I hope you're not a fan of ALIEN 3 or ALIEN: RESURRECTION, if you count the sci-fi franchise among your favorites… Because in due time, they'll no longer count in the grand scheme of things. Much like the STAR WARS expanded universe, they'll be chalked up to glorified fan-fiction once Neill Blomkamp gets to take the reins on a new ALIEN sequel.
Sigourney Weaver confirmed as much in a new interview with EW that also announced an ALIENS 30th Anniversary Reunion panel for this year's San Diego Comic-Con that will see Weaver, James Cameron, producer Gale Anne Hurd, Bill Paxton, Lance Henriksen, Paul Reiser, Michael Biehn, and an adult Carrie Henn sharing the stage for a Q&A.
Weaver is working with District 9 filmmaker Neill Blomkamp to create a new Aliens sequel, one that picks up where Cameron’s film left off and somewhat de-canonizes David Fincher’s Alien 3 (1992) and Jean-Pierre Jeunet’s Alien: Resurrection(1997). “It’s just as if, you know, the path forks and one direction goes off to three and four and another direction goes off to Neill’s movie,” Weaver says.
That appeared to be the direction Blomkamp was going to take, particularly with his ideas of Hicks and Newt being major characters in his concept – something hard to do without disregarding ALIEN 3 since they die in the film's opening moments. And I understand that being the point where Blomkamp might want to jump into the canon, given the latter two films are nowhere near as beloved as the first two in the series. However, this is the problem with the way the studio system of making franchises works these days, and we as fans keep letting them off the hook.
Studios want to rush another sequel into production as soon as they can following the success of a film before, because… well, they like money. And who can blame them? That's why they exist – to make big bucks. But often, it's that reckless approach to make something, rather than something good, that then hurts them… They expect people to pay for their product, but, if it's not very good, then the fans come away pissed-off. They have, to a certain degree, damaged the brand, but, in order to try making money with it again, they have to, in retrospect, disavow the shitty thing they made, hoping to start again as if their mistake never happened. But I don't see them issuing refunds to those of us who may have bought tickets for a movie that they'd now rather pretend never existed.
If you can't take ownership of a movie, even if it's bad, then don't make it. ALIEN 3 and ALIEN: RESURRECTION aren't terrible (okay, RESURRECTION is pretty bad, but ALIEN 3 has some merit, even if it's not on the level of ALIEN or ALIENS). But trying to ignore them, even if it's a convenient shortcut, doesn't carry any good favor with those of us who laid out cash for the ALIEN Quadrilogy on Blu-ray, half of which don't count anymore.
Either get more creative or show some restraint… Because this tactic shall not pass any longer.