New Alien Movie Gets Release Date

Production on a new installment in the Alien franchise kicked off earlier this year and The Walt Disney Company has now confirmed that the movie is expected to land in theaters in 2024. This date is only one of many updates the studio recently offered, as various Marvel, Star Wars, and Avatar movies have had their releases re-worked, though with this Alien movie previously having no release date, this marks promising news for the franchise. However, with the writers’ strike currently impacting a number of productions in all corners of the industry, it’s unknown how it will impact the release of the new Alien. The new film is set to land in theaters on August 16, 2024.

The new film comes from Don’t Breathe director Fede Álvarez and stars Cailee Spaeny, Isabela Merced, David Jonsson, Archie Renaux, Spike Fearn, and Aileen Wu. The original Alien landed in theaters in 1979 and kicked off one of the most beloved franchises in science fiction. In the decades since its launch, the series has earned sequels, prequels, crossovers, video games, comic books, and countless pieces of merchandise. 

When The Walt Disney Company acquired 20th Century Fox, Alien is one of the brands audiences were both most excited for and most apprehensive about. A key component of the successful entries into the franchise is embracing an R-rated mentality, which understandably made fans nervous about how the material would be handled under Disney. Luckily, as proven with a film like Prey, Disney has been able to use its 20th Century Studios banner to continue to deliver more mature subject matter without any restrictions.

The Alien franchise has so much storytelling potential, in fact, that in addition to the upcoming Álvarez film, Fargo creator Noah Hawley is also developing a TV series set in this world. The original films in the franchise largely focused on confrontations with the monstrous xenomorph creatures, while two films served as crossovers with the Predator franchise and two prequels embraced the dangers of artificial intelligence.

The last film in the franchise, 2017’s Alien: Covenant, came from original director Ridley Scott. No story details about this upcoming Alien have been revealed, though it reportedly will be pivoting away from the most recent films in the franchise.

The new Alien hits theaters on August 16, 2024.

Are you looking forward to the new movie? Let us know in the comments or contact Patrick Cavanaugh directly on Twitter to talk all things horror and Star Wars.