The Alien franchise depicts a series of deadly encounters, predominantly spanning the 22nd and 24th centuries, between humanity and the Xenomorph; a hostile, endoparasitoid, extraterrestrial species.

The Engineers' other experiments, designed to exterminate the human race through the means of a deadly mutagen, pave the way for the Aliens to rise and populate through the traumatic implantation of larvae in hosts.

Writer Dan O'Bannon, wanting to write a science-fiction action film, collaborated with screenwriter Ronald Shusett on a script, initially titled Star Beast, but eventually changed to Alien.

Fox's president Joe Roth opposed Ripley's removal, and Weaver was offered a $5 million salary and a producer credit to make Alien 3.

Giler, Hill and Larry Ferguson wrote the screenplay, based on a story from an earlier script by Vincent Ward, intended to bring closure to the Alien franchise by killing off Ripley, the principal character.

[10][11] While fans and critics initially did not receive Alien 3 well, and director David Fincher disowned it,[12][13] the film was a worldwide success and piqued Fox's interest in continuing the franchise.

On its way back to Earth, the commercial towing vehicle Nostromo is diverted to a desolate planetoid by a cryptic signal from a derelict alien spacecraft.

A buried pyramid giving off a "heat bloom" attracts a group of explorers led by billionaire and self-taught engineer Charles Bishop Weyland (Lance Henriksen), the original founder and CEO of Weyland Industries, who unknowingly activates an Alien egg production line as a hibernating Alien Queen is awakened within the pyramid.

Set immediately after the events of the previous film, the Predalien hybrid aboard the Predator scout ship, having just separated from the mothership shown in the previous film, has grown to full adult size and sets about killing the Predators aboard the ship, causing it to crash in the small town of Gunnison, Colorado.

He removes evidence of their presence as he moves along using a corrosive blue liquid and uses a laser net to try to contain the creatures, but the Aliens still manage to escape into the town above.

[30] The film's screenplay was initially written by Jack Paglen in 2013, but was subsequently rewritten by Michael Green and Dante Harper, before Scott's collaborator from Gladiator, John Logan, wrote the final version.

Some 30 years before the events of Alien, scientists Elizabeth Shaw and Charlie Holloway discover a star map among the remnants of several ancient Earth cultures.

Accompanied by David 8 and hoping to discover the origins of humanity, they journey aboard the spaceship USCSS Prometheus and arrive on the distant planet LV-223 in the Zeta2 Reticuli system, the same region of space in which the planetoid LV-426 from Alien is found.

Eleven years after the events of Prometheus, the colony ship USCSS Covenant, carrying thousands of colonists and hundreds of human embryos in cryo-stasis, makes its way towards the planet Origae-6.

The crew is awakened by a neutrino blast and intercepts a transmission sent from Shaw, which they decide to trace to an apparently habitable Engineer home world (referred to as Planet 4), devoid of all non-floral life.

Cameron stated that the crossover would "kill the validity of the franchise", and that "it was Frankenstein Meets Werewolf" – like "Universal just taking their assets and starting to play them off against each other."

[53] In June 2020, Brandywine Productions revealed that a screenplay for a new installment in the original series called Alien V, centered around Ripley, had been written by Walter Hill and David Giler.

[54] In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter published in September 2022, Hill confirmed that the proposed alternative sequel involving Weaver would not be moving forward.

[58][59] In September 2020, Scott confirmed that work on the next installment is ongoing, but was undecided with keeping it tied in with the plot set out in Prometheus and Alien: Covenant.

In July 2018, it was reported that 20th Century Fox had joined forces with Tongal to produce short films, intended to coincide with the 40th anniversary of the Alien franchise.

[101][102][103][104] However the brand lived on through Kenner toylines as simply Aliens and in the comics series included with the action figures as well as in the Aliens/Predator Universe trading cards set.

On December 10, 2020, as part of Disney's Investor Day presentation, a new TV series project based on the franchise was announced to be in development for FX on Hulu, with Noah Hawley and Scott being involved (the former as showrunner and the latter as producer).

In the aftermath of the play's popularity and approval, North Bergen Mayor Nick Sacco's non-profit foundation pledged funds for more performances.

[144][145] This is seen as part of a larger trend of technophobia in films prior to the 1990s, with Bishop's role being particularly significant as he redeems himself at the end of Aliens, thus confounding Ripley's expectations.

Dark Horse Comics also published a number of other miniseries crossovers, featuring the Alien species as an enemy pitted against prolific characters from other continuities.

Predator franchise, Mortal Kombat X, and Dead by Daylight, the four films from the original series were adapted into video games, typically multiple times.

[173][174] The second was Alien: Isolation, a survival-horror game by Creative Assembly that follows Ripley's daughter, Amanda, who is stranded aboard an Alien-infested space station.

[182] In 1996, Galoob released the Micro Machines Alien line of miniature toys, but ceased production the following year, due in large to the violent and graphic nature of its packaging art.

[27] Stuntwoman Breanna Watkins, in scenes that were filmed but not used, portrayed a masked Ellen Ripley in one alternate ending of Shane Black's The Predator (2018), and an unmasked adult Rebecca "Newt" Jorden in a second alternate ending, meant to tie the main Predator franchise to the Alien franchise in which the characters first appeared, in a manner separate from the pre-existing Alien vs.

Predator franchise and incorporating the plot element of time travel; Watkins later elaborated that of the two roles portrayed, while she was serving as a stand-in for Ellen Ripley ahead of a failed attempt at a Sigourney Weaver cameo, that she had actually portrayed Newt Jorden in the original ending, and had been in early discussions about potentially reprising the role in a potential Alien vs. Predator-focused sequel to The Predator.