It sounds very much like director Fede Álvarez pulled precisely no punches with his new Alien movie. Officially titled Alien: Romulus, this will be the first film in the franchise since 2017’s Alien: Covenant, which was a prequel that picked up in the aftermath of Prometheus. We know this one will fall elsewhere in the timeline. It’s going to follow a new cast of characters and tell a new story. One of those characters will be played by Isabela Merced (Sweet Girl) and, as she tells it, the new movie contains at least one very disgusting scene. Prepare yourselves.
Merced is currently prompting her new movie Madame Web and spoke with The Hollywood Reporter. During the chat, she spoke a bit about Romulus and what to expect. While she couldn’t get into the gory details, Merced did share an anecdote about watching a scene from the film with other members of the crew, most of whom couldn’t stomach what they were seeing.
“When we were doing reshoots, Fede Álvarez gave me the iPad where he watches playback, and he had the movie pulled up. So I told him I wanted to see parts of it, and he showed it to me. I was the one holding the iPad, and there were ten people around me watching it on the iPad. So there’s a scene that I’m in, and they all had to turn away. Not one person stayed looking at that iPad because it was so disgusting.”
For many viewers, that’s probably more of a glowing endorsement than anything else. Ridley Scott’s original Alien did not shy away from gross moments, with the famous chest-bursting scene coming to mind. For what it’s worth, Scott has seen Álvarez’s movie and he thinks it’s fucking great, which certainly counts for something. Álvarez, for his part, is no stranger to pushing the envelope, as anyone who has seen 2013’s Evil Dead can tell you.
Romulus will center on "Young people from a distant world must face the most terrifying life form in the universe." In addition to Merced, the cast includes Cailee Spaeny (Bad Times at the El Royale), David Jonsson (Industry), Archie Renaux (Shadow and Bone), Spike Fearn (The Batman) and Aileen Wu (Away From Home). No word yet on when we’re going to see some footage from this thing but it feels like that will happen sooner rather than later. Stay tuned as we’ll be sure to keep you posted.
Alien: Romulus is set to hit theaters on August 16.
