of the android David. Other casting has not yet been confirmed, but the director did clarify that Noomi Rapace’s Elizabeth Shaw will only appear briefly in Alien: Covenant. Jack Paglen (Transcendence) and Michael Green (Green Lantern) are providing the screenplay.
