The “Alien” franchise is undergoing a bit of a stress test since the reigns have moved over to Disney post-merger and with a new feature film heading to theaters next summer it does certainly feel like the brass running 20th Century Studios actually is trying its best to reinvest into the sci-fi horror genre. We’re not only getting a new movie but FX/Hulu and Scott Free are behind an Earthbound prequel series as well that had been filming in Thailand earlier in the year. With the strikes resolved, it was recently revealed to The Wrap by the show’s creator/director Noah Hawley (“Legion,” “Fargo”) that the show is aiming for release sometime in 2025 with the production expected to ramp back up in February.

The Ronin can share a small update on the untitled “Alien” series. Executive producer Dana Gonzales had been previously linked as one of the show’s cinematographers (latest credit being “The Toxic Avenger”) and will direct an unknown amount of episodes alongside Hawley. His directing credits include “Legion,” “The Handmaid’s Tale,” “The Changeling,” and two upcoming episodes from Season 5 of “Fargo.”

We’re still waiting for more concrete plot details about the sci-fi horror series but it is expected to take place before the events of the original 1979 film and out-of-character for the franchise will mostly be set on Earth with the potential of Weyland Industries/Weyland-Yutani (the secondary villain of the franchise) being at the core of it. The cast of the “Alien” series includes Sydney Chandler (“Don’t Worry Darling”), Alex Lawther (“Andor,” “Black Mirror”), Samuel Blenkin (“Black Mirror,” “The Sandman”), Essie Davis, and Adarsh Gourav.

This is how Hawley described the show to Esquire back in 2022:

“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 Corporation, 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?”

On the film front, director Fede Álvarez‘s “Alien: Romulus” has a tentative release date of August 16, 2024, and according to the filmmaker, his director’s cut of the pic got the seal of approval from producer Ridley Scott. There is an expectation that the movie will focus on an off-world colony inhabited by a group of young human colonists. Given that a director’s cut is already being put together we shouldn’t be that shocked if some teaser images or footage is released by 20th Century between now and CinemaCon 2024.

When exactly the new “Alien” series will drop in 2025 remains to be seen as we’ll likely get a release window closer to when the show actually completes filming.