We’ve known since Disney’s Investor Day presentation in December 2020 that the House of Mouse has big plans for the Alien franchise as a streaming series for FXOpens in a new tab. The studio even tapped Fargo’s Noah Hawley to develop it. Though it took a while to learn more about the show, the latest developments have been big ones.
A new Alien: Earth teaser confirms that Xenomorphs won’t be the only monsters haunting Earth in this TV series. There will actually be FIVE species of monsters at play. The Alien: Earth teaser trailer reveals, “This ship collected five different life forms from the darkest corners of the universe, each one a unique, deadly species, monsters.”
Yikes!
When Will Noah Hawley’s Alien TV Series Release? What Is Its Release Schedule Like?
Noah Hawley’s Alien TV series will premiere on FX on Tuesday, August 12, with the first two episodes available to stream on Hulu at 8 p.m. ET and on the FX linear channel at 8 p.m. ET/PT, and on Disney+ internationally.
Alien: Earth will then have a weekly release schedule for its eight-episode season. A new episode will premiere each Tuesday following August 12; these episodes will land on Hulu beginning at 8 p.m. ET and on FX at 8 p.m. ET/PT.
We Can Expect More Than One Season of this Alien Series
Though we don’t know when season one will arrive, we can expect Alien: Earth to have more than one outing. Hawley recently revealedOpens in a new tab that he and FX built the Alien series to recur and have multiple seasons and did not envision it as a limited series.
The Cast of FX’s Alien TV Series
As mentioned, Sydney Chandler will play one of the leads in Noah Hawley’s Alien TV series, named Wendy. Chandler is joined by The End of the F*cking World‘s Alex Lawther who will play the male lead, a soldier named CJ, and Samuel Blenkin, who is named as another main character, a mysterious CEO called Boy Kavalier. Essie Davis and Adarsh Gourav also join the series as Dame Silvia and Slightly.
Shadow and Bone‘s Kit Young has also come aboard the FX Alien series and will play a character named Tootles. And, as mentioned, Timothy Olyphant will reportedly play “Kirsh, a synth who acts as a mentor and trainer for Chandler’s Wendy, who is a hybrid, a meta-human who has the brain and consciousness of a child but the body of an adult.” Fargo‘s David Rysdahl has also joined the cast in an unknown role. AdditionallyOpens in a new tab, The Peripheral‘s Moe Bar-El will play a “a major recurring role” in season one of the Alien series. Finally, Foundation star Sandra Yi Sencindiver has come aboard Alien: Earth as well. She’ll play a senior member of the Weyland-Yutani Corporation.
Finally, Babou Ceesay, Jonathan Ajayi, Erana James, Lily Newmark, Diêm Camille, and Adrian Edmondson all also join the series.
The Setting, Plot, and Timeline of Noah Hawley’s Alien TV Series
While speaking to EsquireOpens in a new tab about his novel Anthem, Hawley spilled a little more tea about the series. And he gave fans of the XenomorphOpens in a new tab some things to ponder. Here’s what Hawley had to say about his Alien TV series:
“It’s set on Earth of the future. At this moment, I describe that as Edison versus Westinghouse versus Tesla. Someone’s going to monopolize electricity. We just don’t know which one it is. In the movies, we have this Weyland-Yutani CorporationOpens in a new tab, which is clearly also developing artificial intelligence. But what if there are other companies trying to look at immortality in a different way? With cyborg enhancements or transhuman downloads? Which of those technologies is going to win? It’s ultimately a classic science fiction question: does humanity deserve to survive?”
Additionally, according to Slash FilmOpens in a new tab, Hawley offered that the show was inspired by a specific moment from Alien. He noted, “There’s that moment you realize Ian Holm [who plays Ash] is an android where you go, ‘Oh, this is really interesting now, because this is humanity trapped between the primordial past and the AI future, and they’re both trying to kill us.'”
As we guessed before, the Weyland-Yutani Corp., otherwise known simply as “the Company,” are likely the new Alien series’ “Big Bads.”Opens in a new tab But we’re still unclear about a lot of things. For starters, how will all this tie into the ongoing Xenomorph saga? After all, they call this show Alien, not “Android.” So we’re going to have to see the acid-blooded bad boys at some point. Otherwise, it will disappoint a great deal of very disappointed fans out there.
The Series’ Plot
Speaking to this, Hawley recently commentedOpens in a new tab on the presence of the aliens in the new Alien: Earth series. He offered that the movies “always [mimic] the life cycle of the creature, right? Which is egg, slow, Facehugger, starts to get faster — you know what I mean? And, of course, that’s great for a horror movie to build that way. So I found a way to kind of innovate around that structure and play with it.” He didn’t add more detail about how the structure of the Facehuggers’ life would come into play or be updated, but it’s good to know the Xenomorphs are on Hawley’s mind.
Additionally, Hawley noted more about the difference between the new Alien FX series and the movies that originated it, offering, “Look, a two-hour movie, you can set it up, and then it’s just about, ‘Are they going to survive?’ But if you’re making a series, ‘Are they going to survive?’, you can’t sustain it. Even if you have 60% of the best action-horror on television, you still have 40% of ‘What are we talking about?'”
Finally, Hawley recently shared that his intention was to ignore some of the lore put forth by the later Alien moviesOpens in a new tab. It will be interesting to see how this series comes together.
The official synopsis for the series notes, “When a mysterious space vessel crash-lands on Earth, a young woman (Sydney Chandler) and a ragtag group of tactical soldiers make a fateful discovery that puts them face-to-face with the planet’s greatest threat.” You can also find a longer-synopsis to burrow into in the link below.
The Series’ Timeline
Another big question is when does the Alien TV series happen with respect to the movies? Prometheus takes place in 2089, while Alien: Covenant takes place in 2104. The original Alien takes place exactly 100 years from now, in 2122. The events of Aliens occur some 57 years later in 2179, with Alien Resurrection finishing things a whopping two hundred years later. And Weyland-Yutani exists in all these eras.
But happily, we now know a little bit more about where Alien: Earth will land in the timelineOpens in a new tab. FX Chief John Landgraf shared an updateOpens in a new tab on the Alien series at a TCA winter panel for the network.
He said, “Alien takes place before Ripley. It’s the first story that takes place in the Alien franchise on Earth. So, it takes place on our planet. Right near the end of this century, we’re in — so 70-odd years from now. Ripley won’t be a part of it or any of the other characters of Alien other than the alien itself.” That’s right folks, no Sigourney Weaver. We’re sad, on the one hand, but excited for more specificity on the other.
For those who want exactitude, Alien: Earth takes place in 2120.
Really though, all we want is one good chestburster scene. Is that too much to ask? The Alien: Earth series will release on August 12.
Originally published on January 5, 2022.
