Fede Alvarez Will ‘Go Into Uncharted Waters’ On Alien: Romulus Sequel

With Alien: Romulus, director Fede Alvarez aimed to make something that neatly slotted between Alien and Aliens – returning to the original two classics, while also liberally referencing everything from Alien: Resurrection and Prometheus, to the beloved Alien: Isolation video game. As a result, his film brought fresh characters and variations on the Alien mythology – but was all about capturing that legendary iconography anew.

If a Romulus sequel does happen, though, it seems Alvarez plans to go in the opposite direction – taking Alien somewhere more unexpected. “Rodo [Sayagues, co-writer] and I are working on that right now,” the filmmaker tells Empire. “We’re excited about where it can go. We’ve almost checked all of the boxes of things that I want to see [in Romulus], and brought back a lot of the things I hadn’t seen in a while. Wherever we go now, we can go into uncharted waters.” The plan, he hints, would to be follow the exploits of Cailee Spaeny’s protagonist Rain, introduced in Romulus. “I think it’ll be so exciting to go with characters you know from this movie, to a place in the Alien franchise that we’ve never been before, and to discover things that you’ve never seen before,” he says.

A direct Romulus sequel would only arise if Alvarez finds a story worth telling. “The mistake usually with sequels is to make them because you can, and because of the success of Romulus, we definitely can make a sequel,” he states. “But I wouldn’t do it unless we have a really good idea for it, something that’s worthy of the title.” Our chests are positively bursting with excitement.

Read Empire’s full Alien: Romulus interview with Fede Alvarez – talking the film’s reception, its most controversial elements, and where he’d take it next – in the 28 Years Later issue, on sale Thursday 16 January. Pre-order a copy online here. Alien: Romulus is out now on 4K, Blu-ray, DVD and digital.