‘Prometheus 2′ Script Update; Ridley Scott Says No More Xenomorphs

Ridley Scott, at this point in time, is far along into pre-production on the Matt Damon-headlined Mars survival adventure The Martian (preparing for release in fall 2015), and has screenplays for both Blade Runner 2 and Prometheus 2 being cooked up. Scott most recently said he expects to begin shooting the Blade Runner sequel after he finishes The Martian, but that doesn’t mean the Prometheus followup has stopped moving forward.


On the contrary, Scott informed Yahoo! Movies UK that a Prometheus
sequel is something that he’s very much looking forward to making – and
thus, he is keeping the screenplay writing process chugging along at a
steady pace.

“Right now, as we speak, it’s being written. I’ve had 15
drafts evolving. I definitely want to do that ['Prometheus 2'] again
because I really enjoyed doing ‘Prometheus’.

It’s not clear if Michael Green, who reportedly handled revisions on an earlier Prometheus 2 script draft by Jake Paglen (Transcendence), is also the screenwriter responsible for the many revisions that Scott mentioned (Green is a bit busy at the moment, working on projects such as the upcoming Starz TV series American Gods).

Ridley Scott at work on the ‘Prometheus’ set


The most heavily criticized aspect of the first Prometheus is almost certainly that of the final shooting script draft penned by Damon Lindelof. Given Paglen’s shaky debut with Transcendence, it is encouraging to hear that the Prometheus 2
screenplay will, if nothing else, have had a good deal of work put into
it – perhaps enough for it to mark an improvement on the script for its
predecessor – by the time filming actually gets underway… whenever that
might be.


Indeed, part of the problem with Prometheus, arguably, was that it started out as a straight-forward Alien prequel (written by Doctor Strange scribe Jon Spaihts), before it evolved into more of the speculative – and divisive (see his most recent TV show, The Leftovers)
– philosophical work that Lindelof is known for crafting. The end
result, as mentioned before, was a sci-fi/horror movie that didn’t fully
satisfy as either of those things, for many filmgoers.

The ‘Deacon’ from ‘Prometheus’


It sounds as though Prometheus 2 will have a clearer vision
of what it is, by comparison – and among other things, that means no
more Xenomorphs (and/or proto-Xenomorphs?) in the Prometheus sequel, according to Scott.

“The beast is done. Cooked. I got lucky meeting [the late
H.R. Giger] all those years ago. It’s very hard to repeat that. I just
happen to be the one who forced it through because they said it’s
obscene. They didn’t want to do it and I said, ‘I want to do it, it’s
fantastic’. But after four ['Alien' movies] (he has conveniently
forgotten the ‘AvP’ movies), I think it wears out a little bit. There’s
only so much snarling you can do. I think you’ve got to come back with
something more interesting. And I think we’ve found the next step. I
thought the Engineers were quite a good start.”

That’s just as well; Prometheus set the stage for a sequel that stands well apart from past Alien
movies, despite it being set in the same universe. Not to mention, the
followup – with Noomi Rapace and Michael Fassbender back as the
human Elizabeth Shaw and android David – will presumably take place on a
planet populated by Engineers and other dangerous life forms (re:
Scott’s “good start” comment). There ought to be plenty of other monsters on the menu, by the sound of it.