Sigourney Weaver was the star of the Alien franchise for four movies straight. She played heroine Ellen Ripley in Ridley Scott’s Alien, James Cameron’s Aliens, and David Fincher’s Alien 3… and even though Ripley didn’t make it out of Alien 3 alive, Weaver still returned to play a clone of the character in Jean-Pierre Jeunet’s Alien: Resurrection. 27 years have gone by since the last time Weaver starred in an Alien movie, and the franchise has continued without her through the crossover movies Alien vs. Predator and Aliens vs. Predator: Requiem, the prequels Prometheus and Alien: Covenant, the “mid-quel” (it slots in between the events of Alien and Aliens) Alien: Romulus, and the upcoming TV series Alien: Earth. But during a recent interview with Deadline, Weaver confirmed that she would “consider” returning to the role of Ripley if the offer came up.
When asked if there’s a future for Ellen Ripley on screen, Weaver replied, “I feel like she’s never far away from me, but on the other hand I have yet to read a script that said “you have got to do this.” So for me, she is in this other dimension, safe from the Alien for the time being. I don’t really think about it, but you know, it’s not completely impossible, and certainly a lot of good filmmakers are inspired by the material. How much does the public really need or want another Ripley movie? I don’t really sit around and think about it, but if it came up, I would consider it. It has come up a bunch of times, but I’m also busy doing other things. Ripley has earned her rest.“
As Weaver mentioned, Alien projects that would have featured the return of Ripley have come up over the years. Neill Blomkamp was developing an Alien 5 that would have picked up after the events of Aliens, ignoring Alien 3 and Alien: Resurrection so Weaver and Michael Biehn would be able to reprise the roles of Ellen Ripley and Colonial Marine Dwayne Hicks. Weaver was interested in coming back for that one, but Blomkamp’s Alien project was scrapped because Ridley Scott was working on his prequel movies.
A few years ago, franchise producer Walter Hill wrote a 50 page treatment for a sequel that would star Weaver as Ripley and, as Hill described it, “tell a story that scares the pants off your date, kicks the ass of a new Xenomorph, and conducts a meditation on both the universe of the Alien franchise and the destiny of the character of Lt. Ellen Ripley.” But that idea didn’t seem to go anywhere.
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