'Alien 5' script treatment from Walter Hill teases 'dreams' and 'destiny'

Walter Hill’s script treatment for Alien 5 delivers a strange twist on the original movie’s famous tagline, stating that “in space no one can hear you dream”.

SYFY Wire revealed the front page of the treatment, which also bears a quote from author Edgar Allan Poe referring to a “dream within a dream”, suggesting there could be Inception-like trickery at play.

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Hill confirmed the revelation by Sigourney Weaver last week that a treatment exists for the return of Ripley, more than 20 years after the character was last seen in 1997’s Alien: Resurrection.

Weaver stated that Ripley had “done her bit” and “deserves a rest”, but Hill is more excited by the prospect of the iconic hero returning to screens.

He said: “Sigourney, as she has from the very beginning, is being too modest about her proven ability to pull off the idea — which is to tell a story that scares the pants off your date, kicks the ass of a new Xenomorph, and conducts a meditation on both the universe of the Alien franchise and the destiny of the character of Lt. Ellen Ripley.”

Alien 5 is clearly an ongoing project for Hill who shared a version of the script dated March 2020, co-written with David Giler, who was also a producer on the original 1979 film.

It’s unclear what will happen with this script treatment, which seems at odds with the prequel-focused direction Ridley Scott has taken the franchise with Prometheus and Alien: Covenant.

Scott said earlier this year that he believes there’s “a lot of mileage” left in the franchise, but that it will have to “re-evolve” in the wake of Covenant’s lukewarm reception.

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A previous plan for a new Alien sequel directed by District 9 filmmaker Neil Blomkamp was shelved in 2017 in the face of Scott’s re-direction of the franchise.

The director said he felt like his idea was “pretty awesome”, but acknowledged it’s unlikely to ever happen.