With Alien Romulus now released worldwide and garnering the third biggest opening weekend of the franchise it would seem that the future of the franchise is assured. Delighting and scaring fans in equal measures and with so many callbacks and Easter eggs fans are enjoying multiple views of the film but what went on behind the scenes of that Alien Romulus surprise character.
********* MAJOR SPOILER AHEAD *********
After the LA premiere director Fede Alvarez was asked about various aspects of the film including several of the plot twists but the big question was about the surprise character re-appearance of the late great Ian Holm as the synthetic Ash look-a-like called Rook (the antithesis of Lance Henriksen’s Rook in ‘Aliens’).
Commenting on the sup[rise character and the use of Ian Holm as the synthetic director Alvarez said, ‘It was unfair that the likeness of Ash was never used again. Lance Henriksen has been used a few times. Michael Fassbender got to do it a few times. So when we started thinking about the likeness of this character with Ridley, it was going to be a torso [and head] that we would build. So it didn’t need to be the likeness of a current working actor, and Ridley was the one who said, “Ash was always the best. He needs to make a comeback.” So we went for it with the permission of the family: his widow and all of his kids. We wanted to make sure everybody was on board with the idea of bringing his likeness back.
Rook is a different character, but I play with your prejudice because fans of the original know that face. There’s also a whole generation [of new viewers] that are going to watch this movie and the character is not going to mean much to them. They’re not going to feel that effect, but for the ones who’ve seen the original, they know that he shouldn’t be trusted. But he does behave in a way that is actually very honest. He’s rarely lying to anybody or scheming or trying to con someone into doing something they don’t want to do. He’s actually pretty straightforward, but that’s the line that was fun to play: “Is he going to be more like Ash, or is going to be more like Bishop?” That’s the beauty of this and how our prejudice against synthetics in the Alien world makes us suspicious right off the bat and not trust him. And Andy goes through the same process, so the whole movie works because of that prejudice. You’re like, “Is Andy going to be Bishop? Is he going to be Ash?” So it’s the same with Andy, and hopefully people will get all that and enjoy the journey of these two synthetics together.
Metaphysic is the company that did a lot of the work on the enhancements to the puppet. We had a puppet that talked, and it was all based on an Ian Holm headcast that we found. It was made for The Lord of the Rings, and that was the only headcast that exists of Ian Holm. So the Legacy [Effects] guys that did the animatronic started there, and then some shots needed more help from CG for the lip sync and the lines. But there are some others that didn’t. There are some shots where you are literally looking straight at the animatronic. So it was a combination of things, and while I don’t know exactly what they do, I am sure it is a combination of CG and the headscan. There might be some deepfake in the eyes because it’s the best when it comes to creating the likeness of the eyes, but it’s a whole bag of tricks from 1970s and 1980s technology to technology from yesterday.
……whether we’ll see another surprise character in future films remains to be seen.
related feature : Ian Holm – OBITUARY
related feature : Alien Romulus director Fede Alvarez talks in full about making the film, practical effects and Ridley Scott
source: deadline
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