Ridley Scott’s original 1982 film “Blade Runner” remains a cornerstone of the sci-fi genre, and whilst Denis Villeneuve’s sequel “Blade Runner 2049” isn’t quite in the same league, going by critical reviews it did an excellent job honoring the original.
Scott also was behind another staple of sci-fi filmmaking with 1979’s “Alien,” a franchise he did return to direct with both 2012’s “Prometheus” and 2017’s “Alien: Covenant”.
It turns out, in the case of the latter film, it came at a cost. Speaking with Empire (via Slashfilm) recently ahead of his “Napoleon” film opening this Fall, Scott confirmed he was forced to choose between directing “Alien: Covenant” and “Blade Runner 2049” due to a scheduling conflict.
Ultimately he had to bow out of the “Blade Runner” follow-up, and still feels frustrated by that: “I shouldn’t have had to make that decision, but I had to. I should have done ‘Blade Runner 2.'”
The films were ultimately both released in 2017, ‘Covenant’ to mixed reviews and “Blade Runner 2049” to gushing ones. Scott remained onboard as an executive producer on the latter.
With the studios now diving back into these franchises, Scott is very much involved in all three new works on the way – Fede Álvarez’s new “Alien” film, Noah Hawley’s new “Alien” series, and Amazon Prime Video’s “Blade Runner 2099” series.
In terms of the “Blade Runner” series, Scott says: “It’s all set years on. To me, it circles the idea of Aldous Huxley’s ‘Brave New World'”. As for the two “Alien” projects, it won’t tie into Scott’s Prometheus/Covenant films, with the director confirming: “they’re all new”.
