Posted in: FX, Preview, TV | Tagged: alien, fx networks, noah hawley

Alien: Noah Hawley on FX Networks/Season 2, Ridley Scott Involvement

Noah Hawley (Fargo) shares how involved Ridley Scott was with the Alien series and mentions that FX Networks is already talking Season 2.

It was back in April when we last checked in on how things were going with FX & Noah Hawley's upcoming "Alien" series, Justified: City Primeval star Timothy Olyphant dropped some interesting details on what we can expect (more on that below). Over the past few months, Hawley has also done a great job of giving us a sense of how he's approaching the series and the themes that he's looking to pursue. Checking in with Deadline Hollywood for its Crew Call podcast, Haley had some additional details to pass along.

First up, Hawley shared that the higher-ups at FX Networks are making it clear that he can keep his focus solely on "Alien" – and if they're talking "season two," then they must 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." From the directing standpoint, Hawley has wrapped things up – with overall production rolling on until July (with heavy post-production meaning a 2025 premiere).

As for Ridley Scott's involvement with the project, Hawley confirms 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."

Alien: Timothy Olyphant Discusses Upcoming FX Series

In an interview with Vanity Fair that went live back in April, we learned that Olyphant was back in Los Angeles for the interview – on a brief break from filming in Thailand. When asked how it's been working with Hawley, Olyphant reaffirmed Hawley's credentials, responding, "I don't know if you're familiar, but he's very good at what he does. Very good."

"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 shared, 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 if Olyphant's correct.

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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