Five Alien Nightmares Are Loose on Earth in First “Alien: Earth” Trailer

The first trailer for Fargo creator Noah Hawley’s Alien: Earth has landed, and with it, we finally get a sense of the massive scope and scale of Hawley’s ambitions for his adaptation. Once again, Hawley’s attempting to take a beloved film (or in this case, film franchise) and graft the essential components of its DNA into a deeply satisfying small screen experience, trading in adapting the Coen Brothers’ offbeat and singular sensibility for the grand, gruesome sci-fi horror franchise that Ridley Scott’s  Alien kick-started in 1979.

After a brief, chilling opening set-piece that includes one of the franchise stalwart aliens, the face-hugger, we’re set down on Neverland Research Island, which is, as the title makes plain, based on Earth. The year is 2120, and a research team is about to break new ground where they’re preparing to “help” an ailing young girl become the first person to transition from a human body to a synthetic one. What could go wrong?

We move on to Prodigy City, where a spaceship crash-lands containing something invaluable. As we’ve learned over the course of the Alien franchise, you really don’t want to go snooping around abandoned ships, but a team led by Wendy, by that little girl from Neverland Research Island, now grown (and played by Sydney Chandler), braves the unknown to check out the ship. Again, what could go wrong?

The ship has all the markings of an Alien nightmare waiting to unfold. Splattered blood, cracked and shattered cages, the works. The ship was carrying five different life forms, we learn, “from the darkest corners of the universe.”

What. Could. Go. Wrong?

These five life forms are on the loose, and Alien: Earth will track what happens when Wendy and her team of “hybrids” try to uncover where they are and who’s responsible. The Earth they live on is controlled by five corporations, including Weyland-Yutani, the owners of the ship that spilled its monstrous life forms onto the blue planet. A few of these monsters we’ve met before—the iconic Xenomorph and the face-huggers, of course—but we also get a glimpse of a jellyfish-like creature and, as some folks are speculating, the possibility that Alien: Earth will include a predator. It wouldn’t be the first time the franchises have crossed paths.

Joining Chandler in the cast are a great ensemble, including Timothy Olyphant as Kirsh, Alex Lawther as Hermit, Samuel Blenkin as Boy Kavalier, Babou Ceesay as Morrow, Adrian Edmondson as Atom Eins, and Essie Davis as Dame Sylvia.

Check out the trailer below. Alien: Earth arrives on FX Networks and Hulu on August 12.

Featured image: “Alien: Earth” key art. Courtesy FX Networks.