‘Prisoners’ Writer Aaron Guzikowski Hired to Write a New ‘Alien’ Film, With Ridley Scott Producing

Aaron Guzikowski, the writer of “Prisoners” and the creator of “Raised by Wolves,” has been hired to write a new “Alien” feature for 20th Century Studios. The Hollywood Reporter first reported the hire on Friday, and Deadline confirmed the assignment.

Ridley Scott and Michael Pruss are producing the film through Scott Free. Scott is not directing it, and no director is attached, according to Deadline and TheWrap. J.R. Young is overseeing the project for the studio, Deadline reported. Plot details are being kept under wraps, and Deadline described the film as being in very early development.

The assignment reunites the writer with Scott. Guzikowski created “Raised by Wolves,” the HBO Max science-fiction series about two androids raising human children on a colony world after a war destroyed Earth. Scott was an executive producer of the series and directed its first two episodes, which The Hollywood Reporter described as his first television directing since he began making films in the 1970s. The series ran for two seasons. Guzikowski also wrote “Prisoners,” the 2013 crime thriller directed by Denis Villeneuve.

On what the new film connects to, the two trades do not tell the same story. The Hollywood Reporter’s sources say the film is not a sequel to “Alien: Romulus,” the 2024 film directed by Fede Álvarez. Instead, those sources link it to Scott’s two prequels, “Prometheus” (2012) and “Alien: Covenant” (2017), through David, the android played by Michael Fassbender in both films. Under that account, Fassbender is not attached to the new film.

Deadline’s account is narrower. It says little else is known about the project, including whether it would follow “Alien: Romulus” at all, and neither Deadline’s confirmed reporting nor The Hollywood Reporter’s ties the Guzikowski script to the separate prequel idea Scott described in August. The two versions are printed here as the trades published them; the reporting does not establish which branch of the series the script belongs to.

In an August interview with the Los Angeles Times, Scott said a third prequel centered on David was in development and that he hoped to make it. In the Times account, the prequel would pick up David’s story, with the android building what Scott called “a brave new world for himself.” David was last seen in control of the colony ship at the end of “Alien: Covenant,” with its settlers asleep aboard, and no later film has returned to him. The Guzikowski hire was reported two months after that interview. Neither trade reports that Guzikowski is writing that prequel.

Guzikowski’s earlier screenplays include “Contraband” and “Papillon,” and he created the Jason Momoa series “The Red Road,” according to iHorror’s coverage of the hire. His best-known work remains “Prisoners,” in which a father’s search for his missing daughter drives the story, and “Raised by Wolves,” which, like the prequels in The Hollywood Reporter’s account, is built around androids and the people in their charge.

What is not in the reporting: there is no director, no cast and no release date. Michael Fassbender’s involvement is unconfirmed in every version of the story, including the version in which David is the connecting character. “Alien: Romulus” grossed more than $350 million worldwide, according to Deadline’s reporting. Scott directed the original “Alien” in 1979 and returned to direct both prequels.

Guzikowski’s other current work includes an animated “Death Stranding” film and an adaptation of a Philip K. Dick short story for Sony Pictures, according to TBS News coverage of the hire.

Sources: The Hollywood Reporter; Deadline; TheWrap; Los Angeles Times; TBS News.