*FX has released the official trailer for “Alien: Earth,” an eagerly awaited science fiction horror series slated to premiere on August 12 on FX and FX on Hulu.
Created by Noah Hawley, this eight-episode prequel to the 1979 film “Alien” takes place in 2120, two years before the events that introduced Sigourney Weaver’s Ripley character. The trailer offers a chilling glimpse into a story set on Earth, breaking from the franchise’s traditional confined settings, such as spaceships or prisons.
The series follows Wendy, played by Sydney Chandler, a hybrid prototype—a humanoid robot with human consciousness developed by Prodigy Corporations. As the official logline states: “When a mysterious space vessel crash-lands on Earth, a young woman and a ragtag group of tactical soldiers make a fateful discovery that puts them face-to-face with the planet’s greatest threat in the sci-fi horror series ‘Alien: Earth.’ As members of the crash recovery crew search for survivors among the wreckage, they encounter mysterious predatory life forms more terrifying than they could have ever imagined. With this new threat unlocked, the search crew must fight for survival and what they choose to do with this discovery could change planet Earth as they know it.”
The trailer reveals that the crashed Weyland-Yutani vessel, the USCSS Maginot, carries five unique lifeforms, including the familiar Xenomorphs and new species yet to be seen in the “Alien” universe.
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Hawley has emphasized that the series will not revisit Ripley’s story. “It’s not a Ripley story. She’s one of the great characters of all time, and I think the story has been told pretty perfectly, and I don’t want to mess with it. It’s a story that’s set on Earth also,” he said in a 2021 Vanity Fair interview.
He added, “The alien stories are always trapped… Trapped in a prison, trapped in a space ship. I thought it would be interesting to open it up a little bit so that the stakes of ‘What happens if you can’t contain it?’ are more immediate.”
This shift to an Earth-based narrative raises the stakes, exploring the consequences of unleashing extraterrestrial threats on a global scale.
The cast is led by Sydney Chandler as Wendy, with Timothy Olyphant as Kirsh, Alex Lawther as CJ, Essie Davis as Dame Silvia, Adarsh Gourav as Slightly, and Samuel Blenkin as Boy Kavalier. Other notable actors include Erana James, Kit Young, David Rysdahl, Babou Ceesay, Jonathan Ajayi, Lily Newmark, Diêm Camille, Adrian Edmondson, and Moe Bar-El, alongside supporting performers like Sandra Yi Sencindiver, Tanapol Chuksrida, and Richa Moorjani.
Watch the trailer above.
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