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Alien: Earth – FX Boss Titles Noah Hawley Series, Offers Update

FX boss John Landgraf shared that Noah Hawley's series is titled Alien: Earth and offered an update on how production is going so far.


While we didn't get to hear from FX boss John Landgraf during one of his informative TCA sessions this summer, he is back on Emmy nominations day to celebrate just how well shows like The Bear and Shōgun did – 23 and 25 nominations, respectively. In the process of offering an update on Noah Hawley and when a sixth installment of Fargo could be in play, Landgraf did drop some interesting news and an update regarding Hawley's in-production "Alien' series. "Noah is deep in work on Season 1 of 'Alien: Earth' right now," Landgraf shared with Variety. "We're in post-production, and we are talking to him and watching cuts every week. We're pretty bullish on 'Alien: Earth,' and we've told him that assuming as we hope that 'Alien: Earth' is a returning television series, we want him to focus on at least writing two seasons of it before returning to a possible sixth season of 'Fargo.' So it's going to be a little while, but I'm also intensely proud of that show." Hmmm… so it's called Alien: Earth, and FX is definitely looking for it to go at least two seasons – with Hawley set to focus on "at least writing two seasons of it" before working on Fargo.

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Image: FX Networks

Alien: Noah Hawley on FX Network's Reaction, Ridley Scott Involvement

Checking in with Deadline Hollywood for its Crew Call podcast, Haley had some additional details to pass along regarding the series. First up, Hawley noted that the higher-ups at FX Networks had made it clear that he can keep his focus solely on "Alien" – and if they're talking "season two," then it sounds like they like what they're seeing. "They're [FX Networks] saying maybe don't do two things at once on this show," Hawley explained. "Their hope is to put a season two as close to season one as possible."

As for Scott's involvement, Hawley confirmed that it never went beyond an early conversation while Hawley was mapping out his plans. "In the four years it's taken me to launch this show, he's made how many movies?" Hawley added. But it was during his conversation with Scott that Hawley decided which direction to go in. "What I said to Ridley is, 'I'm adapting your movie.' I had to make a decision — retro-futurism or 'Prometheus'? And I chose retro-futurism," he explained. "When I close my eyes, and you say 'Alien' to me, I see that green Ascii text. You know, I hear that sound. I see that keyboard with the weird Egyptian ruins on it. I see those hallways."

Timothy Olyphant Discusses Upcoming FX Series

During an interview with Vanity Fair from April that saw Olyphant on a brief break from filming in Thailand, the actor had nothing but praise for what Hawley brings to the project, adding, "I don't know if you're familiar, but he's very good at what he does. Very good." Thankfully, Hawley didn't try to land Olyphant for the series a few years back – as the actor explains. "Don't tell Noah [Hawley] this, but if my kids were still living at home, I don't think I would have done the job," Olyphant revealed, noting that Alien came at a point in his life where it's easier on a number of levels to travel for filming than it used to be. "I mean, 'Justified,' 'Deadwood,' 'Santa Clarita Diet,' those really [kept] me here for a good stretch. When my children [were] somewhere between sixth grade and all the way through them leaving the house, I essentially got to work and live here in Los Angeles and be able to go to their tennis tournaments and take them to music classes and whatnot."

Olyphant continued, "Once they all left—and we hate them for it—it was a bit like, I just asked my wife, 'You want to go to live in Bangkok for a few months?' If she says yeah, I'm in. It's a really fun time. Don't tell the kids, but they're not that missed. We did 'Daisy Jones' and lived in New Orleans for a couple months. [Justified] took us to Chicago. 'Full Circle,' we lived in New York for a few months, and now we're living in Bangkok, and it's been a ball."

But it was the last part of his response that got our radar going. While describing his time filming in Thailand, Olyphant noted that "there's a monster" in the FX series that "takes up a lot of screen time." That gave him the opportunity to check out the beaches in Bangkok – and he even "got to go see my buddy Walton Goggins down there filming 'The White Lotus.'" Hmmm… looks like whatever the big bad is, we'll be getting to see a lot of it…

The upcoming FX series stars Sydney Chandler (Pistol, Sugar) as meta-human Wendy, Alex Lawther (The End of the F*cking World) as soldier CJ, Samuel Blenkin (Black Mirror) as CEO Boy Kavalier, Essie Davis (Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries, The Babadook, Babyteeth) as Dame Silvia, Adarsh Gourav (The White Tiger) as Slightly, Kit Young (Netflix's Shadow and Bone) as Tootles, Timothy Olyphant (Justified: City Primeval) – possibly as Wendy's mentor trainer, a synth named Kirsh, and Sandra Yi Sencindiver (Foundation) – reportedly as a senior member of the Weyland-Yutani Corporation.

In addition, the series stars Babou Ceesay (Guerrilla, Damilola), David Rysdahl (Fargo), Jonathan Ajayi (Wonder Woman 1984, Noughts and Crosses), Erana James (Uproar, The Wilds), Lily Newmark (Pin Cushion, Sex Education), Diêm Camille (Washington Black, Alex Rider 3), Adrian Edmondson (War & Peace, A Spy Among Friends), and Moe Bar-El (The Peripheral, Tehran).


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Ray FlookAbout Ray Flook

Serving as Television Editor since 2018, Ray began five years earlier as a contributing writer/photographer before being brought onto the core BC team in 2017.
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