ALIEN: COVENANT Director Sir Ridley Scott Admits To Wishing He'd Helmed BLADE RUNNER 2049 Instead

Prometheus was supposed to reveal the secret origin of the Xenomorphs and, while it pulled back the curtain to some extent, what we found was largely confusing and...well, downright weird. 

Moviegoers largely rolled their eyes at what filmmaker Sir Ridley Scott clearly envisioned as a thought-provoking new approach to the Alien franchise, and he tried getting back to basics with 2017's Alien: Covenant. Unfortunately, that too was underwhelming and prematurely ended Scott's prequel series plans. 

During a recent interview with Empire (via SFFGazette.com), the legendary filmmaker confessed he regrets helming Alien: Covenant instead of Blade Runner 2049, a movie also released in 2017. 

Hailed by many as a masterpiece and the perfect sequel to Blade Runner, it was directed Denis Villeneuve and received a much warmer response than Scott's Alien movie. However, it was scheduling issues which stopped Scott from returning to the other sci-fi franchise which put him on the map. 

"I shouldn’t have had to make that decision," he admits. "But I had to. I should have done 'Blade Runner 2.'"

It would have been special to see Scott reunite with Harrison Ford, but it's hard to picture him delivering a movie as incredible as what Villeneuve dreamed up. Still, the director is going to get the chance to return to his future dystopia in Prime Video's Blade Runner 2099 series. 

As a producer on that, he's set to be heavily involved from a creative standpoint. The show received the green light last September but work on the show has inevitably stalled as a result of the ongoing WGA and SAF-AFTRA strikes. 

Game of Thrones alum Jeremy Podeswa will direct the pilot episode of Blade Runner 2099, while Silka Luisa (Shining Girls) is on board as showrunner and executive producer. Few plot details have been revealed, though it will serve as a follow-up to Blade Runner 2049. 

It's always fun to think about what might have been. Had Scott not made Covenant, there's a chance Neill Blomkamp might have even been able to bring his vision for Alien 5 to the screen...