It’s now been 26 years since Sigourney Weaver last played the role of Ellen Ripley in Alien Resurrection (1997), which was of course the fourth time Weaver’s Ripley battled Xenomorphs up on the big screen. Legacy sequels are all the rage for popular franchises at the moment, but will we ever see Sigourney Weaver as Ellen Ripley again? Don’t count on it, she says.
“There are all kinds of younger actors taking this kind of role. And there was an Alien [film] that I really wanted to do with Neill Blomkamp and we didn’t get to do that, but, you know, that ship has sailed,” Weaver tells Total Film this week.
The actress adds, “I’m very happy doing what I’m doing. I put in my time in space!”
The Blomkamp project would’ve been a sequel to James Cameron’s Aliens that would’ve brought back Ellen Ripley. What we know of Blomkamp’s vision is that it would’ve seen Weaver return alongside Michael Biehn as Corporal Hicks, and various pieces of concept art have surfaced over the years to give us some idea of what Blomkamp had been planning. The plan was to retcon all the films in the franchise beyond Aliens, but of course 20th Century Fox ultimately decided to go forward with Ridley Scott‘s prequel Alien: Covenant instead.
The Blomkamp project is very much dead in the water at this point. The Alien franchise will instead return with an upcoming TV series as well as a new movie directed by Fede Alvarez.
For now, the last time Weaver reprised the role of Ellen Ripley was for a sketch on “Full Frontal With Samantha Bee” back in April 2019. You can check that out down below.
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